Ishmael read the note once more, eyes straining to read the faded ink that had been written many years ago. The envelope was discarded, laying upon the desk that his father, Arthur, had built for him was he was in his teens. The desk was built shortly before Hatsue had left him, and at that point he still held on to the thought that she, somehow, held deep feelings for him. It was the mask that she and her people wore, he told himself.
What was he to expect of her? She had toyed with his emotions for several years, forcing him chase her in what seemed to be a never ending quest, only for it to end abruptly with a letter. A letter sent to him from the confines of some camp, a letter with a fake name that was easily recognizable as a woman's if one tried hard enough.
He remembered him taking the letter from his mother and slipping into his room with a sly grin on his face. He ran the envelope through his fingers, trying to memorize the folds that this paper contained. He inhaled deeply, slinking into the wooden chair and carefully pulled out the pocketknife he carried with him. He slid it gingerly across the top of the envelope, trying his utmost to create as few tears as he could.
As he expected there were other letters as well, a good five or six from his friends that attended school with him before their untimely departure. He opened each of them, skipping to the bottom to find the one that he was truly after. He could only fathom what she had written, it had been a good few weeks since he had sent his letter to her. He had put his heart and soul into that letter, he remembered how he had stayed up late as he tried to perfect it to the point of being flawless, and even then it wasn't good enough. He figured that she would be arriving at her destination shortly, and that it would be best to have it there before her arrival. He thought it might comfort her to know that someone back on San Piedro still remembered her and thought of her, he hoped that she would think of that when he read his letter.
He shook himself from the memory and pulled out the letter from Hatsue. His face was that of a grin, but soon fell as he read it.
I don't love you, Ishmael...I knew we could never be right together. It read. He felt his heart plummet. Surely this was some trick or ploy! He read it over and over, thinking that his eyes were simply too tired to comprehend the strokes that filled the paper. After a few more moments, he placed it on the desk and buried his head in his hands, silently weeping.
A few months later he enlisted in the Armed Forces, he thought that he could somehow sway Hatsue's mind so that she would love him once more. For her to come back to him after the war and say how wrong she was for thinking like that, they would get married, and live out their lives as he always dreamed. All that shattered on the tiny island of Tarawa.
He remembered hiding behind the rocks that littered the beach, silently watching as his fellow Marines dropped to the ground as though all of the force of the universe had suddenly been thrusted upon their fragile bodies. He didn't dare move but kept his M-1 Carbine close to his body, his hand gripping the trigger shakily. He watched at the Japanese dove over the cover the rocks, stabbing any American that dared to advance.
Ishmael couldn't help but see the resemblances between them and his love, Hatsue. That was the sole reason his muscles and instincts failed him, they reminded him of her. The girl he had loved for a majority of his life, the girl who had torn his heart out, the girl he still loved despite all of this.
Before he knew it he heard a bullet screech past his head, only to have a stabbing sensation rip through his body. It started it his arm and rocketed through his body with tremendous force. It took all of his strength to keep from screaming as he tried to haul himself back out to sea. He knew he needed to get away otherwise he would be a dead man for sure, his adrenaline fueling him just long enough to be waist deep. It was only then did he realize what had happened.
He saw the wound in his arm and the massive amount of blood that oozed from it. The waves slapped against his body, sending ribbons of salty water into the open flesh. He bit his lip even harder to the point of where he could taste more blood in his mouth. Anger soon replaced his anxiety, they had done this to him, the Japanese, Hatsue's people.
His bitterness towards The Japanese only continued to increase once he had to endure the amputation of his arm. It's necessary to your survival, the doctor had said, the infection has already set in, if we let it spread anymore you won't survive. He remembered what had happened to the boy next to him only hours earlier. He didn't have a choice, he was doomed before help even came. It was their fault that the young boy had died, their fault that so many of his fellow Marines had perished, their fault that he no longer had an arm. Hatsue was one of them, and she was now his personified hated for them.
He ran his only hand over the stump that was once his arm, feeling the ragged flesh and scar tissue that had healed after a long time. He thought of the pain that he had been forced to endure as they separated the flesh from his body, reminding him of a similar pain that he had once endured when Hatsue ended their relationship. Oh, how he remembered her face when she had returned from Manzanar with a newborn on her shoulder and how it was as emotionless as ever. She seemed to be unfazed by anything that had happened between them and carried on her life as though none of it had ever occurred. The sheer anger that seethed through him then was enough to fill a house full of people, and she didn't even acknowledge him. After all, it was her people that done this to him, and it all started with her.
Ishmael read over the notes that would most definitely save Kabuo, the shorthand was there and explained very well what had happened that foggy night of September sixteenth. He knew precisely what had happened, and had the radiomen stayed another day he could easily wager that none of this would be happening. He held the puzzle piece that would solve the case and free Kabuo, he knew it. It all came down to Hatsue, the war, and the pain that the two had brought upon him. It was their fault he had no one to love, why he no longer had an arm, and why he had turned bitter, and Ishmael was not willing to let it go so easily.
Ishmael took the paper and balled it up, trying to crush it with the strength of his only hand. He took the crumpled piece of paper and walked out to his mother's kitchen, stopping for a moment to gaze out the window. The snow was still falling, but not as fast as it had been in past days, and if he wasn't so late he might have noticed that it was slowly picking up, gradually obscuring the tall cedars from view. Looking at those trees only reminded him of the times that he and Hatsue would spend together in the lone cedar as he whispered sweet words into her ears, and how it had all ended because of her and her people.
He placed the paper beside the gas stove that his mother owned. With a gentle click a blue flame erupted from the pilot, ready to heat whatever his heart desired. Ishmael dropped the paper into the flame, watching as it exploded into a sea of oranges and yellows as the paper was burnt. He continued to stare at it indifferently as the paper blackened and crumbled. He turned off the flame but continued to stare, his mind telling him what he had done was right while his heart said otherwise.
"Ah, Ishmael, what are you doing up at this early hour?" He heard his mother ask, walking up beside him. His gaze met hers, and he could see how the years had aged her. Her face was no longer smooth and her once beautiful blue eyes were now dull, slowing the experiences that she was forced to endure and how they had shaped her.
"It's nothing mother, I was trying to write for the newspaper but nothing wants to be written. I was sick of throwing the unfinished ones into the basket so I thought this might have provided some inspiration." He lied smoothly. Helen placed a hand on her son's shoulder, trying to comfort him.
"I heard from Mr. Hisao what Hatsue has asked of you, I think by you doing this it will shine a light on this case. If you allow your thoughts flow or relax for a bit it will come to you more naturally instead of needed to stink up my house with the smell of burning paper." She said knowingly. Ishmael didn't dare to respond and kept his gaze fixed.
"Sorry," He responded quietly, unable to keep his voice from cracking. Helen kissed him on the cheek and walked off in the direction off her bedroom.
"Perhaps some sleep will do you well, Ishmael. There's no point in trying to force something out of nothing if you can't." She said before disappearing behind her bedroom door. Ishmael turned and looked out the window above his mother's coffee table. The wind had picked up considerably so that one could no longer see the beautiful cedars that were surely there. The wind blew with such a ferocity that one could hear it howl from the inside of the house without any issue. Ishmael gripped the stump of his arm, a sad smile etched into his face.
"You deserve it Hatsue, never forget that."
Hello everyone, and thank you for reading! I'm writing this as an assignment for my Language Arts class, which I am supposed to rewrite the ending for the story Snow Falling On Cedars. I would greatly appreciate it if you left a review telling me if there if anything I need to fix, grammar, tense, anything along those lines (just no flaming please). Let me know what you thought of it, and thank you once again for reading!
~ForeverHalfa