Gregor frowned. “I’m disappointed.”
Now he had caught me off guard. “By what?”
“Your answer,” he replied. “Because I believe her, and I think you should, too.”
Another pause in the conversation, which this time I broke. “It is a nice night, isn’t it?”
He nodded. I didn’t mention that the brand of bourbon Gregor had bought was the same that had spilled into my lap, costing me the penis in question. Gregor’s intentions in bringing the gift were good, so what profit was there in trying to make him feel bad about it?
I expected that the bourbon would taste like bad memories; instead, it just tasted like good alcohol. And it was nice to have: Marianne Engel quaintly clung to the idea that morphine and booze were a bad mix, but I suspect Gregor was trying to show me his wild side by allowing me a glass or two.
A few days later, after she had recovered, I asked Marianne Engel why she increased the music’s volume throughout her carving. She reminded me that the gargoyles became louder the longer the process went on, and turning up the stereo was a way to drown out their screams. She explained that when she cut through the excess stone to find the grotesque’s form, the only way to know whether she’d reached the monster’s outline was to actually cut into it. If the grotesque screamed in pain, then Marianne Engel knew that she’d cut deep enough.
I asked whether she wasn’t afraid that she was drowning out important instructions from God. She laughed and assured me that in the entire world, there was not music loud enough to drown out the sounds of His commands.
A major complaint of burn survivors is that only one pressure suit is covered by insurance, despite the fact that these garments cost thousands of dollars and must be worn up to twenty-three hours every single day. During the other hour, the patient is being cleaned, and if the caregiver is already busy washing the patient, how can she or he also be cleaning the pressure suit at the same time? This is why it’s essential to have at least two. “But the cost!” cry the insurance companies as they deny the claim. Furthermore, even with proper care pressure garments last only about three months.
Insurance companies were not a problem for me, as my costs were being covered in full by Marianne Engel. But I had to wonder, briefcase of cash under the skeleton bed or not, how could she afford this? She kept reassuring me that her prominence as a carver had left her amply rewarded and that there was nothing she’d rather spend her money on. I was unsure but even if I tried to argue, what would be my case? That my scars should go untreated?
My pressure suits and mask were finally ready in mid-March. When Sayuri handed them over, I could immediately appreciate all the work that had gone into them. The mask had been sanded down so that it would sit comfortably along the contours of my face. Sayuri even pointed out how the students had paid special attention to where my scars were raised above the skin’s surface, and had prepared the plastic accordingly.
“You’ll need to use this as well.” Sayuri held out a spring-loaded contraption. The way my face had been burned left me particularly susceptible to oral commissures—scar tissue around the corners of my mouth—which, if not treated, would make it difficult for me to eat or speak in the future. After I had properly wedged the retractor into my mouth, I raised the mask to my face. It was to remain in place all the time, except during cleaning and skin care, even while I was sleeping. I asked Marianne Engel how I looked (in the process discovering that the retractor made my already garbled voice sound even worse) and she answered that I looked like a man who was going to live for a long time.
I looked into the mirror. As if the scarred topography of my face were not enough, it was now smashed flat by the clear plastic. The areas that were normally red had turned white under the pressure and the retractor had peeled my mouth outwards in a grotesque grimace. Every imperfection was amplified, and I looked like the bastard child of Hannibal Lecter and the Phantomess of the Opera.
Sayuri assured me that a poor first reaction was normal, because all burn patients—including me, despite being specifically told otherwise—assume that the mask will hide their faces. But it did not. It would not shield me and help me cope; it was a Petri dish that would place my face under the microscope of the world.
Sayuri explained the proper order in which to put on the pressure garments and showed Marianne Engel how to fasten the straps in back. While they fussed with the technicalities, I was left to experience the sensation, which was like slipping into the tight fist of an angry god. It’s only fabric, I told myself. It’s not who I am. It sent shivers down my spine anyway.
IT FEELS GOOD, DOES IT NOT? LIKE YOU ARE BEING BURIED ALIVE. The snake loved to laugh at me. I AM COMING.
I found Marianne Engel waiting for me in the dining room, wearing a kimono of jade silk. It bore an embroidered scene, impeccably stitched, of two lovers under a cherry blossom tree near a carp-filled stream. In the garment’s starry sky, a full moon looked down on the lovers as if it were not only the source of their light, but also the protector of their love.
She asked whether I was ready to eat. I answered that I was. I went out on a limb to guess that Japanese was on the menu.
“So desu ne. How perceptive you are,” she said with a slight bow. The stream on her kimono disappeared into the blue sash across her waist, drawn with an obi bow in back. “I’ve been reading Makura no Sōshi.”
“Yeah, I saw that on your bookshelf. Pillow-something, right?”
“The Pillow Book of Sei Shōnagon. A very famous Japanese text, tenth century, and the first novel ever written. Or so they say, but who knows for sure? I’ve been thinking that I should do something with it. You’d be surprised how many great Japanese books don’t have decent Latin translations.”
“No, I wouldn’t.”
Marianne Engel retreated to the kitchen with short, sharp steps, as she’d even gone so far as to put on geta, traditional wooden slippers. She returned with multihued trays of sushi: slices of white (and orange and silver) fish lay on beds of compressed rice; beady red fish eggs lolled on seaweed beds; and shrimps curled into each other, as if hugging tightly during their final moments on earth. There were inarizushi, cubes of rice wrapped in thin sheets of sweet golden tofu. Gyoza, dumplings made of beef or pork, bathed in zesty black sauce. Yakitori, barbecued strips of chicken and beef, on wooden skewers. There were onigiri, triangles of rice wrapped in seaweed; each, she explained, contained something different, something delicious: plums, fish eggs, chicken, tuna, or shrimp.
We cleaned our hands with o-shibori, steaming napkins, and then she placed her palms together. She said, “Itadakimas!” (a Japanese blessing before eating), before adding her more familiar Latin invocation.
She showed me the proper way to stir my miso soup with chopsticks and demonstrated that ramen noodles must be slurped loudly, because this not only cools them but makes them taste better. While she drank sake, she insisted that I stick with oolong tea; she just wouldn’t give up that silly idea that alcohol and morphine don’t mix. Every time my cup was less than half-full, she refilled it with a slight but respectful bow. When I inserted my chopsticks into my bowl of rice so that they stood straight up like two trees growing out of a snowy hill, she immediately pulled them out. “It’s disrespectful to the dead.”
When the meal finally ended, she rubbed her hands together gleefully. “Tonight I’ll tell you a story about another woman named Sei, although this one wasn’t even born until hundreds of years after the writing of the Pillow Book.”
XVII.
Long ago in old Japan, a girl named Sei was born to a glassblower named Yakichi. At first her father was disappointed that she was not a son, but his disappointment ended the second that he held her. From that moment on he was devoted to her, and she to him.
Yakichi watched with proud eyes as Sei grew from a spirited child into an intelligent young lady. That she was beautiful was beyond question and, in her fine features, Yakichi could see his late wife’s eyelids and cheek
bones. The mother died when Sei was just a child and this made the father and daughter hold each other all the tighter.
On the verge of adulthood, Sei decided to follow in her father’s footsteps. Yakichi felt great joy in her decision and his happiness was now complete: his knowledge wouldn’t die with him, after all. Sei adopted the title of Glassblower’s Apprentice and showed remarkable potential and quick progress. She had a delicate touch and, more important, she could envision the object before it was blown. Technique can always be learned, Yakichi knew, but Sei was born with the gift of vision. She could see beauty where others saw only empty air.
Sei studied well under her father’s tutelage, learning just how hot to stoke the fire and just how forcefully to blow. She learned to read the bright glow of the heated glass. She worked diligently to develop her understanding of breath; for she knew that with breath she could create a world. She imagined herself breathing life into the glass and, with every week that passed, Sei came closer to realizing the loveliness of the objects that she could picture in her imagination.
Yakichi began to bring Sei to the local weekend market, where he maintained a stand to sell their wares. Men started to come in swarms. They claimed they wanted to look at the glasswork but really, of course, they came to look at the captivating young woman. “How like glass you yourself are,” one old man couldn’t help but say, scuttling away like a crab across a beach when he realized that the words had actually slipped aloud from his claws.
Soon, their table was selling out before lunchtime. Almost all the pieces were purchased by men—even as gifts for their own wives—simply because they wanted to own a container of Sei’s breath.
Yakichi was pleased. Business was stronger than ever, finances were good, and Sei was becoming a fine glassblower. But for all their success, Yakichi wished a husband for his daughter. Though he was a protective father, he wanted her to experience all that life had to offer and, he thought, a “beneficial” marriage would better their family line.
So Yakichi took stock of the men who frequented the stand. There were artisans, landowners, fishermen and farmers, soldiers and samurai. Certainly, he mused with a smile, there would be no shortage of suitors. After all, Sei had beauty, skill, health, a pleasing personality, and loyalty. She would be a fine wife and good mother, anyone could see that, and it would be easy to arrange an advantageous marriage.
When Yakichi approached his daughter to suggest this, she was quite shocked. “I know this is the tradition,” she cried, “but I never thought that you would ask it of me. I will marry for love, and love alone.”
The force of his daughter’s conviction surprised Yakichi, for she had never before gone against his wishes. Marriage was for improving one’s family position, the old man thought; marriage was not something to be undertaken for love. And yet Sei insisted and, because Yakichi adored her, he acquiesced. Still he worried, because there was no one in his daughter’s heart.
But, as is often the case in these matters, Sei soon met a young man, and she did fall quite completely in love with him. At first, Yakichi was displeased because Sei had chosen Heisaku, a simple farm boy with neither money nor prospects. However, the boy had a pure, good heart. So, maybe…
Yakichi remembered his own departed wife. Although theirs had been an arranged marriage, they had been lucky and Sei had been conceived in love. Buoyed by the memory of his own good fortune, Yakichi decided that he could hope for nothing less for his daughter. He gave his blessings to Sei and Heisaku.
It was about this time that one of Sei’s more inspired pieces—a glass flower—was given to a daimyo, a local feudal lord, by one of his servants. This daimyo was despised and feared for his brutal temper. He had no time for glass flowers and angrily asked the meaning of the trivial thing.
The servant, always looking for special favor, said, “I thought you might like to know, my lord, that this glass flower was created by the most beautiful girl in all the land.” The daimyo’s ears pricked up and the servant quickly added, “And she is unmarried.” The servant, you see, had recently overheard the daimyo talking about his desire to start producing children, saying that only the most beautiful and skilled woman would suffice.
The daimyo quickly decided on a plan of action. He sent out a message that he had in mind a commission for a great glass statue, and that he’d heard Sei and her father were the most skilled glassblowers in all of Japan. For this reason, the message claimed, he was summoning them.
The daimyo had no more interest in commissioning a glass statue than he had in commissioning a ladder to the moon. He was interested in owning land and castles and cattle and rice fields. And a beautiful woman. Yes, that interested him very much. But Sei and Yakichi knew nothing of this, and were only excited. They imagined that this might be the first of many noble commissions—in short, the realization of their dreams. So the father and daughter loaded up their little cart and set off for the daimyo’s castle.
They were admitted into the main court, where the daimyo was waiting, and his eyebrows went up at the sight of Sei. His gaze followed her around the room; to Sei, it felt like cockroaches upon her skin. She could tell immediately that this was not a good man, as he sat there turning one of her glass flowers over and over in his grubby fingers. But this was not about her feelings, she told herself, and all she could do was give the best presentation possible.
Sei and her father showed the daimyo their finest works and described them in detail. She showed crystal cranes and glass-bubble blowfish with translucent skin. She displayed tinted sake glasses and heavy goblets. She exhibited plates and toy horses and wind chimes that produced pure notes in the slightest breeze. When father and daughter were finished, a rainbow of glass lay before the daimyo.
The daimyo was impressed, sure enough, but by the artist, not the art. Sei was the most enticing girl that he’d ever seen. He clapped as Sei and Yakichi bowed deeply. “I have made my decision,” he announced.
The father and daughter held their breath, which was highly uncommon for glassblowers. They waited hopefully but the words were not at all what they expected. As he fingered the glass flower, the daimyo said, “Sei is fit to be my wife and bear my children. She should be overjoyed with her good fortune.”
Sei knew that this was a very powerful man and that to oppose him would be very difficult. Nonetheless, she could not stop herself. “But I love another.”
Yakichi immediately begged pardon for his daughter’s abruptness. When pressed, however, he did confirm the truth of her statement. The daimyo was livid and the glass flower snapped in the involuntary fist that he made. Who could compete with a lord? He demanded to know who this “other” was.
Sei spoke up. “He’s only a farm boy, but my love for him is true.”
The daimyo asked, “What is his name?”
Sei feared that if she told, Heisaku would be hunted down and killed. She looked at her feet for a moment and then lifted her head to meet the daimyo’s gaze. “The name of a simple farm boy should be of no consequence to a lord.”
The daimyo was shocked by the girl’s audacity. Then he laughed, too loudly, too spitefully. “A farm boy? You dare to choose a farm boy over me? You dare to withhold his name?” The daimyo looked down at his hand and saw that he was bleeding where the broken glass flower had cut him. The blood calmed him because it reminded him who he was.
“You will not marry this farm boy,” he stated with certainty, “and you should thank me now for the life that I have saved you from. You will marry me.”
Sei spoke with equal certainty. “I will not marry you. I will marry the farm boy or I will marry no one.”
The daimyo’s counterargument was swift and merciless. “Very well. Marry, then. Marry this farm boy and I will execute your father. But marry me and your father shall live.”
Sei stood dumbstruck, for never could she have imagined herself in such a position. Never could she have imagined a man such as this. The daimyo continued, “In one week, you will
return to this court and speak a single word. ‘Yes’ means you will marry me and your father will live. ‘No’ means you refuse me and your father will die. A single word. Think well, Sei.” With this, the daimyo threw the shards of flower at her feet and swept out of the courtyard.
Father and daughter were released from the castle to ponder their answer. There was nowhere they could hide; they could not just pack up and move, as they would be found wherever they went. Yakichi pleaded with Sei to say no. He was an old man with only a few more years to live, he argued, but she had her entire life ahead of her. The father was willing to die so that the daughter was not condemned to a lifetime of unhappiness.
Sei wouldn’t hear of this. She refused to make a decision that would kill her father. And yet, she knew the unhappy waste that her life would become with the brutal daimyo.
That night, Sei was unable to sleep. She tossed in her bed, considering the problem from all sides, but there seemed to be no way out. Then, shortly before dawn, inspiration came and she knew what she must do. When Yakichi awoke, he found his daughter gone and, in her place, a note stating that she would be back in a week to face the daimyo.
First, Sei went to her farm boy and explained the situation. She told Heisaku that he was her one true love but that she would never be able to speak to him again. The last words she said to him were “If you listen to the wind very carefully, you’ll be able to hear me whisper my love for you.” Then she disappeared.
Days passed, and Yakichi began to think that his daughter must have run away. Though it saddened him that he would be unable to say goodbye, he was reassured that she would live. When a week had gone by, the father appeared before the daimyo to say that Sei had disappeared and that he was pleased to forfeit his life in her stead.
The daimyo was about to order the father’s execution when two women, clothed in simple robes and with shaved heads, entered the courtyard. It took even Yakichi a moment to realize that the younger woman was Sei. He broke into tears now that Sei had reappeared to marry this awful man.