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By Root 1143 0

my mother’s car as totaled—but he didn’t sound overprotective to me, just concerned. It was my cousin Zoe who sounded a little out of control, but then she always did. She had been born when I was nearly fourteen, and she was so much younger than the rest of us that it sometimes seemed she’d grown up in a completely different family. Her older brother, Joey, was about my age, heir to the family name and the family fortunes, and we’d never gotten along. But Zoe, who was fifteen now and adored the Internet, found my life amazing and exotic, and she wrote frequently to relay dramatic events from high school, even though I seldom wrote back.

It was nearly dawn. I got up and went to the window. Outside, the cobblestones were brightening to gray, wooden houses emerging from the night. Across the street, a subdued rattling of pots jarred me from my thoughts, followed by the sound of water running. Mrs. Fujimoro came out to sweep her walk. I stepped out onto the patio, nodding good morning. Her broom made such firm strokes—swish, swish, swish—that until she paused I didn’t realize the earth had begun to rumble again. It was ordinary at first, a large wave hitting the shore, a truck passing down the street—but no. I met Mrs. Fujimoro’s gaze. She caught my hand as the shaking extended, began to swell.

Leaves quivered and water trembled in a puddle. A tiny crack appeared below the Fujimoros’ kitchen window, zigzagging to the foundation. I held her hand, staying very still, thinking of my mother’s accident, of the moment she realized she could no more stop the car from smashing into her than she could alter the progress of the moon.

The tremor stopped. A child’s questioning voice floated from the house. Mrs. Fujimoro took a deep breath, stepped away from me, and bowed. She picked up her broom. Her expression, so recently unmasked, was already distant again. I stood alone on the worn cobblestones.

“You turned off your gas?” she asked.

“Oh, yes!” I assured her. “Yes, I turned off the gas!” We had this exchange often; it was one of my few phrases of perfect Japanese.

Yoshi was in the doorway by the time I turned, his hair tousled and an old T-shirt pulled on over his running shorts. He had a kind face, and he gave a slight bow to Mrs. Fujimoro, who bowed in turn and spoke to him in rapid Japanese. Her husband had been a schoolmate of Yoshi’s father, and we rented the house from them. On the rare occasions when Yoshi’s parents visited from London—his mother is British—they stayed in another flat the Fujimoros owned around the corner.

“What were you talking about?” I asked when Yoshi finally bowed again to Mrs. Fujimoro and stepped back inside. He’d grown up bilingual and moved with fluid ease between languages, something I both admired and envied.

“Oh, she was telling me about the Great Kanto Earthquake in the twenties. Some of her family died in it, and she thinks that’s why she gets so afraid, even in the little tremors. She’s terrified of fires. And she’s sorry if she startled you by taking your hand.”

“It’s all right,” I said, following Yoshi to the kitchen, picking up my empty cup on the way. “The earthquakes scare me, too. I don’t know how you can be so calm.”

“Well, they either stop or they don’t. There’s not much you can do, is there? Besides, look,” he added, gesturing to the paper, which of course I couldn’t read. “Front page. It says an island is forming underwater, and then everything will improve. This is just a release of pressure.”

“Great. Very reassuring.” I watched him add water to the tea, his movements easy, practiced. “Yoshi, my mother was in an accident,” I said.

He looked up.

“What happened? Is she okay?”

“A car accident. Not serious, I don’t think. Or serious, but she’s fine anyway. It depends on whose story you read.”

“Ah. That’s really too bad. You’ll go see her?”

I didn’t answer immediately. Did he want me to go? Would that be a relief? “I don’t think so,” I said, finally. “She says she’s okay. Besides, I need to find a job.”

Yoshi fixed me with the kind expression that had once drawn me to him