Braving it in the New World
Walking away
Yoshi watched out the window as his cousin walked April off through the village to show her the old mill where their family had been processing rice for centuries. He found himself frowning as Kiyoshi took April’s hand to help her over a very narrow foot bridge.
Kiyoshi had done well for himself. He’d modernized the village’s traditional way of farming so that they were bringing in a much larger harvest. Everyone, especially his cousin, was wealthier that Yoshi ever remembered. Kiyoshi had the largest house, the only car, and the nicest clothes. He was also single, since his wife had died of cancer nearly ten years ago.
Yoshi had watched his cousin and April getting closer for the last two weeks and he had to admit that it bothered him... a lot. April’s face lit up when she saw Kiyoshi and her cheeks flushed as red as her hair when he complimented her on how much better her Japanese was getting. April was cute when she tried to pronounce the longer harder words that Kiyoshi taught her. When a word was too hard, she’d say it over and over again and different people from the village would laugh and repeat it slowly and clearly for her to copy until she got it right.
Yoshi sighed heavily as he remembered all the quiet evenings he’d shared with April. He missed sipping tea with her and teaching her some basic Japanese. She’d helped him with his English since the day she met him... April had spent the best years of her life in a sewer with a giant rat... Sometimes Yoshi missed being Splinter. He was fifty-four... not a young man, but definitely passed his prime. He’d spent almost half of his life as Splinter and it was hard to readjust.... he’d been spending his days meditating in the ruins of the old dojo that someone - probably Shredder - had burned to the ground.
“What troubles you, nephew?” his old aunt asked from her chair in the corner. She rose very stiffly and hobbled over to stand by him. Her back was hunched from decades of working in the rice fields, but her eyes and mind were still bright. “Ah, I see,” she said, as she gazed off to where April and her son, Kiyoshi were walking.
“I feel a fool, Auntie,” Yoshi said. “April has been my closest friend for many years and I know that she would not object if I approached her. Sometimes I think on it, but then I remember Shen and my heart freezes.”
His aunt nodded and turned to the stove to make some tea. “I understand, nephew,” she said. “Did you know that I was married twice? Kiyoshi’s father was my second husband.”
“No,” Yoshi said, moving to help his aunt. He’d lived in the States for too long to think of cooking as women’s work. “He was killed in the war, then?”
“Yes,” the old woman sighed. She shooed her nephew away and finished making the tea herself. She didn’t like men meddling in her kitchen. “He was in Hiroshima when the bomb fell. We had grown up together, much like you and Shen. He was very dear to me.”
“I am sorry, Auntie,” Yoshi said. “I did not know.”
“He was a ninja like you and Kiyoshi,” she said. “He was one of the best, but he liked those evil things that you always refused to do. He left the dojo because he didn’t agree with the old masters when they decided to stop teaching the most wicked moves... the ones that are meant to cause suffering.”
“But yet you loved him,” Yoshi said.
“Yes I did,” his aunt nodded. She turned and got two cups down from the cupboard. “And because I loved once, I knew I was able to love again. It is no betrayal to Shen to love again,” she said. “It is a betrayal to her only if you refuse to love at all.”
Yoshi went to stand by the window again. April and Kiyoshi had disappeared over the hill.