Chapter Twenty-Two
Nick had detected a suspicious sounding ticking noise under the hood of the Mustang - which Lucy had insisted that she couldn’t hear - so he’d booked it into Rick’s Auto Shop for some tender loving care, and they’d taken the red line into Porter Square and then walked the rest of the way to Somerville.
“I think you love that car more than me,” Lucy teased him. She was dressed in jeans, sneakers and a pink, sleeveless blouse. Nick noticed she was wearing a navy blue bra today and hopefully, panties as well. She had tied her hair in bunches with two red ribbons which made her look like a young teenager.
“Well, she’s
almost
as sexy as you,” Nick mused, “and she doesn’t give me half as much trouble.”
“But can she suck cock as well as I can?” Lucy asked sweetly.
“As far as sins of the flesh go, I fear you have no equal.”
He kissed her on the nose, noticing that she was still a little flushed from her sexual exertions earlier that morning. As was customary with Lucy, there had been an eventful start to their day. Nick had risen early - a tricky detail on one of his carvings staying with him through sleep - and he had crept down to the basement to work while Lucy still slept. When he had re-emerged for breakfast, he had found the back door to be locked. Seeing Lucy in the kitchen, he had rapped on the window, but she had merely smiled and poked out her tongue. Because they were going out later, he knew that she wouldn’t let him miss breakfast, so she was merely yanking his chain for entertainment. She would be in for a surprise this time, however, because what she didn’t know was that lock-picking was a skill sometimes required in the old buildings that Nick worked on. He had fetched his set of picks and wrenches and within a minute he was standing behind a startled Lucy and snapping a pair of handcuffs onto her wrists. Breakfast had gone cold while she had received her punishment upstairs.
The day was overcast but humid, and by the time they reached the apartment building, little beads of perspiration dotted Lucy’s’ cheeks and forehead. As they waited for the elevator, Nick said, “I’m a bit nervous.”
Lucy smiled and squeezed his hand. “You’ll be fine. Just follow my lead.”
They got out on the third floor and Lucy pressed the bell on the first door. A Japanese teenage girl opened it, greeted Lucy with a hug, and ushered them into a small ante-room containing dozens of pairs of shoes.
“Look,” Lucy said. “I bet they’ve all come here to check you out.”
They took off their shoes and entered a crowded living room. Lucy found Aunt Akiko standing with a small group in the corner and they exchanged kisses. Nick recognized a couple of faces from the restaurant, spotted Lucy’s charming cousin Chieko, and quickly deduced that he was the only Caucasian there.
Lucy guided him around the room, introducing him to everybody in turn, until they finally reached their host, Great Grandmother Bunko - affectionately known as ‘Mama Bunko’ to the family - who had just turned ninety-four. The white haired old woman was flanked by two other elderly women, presumably her daughters, and was sitting so still, Nick thought she might be asleep. Lucy spoke to her in Japanese and gestured to Nick who bowed as Lucy had previously instructed. She placed their gift with the others and then led him by the hand into the kitchen where the younger guests had congregated.
Lucy grabbed a couple of beers from the refrigerator and handed one to Nick.
“Don’t worry about formalities,” Lucy said. “We celebrate birthdays here just like everyone else.”
“What about dinner?”
“You know how to eat Japanese food by now. Just don’t belch and don’t stick your chopsticks in your rice.”
Nick looked at her inquiringly.
“We do that at funerals,” she explained.
“What, belch?”
“Idiot.”
Chieko suddenly entered the kitchen with a look of concern on her face and whispered to Lucy who briefly looked as though she had seen a ghost.
“Problem?” Nick asked.
Lucy looked at him and for a fraction of a second, he saw the tiniest flash of anxiety in her eyes.
A moment later, a smarmy-looking Asian in a dark business suit entered the room. He came over and spoke in Japanese to Chieko and then said, “How you doing, Lucy?”
“Pretty good, Ken. Nick, this is Ken Yagamuchi.”
Nick wasn’t sure if he was supposed to bow again, but Yamaguchi saved him the worry by extending his hand.
“Nice to meet you, Nick,” he said as they shook, and then turned his cool smile back to Lucy.
“So this is your new boyfriend?”
“No, we’re just friends.”
“’Friends’, right. You at college together?”
“No,” Nick interjected. “I’m a craftsman, actually. I restore old buildings.”
Yamaguchi appraised him, still with the slight smile playing on his thin lips.
“That so? My company has just taken possession of a property in upstate New York. It needs some work. Maybe I could send some business your way.”
“How is the ‘laundry’ business these days, Ken?” Lucy jumped back in, as if she was trying to protect Nick from something.
Yamaguchi chuckled and said to Nick, “Your ‘friend’ doesn’t approve of my line of work much. She thinks I take advantage of people who are down on their luck.”
“And what line of work is that?” Nick asked.
“I guess you could call me a financial advisor,” Yamaguchi said, handing Nick an embossed business card. “Give me a call some time.”
Lucy swigged on her beer and said, “So what are you doing up here, Ken?”
“Paying my respects, of course. Mama Bunko’s son helped me a lot when I was starting out.”
“I’ll bet he did,” Lucy said.
Yamaguchi regarded them a moment, then said, “I’m curious. How did you two meet?”
“I spotted Nick doing some work on a cupola on campus,” Lucy said before Nick could reply. “I was impressed with his work and we got talking. I’m doing a project on woodcarving.”
Nick figured there had to be a good reason for Lucy’s elaborate lie, so he kept his mouth shut.
Yamaguchi looked unconvinced. “You still drawing those cartoons?”
“Uh-huh.”
“So where are you studying now?”
“Boston U,” Lucy lied again.
“And this ‘project’ includes inviting your friend to a family gathering?”
To Nick, this was all sounding uncomfortably like an interrogation.
“Nick was showing me some more examples in town, so I invited him along.”
Nick felt a little deflated that he was being passed off as a casual acquaintance, but clearly nobody had expected Yamaguchi to show up today and he had to have something to do with Lucy’s troubled past.
“Sorry if I seem to be prying,” Yamaguchi said to Nick. “But Lucy and I go back a ways and I was just wondering what she was getting up to.”
“Like Lucy said,” Nick replied. “We hardly know each other.”
“Right,” Yamaguchi grinned. “Bet she’s driving you nuts. She always was a handful.”
“Actually, she’s been very sweet,” Nick said.
“
Oh
yeah. Our Lucy knows how to turn on the charm alright.”
Lucy said something sharply in Japanese and Yamaguchi laughed again. “Don’t mind me, Nick,” he said. “I’m just messing with her.”
Chieko, trying to change the subject, said to Lucy, “Isn’t your dad coming?”
“I doubt it,” Lucy replied. “Things are kind of awkward right now.”
“Maybe he doesn’t want to meet your new boyfriend,” Yamaguchi suggested.
“Come on,” Lucy said, taking Nick’s arm. “Let’s go find Auntie Akiko.”
“See you later,” Yamaguchi said. “I’ll tell Johnny you said ‘hi’.”
As they weaved through the guests in the living room, Lucy said, “Don’t worry about him, he’s an asshole.”
“Are we leaving?” Nick asked.
“No, that will make things look worse. Just be polite. Nobody will tell him anything about us.”
Lucy and Chieko sat on either side of Nick at dinner, and discreetly helped him with Japanese table etiquette. Lucy was particularly animated and chatted in Japanese whilst periodically translating for Nick. As he watched his popular and vivacious girlfriend holding court, he tried to reconcile her with the eccentric sexual dynamo who lived under his roof. Only that morning, she had fucked him like a crazed beast while her hands were cuffed behind her back. He was still amazed at the variety of ways that Lucy could sexually gratify both of them, using her mouth, breasts, thighs, vagina and today, even her feet - Nick had never been jerked off by a girl using her bare feet before, but she had succeeded in skillfully bringing him off, nonetheless.
After dinner, Mama Bunko was helped back into the living room where they brought in her birthday cake, and then her daughters opened her presents for her. When they opened Nick and Lucy’s gift a peculiar thing happened. Lucy had chosen one of Nick’s wood carvings from his basement - a hummingbird in flight - because Aunt Akiko had told her of the old woman’s passion for birds. Nick didn’t think it was one of his best works, but Lucy had told him it was ‘exquisitely detailed’.
Evidently, Mama Bunko agreed, because when the figure was shown to her, she reached out a frail hand, examined it closely, and then tears formed in her eyes.
Sitting in the corner, Nick whispered, “What’s wrong?”
Lucy shook her head.
Finally, Aunt Akiko called Nick and Lucy over. She spoke to Mama Bunko in Japanese and the old woman peered up at them through filmy eyes. Then she reached out and took their hands and the room went silent.
Mama Bunko spoke in a quiet voice and Aunt Akiko said, “Mama Bunko wants to know if you made the carving yourself.”