Angel of Okinawa; Chapter 4

 

Angel of Okinawa; Chapter 4

© 2024 by Amber Wright

Six days had passed and still no U. S. troops had landed on our shores. Were we lucky—or were we being driven mad by the continuous bombings to give up our island?

Not without a struggle, I was sure.

As a rule, we Okinawans fight to the death. There would be no less than a total bloody fight here soon, I could feel.

Doom knotted in my stomach.

Kept me awake at night.

Pounded inside me in my nightmares.

I would have to pray—day and night—for my native Okinawans and my blood U.S. brothers.

As I entered the kitchen, Ruri was chewing on her thumbnail and staring out of the window like in a daze. I touched her shoulder gently, not wanting to startle her too much.

Ruri looked up at me and her eyes snapped down, looking embarrassed. “I was thinking.”

I nodded.

I knew the war had strained all of our nerves, but somehow Ruri’s had been strained the most. She had known more deaths than all of my Okinawan sisters.

She had even remembered her own blood father who had died when she was barely two.

Then I came along right after.

Ruri had even remembered both of my parents and said she remembered loving them as family, too.

Gulp.

“I wonder if Hwang is stationed on the shores,” I said quietly, squeezing out my breath as I felt the floor rumble beneath my feet.

Another bomb had struck the island’s shore.

“I wonder,” Ruri echoed, faintly.

I put my arm around her shoulders and tried to smile brightly. “He’ll be alright. We’ve prayed for him.”

“I trust so.” Ruri nodded slowly, going into that dazed stare again. “But death has been so cruel to this household!” she ended in a strangled wail.

I put both arms around her, and we cried on each other’s shoulders for a while.

^{· · ·}

“Angel, will Daddy-Hwang die?” Dai asked me in a small voice.

I paused kneading bread dough and looked at her little scared face full of round scared eyes.

I smiled and shook my head. “God is going to take care of us all, Dai Sweetheart. Don’t worry. You’ll see.”

“But what if He doesn’t?” Dai whimpered, her bottom lip starting to quiver. “What if God doesn’t care?”

I took a deep breath. It would be difficult to explain to the little three year-old girl but I was willing to give it a try.

She needed it.

She was young, but we all have first learned when we were young. It has made us all the more stronger when we are grown.

I wiped my hands with the dishrag and picked up my little scared sister, looking her eye-level.

“Dai Sweetheart,” I said as simply as I could. “God cares about us every day. Sometimes we don’t know. Sometimes we don’t see. But He does, Dai.”

Dai eyed me with another blink.

I continued. “God cares about you, Dai. Did you know that?”

“He does?” Dai twirled one finger around a pigtail and her brown eyes stared at me.

“Yes, He does.” I smiled and tweaked her nose. “I’m going to tell you something…very important.”

Dai tilted her head as if she was listening hard, and I tried to tell it as childlike as I could without being illiterate.

“When you were just a little baby,” I began, “we were out washing our clothes and you were in a basket beside us. I heard a hissing noise and saw a great big poisonous snake coiled up beside you.”

“You did?” Dai gasped in horror.

“Yes, and do you know what happened?”

“No, what?” Dai shook her head, bobbing her pigtails.

“We prayed to God and the snake went away,” I smiled at her slowly blinking eyes. “So you see, God does care.”

Dai nodded and then after a second she whispered with a dimply smile, “I love God.”

“So do I.” I set her back down on the floor. “Now, go on and play. I’ve got to make a whole bunch of bread buns.”

Dai waved at me with a bright smile before trotting off to play with toys in the living room.

Before the bombings Dai had played outside, but now Meema wanted her inside for protection. We never know when we will have to climb into our cellar from an air raid.

Luckily, the three weeks Hwang had been with us he had the great idea of making our cellar bigger. Now it was big enough to hold all of our fruits, etc., and plus six pallets right beside each other with a little room besides.

Hwang was a good man.

I started kneading the bread dough again.