You would know by her languid airs that she
had all the time and money in the world, well. Not so much of either, anymore.
Grown up in Tokyo, daughter to a wealthy
merchant father and an heiress mother, Keiko had never know hunger, nor desire,
nor anything that moved her to want. Living a perfect sheltered existence
through childhood, attending an exclusive playschool at the age of six and
graduating from a ladies’ university at nineteen, the world awaited her with cradling
arms. Beckoning her so close to their hearts to become human.
Her looks couldn't be bought, only
cultivated like a true pearl, through the harsh revolving grit and grind of a
careful, possessive shell.
In her formative years she felt no stress,
hands flocked around her to take care of that. Keiko knew how to dress with
understated glamour, not an eyelash out of place, lips the shade of roses that
flowered and whithered with each season.
Men would tap her on the shoulder as she
swanked down Ginza Bouleavrd, as she kept friends in lockets who’d grab any
hot-blooded male’s attention: Miss Arashi being one, a JAL air stewardess being
another. The 1960’s. Her hair, her make-up, her wider than usual almond eyes that
sloped off in to a distinguished smile.
‘Are you free to have tea with me?’
‘May I take you for
a dance?’
‘Would
you and your friend escort us to a private member’s club?’
She never had to cook a meal for herself,
never. Always a new man vying for her attentions. Youth, money, beauty, song,
gourmet, dance, evokes the memories of an old lady.
Seventy-six is old by any standard, and
yet, as if it were yesterday the melody of the American band and the sequined
nightgown of the maitre’d float by, leading you coaxingly, deferentially away to
a table.
Handsome face, aquiline bridge, light green
eyes, a pilot from Egypt with the manners of a prince. ‘I thought, I would
never be so happy again.’
Married at twenty-one to a man, a nuclear scientist
of all things, who had won her heart with sweet devil talk. Her simple softness
seduced by his slick tongue, it was all a complicated dance and she felt lied
to. He died at forty-six leaving her a home that only accrued escalating taxes
with age.
But by the sea, everything so green and
turquoise blue, it never got cold so the fruit always grew so plump. The spiders
were hideous and hairy beasts, butterflies with wingspans she’d never believe.
Fruit flies the size of horse flies.
The very tanned surfers, with sculpted
bodies would ride the waves each morning, forgetting the storms and Keiko liked
to imagine mustering that kind of resolve one day. To approach relentless crashing
with forethought and courage, mixed with a thrill of the fun.
Those two years of freedom, working as an
elevator girl at the Department Store had finished her. She had been too
attractive to not be taken off the shelf, wrapped in one of those sharp-cornered
bags strangled in frilly ribbon.
She had never bought a cigarette in her
life, yet had always been offered foreign silk cuts out of silk pockets,
handkerchief, necktie, studs.
Wondering whether the fish danced with the
surge of the wave or got swallowed whole in to a vortex –
Keiko alone liked to watch the setting sun,
rise, then set again.
It was called the Land of the Rising Sun,
perhaps this was the reason why, purely for her to amount to being at this
windowsill.
That was her routine, never lonely looking
out to shore.
She would never be sure of herself again in
her life.
