Later she would remember the unfamiliar words repeated over and over by the adults all around her, Pearl Harbor and torpedo and casualties—but in the confusion inside the church, all Lucy could think about was that some unknown disaster had taken place and she was here, daydreaming, thinking selfish thoughts while her parents were over a mile away by themselves, her father ill and her mother barely able to take care of either of them. It was the first time Lucy understood that it would fall to her to help them if something bad had happened, the first time she realized that in some ways, her childhood was already far behind her.
* * *
Somehow, in the confusion following the news, Lucy ended up walking home alone. She imagined the Kogas realizing that she was missing, and feeling terrible about it—“How could we let that poor girl out of our sight?”—but even that was small comfort. She had a sense of foreboding, and though her shiny shoes pinched her toes, smashing them together, she hurried, almost running, her breath ragged in her lungs.
When she turned down Clement Street and saw the ambulance in front of her house, she was horrified but not surprised. She’d known from the moment the strangers burst into the church that tragedy had come for her—that no matter what other cyclones of disaster had swept the world that morning, one was bearing down directly on Lucy. Everything that led up to this day had been a portent: her mother’s moods, the children’s cruelty, the glassy look in her father’s eyes—disaster.
Two men emerged from her front door as she ran toward her house. Between them they carried a stretcher bearing a figure covered with a blanket. Behind them, a woman came out onto the porch, holding the door—Aiko Narita, her mother’s best friend.
Lucy ran to the stretcher and threw herself upon it. Her father’s shoe jutted out underneath the blanket. If she could just get to him quickly enough, before they took him to the ambulance, there was a chance she could bring him back. If she touched his face, he might feel her hands and choose not to go. If she called his name, he might hear her, and understand that he couldn’t leave them behind, not like this.
The two men didn’t see her coming, and they were startled. One of them said a bad word. Lucy’s fingers barely brushed the blanket when she was seized from behind and held in strong arms. She fought as hard as she could, but Auntie Aiko held her more tightly, and the men carried her father to the back of the ambulance, where the doors stood wide to receive them.
“No, no, no, Lucy,” Aiko’s familiar voice crooned in her ear. Lucy kicked as hard as she could, connecting with Aiko’s shin; she tried to bite Aiko’s arm but couldn’t quite reach. She heard her own voice screaming, couldn’t get enough air. “It’s going to be all right,” Aiko gasped, struggling to contain her. “It’s going to be all right.”
Auntie Aiko was a liar. Lucy knew that she wanted to help, but everything was wrong and Aiko wouldn’t let go, and she saw her chance slipping away as the doors to the ambulance closed and after a moment it started slowly down the street. Aiko tried to carry her back up the steps into the house, but Lucy twisted savagely and almost managed to slip away. Aiko caught the hem of her coat and dragged her back. The coat’s buttons popped off and went rolling down the sidewalk. One went over the curb, through the grate, and disappeared into the blackness below the street.
One more loss, and finally Lucy gave up and allowed herself to be dragged, limp in Aiko’s arms. The button had been etched with the design of an anchor. They would never find another to match. The button would disappear in the muck and rotting leaves in the sewer, as the ambulance carrying her father’s body was disappearing out of view.
5
The doctor had given her mother something to help her calm down, which seemed to make her mostly sleep. Aiko had moved into the house and slept in Lucy’s parents’ bed. Lucy could hear her during the night, getting up to go to the bathroom or to get a glass of water. She missed the sound of her father’s snoring. She missed everything about her father.
The funeral would take place tomorrow. Mrs. Koga had taken her