“You came to us when you were still really young. I can't remember exactly when, but I was young myself, I couldn't have been more than three or four.”
Andrea nods. “I was brought here from Osaka when I was eighteen months old. The Japanese government was pissed, but since I was brought over on an American passport by agents of my biological father, there was little they could do. I'm an American citizen after all, with a birth certificate from the State of Louisiana even. But that's beside the point. What do you remember about my mother?”
I shake my head. I was so little. “Nothing. I mean, I know some rumors, but I personally remember almost nothing. I know she had an affair with Peter, obviously, but other than rumors, I can't say.”
Andrea nods. “I remember almost nothing, too. My grandmother got to send me a few packages when I was smaller, and before my grandparents died, I got a few things. In my room at the house, I have a picture of my mother, back in '94 before she had me, maybe before she met Peter, I'm not sure. She's wearing her student chef's whites, and posing in front of Emeril Legasse's restaurant. In the photo she's throwing up a peace sign of course, since that's something Japanese people often do when they get their pictures taken. She looked so excited and happy, and it was from wanting to read the letters from my grandmother about my mother that led to my own studies of Japanese. But what really drove me was trying to figure out who she was, and why she died.”
“What happened?” I asked. “I mean, I heard she committed suicide.”
“That's what the official story is, and after the arguments that she had with my grandmother and grandfather, it's a pretty reasonable story,” Andrea says painfully. “My grandmother wrote about her eternal shame and regret that she and my mother argued about her affair with Peter the night before she died, and that she said that I shamed the family. Then there was the note that they found in my mother's dress, tucked into the belt, where she said that she could no longer live with the same.”
“You said official story. There's something more?” I ask, and Andrea nods. “Tell me, please.”
“Peter was involved. I mean, besides the fact that I was kidnapped out of Japan and brought here, he was involved. I've never been able to prove that he had a direct hand in my mother's suicide beyond a phone call where he basically told her that she was outta luck, but I have my suspicions. What I do know is that my mother's death wasn't a suicide.”
“How?” I ask, and realize I may sound like I'm doubting her. “I mean, how'd it happen?”
“Security camera footage showed two men visiting the apartment building where my mother and I lived. It took me a very long time and a lot of connections to obtain it. Later, both men were busted by the cops on an unrelated charge, but what was interesting was that the handwriting of one of the men perfectly matched the handwriting used in my mother's suicide note. Even the grammar and word choice was the same. My mother spoke and wrote in the Kanto-style dialect of Japanese, and from some of her earlier school writings that my grandmother sent me, she had pretty, almost dainty writing. The note was written in a heavy, sloppy hand, and was written in Kansai-ben, the Osaka style of Japanese. The differences are small to foreigners, like using ore instead of watakushi to refer to herself, but I really applied myself with my language studies... there's no way that Aiko Mori wrote that note.”
I gawk, and Andrea nods. “Yeah. So you see why I've got a sword to grind against Peter DeLaCoeur as well. For the past six years, I've been pretty much doing the same thing Katrina was, gathering information. I was just looking to finish my MBA before taking him down. When I heard about what you were up to, I approached Nathan when he came back by himself today. He told me where to find you.”
I should be pissed that she's kept this secret from me for so long, but I'm not. Instead, another question comes to mind. “So why have you called me oniichan for most of my life, if you hate the family so much?” The Japanese term for older brother is probably only one of maybe five Japanese words I know. However, I know I'm the only person Andrea uses familial Japanese terms with. Peter hates it when she speaks Japanese since he doesn't understand it and never bothered to learn any, and Andrea would never call Margaret her mother in any language.