Read Online Twenty-Six by Leo McKay - Free Book Online Page A

was sad and enraging. But what was her role in it? What could Meta do? She didn’t have enough Japanese to make a report to the police. The only person who could help her do such a thing was Yuka, who would not. Meta felt such a course of action would be useless anyway, since the man who was beating her was a foreigner, and the Japanese police, like the rest of the society, were unsure about how to treat foreigners. The likelihood was slim that a single report of violence would result in his arrest.
    “Yuka,” Meta began. She stopped. She’d said it all before.
This man has no right to hit you. It’s not anger, it wasn’t a fight, he’s sick. The only thing that’s going to stop the violence, realistically, is an end to the relationship
. “I’ve said it all before,” she said. The image of Yuka with her blouse off flashed in Meta’s mind. Her bandaged, bruised body like a broken twig. Something new occurred to her.
    “He’s going to kill you,” she said. “Take a look at yourself in the mirror. He’s going to kill you. He almost did this time.”
    “No,” Yuka said, her high voice becoming shrill. “I kill him!”
    Meta shook her head. “That’s stupid,” she said. She pointed a finger at Yuka for effect. “He …” she paused. “… is going to kill …” another pause. “… you.”
    They sat at the kitchen table most of the evening. Meta made green tea and they drank it. Yuka called the noodle shop on the corner and the son of the owners came on his scooter with noodles and broth in two big china bowls that they rinsed and left outside the door when they were finished. The conversation went in circles a number of times: Yuka talking about the violence she’d endured, talking about the most recent attack as though she were surprised it had happened. Meta did not want toseem unsympathetic, but she was tired of talking with Yuka about the same problem they’d been discussing for over a year.
    According to what Yuka had already told her, the first hint that the British boyfriend was violent had come when they’d been playing a board game. Yuka had been winning, and after protesting jokingly several times, he’d taken a lit cigarette from an ashtray and stubbed it out on the back of her hand. Meta had noticed the burn, and at first Yuka had claimed she’d burnt her hand in the kitchen. But when Meta learned the truth, she decided she did not want to meet the boyfriend. She did not even want to know his name. She told Yuka immediately what she thought: This was not normal behaviour. Unless he’d burnt her by accident, he had a serious problem. And since then, the outbursts and attacks had followed a predictable escalation: pushes and pinches turned to punches and kicks. Bruises became commonplace. Hidden injuries caused Yuka to wince in pain when standing up or sitting down.
    Meta feared that she was growing hard-hearted about Yuka’s situation: she’d begun to worry primarily about its effects not on Yuka, but on herself. She’d done everything she could think of for her friend and neighbour: she’d recommended sending the boyfriend to counselling. (He admitted he had a problem and was going to a British-educated analyst, but this did nothing to slow the frequency or to stem the severity of the attacks.) She’d recommended Yuka seek counselling herself, secretly hoping it might give her the strength to end the relationship. (The counsellor had actually told her she must be doing something to provoke the man’s behaviour.) Meta had even gone as far as to tell Yuka she did not want to see her again until she ended her relationship with theabuser altogether. This resulted in a two-week lie in which Meta believed Yuka had broken off the relationship. Then one day Yuka had come into Meta’s apartment trying to disguise a limp.
    By now, Meta and Yuka’s relationship revolved primarily around Yuka’s violent affair, and they’d gone through the same cycle several times: advice,