“Perhaps,” said Keiko, placing her clothes back on her shelf.
Emi coughed again, her lungs rattling, and shook her head in disgust as she watched her mother try to occupy her time. “If I hadn’t fallen ill, we would already be back in Japan. Instead we are in a women’s correctional facility in awful Texas.”
“Internment camp,” her mother corrected her.
“The irony of that term!” Emi exclaimed, pushing her own unfolded clothes onto the floor. “Camp. Like someone would choose to be here so they might do a spot of canoeing.”
“Emi, quiet down,” said Keiko. “You’re not well yet. Listen to your voice. You don’t even sound like yourself. And this acting out. It’s not like you, either.”
“I heard you,” said Emi, her face defiant. “You thought I was asleep, but I heard you speaking to the woman next door. Setsuko something. She said that this camp, Seagoville, used to be a minimum-security federal prison. Then they just ripped down that sign and replaced it with one that said internment camp. So technically, we’re being jailed. We are in a prison.”
“Emi, you should be onstage. Truly,” said Keiko, shaking her head at her child. “Are you really sick, or have you just been pretending to sleep for two weeks so you can eavesdrop on my conversations?”
“Why are there so many women from South America?” Emi asked, ignoring her mother’s criticism. “Setsuko said she was from Peru. Why are they interned? It sounds like they weren’t even in this country until a few weeks ago.”
“They’re going to exchange them for Americans in Japan,” said Keiko. “They all will be sailing to Japan, too. Probably with us.”
“But that’s quite odd, isn’t it?” said Emi. “They don’t even live in America. Why should they be punished because the United States and Japan are at war?”
Keiko motioned for her daughter to move over in her little bed and sat down next to her, straightening her thin pillows.
“I don’t know,” said Keiko. “I really don’t understand a thing of all this. But we are here now and what’s important is that you’re healthier. We just have to endure, Emi. We will be home very soon.”
“Endure,” spat Emi. “We have to endure because the Americans are afraid we’ll turn into spies. Dangerous dragon women.”
“Enough, Emi!” said her mother sternly, standing up and leaving her daughter alone in the room.
Emi spent the next few months at Seagoville trying to get her strength back: forcing herself to go on long walks around the camp, eating all the meals—as unappetizing as they were—and adapting to the Texas heat.
She had started to resign herself to the fact that they might be stuck in Seagoville for more than a few months, and though she remained guarded and sullen, she fell into the routine of the camp—the constant roll calls, the hours spent with her eyes closed, the ability to tolerate boredom.
“Your daughter has fence sickness,” she had heard her mother’s neighbor, and now friend, Setsuko say one morning. “Outside of camp, we would call it depression. Have you noticed how she barely eats? She’s even thinner than when she arrived. She doesn’t participate in any of the activities or sports; she just stays here and sleeps or wanders around the periphery of the camp alone. You should be more concerned, Keiko,” Setsuko advised.
“I’ve tried to encourage different behavior,” her mother had said, “but she refuses. In here, she wants to be a ghost. I’m just happy that she’s healthy again, so I let her. Maybe I’m being too tolerant.”
“You are,” said Setsuko, slowly closing the door. “The depression could stay with her longer than she’s in here.”
Emi grumbled and turned around in bed, her eyes still shut. She wouldn’t be depressed when she left the hell she’d been placed in. She would be herself again. But until then, living as a ghost suited her just fine.
In March 1943, when the heat of Texas was starting to fire up again, Emi and her mother were woken up by an INS patrol guard. He came into their room, which they were sure was forbidden for male guards. The very young agent was wearing his beige uniform with pride and holding a clipboard against his thin chest in a commanding way.
“Is this the room of . . . I mean are you . . . ?”
“Yes?” said Keiko, coming toward the door of their small room, a blanket held over her nightgown.
“Are you Keiko Kato?” he asked, pronouncing both her first and last name incorrectly.
“Yes, I am,” she replied politely. “I’m Keiko Kato and this is my daughter, Emiko Kato,” she said smiling at Emi, still in bed. “Is there something wrong?”
“Nothing wrong,” he said, moving back to the door frame when he saw that the floor near Emi’s bed was covered in her clothes, including a slip. “Just here to report that you’re both being transferred,” he said looking down at his sheet.
“To Japan?” asked Emi excitedly. “Finally!” She sat up in bed, not caring if the guard saw her in her nightgown.
“No. To Crystal City,” he clarified. “New camp just built ’bout six hours southwest. Right on the Mexican border. Bet you can even see the line from there.”
“I don’t think it’s an actual li—”
“But why on earth?” said Keiko, silencing her insolent daughter and walking over to the man, dropping the blanket on the floor. “We’ve been here for seven months already. Why move us now? Surely we will be heading to Japan soon.”
“All the families with children are being transferred to that camp. Built specially as a family camp and it just opened up to the Japanese. There’ve been Germans there a few months now.” He looked down at his clipboard and pointed. “Says here that you, Keiko Kato, have a child named Emiko Kato, age one. That you?” he asked looking at Emi.
“Do I look like I’m one?” she said angrily. “I’m twenty-one.”
“Right,” he said reading his paperwork again, rearranging the pages. “Still looks like you’re going. This comes from Washington so there’s no reason to argue. When it comes from up high, it’s like the word of God.”
“But when are we going to Japan?” Emi asked her mother, ignoring the man she had deemed a buffoon the moment he started to speak. “We’ve been here for so long. I don’t want to go to yet another camp. I want to go home!”
“You might like it better there,” the guard said, his voice high and friendly. “Crystal City. I heard they built a swimming pool. For everyone,” he added.
“She loves to swim,” Keiko said quickly, looking at Emi to make sure she wasn’t going to reply. “And when will we be transferred?”
“Today,” said the guard, looking confused. “That’s why I’m here. You weren’t gathered in the mess hall where you’re supposed to be, so I was sent here to see why. You and the other families leave on the buses in an hour.” He looked at the Katos’ confused faces and said, “Am I the first one to tell you?”