Connor recognized Greg Chalmers from Japan. “We were both in Abeno ward when I was working for Nobuo.”
“Only you had a beard then,” Greg recalled. He snapped his fingers. “Yeah, that’s right. It must have been Elly you were asking about that one time.”
“Connor asked about me? What one time?”
“When was it? That’s right—you saw a pair of sister missionaries in Nakamozu and were wondering who they were.”
So? Elly’s expression said to Connor.
“Your last name threw me. I was expecting a Japanese name.” Melanie interrupted, “Are you two officially engaged or what?” Elly grinned.
“You’re engaged?” Melanie practically shrieked.
“Set a date?” Greg asked more calmly.
Elly looked at Connor and said, “The thirtieth.”
Melanie choked on her Diet Coke. “Of August?” Melanie said to Greg,
“They’re both pah.” She made the plosive motion with her fingers next to her right ear. “I’m definitely going to stick around and see what happens now.” She mouthed again to her roommate, the thirtieth? Elly nodded. Melanie said aloud: “What are you going to do, elope?”
“There are a few strings I think I can pull.”
“Ah,” said Melanie.
The two men looked at each other and shrugged.
Later that night, after the pizza and video, Connor and Elly wandered across the baseball diamond. They stopped at second base and exchanged kisses that tasted of tomato paste and popcorn. Music from a car stereo reverberated across the park.
Elly asked, “Do you know how to dance?”
“I took social dance,” Connor said. “My senior year, a girl in my family home evening group wanted to audit the class, and a girl can’t audit social dance unless she brings a guy along. So now I can foxtrot to anything.” He swung her around by the waist. “Slow-slow, quick-quick. That’s all you have to remember.”
“Easier if you just pick me up and carry me.”
So he did that, and set her down on the grass. They watched the moon rise over the mountains. Elly said, “I just realized something. Obon ends on the fifteenth too. Don’t they light the Y on the mountain for graduation? We can pretend it’s the okuribi bonfire.”
“There do seem to be a few of our ancestors’ spirits wandering about. Perhaps it’s time to send them on their way.”
“The right intentions but a questionable grasp of the means? It was a different world back when they were our age.”
“Does that mean the ends do or do not justify the means?”
“I haven’t any complaints about the ends.” Elly nestled into the crook of his arm.
A playful shriek echoed across the park. Cold water pelted down. “The sprinklers!” They leapt to their feet and hurried to the safety of the parking lot. Jets of water arched across the dark lawn, throwing off a halo of rising mist that sparkled icy white in the glare of the distant streetlights.
Elly asked, “Can I come over tomorrow?”
“Not tonight?”
“I’m too frazzled. And feeling a bit too randy for my own good. Not a healthy combination.”
“Afraid I might take advantage?”
She draped her arms around his neck and smiled coquettishly. “You’re too honorable a fiancé to try something like that. And I’d be disappointed if you didn’t. Our great-grands really knew what they were doing. Though I keep thinking there’s something else they were after.”
“You mean getting married?”
“Something more than getting married.”
When she got back, Melanie and Greg were sitting on the couch talking. He didn’t have his arm around her yet. But seemed inclined in that direction. Elly knew better than to barge in, so she went upstairs to her room and lay on her bed.
We haven’t gotten to the ends. She was chock full of cryptic wisdom these days. There was so much more they had to do. She closed her eyes and saw again the image of an old man and a young boy and a car. There was so much more she had to do. She was determined to marry Connor. She was convinced that they belonged together forever, and that absolutely no good would follow from their being apart. She was so desperately in love with him, yet she still could not say that she loved him.
What is love? she asked herself. From a long-forgotten AP English class, the lines from Twelfth Night crept into her thoughts:
’tis not hereafter;
Present mirth hath present laughter; What's to come is still unsure.
In delay there lies no plenty;
Then come kiss me, sweet and twenty; Youth’s a stuff will not endure.
Tears welled up in her eyes. Patience, she recalled her mother lecturing her so many times. Elly smiled despite all her fears.
The next morning Connor met her at the back door of the basement apartment with a drawer under his arm. Classical music was playing in the background. Elly recognized the music only as an opera.
She looked at the drawer. “What’s that?”
“It’s from the bureau. The bottom panel is split.”
He led her through the doorway adjacent to the stairs, past a weight bench, the water heater and the furnace. Her attention was drawn to the kitchen alcove. A pair of naked hundred-watt bulbs glowed in the ceiling fixture. A microwave, a refrigerator, a set of cupboards over a counter and sink.
“No stove?”
“Never ran the wiring and Aunt Wanda thought a gas stove was too much of a risk with her previous tenants. Always use the kitchen upstairs. The washer and dryer are down at the other end by the stairs.” He indicated the spackled drywall. “I’m getting around to all this.” He set the drawer on top of the bureau. “A little beat up, but it’s in pretty good condition.”
Elly nodded.
“There’s a mirror that goes with it.” He rooted around in the closet beneath the staircase. “Here it is.” He held up the dusty, walnut-framed mirror.”
Elly nodded again.
“The question is where to put it. The bureau, I mean. I was thinking against the wall next to the window. But facing east or north?”
She followed him into the bedroom. “This way,” she said, pointing toward herself.
“Linens and towels are here.” He indicated the closet next to the bathroom door.
Elly turned around and took a step. Her foot struck something hard and heavy. She glanced down at the corner of the bed and lifted the edge of the comforter. The frame was elevated on four cinderblocks, which in turn sat on a plywood pad. She couldn’t see what kept the whole thing from rocking over.
Connor explained, “I put two-by-six blocks under the mattress frame, and dropped quarter-inch lag bolts through the angle irons into the cinderblocks.”
Elly bit her lower lip and scrunched up her cheeks.
What?” Connor asked.
“Nothing.” But she was beginning to giggle.
Connor looked hurt. “It’s a quite efficient design.”
Elly burst out laughing. “It is, it is. I’m sorry.” She managed a moment of self-control. “It’s all very practical.”
“Yes, it is.” He pouted.
She kissed him to make up for her teasing. “What’s the opera?”
“Mozart. The Marriage of Figaro.” He led her into the living room, hit stop and then play. “It has one of the greatest overtures of all time.” She noted how his right hand moved as if conducting the orchestra through the exuberant, opening bars. “During the overture, Figaro is measuring his apartment for a new bed.”
“How appropriate.” Her eyes sparkled.
“I thought so too.” He extracted a booklet from the CD case and turned to the libretto. “Here it is.”
That was indeed how the opera started: Figaro marking out a space for the bed the Count had so generously provided.
Elly nodded. “I think you should fix the drawer, Danna-san.”
“That I will, Okusan.”