Jack finally notices his Japanese half-sister and shit goes crazy..
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My name is John Cameron, but my family and fireside name is Jack, and always has been, except for my Grandad, who invariably calls me Jacko, the same name as his scruffy, smelly Jack Russell. Was he trying to tell me something….?
When I was just over a year old, my parents separated, and my mother brought me back to England from Japan, where we’d lived. My father remained in Osaka, where he was Chief Consular something or other, some sort of senior diplomat with the Foreign & Commonwealth Office. He had no interest in coming back to England, he preferred to stay in Japan, and as I had zero interest in ever going back to Japan, especially to see or stay with a man I didn’t know at all, I never saw him again.
Not that I minded; I didn’t remember him at all, only the odd flash of recall when I saw a photo of him at home. My total connection with my father was limited to birthday cards, Christmas presents when I was younger, his payment of my school fees, and the (very) occasional phone call; he wasn’t what you would call the affectionate type. My mother was content to be his best friend, and vice versa, as being husband and wife was something neither one of them could manage to make work. As long-distance best friends their relationship seemed to work well, and both of them were quite happy with that state of affairs, as was I.
I grew up in a fairly large, comfortable house in Copthorne, in Shrewsbury, a small town on the River Severn in the Welsh border marches, a place of no real significance except that it’s the county town of Shropshire. My father paid for me to attend Shrewsbury School as a day-boy, one of the few local boys among a horde of trust-fund boarders.
My mother had the occasional boyfriend as I was growing up, but they left me alone, and I completely ignored them for the most part, an arrangement that suited all parties. As a result, I had no other significant male influence except my grandfather, my mother’s father, who lived in a huge 18th century former Rectory outside Oswestry, about 20 miles from Shrewsbury.
My father married a Japanese lady, Setsuko, not long after he and mother divorced, and about a year later they had a daughter, Teruko, which means ‘Shining Child’ apparently, and once in a while, (especially when she was younger) I would get exquisite little calligraphic birthday and Christmas cards from her, addressed to ‘Revered Elder Brother’ and even a couple of photographs of her over the years.
I could see why she was called ‘Shining Child’. She was very fair-skinned, not that pinkish ‘peaches & cream’ complexion that some Japanese and Korean girls have, more Caucasian, and she had fine, long, light hair, a dark honey-colour, not quite as fair as my father’s, and nothing like mine, which is deep brown, like my mother’s. Taken with her big jet-black eyes, she looked quite arresting, a pretty little kid all around. Her features obviously favoured her mother, as I could see no immediate resemblance between her and my father or myself.
When I was 18, I managed to pass all my A-Level examinations, and applied to university. I wanted to study Mechanical Engineering at Manchester or Imperial College, London, so I dutifully filled in all my applications and sent them off for processing. I had already applied for funding, so I wasn’t going to ask my father; he’d stopped supporting me on my 18th birthday, which was all fine and according to the agreement he and mum had made when they first separated, and it didn’t seem fair to put the arm on him again.
Now that my finals were over, I had a large chunk of the summer recess to kill, and mother suggested I take a few days and go away somewhere, maybe Ayia Napa or Rimini, or maybe Mykonos, go and party, and blow off some post-exam steam. So I went to Rimini with a bunch of school friends, drank a huge amount, and lost weight through partying excessively round the clock.
I arrived back home a week later, oozing alcohol from every pore, to terrible news.
My father and Setsuko had been involved in a car accident in Osaka the day before, they both died in the crash, and mum, and I were listed as next of kin. Teruko was only 15, and as her sole relative, I was requested by the British Consulate in Osaka to come and retrieve her.
I arrived in Osaka after a flight lasting almost 14 hours, to find an aide from the British Consul-General and an official from the office of the Shusho, the Prime Minister, waiting for me. It was a courtesy, really, for the consular aide to be there. My father had been killed while he was on personal travel, on holiday for a few days with his family.
Apparently, they were on their way to collect Teruko from boarding school when the accident happened. As he was off the diplomatic reservation, the Consulate were not able to sign any of the police documentation because he was on leave when he died, hence my presence.
The Japanese government, however, were falling over themselves to ease the way for me. It wouldn’t look at all good in the international press to have it known that a senior British diplomat had been killed by a Japanese national, hence the Prime Minister’s aide.
He spent what seemed like an inordinate time apologising for the circumstances leading to the death of my father and his wife, in quite perfect, ‘received-pronunciation’ English. I put him at his ease, assuring him that I didn’t blame him, the Prime Minister, The Emperor, the Japanese people, Mothra, Rodan, or Godzilla; it was a simple, tragic accident, and that these things happen. It seemed to be the only way to calm him down and basically get rid of him.
After the usual courtesies and condolences, the Consular aide got down to my reason for being there.
“I’ll be taking you to see your sister, Mr. Cameron” he told me. “When we heard what had happened, the Consul and his wife picked her up from school and broke the news to her about the accident; she’s staying with the Consul and his family, so I’ll take you there now; I’m sorry, I really don’t envy you right now. Have you met your sister before?”
I had to confess, I only had a couple of old photos of her, taken when she was nine or ten, so I really had no idea what she was like or how she’d react to me.
When we arrived at the Consul’s residence, the British Consul himself, a Mr. Simpson, was waiting for me; he was obviously aware that father had passed away, but so far he’d only told Teruko that they’d been involved in an accident, but hadn’t told her the worst part yet; he thought news like that should come from a family member. After some desultory small talk and passing of condolences, he asked me if I would like to meet her. I assented, and he went into the hallway and called out in Japanese, “Teruko, can you come here please?”
After a few seconds wait, I saw a slight figure coming down the stairs accompanied by an older woman, probably the Consul’s wife.
When she came into the room, I got my first look at my little sister. She was smaller than I expected for a 15 year-old schoolgirl; 5’2″ or so, slim and elfin, with tiny little hands and big, dark, almond eyes, and that vivid, honey-coloured hair, cascading down almost to the small of her back. She looked exquisite, like a porcelain doll. I was a little unsure how to greet her, or whether she spoke any English; did I hug her, kiss her cheek, or just shake hands?
When she saw me her eyes widened, so she obviously recognised me from my photos, and she stopped and smiled hesitantly, before bowing. She then said something formally, almost ritualistically, and I looked helplessly at the Consul for help.
“She said ‘Hello, greetings to revered Elder Brother'” said Mr. Simpson softly. I nodded my thanks to him.
“Teruko, please, be seated, I have very sad news,” and the consul translated for me again. Her eyes got even bigger, and tears began to well up, so I gave her my handkerchief.
“Your mother and my, our, father died of their injuries, I am so sorry” and once again he translated. Her little face crumpled, and tears rolled down her cheeks. I offered her my arm, and she pulled herself into me, crying silently, sobs wracking her slight frame as I held her to me and patted her gently, not sure how to deal with grief like this.
For all I knew, I was now her sole family, and while it was my duty to look after her, I was concerned about dragging her to England when all she knew was Japan. I looked over at Simpson.
“What happens to her now, does she have grandparents or family she could perhaps live with here, rather than me uprooting her to a foreign country?” I asked him, and he gently questioned her once she had calmed down and composed herself a little.
” Teruko, where are your grandparents?”
She looked alarmed, and started talking rapidly.
I sat there while she rattled on, Mr. Simpson’s face becoming more and more sombre, until she’d finished, more tears rolling down her cheeks.
“Jack, she can’t go to her grandparents. What she said was, she can’t live with them, because she’s mixed-race, and because racial purity is so important to Japanese people, she’s effectively an outcast, she has no place in their family, and they can’t, or won’t look after her; it would dishonour them, she’s frightened of what they would do to her, and she asks, no, begs that you, her ‘Revered Elder Brother’ now look after her.
I was appalled; I’d never heard anything so medieval and ridiculous. I thought for a second.
“Mr. Simpson, I need to talk to my mother. Obviously I can’t leave her here by herself. How difficult would it be to get a visa for her to travel to the UK with me?”
He smiled.
“There’s no problem, your father registered her as a British Citizen when she was born, I’ll arrange for a passport to be issued to her, she could go with you as early as tomorrow if it came to it; in fact, I could compel you to take her by appointing you her guardian pro-tem; technically, she’s a British Citizen and a minor in distress and you are her next of kin, but I don’t think it will come to that; will it?” he asked me searchingly.