Incident

(This is a post I wrote sometime ago. Enjoy or don't enjoy.)

I have Friday afternoons to myself. So far its either been a time to clean my place or catch a ferry to the mainland for drinking and hanging out. But this one Friday, the third after arrival, I went out walking.

I walked all over the island: the lily-field (sans lilies, so just "field") and the rocky cliffs there, the western beaches and tide pools, which I walked through against my better judgement; a false step meant complete lasceration of my feet and legs. At the southern beaches I swam in the ocean for the first time and enjoyed a grape slushee.

On my way home, I passed the home of a friend on the island, and she invited me in for a drink. I accepted, not wanting to insult or commit some little social atrocity. Her daughter was watching TV, and soon Aladdin was playing in the background.

Disney characters are everywhere; you'd think Disney himself had a hand in writing their constitution.

I asked for a water, but soon the water was gone and there was an Orion beer in front of me.

"Do you like to drink?" She said."Sure." I didn't tell her I don't drink a lot. That "don't want to insult" mentality again.

"Our impression of Americans. Drink all the time. All day."

"Well, some of them. But they're the minority. On the job," I crossed my arms, the "no" gesture.

I finished my beer and she was on her second when she brought out the wine. I drank slowly; I had no wish to be drunk in front of her or her daughter, who I have occasionally in class. We just chatted, she showed me the ashes of her husband's grandfathers who died in WWII and I tried my damnedest to be a good guest and ask questions.

Aladdin was putting the moves on Jasmine when her husband came in.We introduced ourselves and he sat down on the tatami with a beer.

(misete age yokagayaku sekai)

We were chatting amiably enough, enjoying ourselves. Sushi appeared, we ate. The day was cooling down, and cold drinks and the rotating fan helped. I had another glass of wine while the husband and wife downed another beer or two. Like those at my welcome party a week ago, these people liked to drink. And my glass was never empty.

"Dozo," any quick Japanese will say if they see your drink vanishing. And you'll do a little bow as your glass fills and say, of course, "Domo." That said, I'm careful now to drink as slow as I possibly can lest I drink too much.

I fear my loss of self-control.

(suteki naatarashii sekai)

We had cigarettes about the time a guest arrived and sat down, another friend of the wife, a young Japanese man only a year older than me with that particular Japanese cockiness that doesn't seem threatening, just outgoing, a sun-ray. He beamed.

I'm a social smoker, meaning if someone will offer, I'm there. Sometimes it will be months between cigarettes, sometimes a few weeks. In the last year, I marked time between one and another with a death.

The wife would translate for me, but often we would just be talking ourselves as the husband and the guest conversed. I began to feel awkward as I realized either the wife couldn't hold her drink or she didn't know what was appropriate to say in English conversation.

"I'm so bored here. I've lived on the island for 14 years. So boring."

"No, I would never divorce him. I love him, but if we did, I would take my daughter and go. She's mine."

"She's our only one. My husband, he has no seed for more."

I nodded. If I have one talent it's one that allows me to go with the flow with minimal interruption. I nod, smile, offer sympathies and empathize. Minnesota nice, you might say. And it served me well. At least until the shouting started.

The daughter had popped in Finding Nemo, and the husband started to argue with his wife about her constantly watching the film. Over and over again she would watch it, and it didn't seem to be a good thing to do when guests were present.

He may or may not have liked me casting glances at the television. I'm a sucker for Disney movies, especially Pixar, and I couldn't help but look.At first it was just that murmuring arguing. Not loud, but insistent, and the wife would often stop and translate. I would catch words, eddies in the waves, indistinct and confusing. The other guest took this in stride, so I tried to follow his example.

I snapped up a piece of sushi and drank a little wine, but it was fast losing any appeal. The guest and I exchanged a look as our hosts continued. The daughter's eyes were darting between the onscreen fish and her bickering parents.

Then they were louder, almost yelling. The daughter got up and sat next to her mother, clutching her arm. The husband remained cross-legged on the floor, wine glass in hand the pet parakeet on his shoulder, murmuring. It was the wife who was shouting.And then it faded, fast and unexpected. We sat picking at our food, sipping wine, and exchanging words. The daughter still clutched her mother's arm.

Another guest arrived and the arguing renewed. He paused in the doorway but came in after. He was smiling before he entered, but as he came around and sat on the sofa I saw it was gone.

Then the wife was on her feet, moving toward her floor-bound husband. She hit him, once, twice, three, maybe four times. The daughter was up, screaming "Okaasan! Okaasan!" The first guest moved; this had happened before and he went to intervene.

They separated. The husband was on his feet, the wife pacing around him. The daughter was near the television, her hands clutched under her chin. There was a flow of Japanese and they were grappling with eachother again ("OKAASAN!"). The guest moved, separated them.

The wife kept moving toward the cabinet where the urns of ashes were kept, and before any of us could move to stop her, there was ash in the air and broken urn on the tatami. The ash went soaring into the fan and shot through the air. There was a piece (bone, oh my god it's bone) in my eye.

Five minutes later, guest #2 and I were out the door, the husband and wife offering apologies and us accepting.The first guest stayed behind, picking up urn shards.