LENA
“Good luck,” Amos said when he dropped me off at the train station a few weeks later. He looked around and when he saw no one was paying attention, he snuck in a kiss.
“Are you sure you don’t want to come rub elbows with one of Hollywood’s A-listers?”
He shrugged. “Positive. Now, if you had a meeting with one of my favorite manga artists, like Takehiko Inoue, you wouldn’t have gotten rid of me so easily.”
“You’re a nerd.”
“And you love me for it.”
“I do.”
“I’ll see you later. Come back with a signed contract, or whatever it is they do in this case.”
“I’m sure it’s too early for that. We’re just in talks right now.”
“Okay, either way. Text me when you’re getting back and I’ll come meet you.”
“I can find my way home, you know.”
“Yes, but you can also allow me to be chivalrous if I feel like it.”
“Okay.” I hadn’t yet gotten used to this new dynamic between us.
I gave him one last glance as he stood there with me at the entrance of the subway, tall and handsome, hands in his pockets.
Schoolgirls passing by gawked at him; he stood out like a sore thumb.
I knew I did, too, but I noticed it more when people looked at him.
“You better go. All the girls are staring at you.”
He breathed out a laugh. “Too bad, ’cause I only have eyes for you.”
Warmth spread through my chest, radiating throughout my body, making me all tingly and happy.
I couldn’t remember if I had ever known such happiness.
“I’ll call you when I’m done.” I leaned in closer and said, “I would very much like to kiss you, but I guess I’ll wait until I get home.”
“Hmmm,” he replied, looking down at me through his thick eyelashes.
I said goodbye and jumped on the next train headed to Shinjuku.
Amira Farouk was staying at a hotel close to the station, and I was supposed to meet her there.
I had been downplaying it with Amos, but I was nervous.
It was a huge deal, and it could be even bigger than drawing Ishikawa’s manga.
Switch was my comic, my creation from start to finish.
I wasn’t sure if it would be a good fit for a movie, but I would love seeing it on TV.
I sent Amira a text when I got to the bar of her hotel—we had been communicating via text and e-mail for the last few weeks—and she came down soon after.
Her infectious smile was the first thing that drew me in, and her stunning beauty was the second. Her honey-blonde hair fell in short waves against tan skin. Her eyes were a bright green, and her features were the perfect mix of both of her parents. Her mother was an all-American lady from LA, while her father had emigrated to the US from Pakistan. Both of her parents had worked in Hollywood their entire life. I had seen her in movies, and it seemed so surreal that she was right there in front of me.
“Thank you so much for meeting me, Lena.”
“Well, I believe I should be the one saying that. I’m humbled you like my little comic enough to even think about turning it into a show.”
“I absolutely loved it! I came across your comic book after reading a headline about you and another artist coming here to help out with Ishikawa’s last manga.”
“I take it you’re a big comic book and manga fan?”
“Well, I don’t know a whole lot, but I read Ishikawa’s comics—which I absolutely love, by the way—and I was really shocked when I heard that we were finally going to get an ending. By the way, I don’t guess you could give me any spoilers?”
I shook my head and let out a nervous laugh.
“I can’t, or they’d have my head on a silver platter.”
“I’ll just have to wait for when they publish the English translation of the manga, then.”
“It shouldn’t be long. My boss, Marty Fredrickson—whom you’ve spoken to—has acquired the rights for the manga in the US. He’s planning to have it released shortly after the Japanese release.”
“Ohhh, that’s exciting. I can’t wait. So, Lena, let me tell you about what I have in mind for Switch.”
Amira and I talked for a while about the possibility of turning my comic into a series. She said that given the subject matter, she was looking at Netflix, Hulu, or HBO as the most suitable channels.
Her schedule was packed for the remainder of the year, but she was determined to take up a couple of producing roles. She told me that while she considered herself a bit of an exception in a Hollywood that was not up with the times when it came to diversity, often she still didn’t get roles because she wasn’t white enough.
“If there’s anything I’ve learned from actresses who have taken up producing and directing, it’s that I have to take matters into my own hands. I firmly believe Switch could be a great show, especially with such a poignant subject, and while I don’t think I would be suited for the main role, I’m definitely looking at one of the supporting ones.”
Amira and I left the bar and went on a walk around town.
She put on a baseball cap and oversized sunglasses to blend in, but even with that camouflage, it was obvious she wasn’t a local.
With her eyes concealed by big, fancy sunglasses, you couldn’t recognize who she was, but she looked like a model visiting the city in between photo shoots.
She wanted to go to a cat café, so I pulled up my phone and searched for the one I’d heard Akane talk about. I asked her if she wanted to take a taxi, but she asked for the “full Tokyo experience,” so we took the Chuo line and stopped in Musashino.
The cat café wasn’t hard to find.
As soon as we stepped in, I knew I’d made the right decision taking Amira there.
The décor of the place was nothing like other cat cafés I had seen. It was still a café for all intents and purposes, but the inside had a cute, human-sized “cat house” that looked like it had come out of one of Miyazaki’s anime. The ceiling was painted green, and it looked like we were sitting inside a forest. Cats roamed around, some of them letting the patrons hold and pet them.
I knew not all cats were equally friendly or cared to be touched by humans, and I wondered what the selection process was for one of these places.
Do the cats have to pass a sociability test?
When Amira took her sunglasses off, I noticed the other customers trying to figure out if they knew her from somewhere, but everyone was discreet and left us alone.
Our waitress had a certain wide-eyed look when she took our order and I was certain she recognized Amira, but she didn’t say anything.
We had lunch and tried the café’s peculiar hot dog wrapped in a cluster of onion rings. Amira asked questions about me and my career, and she wanted to know how I’d gotten my start.
“Now you’re working together with another designer from the US, am I wrong?”
“No, you’re right. Amos and I—I mean, my coworker’s name is Amos St. Clair.”
A huge smile stretched across her face.
“Are you two…together?”
I gave her an embarrassed eye-roll and sighed.
“We are.”
“How is it, working and being together? I’ve never fallen in love with someone I worked with or one of my costars. Does it get complicated?”
“Well, I wouldn’t really know. It’s fairly new, but I have to say we get along surprisingly well when it comes to work. I’m the one who’s doing the main drawings, and he’s helping more with the background. With him being a man, I expected him to want to take over, but he hasn’t done that. He really respects my work,” I said reflectively.
I’d never thought about it much, but he’d never tried to get the upper hand during our whole stay, had never tried to do more or take credit, even in the beginning.
That was a rare quality. My heart swelled in my chest, realizing that made him even more special in my eyes.
“That’s great, Lena. He sounds like a great guy.”
“Well, he does drive me crazy most of the time—”
“Don’t they all?” she replied, letting out a cheerful, melodious laugh. It was totally infectious, one that made you want to laugh along regardless of whether something was funny or not.
“I swear, that’s what my sister used to say about her boyfriend, Hugh. Sam is a makeup artist. She and Hugh met on the set of the show they were working on. They are impossibly cute together. As a matter of fact, I’m supposed to meet them in Shibuya in a little bit. He’s an actor, and he’s visiting Japan to promote the show.”
“Oh. Which show is it?”
“It only premiered a couple of months ago. Hugh plays a dragon slayer. It’s a bit Game of Throne-ish. It’s called Abarath, maybe you’ve heard of it?”
“Unfortunately, I have not. My last few months have been busy and complicated.”
“I bet. Shall we go?”
Amira and I got on the train again. It was fun seeing her react to every little thing around us and to see things from her perspective.
We looked for Amira’s sister, Sam, and her actor boyfriend by the Hachiko statue in the square outside Shibuya’s station, but they weren’t there yet.
Amira and I kept chatting until I caught a glimpse of a curvy, exotic brunette and her tall beau. Her sister waved at us, and when she got closer she said, “I’m so sorry. We got lost in Shinjuku’s station again.”
“Did you get lost in the station or in your bed?” Amira teased her sister.
“Mira!” Sam eyed me cautiously while her boyfriend shook his head, holding back a smile. Amira gave her sister a dismissive wave.
“Oh, don’t worry. Lena is good people. She’s not going to run to a tabloid ruining your little getaway! Lena, this is my sister, Sam, and her boyfriend, Hugh MacLeod, star of Abarath. Sam, Hugh, this is Lena Andrews, comic book artist extraordinaire and creator of Switch. Hopefully I’ve impressed her enough for her to decide to sell me the rights for her comic.”
I laughed at her words, because I was the one feeling lucky.
“Hi, Lena. It’s very nice to meet you. Mira has been talking about your comic book for weeks. I need to start reading it, too.”
“Thank you. It’s nice to meet you, Sam.”
As I looked to Sam’s boyfriend, I noticed he was built like one of those actors in action movies. Tall and muscular, he had wide shoulders and biceps that stretched the fabric of his tee. His hair was brown and wavy, and he had the bluest eyes I’d ever seen.
He gave me a firm shake of his hand and a charming Hollywood smile before wrapping an arm around his girlfriend. I almost wanted to tell them about limiting their PDA in public, but I didn’t want to come across as an obnoxious know-it-all.
“Are you sure you don’t want to come with us?” Amira asked.
“I would love to, but I have a lot of work to do. We have a pretty tight schedule to complete the next two volumes, and sometimes things don’t go completely smoothly. We tend to get lost in translation from time to time. We’re trying to stay true to the creator’s vision, and it’s not always so straightforward.”
“All right, Lena. Maybe I’ll see you again stateside, what do you say?”
“Definitely.” I stretched my hand out to her, but she pulled me in for a hug.
“Thank you for meeting me.”
“Pleasure was all mine. It was nice meeting both of you,” I said to Sam and Hugh as they waved back. “Enjoy your time here. Tokyo is a fantastic place.”
I was pensive on the way back home, still a bit star-struck. I started walking back toward the house then I realized I hadn’t checked in with Amos.
Me: We ended up in Shibuya. I’m just walking back home. No need to come meet me at the station.
Amos: Why do you make it so hard for me to be chivalrous?
Me: I’ll let you buy me a drink tonight. Does that sound chivalrous enough for you? Do you think we can get away?
Amos: Probably. As long as you tell Rika everything about your meeting with Amira Farouk. She’s dying to know every little detail.
Me: I never would have guessed. I’m almost there. I’ll see you shortly.
AMOS
That night, as we went out for drinks, I could sense something was different with Lena. There was a different light in her eyes.
She was even more beautiful and vibrant than usual.
It was as if she had suddenly shed the veil of sadness that too often clouded her eyes.
“May I propose a toast?” she asked.
“A toast? To what? If this is about work, I think it’s premature. We’re far from done. I’m not usually superstitious, but in this case…”
“No, I meant a toast to you.”
I breathed out a laugh, surprised.
Lena gave me a sheepish smile. She looked terribly cute when she did that.
“Yes, to you. I was awfully stubborn when we started working on our fanfiction, and I was upset when you decided to take it to Marty. Now you know how personal this project is for me, and at the time I wasn’t ready to share it with everyone. I was doing it for my own sake…for my best friend. I thought it wouldn’t be received well.”
“You’re right, it was risky, but I think it worked out well, after all,” I said, pointing at the two of us. She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear and smiled, her eyes growing softer.
“Yes, it did. And you know what else you helped me realize? How much I missed Japan. I had been avoiding coming back because of Maggie’s death, but what I had forgotten was how many great memories I had—of her, of my college days, of all the little things that make this country so unique. Thanks to you, I fell in love with this place all over again.”
I held her hand in mine and gave it a gentle squeeze.
“In fact, I was going to propose something.”
“I’m all ears.”
“I want us to travel a little bit, when we’re done with this—or we could take small day trips during the weekends. I want to show you everything I’ve seen, Amos, and I want to see everything I haven’t seen with you.”
I felt my heart swell with pride, because her words were more meaningful than any I love you.
Lena Andrews was giving me her whole heart, and I wasn’t going to be the fool who threw it away. The intoxicating joy that spread through every cell of my body hit me like a wave, prompting a knot in my throat and tears in my eyes.
I smiled, fighting the impulse to kiss her. I was going to love her for as long as she’d let me, maybe even for the rest of my life, if she was up for that.
“I would love that.”
She raised her glass, and I did the same.
“To you, Amos. Thank you for bringing me back to one of the places I love the most.”
“Where are you going? We can get to the house faster if we take this road.”
“You’re wrong,” she said. “We should keep going straight and then turn right at the fourth intersection.”
It was late, and even though every residential street looked the same, I knew I wasn’t wrong. I had been down this street before, and I knew we could get to the house just as fast.
“It’s the exact same thing if we go down this way. I just walked this way back to the house the other day. Trust me, we’ll get there in the same amount of time. Want to bet?”
“No. I don’t want to.” The tone of her voice had none of the playfulness from earlier in the night.
I frowned, confused.
“Amos…can we please go the other way? Please?”
“Maybe…if you tell me why.”
“I can’t go down the way you want me to.”
“And why is that?” I gave her a cautious look, and she sighed.
“I can’t go down that way because that’s the intersection where the accident happened. A while after we got here, I realized it was much closer to the house than I thought. I haven’t been able to walk by there yet. I haven’t even been able to see if the house where we lived is still there. Trust me, I’ve tried. Every time I get close, I get stuck. I can’t move forward.”
“I’m sorry,” I said, wrapping my arms around her.
“You didn’t know,” she mumbled.
I kept my arms wrapped around her for a few minutes, and then I had an idea.
“Have I told you what I did when my brother died?” I whispered against her ear.
“No. I wanted to ask you about him, but I didn’t want to upset you. I wanted you to be ready to tell me whatever you wanted to.”
“I spent the whole summer locked in my room, sketching and listening to all the music he loved. Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd were his favorite bands. He was young, but he had great taste. I went through all his CDs, and I listened to many of them over and over. There was one song above all that really made me feel close to him.”
“Which one was it?”
“I’ll tell you if you agree to do one thing for me,” I replied.
“Don’t make me walk down that intersection, Amos. Please.”
“I’ll be right there with you.”
“I’m honestly considering taking back every nice thing I’ve said to you tonight,” she joked nervously.
“You’re not serious.”
“Oh, watch me.”
“Come on, Lena. You do want to know which song I listened to, don’t you? Walk with me. I’ll be right here with you. It’s time to release this bad memory like one of those demons in Japanese folktales.”
“This is not an episode of Inuyasha, St. Clair.”
“I know you can do this.”
“You give me far too much credit.”
I took her hand and held it a little bit tighter than usual. Part of me was afraid she’d take off and run away. I could hear her trying to steady her breath, inhaling and exhaling slowly. She shivered, even though it was a muggy July night.
We reached the intersection and she grasped my hand even tighter.
“Was it here? Right at this intersection?”
She gave me a nod, trembling and fidgeting in place.
I pulled my headphones out of my pocket.
Luckily, I never went anywhere without them.
“This is the song I listened to when my brother died. It hurt like a bitch, but it made me feel closer to him. It was the only thing that made me feel a little better.”
Lena listened to me, but as she did, her eyes welled up with tears and she started fidgeting even more. She looked like she was on the verge of making a break for it.
“Stay,” I said. I placed the earbuds in her ears then gently kissed each of her cheeks. It was almost midnight, and there was hardly anyone walking down the street. No one was paying attention to us.
I pressed play, put the phone in her back pocket, and took her hands in mine.
At first, she frowned in confusion.
I nodded. “Just give it time.”
Several seconds later, her eyes widened when she realized what song it was.
When the notes of “Wish You Were Here” by Pink Floyd started playing, silent tears fell from her eyes, one by one, faster than I could catch them.
She glanced at the crosswalk, the very same one where she’d lost her friend and had almost lost her own life, and then she looked at me, eyes glossy, lips trembling.
I caressed her face and pressed my forehead against hers.
Her arms circled around my waist and she pressed her face into my chest, crying for a good minute. Then, when the song was over, she pulled back.
Lena wiped her tears away and attempted a smile.
I smiled back, wondering if she was okay.
“Are you all right?”
“I will be,” she sniffled.
I tried to say something, but she placed a finger on my mouth and an earbud in my ear. I had put the song on repeat and it was playing all over again.
She stared at me for a moment then took a fistful of my shirt and pulled me down to her, brushing her lips against mine.
Her kiss was gentle and sweet at first, and then it turned rough, possessive, all-consuming. She needed to feel me, and I wanted to be there for her.
I loved her. I wanted to give her everything.
I wanted to free her of her ghosts, of her painful memories. I wrapped my arms around her and cupped her ass.
She pressed her body against mine even more.
Her lips were breathing me in, as if she couldn’t get enough. She didn’t want to stop, and neither did I. We kept on until someone appeared at the other end of the crosswalk and made their way toward us.
We moved out of the way. Lena cleaned her tear-stained face and looked around, as if in a daze.
“You were right—that did help, if only just a little.” She smiled uneasily, her beautiful pink lips raw from kissing and curled up in a smile.
Then, her eyes fell on mine and she said something I hadn’t expected her to say.
“Come on, let’s go see if the house where I lived is still there.”