The woman met Toshio’s smile with a bewildered look. Though her porcelain features made her appear to be younger than Toshio, her hair, tied in a loose knot at her nape, shared the color of the single strand of white freshwater pearls shewore around her neck. “I’m so sorry. I made a mistake. I thought that the line outside was for the ramen restaurant.”
“It is,” Toshio said.
The woman glanced around the room. “This is the restaurant?”
“No. This is my pawnshop.”
“Is the restaurant upstairs?”
Toshio shook his head. “It is not.”
A wrinkle deepened across the woman’s handsome forehead.
“You must be tired from standing in line this whole time. Perhaps you’d like to sit for a while?” Toshio gestured to a low table surrounded by a set of silk floor cushions in a corner of the room.
The woman tilted her chin and touched her thin lips. “I…I could have sworn that this was the restaurant. I watched the man in line in front of me walk through its door. I saw tables and chairs and…” She dipped her head in a small bow. “I am sorry for bothering you.”
“There is no need to apologize. May I offer you something to drink? Some tea?”
“Thank you, but I—”
“Please, I insist. It is no trouble at all.” Toshio walked out from behind the counter and called over his shoulder, “Hana? Will you bring out some tea? We have a guest.”
—
Hana shut the record book and stood up from a desk that had once belonged to her mother. She knew her cue as well as she knew the single thought presently rolling around the woman’s mind.
Tea.At this point in their conversation with her father, allclients pondered the same thing. It was a simple thought, small and as light as air, without any sharp edges they could cut themselves on. They had all drunk tea before and remembered how it washed over their tongues, slipped down their throats, and warmed their souls. No harm had ever come from a cup of tea, and they could not think of a single reason to refuse the pawnshop owner’s kind offer. If anything, it would be impolite to say no, seeing as they had been the ones who had mistakenly wandered into his shop. They tried to remember where they had been headed in the first place, but the most they could recall was feeling a cold emptiness in their stomachs. Tea could soothe that. Perhaps it was tea that they had been standing in line for all along. Hana filled a kettle with water and set it on the stove.
“Tea would be nice.” The woman nodded with a smile.
“Wonderful. My name is Ishikawa Toshio.” He gestured to a floor cushion. “Please, have a seat.”
“Thank you.” The woman settled onto a cushion that was the same shade of gray as the day outside. “I am Takeda Izumi.”
“Thank you for choosing to visit us today, Takeda-sama. I am certain that you will find that we make very fair, if not generous, offers at this pawnshop.”
“But I’m not here to…” Izumi rolled a pearl from her necklace between her forefinger and thumb, her brow furrowed as though she were rummaging through drawers inside her head, trying to find what she had meant to say next.
Hana carried over their tea on a black lacquer tray.
“Hana, this is Takeda-sama,” Toshio said.
Hana bowed. “Welcome to our pawnshop. Please enjoy your tea,” she said, setting the tray on the table.
Izumi turned to Toshio as Hana took her leave. “You have a lovely daughter, Ishikawa-san.”
“Thank you. She takes after her…” Toshio banished his next words with a stiff smile.
He anchored his eyes on their tea and poured it into small clay bowls. The bowls were the color of the calmest sea, but cracks of varying sizes crawled over their glaze. If not for the kintsugi technique used to repair them, they would have fallen apart. Gold dust and lacquer filled the cracks, streaking over the bowls like lightning.
“Those are exquisite,” Izumi said, admiring the bowls.
“Thank you. I was rather upset with myself for tripping and dropping them, but in this instance, I will admit that I am grateful for my clumsiness.” Toshio handed Izumi her tea. “Broken things have a unique kind of beauty, don’t you think?”
Izumi traced the bowl’s delicate gold joinery with the tip of a perfectly manicured finger. “Some things wear their damage better than others,” she said softly, so softly it was as if she were worried that her voice might shatter the bowl.
“I have found beauty in all manner of broken things. Chairs. Buildings. People.”
