The Matsumoto Estate
April,
What is nothing? If you really think about it, can you imagine nothingness? Not black, white, or any other void, but complete non-existence? If you are one of the rare ones, if you can grasp that slippery idea, then maybe you will begin to understand what it was like…
He was still not sure how it had happened. Even when his sister got in trouble, David had been able to avoid fighting. Bleeding from at least five different injuries was a wholly new experience, and with the broken bones in his hand, he was having an absurdly bad day at the end of an incomprehensibly bad month.
From the front seat of the black Mercedes, Yukiko passed another critical eye over him as he pulled at his uniform collar. His Japanese clothes never fit him quite right. With a slam that rocked the whole car, Masao Matsumoto closed the driver’s door. As usual, his host father was impeccably dressed in a traditional kimono and the sleek sedan came to life with a quiet purr.
Within seconds, the car was tearing along a maintenance road through the forest behind Nakano Junior High. Masao bit off a string of quick Japanese as they raced through the blind turns of the darkening forest road.
“Masao would like to know what happened,” Yukiko said in perfect English. His host mother sat as serenely and composed as ever in her brightly colored clothing despite the high speed driving. Unlike Masao, her kimono was bright and colorful, with an array of light flowers that enhanced her delicate features. To either side of him, his host siblings Rie and Takumi slid into him with each turn. He was sure he looked strange plopped down between the stunning pair. David was bruised, bloody, and stuffed between two diminutive thirteen-year-olds that could have been on the cover of any sports magazine.
“Uh,” David said. Masao turned around to look at David, which was extremely frightening given the trees rushing by. In a desperate attempt to get Masao’s eyes back on the road, David spoke quickly. “I ran into a couple of third years.”
Rie leaned over him, unleashing a quick stream of Japanese at Takumi, who merely shrugged in reply. Yukiko smiled, encouraging David to continue. Luckily, he knew the twins would have no idea what he was saying. Their grasp of English, even after a year of studying it, was about as good as his nonexistent Japanese.
David told her about the fight. He had caused the third years’ team to lose, again. They had not picked him, instead, their teacher Mr. Shima, had assigned him to the team as a kind of handicap. David had done his job a little too well. His chronic lack of coordination was something he had almost considered a blessing back in the Phoenix desert, where the hot summers made running any distance painful. In Japan though, his apathy towards sports had become a liability.
They had found him behind the gym after school. The three boys were older than David’s thirteen years, and full of hard-coiled muscle. He had smiled weakly and looked for the twins, but somehow they had been separated on the way to meet up after school. He was sure it was no accident.
The anger and hate on the oldest boy’s face had been easy enough for him to understand. He tried to bolt, but they surrounded him in a close circle almost instantly. Then the pushing began.
As usual, he did not retaliate as they bounced him from bully to bully. He had tried to stay calm, to take it. He hoped that if he did not give them a reaction, they would soon grow bored and leave him alone.
In a lull, the oldest boy, Koji, caught David’s eye. He stood there for a minute as two of his friends closed in behind. When Koji smiled, it was a smile he had seen before in Arizona. It reminded him of a boy who liked to pull the tails off lizards. Koji held up the picture that David had brought in for a report on his family. The one picture he had of his whole family, still together. Though David could not understand his words, Koji’s eyes were clear enough.
It was like a switch, they had found the one thing that could set him off. The chance Koji could ruin the one picture he had of his mother released a torrent of fire with him. He broke. The weeks of frustration, loneliness, and rage blurred in his mind as his body reacted without thought. Screaming, David had lashed out, his hand striking Koji square in the chin.
Pain had washed through his hand and arm as he fell to his knees in agony. Koji, unfazed, took the opportunity to throw a few quick punches of his own before kicking him the rest of the way to the ground. The boys had laughed, then rolled him down the hill to the forest’s edge and left him there, curled in a ball around his broken hand.
Takumi and Rie had found him a few minutes later, still crumpled on the ground, crying like some elementary student. The shame was almost worse than the pain. He wanted to disappear. Rie helped him up, and the pity in her deep almond eyes had been almost more unbearable than his hand. Takumi had stood apart. It was a first to see his host brother so calm at school, and then David saw his eyes. A new and dangerous element in them made David shudder.
It took a while for Masao and Yukiko to get there after Takumi’s call. They had driven in through the forest. David was not sure if they had done it to save him the embarrassment of having to walk through the school, or if they simply wanted to avoid creating an incident. Whatever the reason, he was glad.
David stopped talking and the car skidded out of the forest onto a much larger main road. Yukiko had already set his hand. From her serene and formal dress, you would never know she had been a nurse. David tried to remember his own mother, but his memories of her had faded into a distant shadow. He was a toddler in the picture. Jessica was a newborn. The images of her faded even as he tried to grasp at them. In the front, Yukiko began translating David’s story into Japanese.
David recognized the road as the main street between Nakano and Himeji. Not far from Japan’s inland sea, the Matsumotos lived on an estate just outside of Nakano town, which was in a valley surrounded by tall mountains. It reminded David of a smaller, greener version of home.
He had left his sister Jessica, and his father Dr. Matthews, nearly a month before on a whim to study in Japan. A last minute opening in the exchange program had had him hustling to prepare in time to leave for the beginning of the Japanese school year in April. A month ago, David had driven down the road with excitement. Now he felt defeated, not just by the boys, but by Japan. He had tried, but nothing he did had helped him worm his way into any group. Most of his classmates had written him off when they discovered he only snowboarded, poorly. At the Estate, the Matsumotos had been welcoming and friendly, but only Yukiko spoke English and the rest of them kept to themselves.
Masao turned the car onto a narrow, but well maintained dirt road. They had arrived at the Estate. Without the spring sun, the trees were old and foreboding. The forest seemed more of a barrier to David than the ancient stone wall that came into view when the car skidded around the long drive’s final curve. Sliding along the seat brought David back to the present. He was in an alien land and could barely say hello.
The Estate’s wall rose like a dark cliff. Rough in design and old with lichen, it was still elegant in its own way. A huge gate stood in the center of the road. Wide enough to let two cars through simultaneously, it was welcoming and imposing at the same time. Two huge wooden doors covered the road, while stone and wood supported the overhanging roof above. Tiered eaves with elegant curves and dark clay tiles bespoke their ancient purpose to repel rain and arrows alike.
As the car approached the gate, Masao finally slowed. Although he had seen it many times over the last month, he was still struck by the view as the heavy doors parted.
Beyond the gate, the main house rose before them, a single level with a tiled roof. As with the outside gate, the Matsumotos’ main house followed traditional Japanese design. With both wood and modern materials, it was a seamless combination of functionality and art.
Behind the House was the Estate’s jewel, a Japanese garden complete with brook, pond, and stone bridge. Each miniature