1st 5 Pages December Workshop - Letai Rev 1

Name: Jean Letai
Genre: Upper Middle Grade Fiction
Title: Shinto Secret


I push my shoulders back and stick my chin up a couple inches, hoping I look like a young lady of the world instead of a jittery kid stuck at this stupid airport all alone. The time has already hit mid-afternoon here in Tokyo, but it’s still the middle of the night back home in America. The Hour of the Ox, Mom calls that darkness after midnight, when the Japanese believe spirits are most likely to appear.

It must have been the Hour of the Ox last week when Grandpa Ojiisan showed up, reaching out to me with that hand as wrinkled as a bird’s claw. Ghost or not, I knew who he was – even with his scraggly white hair dripping wet, his long wispy mustache drooping against his creased, wind-burnt cheeks, his nose protruding more than it should, and his feet and legs evaporating right in front of me. He struck me as so beautiful then, in some eerie kind of way.

Really not sure why though. He was more like a monster – only partly there, torn between this world and some other place. Those narrow dark eyes creeped me out more than his vanishing limbs. They were so piercing, boring into me…

Then there was that gobbledy-gook he croaked out in his hoarse whisper, so unlike his usual voice. "Key-what-soo-kitane," it sounded like. His mouth was open trying to say more when crash! There went my iPod clattering to the floor. I like to listen to it as I fall asleep, but I wish I hadn’t that night. It scared the breath out of me, and poor Grandpa Ojiisan disappeared altogether. The very next morning I found out he had died.

I wonder how you spell that thing he said. Maybe I can find it in my brand new Japanese-English dictionary. I pull the dictionary out of my backpack’s zippered pocket and look under K. I’m curious, plus it gives me something to do while I’m waiting in this bustling airport terminal looking foolish. Ke, Kee, Ki… Ki-wot-su-ke-tene: Take care, or be careful. Hmmm, that’s got to be it. But I’ve never heard it before. Can you dream words you’ve never heard before?

Sounds like a right-brainer thing to do, and I’m a leftie – the most left-brained member of the whole family, at least according to an Internet quiz the five of us took. I stick to logic and rational thought. Usually. Yet how rational is it that I just flew halfway around the world to this country whose language I don’t speak, to spend the summer with a woman I hardly know?

I try hard to paste a pleasant smile on my face as person after person greets loved ones in this waiting area. I slip my dictionary back into its zippered pocket, glad to have something to do for a brief moment, then clutch the handle of my rolling duffel bag with both hands. I can’t help shifting my weight from foot to foot. I probably look like some kind of idiot.

Digital cameras flash on all sides of me. Konnichiwas and giggles, high-pitched with excitement, fill the air. My Japanese grandmother is supposed to be right here waiting for me, so delighted to see me and eager to hear about my journey. Where is she?

Wishing I could teleport back home, I cast my eyes down at the shiny white floor, gleaming from the fluorescent lights high above. Dozens of business shoes, heels and sandals stride across my line of vision – black, brown and burgundy click-clacking past in a chaotic tap dance.

Strange syllables ring out through the loudspeaker – official-sounding inflections in the Japanese language I cannot comprehend. Biting my lower lip, I look up at the airport signs and giant video monitors all displaying Japanese kanji characters, symbols completely unlike my American alphabet. For some reason I had assumed there would be English subtitles, some way for me to understand where to go. More importantly, I thought Grandmother would be leading the way.

‘You know what a strong-willed lady she is, and how close the two of them were,’ I can hear Mom’s words from last week echoing in my head. ‘There’s no telling what she’ll do if she decides she doesn’t want to keep on living with him gone.’ The words I was never meant to hear had drifted up to my bedroom where I lay trying to sleep. ‘Keiko would give her a reason to move forward, keep her from thinking there’s any other option.’ I had listened helplessly as Mom pressed Dad to send me away.

Now I’m listening helplessly for someone – anyone – to call my name, or thrust out a sign, or give any indication that I am welcome, expected, anxiously anticipated even. I search the mob of Asian faces surrounding me. One face must be looking for me. I had pictured our eyes meeting with instant recognition. I would bow in the Japanese way of greeting, as Mom taught me, and Grandmother would bow back, and then we could embrace. I could sure use a hug after that long thirteen-hour flight. And a restroom.

I know I should feel sorry for my grandmother. I should be going out of my way to help her all I can through this difficult time, especially if Mom is right about her not even wanting to keep living with Grandpa gone. It’s kind of sweet, the thought of loving someone so much you don’t want to go forward without them. But I’m sure Grandpa would want her to go on.

To me, Mom said just that Grandmother needs company to get past her grief, and that I’m the only one of the family with enough maturity but no real responsibilities tying me down. So it’s not enough as the oldest kid I always have to babysit Aki and Juni (which I really don’t mind – we eat pizza and watch TV, not such a bad way to spend a night). But now I’ve got to babysit my grandmother too?

Mom said the poor woman has been dreaming her entire life of climbing Mt. Fuji, the most sacred of all mountains in Japan, the ultimate pilgrimage for followers of Shinto – Japan’s ancient religion. Grandpa Ojiisan had finally arranged to climb the sacred mountain with Grandmother this summer, but now I must go in his place.

It’s only for the summer. My friends think it’s very cool, flying solo across the Pacific Ocean when I’m just 14, visiting a continent as far away as Asia. But I definitely did not want to come.

“She’s your grandmother,” Mom had said sternly when I objected to this whole idea. “She’s in your blood. And Japan is in your blood, too.”

Japan is certainly in my name, Keiko. Even though Dad is American, and Mom and Dad had already settled snug as bugs in small-town New England, Mom insisted on giving us three kids Japanese first names. “With a last name like Jones, you need an interesting first name,” she figured.

Still, I can hardly pronounce Obaasan, the Japanese for Grandmother. I don’t know how I’m supposed to comfort her. I’ve never visited Japan before and will probably be more trouble than help. I can’t even use my cell phone here, since apparently it operates on a different frequency from Japanese phones.

Why didn’t Mom come herself? She can’t take that much time off work, or away from Aki and Juni, but she doesn’t mind not seeing me for six weeks?