One new scene from Spreading Wings for those still following the story.
C&C more than welcome and thanks to all who have written me. Your help
has been invaluable.
Several folks have been kind enough to offer their help in fixing my
formatting problems. Thank you one and all. I will be in touch with you
sometime today or tomorrow.
Revisions of Scenes 23 through 26 are now on the web site.
Regards,
Don Granberry.
Most of the characters in this piece and the setting for it, were
conceived of by Rumiko Takahashi for her Ranma1/2 series of Manga. All
such characters and the setting are the property of Takahashi-san and
her licensees. All other characters in the piece are purely fictional
and any resemblences to actual persons living or dead are purely
coincidental.
Spreading Wings
Part I: The Burning Ring of Fire
Scene 27
Japanese society is very closely knit together by the concepts of giri
and gimu. Giri are duties owed to oneself by others. Gimu are duties
owed by oneself to others. Everyone in Japan is entangled in a web of
giri and gimu. Foreigners as a rule, lack these entanglements. This lack
makes dealing with foreigners difficult for the Japanese. This
difficulty will manifest itself in ways that often times seem
prejudicial or perhaps even discriminatory. Such treatment is not
intended as such. The Japanese arrange their acquaintances in shells.
Those with the most ties of giri and gimu are in the inner shell. Those
with the fewer ties of giri and gimu are placed in increasingly distant
shells. This is why foreigners in Japan are referred to �gaijin.� It
means �outside person.� A foreigner is someone so isolated from the
complex, interactive web of giri and gimu that the only thing one may
rightly do is to treat them as a temporary guest.
Under certain conditions this will give rise to an odd behavior on the
part of some Japanese known to experienced foreigners as �gaijin
fever.� Usually the behavior is innocuous and often humorous. It
manifests itself in many forms. One common such manifestation of gaijin
fever, often seen among Japanese males trying to cope with a foreign
male, is the determination to drink with the gaijin until he is nearly
comatose. Many Westerners suspect that this is actually an attempt by
the Japanese to get to know the real person inside that funny looking
body. An attempt as it were, to understand the mind behind those
strangely shaped, often weirdly colored eyes.
Watching Nabiki pour sake for the gaijin was so out of character for
her it gave Soun and Genma an exceedingly bad case of �gaijin fever.�
The drinking got truly serious after Genma finished relating his and
Ranma�s travails at Jusenkyo.
�So, Biru-san, what is your blood type?� Soun asked as he refilled
Genma�s cup.
�Type O, and yours?�
�Mine is O as well� Soun said.
�Type A,� Genma rumbled.
�What part of America are you from?� Soun asked.
�Texas.�
�Oh, then your family owns a ranch?� Soun asked.
�Ah, no. Actually, my father worked as a welder in a shipyard as did
many in his family. My mother�s family were vegetable farmers. Her
maiden name was Yamagawa.�
Westerlake finished off the cup he had in hand and Nabiki refilled it.
�So her father was nisei?� Soun asked.
Genma poured Soun another sake.
�No, but her grandfather was. He served in Italy during World War II.�
�Mmm!� Soun and Genma noised together.
All three men paused to have another cup.
�Her father fought in Korea and her older brother in Vietnam.�
�My father�s father saw duty in Okinawa during the war. My father was
exempt from service during the Korean war because he worked in machine
shop that made howitzers at the time, but my older brother died just
outside of Caison.�
�A Marine?� Genma asked. His voice sounded like boulders sliding down a
steep slope.
Nabiki refilled Westerlake�s cup. Westerlake shook his head no to
Genma�s question and immediately regretted it.
�No, he ah, he flew C-130�s for the Air Force.�
Westerlake looked at the newly filled cup with some consternation but
downed it. Nabiki promptly refilled it. Westerlake nearly grunted with
exasperation.
�Where did you go to school?� Soun asked.
Nabiki left and returned with another pair of flasks.
�I did my undergraduate work at Annapolis. My doctorate is from MIT.�
Nabiki passed one of the flasks over to her father then refilled
Westerlake's cup. Westerlake noticed the full cup, picked up carefully
and drank.
�And now you teach at the University of Tokyo?�
Westerlake�s cup was full again. He sighed and downed it. Nabiki
refilled it.
�Yes.�
�Why not Boeing?� Genma rumbled, then downed a cup of sake. Soun
refilled his cup and Genma refilled Soun�s.
�Boeing is not working on the things I am interested in. By taking a
teaching job, I could work on what I was interested in, so here I am.�
Westerlake said with a shrug.
All three men paused for more sake. Nabiki dutifully refilled
Westerlake�s cup.
�But why teach here? Don�t you miss your family?� Soun asked
More sake. Westerlake was beginning to grimace after each cup.
�Well both of my parents are dead and I never married. I was in the
service for so long I hardly knew my cousins or anything so there really
weren�t too many ties to hold me.�
�What of the family lands?�
�Oh, well I was never much on farming and the land became entirely too
valuable to farm anyway. Taxes, you know? So I sold the old family
place. That really was a sad day. It paid off real well though. I put
most of the money I got for it into the stock market in nineteen eighty
five. Where there was once a hundred acres of tomatoes there are now a
hundred acres of houses.�
This was a really good excuse to pause and drink more sake. Nabiki went
and fetched two more flasks. Everybody had another drink when she
returned except Westerlake, who got trapped into having two drinks.
�So why didn�t you make a full career out of the Marines?�
�Well you know, this may sound a bit odd. I don�t like getting shot at
very much. But even so, I was willing to put up with it even after I got
hit once or twice. The thing I couldn�t handle was when they started
shitting at me. Then I had to get out!�
This caused a great deal of mirth and more sake drinking.
Soun looked at his daughter and saw again how incredibly beautiful she
was. She was glowing as she sat next to Westerlake. Then he remembered
her when she was just ten years old. She was long legged, even then. No
one really to play with or share time with. It seemed to him she had
always been running. Running around the track at school, or around the
block on weekends, her long legs flying. Always so very alone was
Nabiki. It was she that understood numbers so well and always managed to
somehow keep the family solvent. Soun wanted to weep for his little girl
that was no more but the sake caught up with him and he just faded away.
�We�re home!� Kasumi called from the foyer.
�Oh, good Kasumi!� Nabiki called back to her sister, �You are here just
in time to be a witness.�
Kasumi and Tofu walked into the room. Suon was lying on his side
snoring. Genma was staring at Westerlake, holding his best �great stone
face� pose.
�Hmm,� Tofu noised, waving his hand in front of Genma�s face. �His eyes
aren�t tracking. He�s out.�
By exercising willpower that seemed to reach well beyond anything
remotely human, Westerlake stood up.
�I guess...I�d...better be...�
Westerlake�s knees failed him in mid-sentence. He slowly crumpled to
the floor like a large building that had been dynamited by
professionals. Once his descent was finally complete, he looked for all
the world like a pile of twisted, boneless rubble.
�Biru-san wins! He got in the last peck,� Nabiki said cheerfully.
�Have they been drinking all this time?� Kasumi asked.
�Yep!� Nabiki said with a nod of the head.
Tofu whistled.
�Oh, my!� Kasumi said.
�We can�t leave Biru-san like that,� Tofu said sounding alarmed. �If he
stays that way the rest of the night he�ll be laid up in my clinic for a
week.�
�Don�t move him yet!� Nabiki said, �I�ll be right back.�
Nabiki bounded upstairs and returned with her camera and several
blankets. After she got a few frames of the human wreckage piled up on
the living room floor, she helped Tofu lay the men out and cover them.
�You know,� Kasumi said, �the only person I have ever seen do anything
like that was Ranma?�
�Yeah, right after Akane drove him into the floor like a tack,� Nabiki
said sounding immensely satisfied. �I can�t wait to show Biru-san these
pictures.�
�I�d wait a month or so,� Tofu said ruefully, �It will be at least that
long before his hangover goes away.�
�Poor Biru-san! He looked like a squashed beer can,� Kasumi said.