How to Be an American Housewife - Margaret Dilloway [92]
I read the salary. Housing was included. It wouldn’t be so bad. I allowed myself to imagine this new life, packing up this house, flying back to Japan, training, working.
I took the stone out of my pocket and tossed it on the desk. It clattered and turned like a top, black with purple undertones I had not seen before. I spun it again. I couldn’t uproot Helena to Japan. I put my hand over the stone, stopping its momentum.
“Mom?” Helena’s voice near my head came low. “What are you doing?”
“Nothing.” I made to close the computer window, but she put her hand over mine.
“Japan? Are you serious?”
“Of course not. It’s silly. I was only curious.”
“ ‘Teaching in Japan.’ ” Helena was silent, staring at me.
“I know.” I shook my head. “I’m just restless.” I smiled at her, touched her chin. “I’ll get over it. Don’t worry, honey.”
“No, Mom.” Helena wedged a chair in beside me. “It’s not silly at all. I think”—she took the mouse—“it’s one of the greatest ideas you’ve ever had.”
“But finding you a school—you don’t know Japanese—there are so many variables. No. It’s too hard.” I watched her face.
There was no hesitation on it. “I would be learning a new language and culture. Think of the college essay I could write!” Helena grinned. “Besides, you could talk to Yasuo. Do some fact-finding about schools. There’s nothing wrong with that, is there?”
“I guess not.” I could rent out this house for more than the mortgage payment. It would be two years, tops. I would see if I really liked teaching. My hands got cold, my cheeks hot.
Helena pointed to the screen. “Let’s see what the housing is like.”
She scrolled down until an ad caught my eye. “Stop here!” I said. The rent was fifteen hundred a month, exactly the housing allowance’s limit. For Rent, it read. One solitary house of yearning, in hills of Uwajima. Three bedrooms, one bathroom.
The hairs on my neck stood up. I rubbed my hands together and kept my voice calm. “It’ll be gone by the time we’re ready to rent it.”
“It won’t be. We can make it work.” Helena turned to me, grinning hugely. She put her face right next to mine. “Promise me you’ll do this. Promise me you’ll try.”
I nodded, then smiled back. “I will.” I would. For the first time in forever, I spun around in my office chair, laughing like a little kid at a carnival ride. Then Helena sat on my lap and we spun together.
EPILOGUE
The Solitary House of Yearning
If you must return home to live in Japan, expect to find re-assimilation very difficult. Children are resilient, but you have become accustomed to the soft American lifestyle.
Remember in Japan not to act too “American” to avoid offense to other Japanese. Your children should behave as Japanese children and not American, as well.
If this book teaches you one thing, let it teach you this. Do not protest against life’s strains, but let them unfold and carry you through wherever they may.
—from the chapter “Turning American,”
How to Be an American Housewife
Sue
I stuck my head out the back door, a light mist of rain hitting my face. “Time to come in.”
Taro-chan looked up from his mud pie. His face and body were completely covered in the stuff. I groaned. “Hai.” Taro-chan ran full throttle at me.
Sumiko blocked him. “Clean up first.” She held him in front of her like a wet puppy. We marched him into the bathroom, plopped him under the shower to rinse off the muck, then carried him into the ofuro for a good scrubbing.
It had only been a couple of months since I arrived, but my “solitary house of yearning” already felt more like home than my old house. Of course, by the time I had gotten here the original “solitary house” had been rented, but the name had stuck. This home, only a few roads over from Sumiko’s, was cozy and small, set in a copse of trees, as picturesque as a woodblock print. It had a sloping roof and shoji-screen