When Emi had been walking uphill for nearly four hours, she passed by a shrine with stone foxes guarding the entrance. About a half mile later, she saw only farmhouses in the distance. Her body feeling frozen solid, she waved down a truck on the road, which pulled over. She asked the elderly man driving it for a ride to Kazuko Takahashi’s house, the only landmark she knew of in the area. To her relief, the driver, who lived on a farm nearby, knew the house.
He dropped her in front of it, the rusted door of his truck creaking as Emi jumped out. She looked at the small wooden house—the roof covered in a snow that hadn’t made it down the mountain to town, thick blankets draped over the windows from the inside. She considered knocking but thought, the fewer people who had seen her near the German’s farm, the better.
Evgeni had said that the fence was visible from the Takahashi house. Looking around, Emi could see nothing but wild grass, frozen on the ends, and farmland, still retaining the square shapes it had been bundled and tamed into. She moved around the house until it was several yards behind her, and looked again, toward the dying daylight. She thought she saw something metal glinting in the orange sun and ran in its direction until she was out of breath.
A hundred yards, then two hundred, five hundred, before suddenly she saw it. Barbed wire, coiled like it had been above the fences in Crystal City. It looked like it went on for a couple of miles, at the top of a meticulously built fence. It wasn’t the style of low wooden fence that was used to pen animals in Karuizawa, made from long split logs. These were made with horizontal wires, attached to heavy wooden posts. The wires were taut and about four inches apart. It looked to Emi, even from a fair distance, impenetrable.
Moving closer to a line of trees, Emi thought of Drexel’s hand on her back at the party, of Leo being taunted in the chemistry room, of the destruction of Vienna during Kristallnacht, and of Jiro Mori, so weak that he could barely find his words, and she kept walking toward the farm. A hundred yards away she spotted dozens of chickens, and goats, and though she couldn’t see them, she could hear the grunting of pigs. When she noticed a guard making his way around a corner, near the large barn, she rushed back behind the trees. She waited until he was close enough to her so that she could see his face and confirm that he was German. Then she stayed hidden until he was around the other side of the building, as she tried to muster the courage to get closer. The chickens were moving to the edge of the fence, and she thought that maybe, she might be able to reach her hand in and take one. But if it clucked loudly, she would certainly be caught.
She was about to try to run to the fence when she saw a boy rush out from east of her and crouch down close to where a chicken was. The sun had almost completely set but she was sure it was a young boy. Without thinking, she ran up and grabbed him by the coat.
“Hey!” the boy hissed, trying to squirm out of her grip. When he realized that she was a young Japanese woman, he stopped moving and stared at her. She was about to say something when he leaned down and bit her hard on the hand, the only part of her body that was exposed. He scampered to his feet as Emi looked at his childish face—she was sure he wasn’t older than nine or ten—and tried to keep from screaming out in pain. “Who are you?” he hissed, his body and most of his face hidden under the puff of black winter clothing.
“You’re stealing food,” she said, looking at both him and the barn to see if the guard had come around again.
“I’m going to get that chicken,” the boy said pointing, no longer seeming to view Emi as a threat. “See how it keeps coming to the fence, away from the others?”
“But you’ll be punished if you’re caught,” Emi said, watching the boy. “Won’t you?”
“Punished? I’ll be killed,” he said, not taking his eyes off the bird. “Everyone knows that. Why do you think there are still chickens to steal here?”
“Then leave,” Emi whispered into his ear. “You think one chicken is worth dying for?”
“You think starving is better?” he said, pushing Emi to the side. “You’re stupid for coming here. Especially if you don’t want food.”
“Who says I don’t want food?” she said, listening to the snort of the pigs. It sounded like there were a hundred of them.
“You don’t look like you know what you’re doing so you must not,” the boy said, his voice muffled from his coat.
“I don’t,” said Emi. “Know what I’m doing.”
Suddenly, Emi felt someone touch her shoulder and then slam her body to the ground. Her breath knocked out, she looked up to see the face of a Caucasian teenager. As she was on the ground, she saw the Japanese boy slip to the side of the fence, put his arms in between the wires, grab the chicken, which had just waddled close enough, cut its throat, and pull it through, all in a few seconds.
“Who are you?” the boy on top of her asked in Japanese, pinning her down. He was older than the Japanese boy, but still a teenager.
“I’m Emi Kato, I live in Karuizawa, and I came here to steal food, just like you,” said Emi, trying to push him off her.
“If they see you here, they’ll kill you,” the teenager said, moving off her. “Get back, away from the fence,” he said, motioning to the dense trees. “You’re as tall as a telephone pole; they’ve probably seen you already.”
Even though Emi was not used to being insulted and ordered around by some gaijin teenager, she was happy to step out of the line of sight.
With the Japanese boy back next to them, his hands covered in the chicken’s blood, the teenager motioned for them all to follow him, and they ran to where there was a car hidden half a mile away in the trees.
“You want a ride back or what?” the boy asked as Emi stared at his car, pretty sure he wasn’t old enough to drive. “You can sleep out here if you want. Why don’t you give a nice firm knock on the farm door.”
“I’ll take a ride,” said Emi, opening the passenger door to the car.
“Thought so.”
“Won’t they see that a chicken is missing?” Emi asked as she shut the car door. “They aren’t going to think it flew away.”
“They might,” said the teenager. “But they won’t know who took it. Like I said, stick around, maybe they’ll blame you.”
The boy started the car and when they were a safe distance away from the farm, Emi asked how long they had been stealing from the Germans.
“Not long enough,” said the gaijin expertly handling the dark, frozen roads.
“I’ll come back with you tomorrow,” said Emi as they wove down the hills.
The boy started to laugh. “Why would we want you?” he asked in his accented Japanese.
“Because unlike you, and him,” she said motioning to the backseat, “I speak German. He’s Japanese and you’re . . . ?”
“Polish.”
“Right. I don’t think the German guards speak Polish, nor much Japanese or English. I’ll come back with you and find out when they’re doing their rounds, when is a safe time to take more than just a chicken.”
“Say something,” said the Polish boy, swerving to miss a deer. “Say something in German.”