Chapter 22: “Experiencing War” (Part 4)

Masaya sat alone in the living room, drinking whiskey.

His wife had already gone upstairs to bed.

The television was off. As he watched the ice floating in his glass, images from earlier that day seemed to flicker across its surface.

(The truth is... the karate story wasn’t what first came to mind.)

He simply hadn’t wanted to tell Miyauchi what he had really been thinking about.

For some reason, whenever he found himself confronted with betrayal... with someone changing their heart... this particular memory always came back to him.

Masaya took a long drink of whiskey.

(But still... why did Grandfather tell me that story?)

He had been thirteen years old then, in his first year of junior high school.

Whenever he closed his eyes, he could still see his grandfather’s expression as he spoke.

It was impossible to describe.

He looked like a man who wanted to cry but couldn’t.

Like someone who was suffering, yet somehow smiling.

Yes...

There was simply no other way to describe that expression.

“Your grandfather went to war when he was twenty.”

That was how Masaya remembered him beginning the story.

But whether his grandfather had truly intended to tell him something important, something he wanted him to understand, Masaya had never known.

“...Your grandfather can’t drink alcohol. Not a drop.

“But in the army, an officer’s orders were absolute.

‘Go on, Ishikawa. Have a drink.’

“The officer said that to me.

“He was in a good mood that day. I suppose he wanted to reward me for my work. Something like that.

“That officer had always taken a particular liking to me. He treated me differently from the others.”

He paused.

“...It was war, you see.

“We held our rifles and fired from the trenches. Sometimes bullets passed right in front of us.

“Sometimes the men beside us died.”

“Died?”

“Of course they died. It was war.

“The brave ones died first.

“If you raised your head out of the trench to aim and fire, you had a better chance of hitting the enemy.

“Your grandfather never raised his head.

“I just stuck my rifle out and fired.”

“Was that okay?”

“That officer would come up behind me and kick me in the backside.

‘How the hell are you supposed to hit anything if you don’t even look where you’re shooting?!’

“I was afraid of the bullets, and I was afraid of the officer.

“And the strangest thing was this... that officer would walk around behind us, kicking the soldiers in the backside, and somehow he never got hit by a bullet.”

“...Can that really happen?”

“It was strange. Very strange...”

His grandfather paused again.

“...That day, I suppose we must have won some kind of victory. We soldiers didn’t really know.

“But the officer called me into his room and told me to drink.”

“The story you were talking about before.”

Grandfather nodded.

“Your grandfather couldn’t drink.

“Not a drop.

“So I told him, ‘Sir, I can’t drink.’

“And then he took the saber hanging on the wall.

‘You’re saying you can’t drink MY SAKE?!’

“And he pulled it from its scabbard...”

“Really?”

“That’s what makes it so difficult.

“Because it really happened.

“Your grandfather was terrified. I grabbed the glass of sake on the table, drank it all in one gulp... and apparently collapsed on the spot and lost consciousness.”

“Really?”

“It’s all true.

“The next day, that officer came and apologized to me.

“In those days, an officer apologizing to a subordinate was unheard of...”

“...Was that officer actually a good person?”

“A GOOD person?

“That man?”

His grandfather gave a faint smile.

“To me, he looked like a demon.”

He was silent for a moment.

“Even now, I haven’t forgotten.

“I could talk forever about it, but there aren’t many good stories.

“Eventually, as you know, the day Japan lost the war drew closer.

“And life became harder and harder for men like your grandfather.”

“Japan lost...

That must have been frustrating.”

“...Yes.”

His grandfather looked away.

“Yes, I suppose so.

“But if the war had gone on just a little longer... your grandfather would have died.”

“Really?”

“Yes.

“Without a doubt, I would have died.”

He fell silent again.

“But when I think about the friends who did die...

“Frustrating, you say...

“Perhaps it was.

“I’ve never really thought about it before...”

His grandfather made a small movement, as though he were about to rise from his chair.

Then he slowly settled back against the chair again.

His eyes were looking somewhere far, far away.

(To be continued)