Angel of Okinawa; Chapter 16

Angel of Okinawa; Chapter 16

© 2024 by Amber Wright

“Derek did, too.” Gideon sat back down on the chair beside me. “Don’t worry, Alex, you aren’t the only—”

“Derek?” I felt my brows shoot up, puzzled and excited, and gasped out in a flutter. “Derek Penn?”

“Know him?” Gideon eyed me incredulously.

“Yes.” I nodded briskly, blinking nervously. “He was here the first week of this month. I just met him.”

“Really? He’s my cousin.” Alex took a chair nearby. “He dyed his hair with me when he still lived in Tennessee. Now I think he’s got some girlfriend in Indiana.”

“And family.” Gideon noticed me gulping and my horrified eyes. “Back to your red hair…”

I couldn’t hear the rest. I only heard the faint ringing in my ears of Derek has a girlfriend.

I felt all broken inside me.

Why had I let myself get mentally attached?

Because you're stupid, Angel! I told myself. You’re nothing but a silly island girl in the middle of nowhere. Derek was just playing with your feelings, that’s all. He couldn’t possibly be really crazy about you. You were just the only American girl he saw here, so there!

I wanted to sob bitterly, but I saved that for later when both Alex and Gideon were gone.

I was quite alone up in the attic. I felt the horrible hollowness of my cousin’s upcoming departure although he promised he’d see me before he left. And then there was Derek to mourn over.

“Why did I have to lose him before I even had him?” I sniffled to myself, completely shattered inside. “Why!”

Right then I heard a screaming below.

After one short stunned moment, I gathered myself up and wiped away my petty tears. It was the voice of Meema.

Something horrible must’ve happened else she wouldn’t have been crying so hysterical.

I rushed down the stairs two at a time and quickly located my screaming, sobbing Okinawan mother.

She was sitting on the floor in the living room beside a pallet of a soldier. I jerked my eyes to the wounded man on the cot. It wasn’t an American this time. I quickly recognized the uniform of the Japanese. Hwang!

No, it can’t be! I wanted to scream. But the words stuck in my throat and my numb feet edged forward to screaming Meema.

I touched her shaking shoulder and she raised her tear streaked face. I swallowed and asked hesitantly, “Is he—?” I didn’t even want to finish in case I was right.

Meema shook her black head vigorously. “Pray for your father, Angel. There is nothing else to do,” she managed to say in a strained voice.

I nodded and glanced down at the yellow faced man with the quiet voice and gentle manner, pale and lifeless.

Was he only to be brought here to die?

Would his voice not be heard within these walls any more?

Would he die like the countless others who had been buried in the sand to be forgotten?

No, God, please! I begged silently, making my way into the kitchen where I found Dai playing solemnly with a few toys.

Since little Phanny’s funeral she had been quiet. Too quiet. And now I realized that my little sister really knew what was happening. She was, like countless others, a child of the wartime growing up before her time.

Dai stood up when she saw me and hurried over to me with hands up for me to hold her.

I picked her up and silently cried. But soon I found little Dai’s fingers wiping at my wet cheeks.

“Angel,” Dai looked up at me with big, scared eyes. “My Daddy-Hwang isn’t dead, is he?”

“No,” I tried to wipe at my eyes but more tears kept coming. “Daddy-Hwang is sick, very sick.”

“But I love my Daddy-Hwang!” Dai wailed and dropped her head onto my shoulder. “Don’t die, Daddy-Hwang!”

Lei came into the kitchen from outside and reached out for Dai. “Angel, I’ll take her now. The soldiers outside need you.”

I wordlessly handed Dai over to Lei, and wearily tramped my way across the floors to outside. Everything bad seemed to be coming at me all at once, and how could I ever find the strength to go on?

God, help me, please. Help us! I prayed in my mind as I went about the wounded soldiers, cleaning wounds, running errands, writing letters for them to folks back home.

^{· · ·}

Two days had passed.

By the hand of God, Hwang was recovering but as soon as he was well enough he was to be transported to the prisoner boat.

We all dreaded the fact but knew at least he was still alive, and that when the war ended he would come back home to us safe.

April 20^th began like any other day, scorching hot, unbearably humid and filled with gunpowder smoke from backyard war. I cringed, looking at all of the damaged vegetation on the horizon.

The far off mountains of the south looked as if a giant hand had pulled hunks of green from off its curvy sides.

Sigh!

War had indeed stripped us of life, the way of peace and most happiness.

But God would be there to take us through, and take us back to life again.

His love was still there to take hold of, cling to, and find comfort in. I only had to pull out the love inside me—my weapon—to fight against my only real enemy: hate.

The invaders were no enemies of mine, I now understood, only hate itself. I could win this battle, and somehow I knew I would.

As the day wore on I found my back dripping wet with sweat, once again. Boy, what I have to deal with in this life!

Normally, the heat would be hot, but in this gun-powdery thick air the heat had intensified. What joy.

I was wiping the back of my hand across my face when I saw him, laying on a stretcher.

A silent scream rose in my throat.

I stood there, stunned, mute, watching the two soldiers bring him in through the porch door and lower him to the ground.

His face was white.

His lips were cracked dry.

His left pant leg was drenched in blood.

His eyes stared motionless upward.

I forced my legs to move, and it seemed like an hour had passed before I finally reached him.

As I neared him I could tell he was still alive…but barely. Or else he was in a heavy stupor from shock. Either case, I would stand by him until he got well. I had to.

I knelt on the floor beside him and touched his shoulder gently, not to disturb him. “Derek?”