Read No More Tomorrows for Free Online Page B

‘Let’s get married’ during our first two years together. I was a bit daunted by the idea and kept stalling, saying, ‘Yeah, OK, one day . . . later.’ I clearly recall the night I finally agreed. There was no diamonds-and-champagne proposal and big ‘Oh, I will! I will!’ reaction. We were in our TV room, talking about our future, and he said, ‘Ah . . . maybe we’ll get married now?’ This time it was do or die, so I said, ‘I’ll just call my mum and my sister.’ It was important to me that they thought it was a good idea. I might have seen Mum marry and divorce, but for me marriage was for ever. And I really believed Kimi was ‘the one’, which was a bit naive, I guess, given that he was my first boyfriend and I was only twenty.
    I phoned Mum and Merc, and they both just excitedly said, ‘Congratulations.’ So it was as low key as putting the phone down and saying, ‘OK, let’s get married.’ And that was that.
    We started making plans, but then things began to unravel. Though we hadn’t set a date yet, I got quite excited about our wedding day and went and bought a pretty mauve silk slip dress with a chiffon cover and ordered some wedding invitations. I thought we’d have a small wedding party in Japan and then a bigger one in Australia with all my friends and family: after all, I was the bride. But Kimi had other ideas, which was the first sign that the two of us wouldn’t work out. He’d been brought up in a culture where men controlled and women obeyed, especially once they’re married.
    One morning, a couple of weeks after we’d agreed to marry, we were enjoying our usual early surf when Kimi abruptly said to me, ‘Let’s go.’ I assumed he needed to get to work early, so we paddled in, loaded the gear in the car and drove off. We weren’t heading home, but he refused to tell me where we were going, which he had started to do a bit and which annoyed the hell out of me. He pulled up at Omaezaki’s town hall and leapt out of the car, calling back, ‘Aren’t you coming?’
    So with my hair still soaking wet, and dressed in my board shorts and bikini top, I traipsed behind him into an office and unwittingly signed our marriage certificate. I didn’t know what I was signing and just assumed it was some bank document. As we got back into the car, he said, ‘We’re married.’ My jaw dropped and tears sprang to my eyes as I looked at him. We drove home in silence, and I refused to talk to him for the next two weeks. His best friend saw how hurt I was and gave me a beautiful bunch of flowers, saying, ‘Congratulations.’
    I guess the only way to explain it is to say that it was very Japanese.
    Things went downhill from there. Once I was his wife, Kimi became more controlling, always wanting to know where I was. The cultural and language differences were becoming more of a problem rather than less. And combined with the nagging loneliness I felt, and homesickness, little things started to annoy me, like having to explain a simple joke.
    It wasn’t all bad. We still had some good times together – otherwise we’d never have stayed together for another two years.
    I tried to teach him not to control me so much, and he tried. He was also sensitive to my loneliness; he’s a nice guy and did want to help me feel less homesick, taking me camping in the Japanese countryside or on a surfing trip for a few days. We still really enjoyed each other’s company most of the time.
    Looking back, I think most of Kimi’s friends could see how homesick I was, even more than I realised myself. They always tried their best to speak with me and help me to feel comfortable, although we struggled to understand each other. I spoke a decent amount of Japanese by this stage, but most of Kimi’s friends weren’t Omaezaki natives and spoke different dialects, which were often like another language.
    But in the end, the loneliness, the language barrier and homesickness got the better of me. I didn’t