"Death, Life, and Other Things We Ignore"
chapter 2: In Limbo

	“Who would have figured it?  The most religiously devoted 
of all of us wouldn’t be a crazy Christian.”

	It was that statement with the accompanying laugh that 
caused him to stop his prayer chant and raise his head.  Blinking 
a few times, he found himself looking into the smiling face of tan 
colored female with brown hair and brown eyes.  “Excuse me?” he had 
managed to stammer out in the face of another thing that was so 
strange in this strange land where he was to study for a year.

	“Well, you looked a little nervous about approaching the 
building.  That and you were chanting.  And you weren’t praying 
the rosary; I have enough Catholic friends to know what that sounds 
like, which isn’t really like chanting, come to think of it.  

	"Anyway,” the strange woman shook her head before finishing 
her explanation, “for all of our holier than thou attitudes, as a 
group Christians don’t pray nearly enough, and almost never in 
situations like this.”

	To this day, he wasn’t sure how he answered her.  Whatever 
he said had caused her to laugh again.  “Oh, I’m not nearly as scary 
as I look,” she’d replied.  Holding out her hand, she’d continued, 
“I’m Armenta MacDuff, one of the resident crazy Christians.”

	He had taken her hand to shake it, barely remembering to 
do this instead of bowing, and replied, “I am Mitsuru Ikeda.  It 
is nice to meet you.”

	That meeting had changed his life.  Suddenly, instead of 
a year of studying abroad, he was transferring to the American 
university.  Then he was engaged to Armenta, married to her, father 
of her child. It was a wild ride.  One that ended abruptly when he 
had to bury her.

	Armenta’s death had a way of making Mitsuru rethink life, 
and a way of making Mitsuru realize from what he had been running 
away.  For years Armenta had asked to see Japan or to learn a little 
more about his life there.  He’d always put her off.  First he would 
use the “they couldn’t afford to go” excuse.  Soon it was that they 
were just engaged.  Just married.  Then it was that Armenta was 
pregnant and couldn’t travel.  

	After awhile, the excuses became a little harder, but more 
real.  He’d said things like his family wouldn’t know what to make 
of Armenta and their daughter, so he should contact them first.  Or 
that he was adopted, so they really may be focusing more of their 
attention on their natural son.  Or that Armenta would not be 
comfortable in a Buddhist temple, at least not until she learned 
more about that faith.  

	Armenta had taken the last excuse pretty seriously.  When 
she died she had been halfway through a community college course 
on Buddhism.  A few days before she died, they’d had an interesting 
conversation of what went into running a temple.  At the end of the 
conversation she had said that their little Imani should learn 
little about Buddhism.  Not to practice it, of course, but to better 
understand her father’s background.  Not even a week after that and 
Mitsuru had had to learn all about Christian burial customs and 
funerals, as he had to plan Armenta’s.

	He had been thankful for both Armenta’s mother and his 
daughter.  Although he had hated to lean on either of them, they 
at least understood what the heck a “Homegoing” service was or 
that there needed to be food afterwards and a wake before.

	During much of the time after Armenta’s death, Mitsuru was 
in a fog.  Due to his beginnings in life, he was never quite 
comfortable in his own skin. It was always easier to take on some 
other persona or standing.  He’d done it with Armenta, taking her 
name and throwing himself into her circle of family and friends.  
He’d even done it at Greenwood in a way, through his relationship 
with Shinobu and later Hasukawa and Shun.  He was still an Ikeda 
at Greenwood, of course, but he rarely went back to the temple, 
and, with the exception of the scare involving his brother’s high 
school and some other assorted incidents, he wasn’t actively an 
Ikeda.

	Not that that particular train of thought made a lot of 
sense.  

	The problem with changing like a chameleon is that you 
were never sure what your core was.  He hadn’t worried about that 
much at Greenwood, because in high school most boys were pretty 
core-less.  He hadn’t worried about it with Armenta, because she 
had a pretty strong core of her own, and an extended family with 
a strong sense of itself.  Mitsuru had figured they would instill 
a core in Imani and he could go on as he was.  As he had been for 
years.  Then Armenta died and he gradually realized that he needed 
a core, because he was the one left with Imani.  Imani, who deserved 
a more stable existence, a stronger sense of self, than Mitsuru 
had himself.

	Before really thinking things through, he was suddenly 
arranging a trip home and planning to take Imani with him.  It 
meant adding two weeks to her “Easter vacation” and clearing a 
ton of things with the private school that Imani attended.

	He probably should have taken the time to clear a few 
things with Imani herself.

	His daughter had had an interesting reaction to the trip 
so far.  At nine years old, Imani hadn’t seen the trip as an 
adventure, but as something that ripped her from all things 
familiar.  She cried as they said goodbye to her grandparents 
and aunts at the airport.  She spoke very little on the way over.  
She seemed very uneasy about staying in the temple.  And she wanted 
to know if she was supposed to refer to the Ikedas as her 
grandparents.

	Mitsuru hadn’t known the answer to the last one himself.  
For the moment, he focused his daughter (and himself) on connecting 
with his Greenwood friends.  Lots of phone calls and emails later, 
Mitsuru had arranged for his daughter and himself to spend two nights 
in a hotel and four at the temple, with a meeting with his Greenwood 
friends in between.  Shinobu, Hasukawa, and Shun.  He had fallen 
out of contact with them when he transferred to the American 
university.  He wondered how they had changed since he had seen 
them last.  The phone calls gave him a few clues, but….

	  Maybe it was because his head was so much in the past, 
and so confused, that he didn’t notice his daughter’s dress or 
temperament right away.  As a nine year old female, Imani could 
obviously dress herself and Mitsuru had no idea what (if any) 
input he could add to the process.  That was probably why they 
were on the train, halfway to their destination, before he 
processed her clothing.  He had looked down at his seated daughter, 
trying to figure out how to explain her to his friends, and noticed 
she was in black.  Head to toe, black.  Was she fighting back on 
being forced to come on this trip?

	“I cannot believe that you chose to wear black today,” 
Mitsuru heard himself saying to his daughter, “I am not sure how 
I am going to explain that.”  That and a few other things.  
Although he saw his daughter as beautiful, his friends and his 
family – well the Ikedas – would see her as gaijin, strangely 
foreign.  The attire choice wouldn’t help dispel that image.

	His daughter looked up at him and sighed.  In disappointment?  
Maybe. What she replied was, “You know what today is, Daddy.  What 
else would I wear?”

	He knew what today was?  Was he forgetting some anniversary 
or something?  Or was it one of those Christian high holy days that 
he never seemed to remember?  It was a Friday.  Didn’t those things 
usually fall on Sundays?  He ran a hand through his hair, frustrated 
a little at trying to figure out the day.  When he looked back down 
at his daughter, he noticed something silver in her hand.  What in 
the world-?

	“Imani,” he said sharply, “from where did you get the nail?  
There is no way you carried that on the plane!”  Of this Mitsuru was 
sure, given the current world of airport security.  

	“Of course not,” his daughter answered.  “I found it in the 
hotel room.”

	“In the hotel-“ in his incredulousness over her answer, the 
high holy day that must be today finally settled on his brain.  Good 
Friday, the day some important figure died.  Crucified with nails.  
Imani and Armenta were both a little fanatical about that holiday.  
“Imani Shinobu MacDuff!  Tell me you did not break anything to get 
the nail.”  Given everything else, such destruction wouldn’t have 
surprised Mitsuru, even though destruction was not in Imani’s 
character.

	Imani ignored that point in favor of something she found 
more pressing.  “Daddy, since we are staying in…in…”

	Imani strange hang up about temples was beginning to annoy 
Mitsuru.  He was trying…to do a lot of things.  Imani was young.  
She was probably scared.  The idea of Buddhist temples was still 
very new to her.  But, if nothing else, didn’t she trust him?  “A 
temple, Imani.  We are staying in a temple.  You do not need to act 
as if I had exiled you to somewhere undesirable,” he answered his 
daughter, trying not to snap at her.

       “Okay, a temple.  Will there be a church nearby?  I mean, 
for Sunday,” she asked.

	‘Shit,’ Mitsuru thought to himself.  Now that he thought 
about it, that Friday holiday was a lead-in to a bigger Sunday 
holiday.  He even briefly remembered in high school how that 
Christian cult in the dorm had reacted to that big Sunday.   Not 
being in a church on that Sunday was probably not going to sit 
well with his daughter, “Now, Imani – “ he began, before she cut 
him off.

	“But we have to go to church on Sunday!  We have to go!” 
she interrupted her father.  She was obviously upset, because she 
usually didn’t interrupt him.  “Sunday is Easter!  I have to be in 
church on Easter Sunday!”

	‘Now what?’ Mitsuru thought to himself.  This whole trip 
was not gaining him any points with his daughter.  “Imani, will 
you at least try to compromise?”

	“But I am compromising, Daddy!  It’s Good Friday.  Good 
Friday and I’m not fasting and I’m not in church.  No, I’m halfway 
around the world with my father.  This is the first Good Friday, 
the first Easter Sunday without Momma and I – I – “

	Then his daughter burst into tears.

	Mitsuru had never handled crying women well.  What male 
ever did?  Tears were always even more painful when they came 
from someone he loved, regardless of gender.  It had torn at his 
heart when Sho had steamed and almost cried in front of him all 
those years ago.  When Armenta cried, Mitsuru wanted to rip out 
his heart.  But nothing – nothing - was worse than when Imani 
cried.  Since she was placed in his arms as a tiny newborn, 
Mitsuru felt he was supposed to protect her from the world.  
Her tears always meant failure in that task for him.  That, 
and he didn’t know how to comfort her.

	So, he patted her head as soothingly as he could.  He was 
hesitant, both because he didn’t know what he was doing, and because 
they were attracting attention.  Although he’d lived with loud and 
expressive Americans for at least at decade, some of what Armenta 
called his “Japanese reserve” stayed with him.  He didn’t hug people 
often.  He wasn’t a fan of scenes…although uncrazed female attention 
never bothered him.  It did bother Armenta, which was one of the 
reasons Mitsuru didn’t treat women now the way he treated them in 
high school.  Although, Valentine’s Day was not nearly as much of a 
problem in the States….

	It was that thought that snapped Mitsuru back to the present.  
As the train began to slow, he looked at the next station stop.  It 
was so odd how familiar it felt, given that he hadn’t gotten of at 
that stop since his first year after high school. “Imani, we are 
here,” he quietly told his daughter.

	That seemed to break through Imani’s crying.  Almost on 
auto-pilot, she took his hand, grabbed her nail, and followed him 
off the train.  He was a little worried that she still held the 
nail and that she didn’t wipe away her tears right away.  But 
walking down a mostly familiar street, he suddenly felt his past 
around him.  

	He’d probably deny it, if someone asked, but he had actually 
forgotten about Imani for a moment as he walked along to the place 
where he was going to meet his friends.  In a sense, they were his 
family as well.  In an odd way, they might mean even more to him 
than the Ikedas did.  Or, at least equally as much.  And he had no 
idea how his past would react to his present.

	Imani’s voice filtered into his ear. She had asked him a 
question that he didn’t hear, but he didn’t worry about it.  Walking 
inside the American transplant (how ironic of a meeting place was 
this?) he must have just pulled her in behind him.  He glanced 
around briefly and then headed for the seats, not really seeing 
anything.  It was when he saw them that he stopped.

	There they were.  The same, but different.  Shinobu, still 
clearly in charge.  Shun, still himself, laughing and smiling.  
Hasukawa…with his wife Miya, amazingly that continued to work out, 
flustered and arguing with Shinobu about something.  Shinobu could 
still push buttons, it seemed.

	And suddenly, Mitsuru MacDuff – or was it Ikeda Mitsuru – 
was afraid.  When a person changes like a chameleon, it was easy 
to become confused when two clashing colors were present at the 
same time.

- to be continued -