Southland

by Nina Revoyr

He stood back and felt no tears, just a slow, rumbling anger, a fast- sinking sorrow, a hard pride that his father’s face showed no signs of fear or pain; that he’d been strong and impassive to the end.

Frank and his friends were such great American soldiers, ironically, because they were Japanese—because of their sense of duty, and integrity, and faith in each other. Because they knew that somebody always had their back; that if they got hit, their brothers would come in after them. Because the worst thing that they could imagine wasn’t death, or injury, or permanent disfigurement, but bringing shame upon their families. For the sake of their families, they would never be less than heroes.

To his right, Frank saw Tim Nakagawa go down without a sound, brains exploding, slow-motion and almost pretty, out into the smoke-filled air.

They moved on, slowly, from tree to tree, firing forward, behind, to the right, to the left, talking to each other all the time: You got it, man. You’re golden.

The year before, at Union Station, she had watched the Yamamotos meet the coffin of their only son.

“It’s worth a lot more than that, Mr. Larabie.” “I want you to own it, son. Can’t put no price on that.” And so although the Sakais had lost so much, something, too, was given.

And because of the store, the children, the company of people—even without surgery or minor amputation—his gangrened heart was beginning to heal, the grayed flesh to beat again with color and life.

And Alma was nervous—because of her son’s flirtation with the law, but also because of the start of the larger romance it might imply.

If you didn’t make them work, let them run, provide them with structure, they grew restless and bored and destructive.

She’d seen wide-eyed kids worn down into nothing. And she’d seen other kids turn, like milk, into something sour and spoiled, the change sudden, final, complete.

Increasingly, the parents of Curtis’s friends were unemployed, or barely making it, or vanishing altogether, and he needed to see adults with steady jobs. Both of his parents worked. Both had respectable jobs. He had two good examples. He was lucky.

Thomas picked up a mug of coffee; it left a luminous ring on his desk.

Had to work ten times as hard as the white cops to get any kind of respect. And then the recognition was grudging, you know, like we were a necessary evil.

Listening to herself cut, edit, censor, distort, she wondered why she wasn’t telling the truth. There were plenty of things she didn’t share with her girlfriend, but those were just silences, acts of omission. This was a flat-out lie.

He saw how she looked at her son with worry, and with a love so intense it was almost crushing. And he saw how the boy wanted so much to please her, and how impossible she was to live up to.

He thought of Europe again, the place he’d been allowed, no, instructed to kill. And he wondered, not for the first time since he’d come back to the States, if he’d defeated or even recognized the enemy.

What struck her immediately was that the coffee shop was filled mostly with old people, about equal numbers Asian and black. She had seen gatherings of elderly Asian people; she’d seen gatherings of elderly blacks; but never before had she seen the two in one place.

Suddenly she felt a rush of anger—why didn’t her mother want Jackie to see the place that her grandfather loved? Why would she deny her daughter this connection to her past? How many other things— stories, people, places, histories—had Rose denied her daughter?

and she saw, like a ghost that hovered behind him, the texture and shape of his loss.

And she remembered the abyss that had opened in his eyes, a yawning space that couldn’t take in any light. Curtis and David and eventually her brother had fallen into that abyss, and were consumed there.

Jackie felt, once again, as she sat hunched in the passenger seat, like a visitor in someone else’s grief.

There was something about the way he sauntered back to the one empty desk, shoes sliding deliciously across the linoleum, that made Angela know that this most serious of boys didn’t take himself too seriously. And his physical presence—the beautiful, tapered, long-fingered hands; the close-cropped, alwaysmoving head; the slim graceful waist that drew her eyes down and down—was almost more than she could bear.

He had her, he had the boys, he had track and the store. He had his mother, whom he loved fiercely, and who always had his back. All of these elements made up the universe for him, which Angela gladly entered. There was no one else like him, the mischievous, beautiful, always-tender man of a boy. And he was hers, he was hers, he was hers.

And as she stood there facing the old wooden storefronts, bits of memory fell into some prepared, waiting place, and something in her mind clicked and whirred.

Rebecca was stubbornly single, and as much as she liked to talk about people, check them out, catalog and flirt with them, she didn’t follow up on these looks and flirtations, they were like window-shopping for her, a hobby totally removed from the real task of finding and loving someone. And that she had not been able to do. Jackie wondered, suddenly, who Rebecca was beneath her cauterized, careful exterior. She had the disconcerting feeling that she knew less of Rebecca than Rebecca did of her.

By keeping so much to herself, by having this secret, private storehouse of her own memories and thoughts, she kept Laura outside of her, and made herself safe.

What a brilliant capitalist organization the Girl Scouts of America was.

So after setting up a coffee date for the following week, getting the cards from the funeral, and lugging the bowling ball and box out to the car, Jackie drove back up to Fairfax, singing all the way, happier than she’d been in forever.

When Mr. Martindale yelled at him—Jimmy had seen this—Curtis would just shut down, become unreachable. This impassivity only seemed to make his father even angrier; he never yelled at Cory that way, even though Cory did so much more to warrant scolding.

“Say something, nigger!” But Curtis still did not respond. Lawson’s face grew redder and his lips pulled back into a snarl. “You fucking smart-ass coon,” he said. “You think you’re too fucking good to talk to me?” Then he let go of the shirt just as he pulled his fist back;

Her family watching the news to track its progress and destruction, knowing they weren’t going anywhere. Except. Except this storm was personal—it burned buildings and dragged people out of cars. Except this storm recruited, maybe boys that Lois knew. Lois understood the rage, or thought she did, but not the way it was playing out. The problem wasn’t just the lack of jobs, the hunger. It was, as the Yellow Brotherhood always complained, the sense that people were being threatened, watched— even her, even her sister.

He took four big steps, swung the ball back higher than before, leaned forward, and let it go. It hit the wood so hard that Jackie thought it might break through the floor. Then it bounced, and barreled home, and smashed into the pins. They broke violently and flew over the edge. Not one was left standing. Hirano remained where he was, staring down the lane.

And she noticed, now, that while a few of the children were black and Latino, most of them were Asian. Largely East Asian, Korean and Chinese, a few others who looked Thai or Filipino.

The swarms of children looked to Jackie like a deep, slow river, which she wanted, now, to enter and be a part of, but which she needed just as deeply to avoid.

Her body was tightened, taut, and despite the dress and the tree and the sunshine, Frank could see in her the trap ready to spring, the lit fuse, the coiled tension.

Old Man Larabie turned toward the doorway, as if the girl might still be standing there.

She, on the other hand, feared she revealed too much. She thought by showing Frank the result of her need and fury, she was giving him the narrative behind it. But he met her halfway; he let her empty herself with him, and for this she was grateful and loved him. Each of them thought that the other was stronger. Only he was right.

The body of the city itself was at a virtual standstill—but within it, the cells rampaged freely, cancerous with life.

But the memories made her feel connected to something again, and it was more a reclamation than a loss.

And she knew, for the first time—and finally, with this person—that in surrendering herself, she would also, somehow, be given herself in return—stronger, newer, and complete.