Chapter 22

Tommy the immigration cop who detained her had tried to make small talk, friendly back and forth with Akemi, as if there wasn’t a power imbalance between them, as if she wasn’t his prisoner, even as if they might be friends. What was he thinking? He told her he needed a vacation from his job and said, “But the thing is, if I go somewhere alone, Kentucky, say, I think I wouldn’t know what to do with myself. I’d wake up in the morning and think What am I going to do in the hours of this day and the next ones?” Smiling, looked down at her, standing over where she sat in the living area that had too few chairs. Everyone else around making do.

She’d chosen a seat on a window ledge where at least sunlight poured in. Tommy taking her into his confidence. As if she were interested, wanted to hear about his personal life. Or was he suggesting they might go together someplace in America? (It was true she wanted to travel in the country that was now her home and hadn’t been able to, held back by her husband’s job at the college, which kept him busy, often even between semesters; he brought the work home with him, not by choice but necessity, she understood and never complained, instead sympathized. Yet still she was held back. She’d taken one trip alone but that was before they married).