Chapter 19

When Akemi and I had just started seeing each other and it was unclear what, if anything, would happen, I ran into a guy I knew in college, Fred, who played in a band, still did. He didn’t know about Akemi. He and I weren’t confidants. He talked to me about his wife, who was a knockout. We were looking at her photo with the band.

“I first saw her when she was about eighteen, standing with some friends. I went over to her and said, ‘Can you ever see yourself spending some time with me? Because I think it would be a good idea.’ She said, ‘I know. Some men said I bother their lives.’” Because of how beautiful she was, she meant. She said it in all innocence.

“I understand,” I told Fred. “She brings to mind a person I know.” That person was Akemi. Fred, of course, ended up with his dream woman. I wasn’t sure I would.

I read about the Beat Generation, about their travels around this country Akemi had come to and made her new home, Jack Kerouac and Cody and whoever, their life on the road. I wanted to be like that, the kind of guy Akemi would admire, live like Fred and his band. I laughed at myself. Of course this was different. Still, I read and imagined and kept seeing Akemi and, who’d have thought it, she came around, started to like me, flaws and all. Go figure.