Peaceful Circumstances is the story of Karen, a twenty-one-year-old white woman from Los Angeles. Sitting beside the hospital bed of her father, who is in a coma, she is convinced that he can hear her; so, over a single night, she tells him what happened to her during the past nine months that she has spent in Tokyo.

–It’s about Anpo. The Zengakuren, that’s the student movement, is getting more active because the Japanese government is repressing any opposition.

–What’s Anpo, Eric?

–Jesus, Karen.

–I did study American history, you know, Eric.  I did a term paper in my freshman year on the Marshall Plan.

–Well, this is a little different from the Marshall Plan.  Anpo is the security treaty between Japan and the U.S.  Without that America couldn’t keep up the war in Vietnam.  America needs the money and support of the Japanese, the bases, the R&R.

–No, Eric, the R&R guys go to Korea and Taiwan where the girls are cheaper.  Your Uncle Sam likes to save money when he can.  Emi has interviewed some of the girls there.

–Where is Emi, Hiro?

–I was separated from her at the demo.  She’s one of our leaders.  We’re meeting up later in Shinjuku.  Want to join us?

–Yeah, sure.  I’ve got to be back at Zama by 10:00, though.

–What about you, Karen?

–Yeah, I guess so.  If Eric’s going.

Hiro gulped his tea down and put his shirt back on.

–Can I leave my gevabo and helmet here?

–The gevabo is his stick.

–Yeah, I get that much, Eric.  Sure, why not?

–Thanks a lot, Karen.  Thanks, Eric.  See you both tonight.  You know where to go, don’t you Eric?  Mecca.  Same place as before.

–Yeah, the coffee shop.  We’ll be there at about 6:30 or thereabouts.

–Great.  See you.

After Hiro left I could see that Eric was restless.  He stood in the corner by the window looking down on the street and shaking his head.

–What’s the matter, Eric?

–I don’t know.  Things are going to come to a head.  I kind of feel it in my bones.

–What things?  What do you mean?

–Things at the base and in Japan.  Some of our guys are being shipped out already.

–To Vietnam?

–Yeah.  They’re scared shitless, at least the ones I know, but there’s nothing they can do.

–Maybe the war will be over soon.  They’ll be all right.

–Fat chance of that, Karen.  Over soon, that’s a good one.  How many Viet Cong are they going to kill before we call it quits?

We sat down on the tatami.  He stretched his legs out and laid his head in my lap.  I felt so much that I wanted to put my hand on his head and stroke his hair, daddy, but I didn’t.

–You’ll have to go too, won’t you?

–Do you want me to?

He half sat up, turned his head toward me, looked into my eyes and repeated his question.

–No.

He sat up and crossed his legs.  His knees were touching mine.  He took both my hands in his and brought them to his lips.  I could see tears welling in his eyes.

–What is it, Eric?

–I don’t know.  I didn’t expect this to happen.

–What to happen?

–Meeting you.   Maybe having met you is making it harder for me to accept the fact that I … I mean, uh, before now, I think I could have gotten myself to …

Tears were now streaming down his cheeks.  He clamped his lips shut and held my fingers against them.  Two or three tears dropped onto the back of my hands.  I should have taken him in my arms, daddy.  God knows I wanted to.  But something was holding me back, maybe something about me being white and him being black.

–This is ridiculous.  Soldiers aren’t supposed to blubber like this, especially before they even know if they’re going to be sent to war.

–You’re brave, that’s why you’re crying.

–Brave?  Is stealing away from the base at every chance I get brave?  Is preferring to spend time with Japanese who hate what we Americans are doing brave?  And what if I’m given the order to go to Vietnam?  It’s bound to happen.  Is it brave to bite the bullet and go and kill innocent people, people who have no grievance with us and who just want to be left alone in their own country?  What’s brave, that’s what I’d like to know.

It was the first time for me that anything to do with politics had a connection with a real person I knew … or with me.  Before then it had just been discussions and arguments about different ideas, what Prof. Cromwell called “scenarios.”  I put my arms around Eric, daddy, and drew him close to me, right up against my breasts.  I wanted to protect him.  He kissed me, and the most exquisite sensation of warmth poured all over my skin.  He was the one who broke the kiss.  I didn’t want it to end.

–What’s the matter, Eric?  I’m sorry.

–No, I’m sorry.  Man, I am so so sorry.

–Why?

–Because you have no idea what you’re getting yourself into.  No idea.  This whole thing is way above my head, above all our heads.  It’s like a flood that’s coming.  I don’t want you to drown in it too.  I don’t want to pull you under.

–Look, I’m not a child.   My decisions, if I take them, are my own.

–Are they?  What about your father?

–He’s not here, is he?

⁂

    That’s what I said, daddy.  That’s what came out.  I want you to know that.  I knew how furious you would be with me, kissing a Negro and not only a Negro but a soldier “bent on cowardice, like those hippies who throw flowers in cops’ faces and think it’s funny.”  Oh, I remember your every word.  Each and every one of those words was branded by you on the surface of my brain.  “The world is an evil place, Karen … the world is full of traps … and there are people in the world, many people, who envy and hate us, don’t you forget that, Karen, they despise us for what we have achieved … your mother and I always wanted what was best for you … your mother and I wanted to shield you so that you could go through life without having to meet up with evil, with traps set by people who will exude goodwill but harbor evil toward you.  They are out there, Karen, everywhere you will go when you leave this country.  Envy and hatred will appear to you in benign guises, but behind those guises is venom, Karen, venom that, once inside you, can poison your free will.  Up till now we have shielded you from that venom.  We don’t want it to get inside you.”

Venom, daddy?  How does it get inside me?  In the saliva from a Negro’s mouth?  Is it rubbed by black hands into my soft white flesh like lotion?  Or is it words, daddy, words that refute what you say and call it a pack of lies, words that cause the red and black brands you burnt into the surface of my brain to turn gray and fade away?  Is it sights of another place, a place that, in time, starts to look normal, though it is so completely different from anything a girl has seen before?  Or is the vapor of a venom carried through the air that you breathe with other people who are not at all like you, and suddenly your life is affected and you cannot distinguish your fate from theirs … their life from day to day has become inextricably interwoven with yours, and though they are total strangers, their blood comes to mean more to you than that of your “own people.”  That venom is blood, daddy.  That’s what it is.  It’s blood!  Mixed blood!

Copyright Roger Pulvers, courtesy of Balestier Press.

About the Author

Roger Pulvers, acclaimed author, playwright, theatre and film director, translator and journalist, has published more than fifty books in Japanese and English. He was assistant to director Oshima Nagisa on the film “Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence,” and has directed the film version of his novel Star Sand. Awards include the Miyazawa Kenji Prize in 2008 and the Noma Award for the Translation of Japanese Literature in 2013; in 2018, the Order of the Rising Sun; and in 2019, the Order of Australia. His other books include: