A Dictionary of Mutual Understanding by Jackie Copleton Page A

stayed that way for some time, silent but not awkwardly so. Then he raised himself tall before he asked her, ‘I’m curious. Did you tell your parents you’re here with me?’ She considered whether to lie as she turned toface him. The wind whisked her hair against her mouth. He lifted his hand and moved the strands off her face and tucked them behind her ear.
‘I felt the stirring then, an aching pleasure somewhere below my stomach. I told him no, I had told no one. He smiled and moved closer, lowered his face to the side of my cheek and whispered in my ear, “Our little secret.” His mouth grazed the side of my face when he pulled away. I wish I could find the words to describe the feeling of that brief connection. Maybe no word exists for it but without the word how will I remember my reaction other than to repeat the spike of desire again and again until my body becomes its own dictionary?’
    Iōjima came into view; the island was little more than a couple of mounds carpeted in green trees. The ferry rumbled into the harbour and minutes later she walked down the gangway. She watched a fisherman in a rowboat at work with his black cormorant. The bird launched from its master’s pole and dived beneath the surface. The bird seemed to swim beneath the water for a long time and Yuko stopped, worried that it might not return, but then it rose from the depths with a bream clutched in its beak and returned to the pole to drop the fish at its master’s feet.
‘I feel as if Sato is the fisherman and I am the bird.’
    They followed a path that disappeared around the southern side of the island. Concrete defences lined the track. The barricades had been deposited to keep the waves from devouring the land. Sea lice scuttled between the crevices and the sun was white above their heads, thickening the air until their nostrils burned. They passed a field where hundreds of dragonflies hovered. The hum of beating wings echoed across the brown earth and yellowgrass. The place pulsed with heat in a way that Yuko said made the land seem one produced of a fevered imagination. A boy and girl crouched next to a heap of the dead insects. The boy stood up and threw two clam shells linked by cotton thread in the air. A dragonfly, caught under the makeshift trap, fell to the grass and twitched and jerked until it became still. The girl ran over and picked its limp body up and added it to the pile. They began to count their catch and looked up to study the doctor and Yuko.
    Another path broke from this main one and they followed it past a small boat, bleached by the sun and perched high on a pebble beach strewn with fishing nets. A line of fish, flattened and salted, hung between poles next to the boat. They reached a wooden cottage, barely more than a shack. A man stood in the doorway. He picked up a bucket, walked toward them and Yuko looked down as they passed him. Sea urchins clung to the bucket’s inside, their black spines interlocked. He would be taking them to market for the sushi restaurants of Nagasaki. Sato and Yuko turned one last corner and were met by a loop of white sand and grey rocks striated with pink and yellow quartz. A hundred yards from the shoreline, a wooden diving platform floated on the sea. Sato took off his shoes and socks and she followed him. Their feet sank into the burning sand until they reached a line of cycad trees. Sato pulled off his shirt and trousers until he wore only his swimming trunks. He ran down to the shore and crashed into the water, took strong strokes toward the bobbing platform.
    Yuko peeled off her yukata and felt shy in the redswimsuit she had bought for the occasion. The material was so tight around her thighs, so low at the back. She had seen pictures of those modern Japanese girls in a magazine, walking around the streets of Tokyo in their striped beach pyjamas and wide-brimmed hats. She envied their confidence and their daring. How could they