name is Kaz Katsumoto,” he said.
The boys in the room all began to talk at once.
“But you can call me,” he said as he looked directly at the boys, “Mr. Katsumoto.” He reached into his pocket and took out a small piece of chalk. Then he turned and wrote his name on the board. Several of the boys continued to murmur in excitement.
“Good morning, class,” he said for a second time, when he finished writing.
“Good morning, Mr. Katsumoto,” came the murmured reply.
“Is that the best you can do?” Mr. Katsumoto said in mock surprise. “I heard more noise that that walking into the room.”
The boys at the back grinned. “Good morning, Mr. Katsumoto!” they yelled.
“Not bad,” he responded, “but not good enough to cheer on a baseball team. Try again.”
Michiko and Kiko looked at each other in surprise. This was the first teacher that asked them to be loud. Most expected them to be quiet.
“Good morning, class,” he said to them for a third time and cupped his ear.
“Good morning, Mr. Katsumoto!” the entire class thundered.
“The first task of the day,” Mr. Katsumoto began, “will be to determine our timetable.” He opened the drawer of the desk and removed a small stack of paper. “But first I need to know your names.” He walked to the back of the room and handed some paper to each person at the end of the row. As they passed the paper forward, Mr. Katsumoto said, “Match the paper perfectly corner to corner and then fold. Write your name below the fold and place it in front of you.”
He waited as the children did as told. Then he walked up and down each of the rows reading each card out loud. He stopped at Kiko. She had not only folded the paper in half, she made a small fold on the front, creating a trough for her pencil “You like origami, Kiko?” Mr. Katsumoto asked.
Kiko blushed and nodded.
“Me too,” he said. Then he asked the entire class, “Is anyone missing from class today?”
A girl at the front put up her hand. “Tamiko is not here,” she informed the teacher. “Her mother had a baby last night and she won’t be in school for a few days.”
Mr. Katsumoto nodded in understanding. “Please make a card for her,” he directed Kiko, handing her a piece of paper. “Even though she is absent, she is still part of our class.”
Michiko liked the way this new teacher thought. When the tall, gawky girl named Tamiko returned, she would be pleased.
The new teacher stood in front of the blackboard, tossing the piece of chalk up and down in his hand. “Now,” he announced, “we will create our timetable.” He looked at them all and asked, “What do you want to learn?”
This question took everyone by surprise.
Kiko’s hand shot up. “Our subjects should be English, mathematics, and social studies,” she informed him with confidence.
He wrote the list on the blackboard then stood back and waited.
“I hope we can have art lessons,” Michiko volunteered.
The teacher added them to the list. “Is there anything else?”
No one else spoke.
“There is one thing missing,” Mr. Katsumoto remarked looking up and down the list. “We need the one subject necessary to one’s mental alertness that takes a lot of daily practice.”
The whole class groaned. What could this awful subject be?
He put the chalk to the board and paused. “I expect each and every one of my students to excel in this subject.” He wrote the letters B-A-S-E, then paused and wrote B-A-L-L.
A cheer went up from the class.
“This way,” Mr. Katsumoto informed them, pulling a familiar white ball from his pocket. “We will learn to be a team.” He tossed the ball from hand to hand. “And we will save all our noise, energy, and excitement for the field. Is that understood?”
It was as if the new teacher had waved an invisible wand. All the students sat straight up, folded their hands on top of their desks, and looked straight ahead.
“How many of you are bilingual?” Mr. Katsumoto asked.
Kiko put up her hand. “I speak both English and Japanese.”
Understanding what the strange word meant, several other children put up their hands. Michiko did not put hers up. She understood fragments of her grandfather’s language, but she couldn’t speak it with confidence.
“You know,” Mr. Katsumoto said with a frown, “Japanese is not to be used at school.”
“Mr. Katsumoto,” Michiko told everyone at dinner, “says baseball teaches teamwork.”
“Mr. Katsumoto?” her father said in surprise. “His first name couldn’t be Kaz?”
Michiko nodded, her mouth too full of rice to speak.
“Did you hear that, Geechan?” Sam exclaimed. “Kaz Katsumoto is here!”
Geechan put down his chopsticks. “Asahi Katsumoto?” He put his dry spotted hands together and extended his arms, he swung them back then forward, then he cupped his eyes with his hand and followed an imaginary home run.
Chapter Five
SOYA SAUCE
After a day of sewing, helping with customers, and managing Hiro, Michiko’s mother flopped into the wicker chair. A present from Mrs. Morrison, it groaned whenever anyone sat. Her mother’s face was lined and her eyes puffy.
“Do you want me to make dinner?” asked Michiko.
Her mother nodded with gratitude.
Michiko measured the rice carefully. She washed it in a big bowl of water, rubbing the grains gently. She drained it and repeated. When the water ran clear she put it on to boil. That much she knew how to do. But they couldn’t just eat rice. She opened the door and stared at the single lump of brown waxy paper in the icebox. Rice and bacon would have to do.
“Yoo-hoo,” a woman’s voice called out from the bottom of the staircase.
Michiko ran to open the apartment door for Mrs. Morrison. A yellow straw hat brimming with daisies sat askew on her cloud of carrot-coloured curls. The woman looked up and smiled. Her cheeks were pink from exertion. Behind her gold-rimmed spectacles, small blue eyes peeked out of a fleshy face. She put her dimpled hand on the frame of the door when she reached it. Her bosom heaved. The effort to get up the stairs took all of her breath.
“Is your mother here?” she asked blinking behind her spectacles. “If not I’ll have to wait for her. I can’t do those stairs more than once a day,” she puffed.
