IV

 The Indomitable Bette Nakano

 Hiromi “Bette,” 17

 

 September–December 1942

 SEPTEMBER

By September, the evacuation from the assembly center at Tanforan to our new camp in Utah is well under way as we pack our suitcases and prepare to ship our scrap-wood furniture by train. It’s a curious feeling, saying goodbye to Tanforan. The camp may have smelled, been poorly constructed, and had repulsive food, but it was only twenty minutes from home, and some of us had dared to hope we wouldn’t have to leave California after all.

As for me, after four months of the same dusty racetrack, I am looking forward to another adventure, particularly aboard a train, although I must confess I’m a tad disappointed with the railcars that screech to a stop next to the Tanforan fence. I know it’s silly—my younger sister, Yuki, likes to say I’ve seen too many movies—but I was picturing a sleek locomotive with state-of-the-art brass fixtures and polished beverage carts pushed by waiters in bellboy caps. Instead, what we get is an old coal train with steel siding and hardwood seats I know Bachan will be complaining about within the hour.

As we settle in for the ride, I quarrel with Yuki over who gets the window seat, but I lose our game of Jon-Ken-Po and have to make do with the aisle . . . However, I feel particularly mollified when the captain of our train car announces that the shades must be drawn until we reach the Sierra Nevada mountains, which means that Yuki will have no view at all, while I, at least, can content myself with spying on the other people in our car.

Then the whistle blows, a long, mournful sound like you might hear if you were a lost princess aboard the Trans-Siberian Railway, the train lurches forward, and I sit up eagerly as my first railroad adventure begins.

           An hour later, Bachan is using Mother’s knitting bag as a cushion, while Mother dozes on Father’s shoulder as he attempts to read the newspaper under the flickering gaslights. Yuki halfheartedly tosses a softball into the air and catches it in her dirty leather mitt, tosses it and catches it, again and again.

As the train hits a particularly rough section of track, someone stumbles against the back of our seat. “Sumimasen,” he murmurs.

Looking up, I lock gazes with a tall boy with slicked-back hair and sparkling wide-set eyes.

How is it possible that I’ve never seen him before? I know Tanforan housed almost eight thousand people, but how outrageous to have missed a boy this handsome!

He grins. “Nice hair.”

Blushing, I run my hands over my blond wig. “You think so? My sister says it’s dumb.”

Yuki rolls her eyes and thwacks the ball deep into her mitt. I don’t think I’ll ever understand her—she’s fifteen! You’d think she’d recognize a handsome boy when she saw one, but her disinterest is palpable.

“Nah.” The boy smiles wider, revealing a crooked front tooth. “You look like a Japanese Lana Turner.”

I beam at him.

“Your name’s Hiromi, right? I’m Joe. Tanaka.” He says it just like that. Joe—pause—Tanaka. Like Clark—pause—Gable.

I extend my hand. “Actually,” I say in my best Vivien Leigh impression, “I go by my middle name, Bette, now.”

Yuki scoffs. “Since when?”

I shoot her a look. “Since now.”

To tell you the truth, I’ve been thinking about changing my name for some time. “Hiromi” is so old-fashioned and so hard to pronounce—I can’t count the number of times I’ve been called “Hye-romi” or “Her-omee”—and “Bette” is so much more appropriate for a modern American girl like me.

“Like Bette Davis.” Of course, Joe pronounces it correctly, like “Bet-tee,” and takes my hand, grinning.

“Exactly!”

The rest of the train ride is like something out of a dream. Other people complain about the heat, or the stuffiness, or the water running out, but Joe and I are in a world of our own. He’s from San Leandro, across the bay. His favorite song is “Harbor Lights” by Frances Langford, and when he sings a few bars under his breath, I think I might die of happiness.

The first night, coal dust drifts through the cracks as we rattle through the mountain tunnels, and hardly anyone gets any sleep, but in the morning, during our single stop in Nevada, Joe and I stroll past the armed soldiers like we’re in a park instead of a desert depot.

After two days in Joe’s company, I’m in such high spirits when we leave the train in the charming town of Delta, Utah, that I don’t even fight Yuki for a window seat on the bus that will take us the rest of the way to Topaz City.

Gradually, the picket fences and carefully tended flower beds of Delta give way to a broad, flat desert where the earth is so dry, it’s crackled and fragmented like a mosaic.

Where are we going? There’s absolutely nothing but gnarled greasewood bushes for miles and miles. Taking a steadying breath, I close my eyes, imagining how I’ll describe Joe to Yum-yum and Keiko when I see them next.

So funny! So kind! With such long eyelashes!

When the bus halts, I open my eyes again, hoping for an oasis fit for an out-of-the-way romance like in Morocco or Casablanca.

Topaz is nothing like that, however. Here, there are no exotic gardens or pavilions where lovers can meet. There isn’t even a tree in sight.

A barbed-wire fence stretches around an enormous compound—the fence is short, made of three strands, as if it were for cattle. Inside, row after row of long, tarpaper barracks stretches into the distance, each one looking squat and grim and the same as the last. With all the buildings lined up so neatly, I bet Topaz could hold eight thousand people or even more, all in a single square mile!

From the nearby buildings rises a steel smokestack that dwarfs the rest of camp, even the guard towers that line the perimeter. Those are only a couple of stories tall, but there’s no mistaking them or the Caucasian soldiers surveying the Main Gate area from their observation decks.

I sigh. Okay, so it’s a mite bleak.

But with no tall buildings or forests, one can see clear to the Prussian blue mountains ascending in the distance, and I can just picture Joe kissing me for the first time with those majestic ridges behind us.

Frankie Fujita, one of the Japantown boys, is behind me with his uncle, who seems bewildered in his rumpled overcoat and fedora. Tugging a stray thread on his father’s old WWI jacket, Frankie makes a disgusted sound as we approach the door. “What a dump.”

“I think it’s marvelous!” Tossing my hair, I step from the bus in what I hope is a dignified maneuver, but as soon as I touch the ground, my shoe sinks two inches into the dust, and I pitch forward gracelessly.

Frankie catches my elbow, steadying me with his hard grip. “Yeah?” he says. “You oughta get your eyes checked, Nakano.”

I don’t bother telling him I prefer “Bette” now. Frankie calls everyone by their last name.

Straightening my skirt, I take another unsteady step as the Boy Scout Drum and Bugle Corps begins to play a lively marching tune, giving our arrival a festive air.

This is where it will happen, I think, memorizing the pale sand, the unvarying barracks, and the barbed wire that hems my new city. This is where Joe and I will fall in love.

 OCTOBER

I’m so excited for the school year to finally begin that even the unfinished classrooms and dearth of supplies can’t dampen my spirits. My senior year! Even though we’re not in San Francisco anymore, there will still be clubs, sports (I hear Joe Tanaka is a star basketball player, and I can’t wait to cheer him on, although we don’t have a gymnasium yet), and, best of all, dances! There’s already a “Halloween Spook-tacular” planned for this Saturday in Dining Hall 1, provided the administration can engage a band for the evening, and although Joe hasn’t asked me for a dance yet, I’m saving room on my dance card just for him.

On Monday morning, Yum-yum, Keiko, and I cram into our classroom, which, if I had to guess, is even colder than it is outside . . . and it’s freezing outside! The hospital is the only area with central heating—that’s what the steel smokestack is for—so most of the buildings will rely on stoves for warmth and Sheetrock for insulation. Unfortunately, construction of the camp still hasn’t finished, so there’s a hole in the roof of the classroom where the stove and chimney will eventually be. For now, we huddle at our desks in our military-issue coats, blowing on our hands to warm them.

I already know a lot of the other students from Japantown, like Shig and Tommy, who are drawing stick figures on the condensation-fogged windows, but there’s one Caucasian girl among us too.

You wouldn’t have guessed it, but there are a lot of Caucasians in camp, and not just guards, although we have those, too, on the watchtowers and at the gates. They work as doctors, administrative staff, teachers, and the chiefs of the different sectors, overseeing nihonjin workers. Some of them live in Delta, the nearest town, or a special section of Caucasian housing that’s separate from the rest of the camp, although it’s still inside the fence.

The girl’s name, I find out, is Gail Johnson, the blond-haired, blue-eyed daughter of the Agricultural Division Chief, and she’s the only one of us in a Sears, Roebuck polo coat of beautiful novelty tweed instead of the navy wool the rest of us have to wear.

“She’s so pretty,” I whisper to Yum-yum and Keiko. “I wish I was as pretty as her.”

Yum-yum glances at Gail. “I guess she’s all right.”

“For a hakujin girl,” Keiko adds with a smirk.

Quickly, I run my hands over my wig. For a moment, I entertain the idea of purchasing another, but with even the doctors and teachers earning less than a private in the army, no one in camp has the money for something like that. Even if I could scrape together some odd jobs, it would take me over a year to save up enough to look like Gail Johnson.

I’m pinching the bridge of my nose to see if I can make it appear less flat when, to my surprise, our teacher announces that we’re dismissed. The high desert mornings are so cold that until the high school rooms are winterized, classes will take place only in the afternoons. Shig leaps up from his chair with a whoop and leads the charge from the classroom, followed by Tommy and the others.

Gathering her things, Gail follows, her hair flashing like gold in the chilly sunlight.

           On Wednesday, much to my disappointment, an announcement in the Topaz Times, the camp newspaper, declares that the “Halloween Spook-tacular” has been canceled due to lack of a band. I’m complaining about it to Frankie as we leave the mess hall for the high school, where he’s kind enough to accompany me every weekday afternoon.

Dining hall, I think belatedly, remembering to use the correct expression from the booklets we received on Topaz terminology. Frankie hates it, but I think using words like “dining hall” instead of “mess hall” makes everything seem a little more civilized.

“Bet the ketos didn’t want to play for a bunch of enemy Japs,” Frankie grumbles.

Every block has a dining hall and an H-shaped latrines-and-laundry, with six barracks arranged on each side and an extra building for things like churches, libraries, and recreation centers. There are forty-two blocks in all, but not all of them are for housing—two have baseball diamonds, and the four in the center of camp are still waiting for construction.

This means that the Japantown boys and girls are spread out over a mile, which is farther apart than we’ve ever been before, but Frankie and I are on the same block, so we often see each other at meals, and despite his penchant for cynicism, I have to admit I quite enjoy his company. Even the sourest of his moods reminds me of being back in San Francisco.

“It’s more likely they couldn’t afford the travel expense,” I say delicately. “Topaz City isn’t exactly a hot spot for nightlife, you know.”

“You’re tellin’ me, Nakano. They couldn’t’ve exiled us any farther from civilization if they’d sent us to Alaska.” Disgusted, Frankie kicks at the frozen ground. Although it’s past noon, the entire camp is still covered in a glittering veil of frost the likes of which I could have only dreamed when I still lived in San Francisco. Lifting my chin, I pretend I am not a Nisei girl picking her way along a dusty lane but a Russian empress floating over a floor of crystal.

“I was so hoping for a dance with Joe, though!” I say.

“But the guy hadn’t even asked for a dance yet.”

“Yet!” I say. Frankie has always been kind of a dolt when it comes to romance, so I’m in the middle of explaining the many rules of courtship, including the game of cat-and-mouse Joe and I are currently playing, when the horizon darkens in a sinister, familiar way.

My eyes water as a cold wind rises, screaming over the barracks.

“Shit!” Frankie grabs my hand as a dust storm explodes down the street. “C’mon, Nakano, move your ass!”

Hand in hand, we race to the shelter of the nearest building. Tempests like this have been plaguing us since our arrival, but this one is bigger than any I’ve yet seen. It’s like something out of the vast Sahara, sending a child’s wagon careening into the barracks and scattering coal from the coal piles. Coughing, we run through the storm as the winds buffet us this way and that, the sand stinging our eyes and cheeks.

Throwing open the laundry, Frankie shoves me inside and leaps in after, slamming the door as a gust of air reaches us, rattling the walls. Plunking down on the edge of the laundry tub, I shudder. Outside, it sounds as if the world is going to shake apart.

Frankie kicks the door, cracking it. A thin stream of sand pours across the floor. “Goddamn it!”

Frowning, I brush dust from my wig. It wafts from between my fingers, pale as clouds and fine as powder. “Cool it, Frankie. That door never did anything to you.”

He begins pacing the laundry room as dust accumulates under the door and windows in soft piles. He reminds me of a wild horse I once saw at the San Francisco Zoo. “How can you stand it, Nakano?” he asks. “Don’t you hate it here?”

I try to sniff, but the dust is so thick that it makes me sneeze instead. “We have food, shelter, jobs . . . We have each other,” I say. “What’s there to hate?”

He stops by the door, staring at me with those eyes that Minnow says look like embers. “What are you, stupid, Nakano? Can’t you see shit when your face is rubbed in it?”

My retort dies on my tongue. Frankie’s always been distrustful and angry, but he’s never been cruel. Not to us.

Standing, I draw myself up to my full height, even though the top of my head only reaches Frankie’s shoulder. “You shut your mouth, Francis Fujita,” I say, advancing on him. “I see a lot more than you give me credit for. In fact, I see you, and if you let your anger continue to fester like that, it’s going to destroy you and anyone who gets too close, and you’ll have only yourself to blame.”

His jaw drops. I’ve surprised him. Good. Let him think twice before insulting me again. Before he can collect himself, I draw my scarf over my wig, fling open the door, and step out into the raging winds.

           The next day, I’m still fuming as I walk to school, alone. I do see where we are. I see the sewer pipes breaking every week. I see the dust coming in through the cracks in the barracks. I see the armed soldiers in their guard towers. But unlike that oaf Frankie, I choose to see the good where he chooses to see only the bad.

Being an optimist does not make me stupid.

When the first snowflakes begin to fall, however, all thoughts of Frankie fly right out of my mind. Perfect six-branched stars drift silently over the camp, alighting on my hair and shoulders as I dash into the dirt lane, throwing my arms wide.

What a wonder!

Snow fills the air, dense as the Milky Way on the darkest of nights. I twirl, my skirts flying out around my knees, like I’m a ballerina in a glass globe. All around me, children and adults fling themselves to the ground, creating dusty white angels.

In the road, Mas is being dogpiled in the slush by his students from the junior high school. Since he has a little college education and there weren’t enough Caucasian teachers, he was hired to teach the seventh-graders, who shriek and laugh as he heaves himself upright, one or two of them hanging off his biceps.

I’m a little surprised to see Keiko giggling with Yum-yum, their heads thrown back to catch the cold flakes on their tongues. Keiko always seems a little cooler, a little more detached, a little more grown-up; it’s easy to forget that she’s just a kid like the rest of us, even if, like Yum-yum, she had to grow up faster because her parents were taken by the FBI after Pearl Harbor.

“Bette! Can you believe it?” someone cries, startling me. “Snow!” Joe races up behind me, grabbing my mittened hands and swinging me around, laughing. We spin in the snow as the barracks flash past us, blending in with the powdery sky, until he is the only thing in focus: his slick hair, his smile, his fingers on mine.

We’re surrounded by kids on their way to school and adults without jobs stumbling from games of Go, but I truly believe at this moment that Joe and I are the only two people in the entire desert, the entire universe, even, whirling at the center while all of creation revolves around us.

Gradually, we slow, but the world continues to turn dizzily. He chuckles, steadying me in his arms as I lean against him, breathless.

“Too bad the ‘Halloween Spook-tacular’ is canceled,” he says. “We could’ve done this properly, on the dance floor.”

Looking up at him, I bat my eyelashes. “You’ll have to ask me properly next time, Joe. Without your name on my dance card, I couldn’t guarantee that we’d even speak to each other the whole night.”

“Well, I can’t let that happen, can I?” He smiles. “Next ti—”

Splat! Something wet and cold smacks right into my bottom, utterly ruining my moment with Joe. Aghast, I turn, feeling my skirt, which is now covered in dirty, dripping sleet.

Across the road, Shig, Twitchy, and Keiko—How could she?—are laughing and pointing, balling up new handfuls of snow.

My eyes narrow.

I could be disappointed.

I could be angry, like Frankie.

But I am Bette Nakano, and Bette Nakano doesn’t get disappointed. She doesn’t get angry. She takes matters into her own hands.

I lean down, scooping up a pile of slush, and run at them. Yelping, Shig and Twitchy scatter, but they’re too late. My first snowball hits Shig in the neck. My second strikes Twitchy in the back.

“Nice arm, Bette!” Joe races up beside me, flinging snowballs of his own. We’re all laughing, shoveling dust and snow at one another with both hands, shrieking as it runs down our necks into our collars.

In the midst of it all, I glance over at Joe, who grins at me through a shower of white sparkles. It’s our first snow in Topaz—the first snow of our lives—and we get to share it together.

 NOVEMBER

After the disappointing cancellation of the “Halloween Spook-tacular,” it takes almost a month for the Community Activities Section to accumulate a campwide record collection so we’ll no longer have to rely on a band for dance music, and by the time Thanksgiving—and the Thanksgiving Dance—arrives, I am more than ready to swing and jive.

On Thursday, the dining halls serve roast turkey and walnut dressing with jiggling slices of cranberry sauce that still bear impressions from the inside of the can. It smells of the holidays back home in San Francisco, when my whole family would spend days in the kitchen, baking and brining and boiling, before digging in to fresh Dungeness crab and somen salad along with our turkey and mashed potatoes.

The cafeteria-style dining hall with its raw wood beams, picnic tables, serving counter, and dishwashing station may be a far cry from home, but we’re still together, and in true American tradition, I know I have a lot to be grateful for.

While our block manager makes a particularly long-winded speech at the front of the dining hall, Yuki and I pick the candied topping from our sweet potatoes, sneaking bites when Mother and Father aren’t looking. Bachan sees us, but she simply winks and pops a scoop of pumpkin-pie filling into her mouth.

I wolf down my meal in the most unladylike manner, especially the bread and real butter—none of that oleomargarine tonight!—and get a second heaping helping of turkey and gravy.

At the dishwashing station, I encounter Frankie, who still hasn’t apologized for his nasty remarks last month.

I regard him coolly as I rinse my plate. “Francis.”

“Nakano.” He nods. “You look like you’re having fun over there.”

“I am.”

“Wish they’d had real gravy instead of that walnut stuff,” he says. “I couldn’t eat it.”

“I thought it was nice.” I wait for him to apologize, but he simply dips his fork and knife in the soapy water, looking as if he’d rather swallow a toad than say he was sorry for anything, so I place my dishes in the drying rack with a clatter. “Well, I hope you and your uncle have a happy Thanksgiving.”

           That night, in preparation for the dance, I hang up my dress, a beautiful white rayon splashed with flowers, and polish the dust from my pumps.

Because we’re a family of five or more, we have two connected apartments instead of one, which means that Bachan, Yuki, and I share one room while Mother and Father have the other. The ceiling, walls, and floors are all covered in Masonite, with exposed nail heads shining around the perimeter of each square board. It’s not the coziest of accommodations, I’ll give you that, but, with a few improvements, we’ve managed to make it homey enough.

There are the curtains Mother sewed from empty rice sacks, and the tables, chairs, and dressers Father shipped from Tanforan. He’s also built a wardrobe for our clothes and shelves to display photographs or hold necessities like toiletries and cups.

By the cast-iron stove are pegs for our towels to dry, along with coal and kindling buckets that, as the eldest, it’s my duty to keep filled. Bachan’s cot is closest to the stove, where it’s warmest, then Yuki’s, then mine, where I’ve hung a curtain for a little privacy.

Now Yuki and her friend Mary, Stan Katsumoto’s sister, who’s also on the softball team, sit on my cot, reviewing my dance card.

It’s nearly full, with Shig, Twitchy, Tommy, and Stan having signed up, but there’s only one name that matters to me.

1. JOE TANAKA

9. JOE TANAKA

16. JOE TANAKA

True to his word, Joe has called not once but three times to ask me for a dance. I think I’m in heaven!

“Do you think he’s going to kiss you?” Yuki asks.

Mary scowls. She’d be much prettier if she weren’t scowling so much of the time, but it’s not my place to say.

With a laugh, I swipe the last of the dust from my heels. “The question is, ‘Will I let him?’”

“Well?”

“Well, I haven’t decided!” I plop down on the cot between them. Mary leans away uncomfortably. “If he’s a gentleman, then—”

My stomach lets out an embarrassingly loud gurgle, momentarily silencing me. In the back of my throat, I taste bile. Quickly, I clap my hands over my mouth.

Mary is already reaching for the waste bin. “You okay?”

I shake my head. “I think it must have been something I ate—”

“You didn’t eat the walnuts, did you? Mom refused to serve them in our mess hall.”

Yuki’s stomach growls, even louder than mine, and she jumps up, grimacing. “I knew that gravy was off!”

As one, she and I scramble for our zoris and fly toward the door, doubled over in pain. Outside, it seems like the whole block is fleeing for the latrines, filling the air with groans and the stench of sickness.

I’m so ill with food poisoning that I spend all night in bed with a bucket on the floor beside me.

I miss the dance.

Worst of all, I miss my dances with Joe.

           By the next morning, however, I’m feeling almost as good as new, if a little tired, when who should knock at my door but Joe Tanaka himself! “Hi-ro-miii!” Yuki screams, though I’m only behind my curtain. “It’s for you-uuu!”

Flustered, I tighten my wig band over my hair and pull on my blond curls, peeking frantically at my hand mirror to ensure that none of my black hair shows.

“Hiromi!”

“For the last time, it’s Bette now!” Pinching my cheeks to put a little color in them, I check my expression once more and throw back my curtain, appearing in what I hope is a dramatic fashion.

Huffing, Yuki goes to sulk at the table. “Your hair is crooked.”

Mortified, I tug my wig straight as I sashay to the door, where Joe Tanaka is standing on the doorstep, his breath clouding in the morning air. “We missed you at the dance,” he says, offering me a crepe-paper flower. “Everyone was there, even that Caucasian girl, Gail. I didn’t think she’d want to party with a bunch of nihonjin kids, but you should’ve seen—”

“Oh, Joe, you shouldn’t have!” I interrupt. The flower is a red camellia with rippled petals and a riot of yellow stamens in the center—in Japan, red camellias are a symbol of love. “It’s wonderful!”

Bashfully, he stuffs his hands into his coat pockets. “Well, I thought it was the least I could do, since you couldn’t make it out last night.”

“I can make it out today,” I say brightly. “Are you going to the volleyball game this afternoon?”

“Haven’t thought about it yet. Maybe I’ll see you there?”

“Maybe!” Shrugging, I do my best Scarlett O’Hara impression, pretending indifference, even though I’d love nothing more than to sit by him on the high school field, shoulder to shoulder and thigh to thigh. “If something more interesting doesn’t come up.”

He smiles, and I nearly collapse against the doorframe, swooning. “You make everything more interesting, Bette.”

I wink. “Then I suppose you’d better be wherever I am, Joe.”

 DECEMBER

Unfortunately, after what seemed like such a promising start the day after Thanksgiving, my romance with Joe has stalled. Although he’s no less kind, I feel as if when we talk, he’s more distracted than usual. I suppose he’s busy with school, where we’ve finally resumed our morning classes, and basketball, because the Topaz Rams are already trouncing neighboring schools. He still has a place on my dance card for the “Holiday Jitter-Hop,” but only one: the fourteenth, as unremarkable a dance as you can get.

My worries, however, are eclipsed by the Christmas festivities. On the morning of the twenty-fifth, we wake to a fresh inch of snow that ices all of Topaz City like a delicious buttercream cake. Icicles drip from the eaves like crystals, smoke drifts from the chimneys, and we stand in our doorways as carolers march through the streets, singing “O Come, All Ye Faithful.” In the brittle winter air, their voices are clear and bright as bells.

Inside, next to Bachan’s cot, our stove burns merrily, our concerns about coal rationing forgotten for the moment. On the table are presents wrapped in brown paper and twine. A few of Yuki’s—donations from the Quakers at the American Friends Service—even glisten with tinsel.

As we open our gifts, we find fruitcakes from hakujin friends in San Francisco and manju from our older brother and his wife in New York, where they were living when we got the exclusion order. He offered to come back to be with the family, but Mother and Father wouldn’t hear of it. Of course he and his wife had to stay back East. Why would you come here if you could be in New York City?

Among my presents is a brand-new Tangee Satin-Finish Lipstick in Theatrical Red that I’ve been coveting for months. “Oh, Yuki, thank you!” I cry, flinging myself at her. “You’re my favorite sister; did you know that?”

She flops in my arms, although I can hear her smiling when she says, “I’m your only sister!”

I try on the lipstick the next night while I’m getting ready for the dance with Keiko and Yum-yum, who is positively glowing, she’s so happy. Her father was released from Missoula—he should arrive any day now.

Puckering and pouting, I examine my reflection in my hand mirror. “Does this shade suit me?” I ask.

“You look good in everything, Bette,” Yum-yum says.

“I don’t know.” I flip to the Tangee advertisement in Vogue magazine, where Constance Luft Huhn, head of the House of Tangee, is reclining on a pea-green divan, bedecked in pearls and sapphires that gleam against her creamy skin. I squint at her lips and rouged cheeks, her sky-blue eyes and perfectly arched brows. “It looks different in the ad.”

“Yeah.” Keiko rolls her eyes. “Because she’s Caucasian.”

I frown at my reflection—my round cheeks, my flat nose—feeling like a dumpling compared to the likes of Constance Luft Huhn, Gail Johnson, and the pretty white women in my favorite films and magazines.

“She’s not even real,” Keiko says, tapping the ad. “That’s a drawing, not a photograph. In real life, she’s probably got acne and a double chin like the rest of us.”

“Oh.” For a moment, I feel silly. Naturally, I can’t look like this illustrated woman, nor should I want to. What a bore, to be two-dimensional.

Yum-yum tucks the red-paper camellia behind my ear. “You’re real, though, and beautiful.”

“Aren’t we all?” Keiko laughs, fluffing her hair in what’s clearly an imitation of me.

With a smile, I throw my arms around Yum-yum and Keiko, squeezing them so tightly, our cheeks squish. “Absolutely.”

           The “Holiday Jitter-Hop” dance is in Dining Hall 32, and I can hear the music even before I enter, the strains of a Mills Brothers song filtering through the walls. Standing before the steps, I brush out my skirt and look up at the door—the unvarnished wood is plain, even unsightly, spattered with mud from the slushy December days, but I want to memorize every nail, every splinter, every moment of anticipation.

Joe’s inside.

My dance is inside.

The rest of my life is inside.

“Are we going in, or are we going to stand out here all night like dunces?” Keiko asks, cocking an eyebrow at me.

“Of course we’re going in!” I flash her a smile. As I check my dress and wig one last time, the red camellia crackles in my hair.

I’m ready, I think. Twining my arm in Keiko’s, I take the steps up to the dining hall.

Inside, the building has been transformed into a true Christmas wonderland for the decorating contest. Fragrant juniper and pine boughs from Mount Topaz adorn the walls, and the beams are festooned with streamers and poinsettias made from back issues of the Topaz Times. Atop a table, a tree strung with garlands stands in one corner. Cardboard snowflakes dangle from the ceiling, turning beautifully around a small bunch of mistletoe suspended over the center of the dance floor.

“Looks like a kids’ craft project in here,” Keiko says, crossing her arms and leaning against the doorframe.

I blink back tears. “I think it’s perfect,” I breathe.

And it is.

Beneath the hot dining-hall lights, the evening passes like a flurry of snow. I dance with Tommy, Shig, Stan, Mas. Twitchy takes me out to swing, spinning me around the dance floor, our heels kicking up, our faces sweaty and glorious. He’s a marvelous dancer, all that buoyant energy going into every twirl, every lift, every dip.

All too soon, and not soon enough, it’s the fourteenth song of the night. I glance down at my dance card, even though I already know who my partner will be.

14. JOE TANAKA

Couples are quickly dissolving and pairing off again like shapes in a kaleidoscope, whirling away in spirals of multicolored skirts as the music starts.

It’s “Harbor Lights” by Frances Langford—Joe’s favorite song—the same song he sang to me as we rode the train from Tanforan three months ago. It couldn’t be more perfect.

I search the crowded mess hall for a glimpse of Joe’s slicked-back hair, his sparkling, wide-set eyes, but he’s nowhere to be found.

“Have you seen Joe?” I ask Yum-yum, who’s dancing with Stan Katsumoto.

“No. Do you want me to help you look?”

I shake my head, twining my hands in my dress. The seconds keep slipping away!

“He ducked outside.” Stan nods at the door. “The guy was red as a keto sunburn.”

“It is hot in here,” Yum-yum says.

Biting my lip, I hurry from the dining hall as Frances Langford begins to sing. Without my coat, the outdoor air is chilly on my skin, and I hug my arms as I search the empty street.

“Joe?” I call, descending the stairs.

There’s no answer.

Shivering, I turn the corner.

And there he is, on the dark side of the building. Breaking out in a smile, I take a step forward.

But my joy freezes in my chest as I near him.

He’s not alone. There’s a girl in his arms, almost as tall as he is, with golden hair like summer sunshine in the dining-hall shadows.

It’s Gail Johnson, and they’re kissing, lips locked, pressed against the wall, like they’re the only two people in the entire universe.

No, no, no, this can’t be right.

This was my dance.

That was my kiss.

Tears fill my eyes. A sob catches in my throat.

And I flee. I run into the darkness, crying, until one of my heels catches in the slush, and I go tumbling forward onto my hands and knees. Dirty water spatters my arms, my legs, my white flowered dress.

The red camellia tumbles from behind my ear, landing petals-down in the mud.

“Whoa, whoa, Nakano,” someone says, hoisting me up. In an instant, I recognize the “All-American” patch on the sleeve—Frankie. “Are you okay?”

Covered in mud, with tears running down my face, I know I’ve never looked worse, but at this moment, I couldn’t care less. I fling myself into Frankie’s arms as he sets me on my feet. “No, I’m not.”

He pats my shoulder. “That Tanaka boy break your heart?”

With a wail, I bury my face in Frankie’s shoulder.

He sighs, and through the haze of my anguish, I feel his arms go around me. “Want me to hit him for you?” he asks.

I let out a sound that’s supposed to be a laugh, but it comes out more like a hiccup. “Oh, Frankie.” Leaning back, I smack him lightly in the chest. “That wouldn’t do any good.”

He smirks.

“But thanks for offering.”

As we stand in the ice and mud, the last notes of “Harbor Lights” drift over the empty street. My eyes well up again.

“C’mon, Nakano, don’t cry.” Gently, Frankie takes my hand, swaying with me as the next song begins. “What happened?”

“He was kissing Gail Johnson.” I hiccup again. “During our song!”

“That keto girl?” He has the audacity to laugh—a big, bellowing laugh that would sound harsh if it didn’t have such warmth to it. “Shit, Nakano, you’re twice the girl she is. Dumb boy doesn’t know what he’s missing.”

I sniff. In his arms, I feel the chill beginning to ease from my bones. “You really think so?”

“Yeah.”

“But she’s—” I stop myself from adding so pretty. I’m pretty too, after all. Instead, I frown at Frankie. “Why are you being so nice to me?”

“You’re a nice gal. You deserve nice things.” His gaze flicks to the icy road and mud-splattered barracks, and his eyes harden for a moment. “Nicer than this, at least.”

Blinking away the last of my tears, I lay my head on his shoulder. “You too, Frankie,” I murmur.

We dance outside under the orange lamps. We dance while Joe Tanaka kisses Gail Johnson in the shadows. We dance while the song changes to Count Basie, and the mess-hall floorboards thunder with footsteps.

At last, Frankie kisses me on the forehead and takes a step back. He smiles. “Your wig’s crooked.”

“Oh no!” I blush, but Frankie just shakes his head.

“Cut it out, Nakano. You make a big deal of seeing the good in everything, but you’re a dunce if you can’t see how good you look tonight.”

He extends his hand then, but I don’t take it right away.

I suppose it’s true. I choose to see the bright side of any situation, no matter how dim. I saw the good in that God-awful train ride from California. I see the good in Topaz, despite the dust, the plumbing, and the cold. I even see the good in Frankie. This should be no different. I should be no different, and it should be easy, because as of tonight, I’ve decided to think of myself as gorgeous, and not once in my life have I been dim.

But if Frankie Fujita is right about something, he’s not going to hear it from me.

“I’m no dunce,” I say primly, taking his hand.

“I know.” Grinning, he walks me back to the dining hall, where the dance has gotten hotter and louder and more joyous. In the crowd, Twitchy and Stan are teaching Tommy some kind of complicated step pattern, and Keiko and Yum-yum are swinging together, skirts swirling out around them like flower petals. Seeing Frankie and me by the entrance, Shig beams and beckons us over. “There you are!”

I feel Frankie starting to slide out of my grasp, so I tighten my grip.

He raises an eyebrow. “I’m not on your dance card, Nakano.”

I lift my head proudly, crooked wig and all. “Forget the dance card!” I say, and, laughing, I pull him into the crowd.