The Electrical Field Read Online Free PDF Page B

of the yard, I spied the gaudy yellow and red stripes of a candy-bar wrapper in the grass. I was reaching to thread my arm under the slats and grasp the wrapper between my fingers when I heard a rustle, and breath sipped up, little by little. Instinctively I glanced up atPapa’s window, where, on good days in the past, he sometimes struggled to sit, but he wasn’t there. It was then I found her with me in my garden, twisting the flower off one of my hybrid teas with her stubby little hands. There were two more by her feet, the pink heads already wilting. “Stop that!” I snapped. I was furious but instantly felt sheepish; she was just a child, I told myself, she didn’t know any better. She let my rose droop on its half-broken stalk and stood up. She held her hands behind her, as if offering herself prisoner. On the pale yellow blouse she wore, I noticed two round shadows where her breasts were starting, like spreading stains. I was more than a smidgen taller than her, but I could tell from her long neck, thin as my rose stems, that she would grow.
    We knew each other. We’d been seeing one another for years now on opposite sides of the field. I’d seen her with her mother, a short woman with thick, muscular calves and dark skin. I’d see Keiko tug Sachi along on the street, gripping tight as she struggled to break free. The child fixed on me as I took my morning walk through the field, among the electrical towers that Keiko warned her away from. Wondering what I was to her.
    I took Keiko Nakamura for Okinawan because of her swarthy complexion, which stayed through winter. She was like me, nisei, that was obvious. Perhaps it was that look of toughness, being the second generation in Canada but the first born here, I don’t know. The wind first carried her name to me when the husband, Tom, called from his car in the driveway, half getting out:
Keiko, nan-to you wa
, complaining about something she hadn’t done his way as she stood holding thescreen door half open in the morning.
Kay, come on in for a coffee sometime, won’t you?
from that big-knuckled woman next door. Neither Tom nor Keiko knew what to do with the child, unruly, wilful child, I saw that; even I knew better.
    “So?” I said to Sachi as she stood in my garden that day. I didn’t know how I meant the word, in English or in Japanese, or if she understood it could mean something in both. She stared, then thrust out her arms and her hands holding my broken blossoms.
    “Sorry,” she blurted, not sounding sorry at all. Like a rebellious child being told to give her teacher flowers, though they were from my own garden. “Miss Saito,” she added, knowing I’d be surprised, even flattered she knew my name. As I took the flower-tops from her I noticed small cuts on the backs of her hands. They were too long to be pricks from thorns; some were fresh. I winced. It had started back then, the small tortures in the kitchen at night while her parents slept.
    “Itai? Does it hurt?” I asked, eyeing her hands.
    She shook her head. She was still clutching one flower that had stayed furled tight, an eye shut against the light. “They were gonna die anyway,” she declared. “When the cold comes back at night.” Without blinking, watching me with each word: “Then they shrivel into old babies.”
    Inside she sat on the chesterfield as I dabbed iodine on her cuts. She didn’t flinch. After a moment she sat up. “What’s that?” It took me a moment to realize she meant Papa. It was the low buzz I carried in my head all day, even when I left the house. Even in my sleep. I barely thought twice.
    “Nothing,” I said. After a moment I added: “Just the fan upstairs.” She paused, listening closely, glanced at me, then kicked her legs against the couch.
    “There. No need for bandages,” I said. “Let the air heal them. That’s the best thing.” I tightened the cap on the iodine bottle and pushed it aside. She slipped her hands out of mine and sat