By March, the party cycle got into full sway, with at least two boisterous nights a week guaranteed. Many of these parties were at my apartment or Matt’s. In our mad texting to invite our friends after work, Yoshi was always included.
At some point during each of these parties, Yoshi and I had developed the habit of sneaking away from the festivities to share a smoke outside. This was our custom, our little ritual. We would catch each other’s eyes and head out, or one of us would just walk out knowing the other would soon be by your side. Rain or shine, freezing cold or balmy warm, we could be found outside the party, smoking and talking. It was during these conversations that I learned most about Yoshi, and surprisingly a lot about myself as well. Usually feeling the buoyant effects of partying, our tongues were looser than normal and we felt more comfortable asking and answering each other’s questions. Sometimes these talks would last only a few minutes, other times for hours.
We did this at one party in early spring until dawn stretched pink fingers across the sky, crowning the mountains that soared over my balcony. This conversation was different from the others, however. We actually discussed in depth the one subject out of so many that we both had danced around: relationships.
Feeling both hesitation and relief, I told him of Chris, my longtime on-again/off-again ex-boyfriend. I had mixed feelings about him, about us, and felt extreme trepidation when I considered a long-term relationship with him. Yoshi spoke of his last girlfriend and how she had left him because he wasn’t ready to get married. He also told me about his few foreign girlfriends, of which none had worked out. He especially detailed his relationship with a red-headed Australian woman he once dated, who was brash and about as un-Japanese you could get; though it was fun for Yoshi, he said there was no way the relationship would have ever worked. Mostly though, we spoke of our dreams for the future.
After a long pause, he quietly spoke of how he was actually jealous of me because I was free to travel and live essentially as I pleased, while he was entirely bound to Yamagata. He was fully indebted to Yamagata’s community and the vital role he played in it, and he knew there was simply no other option for him. It broke my heart to hear him speak of such binding limitations; by that point, I knew of his adventurous soul, so like my own. And I knew there were few things worse than chaining it down.
He shared one particularly painful anecdote from his younger days. Upon graduation, he seriously considered becoming an astrophysicist and astronaut; as a top graduate from one of Japan’s best universities, he had actually qualified to enter training. He was elated, but his father pushed him towards dental school instead because of its immense practicality. He was devastated but accepted his father’s decision. He went dental school and put away his dream of losing himself among the stars.
My heart ached for him as he told this matter-of-factly. Though I was also intimately familiar with the confining bonds of family and societal expectations, the crucial difference was that I could break away and still keep my family, even if it caused discord. If Yoshi broke from tradition in any meaningful way, such as disobeying his family or marrying a foreign woman, he would lose everything, and I mean everything: family, inheritance, social standing, maybe even his practice. But most importantly, he would lose his community and his place in society that was dictated well before he was born, a prospect that was nearly incomprehensible.
It was brutal listening to him relate his impossible position and it made it much clearer why he was so curious and spent so much time with us foreign teachers and his motorcycle club buddies — he was living vicariously through us and running from the inevitable at the same time. I truly ached for him in that moment and the conversation has haunted me ever since.
It was at some point over the course of that night that Yoshi went from being a simple crush to being so much more. The dynamic between us shifted and something that I couldn’t name felt as if it was sliding into place.
****
unrequited 