Sister – a man
In the first summer, after my sister moved to Tokyo, she came back to visit home for the Bon festival week. She had lost some weight, and her well-shaped, bare legs in shorts looked longer. Her chin-length hair was permed and dyed to brown. Her make-up accentuated her already long-lashed eyes and wide mouth. She looked beautiful in a very loud way. She exuded confidence, which intimidated me. She told me she was seeing a man. He lived in Tokyo, but they met through high school friends from the church.
The reverend of the church abutting to my sister’s high school was a progressive person from Osaka. He also covered the church in my hometown, and I was learning English from him. One of the “community work” he did was to provide space for local youth to socialize and play music. Students in the city formed bands, holding an annual concert at the church. The concert was held on the Emperor’s Birthday holiday because one of the show’s agenda was to oppose the Japanese monarchy. The monarchy was sabotaging the equitable society, as the reverend once told me. Another purpose was to provide youth the opportunity to express themselves because the school system did not allow it. My sister played the bass guitar for a girls’ band that performed at the concert. There was a camaraderie among the students, and she made friends outside her school.
There was a man she had a crush on, the frontman in a boys’ band. I remembered she even baked a pumpkin pie for this man. But the man she was seeing in Tokyo was not the frontman but the drummer of the same band. In the photos, he looked short, pale, and scrawny, lethargic-looking man, and the idea of him with my sister didn’t just add up but rather revolting. She told me that a relationship with a man included “licking,” and I felt disgusted towards her and her feeble boyfriend.