The Blonde Geisha

The rain was busy dropping its freshness on the earth, softly tapping on the wooden roof, but inside the Teahouse of the Look-Back Tree it was quiet. So quiet it was easy for us to hear the soft sounds of a woman’s mournful longing mixing with her sexual enjoyment. We listened as the humming sighs grew louder and a faint but delicious scent seemed to pass through the room like unseen waves of pleasure.

“I feel so strange, Mariko-san, like I’m getting ready for a journey I’ve never taken before,” I whispered. “A journey that will satisfy a hunger deep inside me.”

“All women have that hunger,” Mariko whispered back, then added, “that’s why there are engis.”

“Engis?”

“Yes, replicas of a man’s penis made from paper or clay and filled with sweetmeats.” She licked her lips. “Very tasty.”

I had to hold my stomach so as not to laugh, then leaning forward and standing tiptoe on my bare feet, I saw movement beyond the screen. What I’d seen from a distance was confirmed close up. The okâsan, Simouyé, was sitting on her heels on the mat, rocking back and forth. Back and forth. She looked so beautiful. Her kimono was blue and simple. Her sash was also simple and tied in a small knot in the back.

But it was the erotic look on her face that so fascinated me my own body reacted in a strange and mysterious manner. I let out a sigh before I could stop herself. Mariko clasped her hand over my mouth, her dark eyes warning me to be quiet, for if we were discovered, I could guess what punishment would befall us.

I nodded. Mariko removed her hand from my mouth, her palm moist with the wetness of my lips. Before I had time to feel embarrassed, she whispered, “Watch.”

My eyes widened. My mouth dropped, yet I couldn’t look away as okâsan changed her position and bent her body forward. My eye was drawn to what appeared to be something tied to her heel with ribbons. Something long and slender and shaped like a—

“Mushroom,” I whispered, then I clasped my hand over my mouth to keep from crying out. This mushroom was not of the vegetable variety, I could see, but a carefully sculpted, brown leather object resembling a man’s penis. Big, and anatomically real with bulging veins.

I withdrew into the shadow of the screen, thinking. This penis put the woman in control. I smiled. Such power intrigued me and reaffirmed my desire to be a geisha.

I looked again.

Simouyé got to her feet and pulled her light silk kimono around her midriff, then fastened a red cord around her sash and under her breasts. She removed her soiled socks, then put on a clean pair.

“Why is she changing her socks?” I asked, turning my head.

“Geisha consider wrinkled or faintly grayed socks to be the height of impropriety. Showing clean white heels and clean white toes is proof of a most honorable feminine delicacy.”

I smiled at that, thinking it a strange priority after what I’d seen, then I looked back again at okâsan. I didn’t see the strange leather mushroom. Simouyé must have hidden it in one of the numerous drawers in the wooden chest standing in the corner.

The scene was surreal in my eye, but the tears flowing down okâsan’s cheeks were real and disturbed me in a way I didn’t understand.

Didn’t understand at all.

A tightness gripped my throat. Watching the woman pleasure herself had made me feel uncomfortable and yet strange and wonderful. Watching her cry made me feel as if I had violated something more sacred. I didn’t like that feeling. Mariko sensed my discomfort.

“I’ve seen women among us who embrace the ideas of the West,” Mariko said, “and abandon the age-old tradition of a woman walking behind a man and instead, walk hand in hand with him.”

“Are you saying okâsan is such a woman?”

She nodded. “The female mind has many strings, Kathlene-san, and a woman like okâsan is an artist in playing every one of them.” Then before I could quiz her further, she said, “We must go.”

I nodded. My private thoughts lingered in the darkness invading the room, black and velvety quiet, as we left as silently as we’d come. With a little luck, maybe in that silence I’d find the courage to embrace this strange new world. Nothing more could be done tonight. I would go straight to okâsan in the morning and tell her of Youki’s apology. I would bow my head and speak the words Mariko bade me to do, for nothing must stop me from entering the secret world of the geisha.

Crouching, I followed Mariko through the sliding door, down the hallway, over the tiny bridge and into a room where a futon had been unrolled and left for us, as if by magic. A four-paneled mosquito netting, trailing on the floor like the train of a royal robe, hung on silk cords from hooks set in the framework of the teahouse. Its misty transparent walls of green sea foam invited peaceful sleep to all who entered its folds. I was again living the fairy tale, though I guessed setting up the futon was Ai’s doing. I wondered how much the old woman knew, if she’d seen us, and if so, would she tell on us?

Mariko guessed what was on my mind. “We must be careful of Ai-san. She is a woman who embraces everything you don’t, Kathlene-san.”

“What do you mean?”

“She owes allegiance to no one except to the one who pays her.”

Mariko was right. I must be careful around the house servant.

I looked over at Mariko and she motioned for me to lie down on the futon next to her. Without a word, I did so, though my pulse beat with such excitement, such hope for the future, I couldn’t sleep. Tonight I had seen, heard and felt something so delicious it stirred my imagination with thoughts of what life would be like in the Teahouse of the Look-Back Tree: scents of orchid and rose petals, a geisha untying her obi, her silver hairpins falling as she loosened her long hair, then parting her legs, welcoming the bulging penis of her lover. I wasn’t sure what to think about it. Not yet.

As I lay on the futon, the rain pounding on the rooftop became a song, its dripping melody sounding like dancing cats scurrying back and forth on the gray tiles. Long minutes passed. Frogs croaked. I could hear Mariko’s slow, steady breathing. Neither of us spoke as we lay on our backs, our slender bodies touching, warming under the covers. I could smell the scent of tangerine and ginger water on the girl’s skin from her bath mixing with the humid heat emanating from our bodies.

When her hand slipped into mine and squeezed it, I squeezed it back before slowing my breath, letting my body relax. I could only dream what lay ahead for me, but I was beginning to realize my femininity was the secret weapon I could use to discover the deepest core of my sexuality. I wanted to reach the essence of where my pleasure came from, the feelings that came and came again without stopping.

I dreamed of experiencing the ultimate pleasure of a man’s penis insideme, throbbing, thrusting, thrusting, and filling me with his elixir. I suspected that at last the secret to becoming a woman was at hand, that I was no longer in the dark, chasing the elusive butterfly.

PART TWO

KIMIKO, 1895

She walked among us.

The girl with the golden hair.

She was not one of us.

Yet we embraced her.

—Geisha song from Kioto, 1895

4

Kioto, Japan 1895

Through the wooden gate, along the winding walkway of stones, up the narrow stairway and onto the veranda where the scent of camellia oil was as thick as the smells from the River Kamo, I fretted about what I was going to say to okâsan.

I was late.

Frustrated, I wiped the sweat from my face, smearing the thick white makeup okâsan insisted I wear whenever I went outside the teahouse, along with my black wig, perfectly centered and balanced. On hot days the wig was almost unbearable, but dyeing my hair black was not an option since most hair dyes contained lead and were known to cause death.

I ignored the heaviness of my wig. Instead, I prayed okâsan wouldn’t be upset, prayed she would act as custom decreed—there must be a time and place for each emotion—and this was neither the time nor the place for that emotion. As for me, this was my favorite hour of the day when the geisha and the maiko crouched in little groups, chattering. Small talk. Gossip, but more of a polite convention. It was part of our training and imperative that we maiko learned to talk with great animation about nothing at all.

And to play games with our customers. Games like Shallow River–Deep River, where the geisha raised up her kimono with her left hand as though crossing a river, a little bit higher each time, as she teased the onlooker by fluttering a fan with her right hand until she revealed her naked, dear little slit.

I giggled, remembering the first time I heard that phrase. The night I discovered the pleasures of the harigata. My smile faded. It was also the night my father left me in the Teahouse of the Look-Back Tree. Part of me died that night. But another part survived, and for three long years I’d studied to become a geisha. Still, I was but a maiko. Why? What had I done to displease the gods? It was customary for a maiko to spend several years of apprenticeship, then take her place as a geisha at age seventeen.

I’m eighteen. Haven’t I earned the right to turn back my collar and becomea geisha?

How much longer could I stay in the teahouse, sneaking around the city with white makeup smeared on my face, my blond hair covered by a black wig? Was I destined to hide in the teahouse until my womanhood no longer blossomed? Or until someone discovered my identity?

More than once I saw curious strangers pointing to their nose when they looked at me, meaning my long, straight Irish nose. Why was it so important no one knew who I was? My father was gone and out of danger. Why couldn’t I take my place in the world of flowers and willows?