Poston

Finale : It's Never the End

Poston, Arizona
November 1980
35 years since Poston was closed


The brilliant blue sky shone just as beautifully as it ever did. The yellow dirt held onto its tumbleweeds and cactuses like they had been there forever. It was a stark comparison to the bright, green leaves of the vegetables that grew off the farm on the other side of what was now the paved Mohave Road. Forty years ago, it used to be a dirt road. Thankfully, now it was paved, but still empty.

An old gray car and a newer blue car pulled off to the side of the road next to an empty field of dirt. It was a large space of dirt that had been leveled and cleared away, almost as if there were plans for people to live there. But there were no barracks, no fence, nothing but old concrete remnants a few miles away of what used to be Poston Internment Camp. Nobody around probably even knew that there had once been an internment camp on that site.

Nobody knew except for the families that got out of the cars and walked onto the dirt lot. The grandparents of the family looked out onto the dirt with a sad look in their eye as they remembered what Poston was. Their children had but faint memories of an internment camp filled with Japanese Americans and distasteful food and living conditions. Their grandchildren, thankfully, had never had to go through anything of the sort and were raised happy and healthy and in a world more welcoming than it had been thirty years ago.

"Daddy," one little girl said, speaking to a man who looked more like his father than anyone. "Is this really where you and Mommy met?"

"When we were children," her father, Charlie, answered as he looked over at his wife. "Me and Yuki-chan were small, but it was meant to be. And then your Grandpa Jun and Grandma Mao met here as well."

"And Grandpa Sho and Grandpa Masaki met here too," a little boy added. "Right Dad? And you and Aunt Lilly were born here."

"That's right," an old man, Masaki, smiled. "It doesn't look like it, but this place wasn't as bad as you might think."

The silent man, Jun, looked over at his family with a proud smile on his face. He was now sixty one years old along with Sho and Masaki, and he couldn't help but take Mao's hand as he thought about just how much had changed since he had last seen this place. He had gotten married to the love of his life. Their children had grown up. Charlie and Yuki were married with a beautiful twelve year old daughter, Samantha had gotten married to her husband some years back and had a hard-headed ten year old son, Lillian was married with a two year old, now Thomas ran the Aiba farm with his father, his wife, his best friend Jon Matsumoto, and seven year old son. Judy and Cathy had grown up and became missionaries studying in Japan and loving every minute as they learned more about their culture than anyone.

But perhaps the biggest change of all came from the tall, proud man, Joshua, who stood with his wife Marie and their five year old daughter Loren.

He knew for a fact that no one ever imagined this as their life when they had all been living together in an old, smelly barrack covered in tar. It was so much better than anyone had ever dreamed of.

"I guess we might want to get this over with," Sho said finally, breaking the peaceful silence as he let go of his husband's hand.

Jun and Masaki nodded with heavy hearts, and they both went to the back of the old gray car and removed two silver urns from an old trunk. Jun would never understand why these two idiots would want to be spread out in the middle of nowhere, but he knew for sure that no one but them would ever know why they did what they did.

Besides, Satoshi and Nino were his best friends. To disrespect their wishes would be an insult.

Silently, everyone stood around the two urns and each took a small handful of ashes before throwing them out into the Arizona wind. With every handful that went up, it disappeared into the air, and when everyone had thrown out one handful, Joshua took hold of each urn and threw the remains to the sky. After each urn had been empty, everyone stood in silent prayer and remembered their beloved friends as they said goodbye one last time.

"It's only fitting though," Masaki said finally. "They lived together and love each other with each other's hearts. It's only fitting that they died together, right?"

"They said that Nino's heart was under so much stress after Satoshi that it just stopped from grief," Mao added. She held a handkerchief to her face and cried her tears into it. "I can't... I can't believe their gone."

"They're never truly gone," Jun said. "One day, they'll find each other again. They always do."

Another minute passed by before Yuki spoke. "I can't stand another minute. It's too sad."

"I agree," Samantha said. "Let's head back."

Everybody started getting back into the cars, but the older men and the Ohmiya son took one last minute before finally turning back.

"Hey! Who are those two people?"

Jun and Joshua looked over to see Loren looking over at one specific part in the field. There was no one there. "What people?" Jun asked.

Loren pointed. "Over there! Two Japanese men! They're rocking back and forth like they're slow dancing."

"I don't see anything—" Sho began.

"I see them!" Samantha's, Charlie's, and Tommy's children cried out as they pointed to the same spot. "They're over there!"

Masaki gasped. "Guys... That's where Barrack 6 used to be."

Joshua dropped to his knees besides his daughter, trying desperately to see the invisible men that only the children could see. "What are they doing, Loren?" he asked gently.

"They're dancing to an old song. The tan one has his hands on the smaller man's waist while the small one has his hands around his neck."

Sho and Jun couldn't contain it anymore. The tears that started to fall were understandable, and it didn't take long for everyone else to start crying as well.

"They stopped dancing," Loren said. "Now, they're hugging. The tan one has his arms around the other one's waist, and it looks like they're just staring at the sky. Daddy, is that Grandpa and Papa?"

Joshua nodded. "Yes, Loren, I believe so."

In that moment, Jun remembered an old dream Nino had once recalled. One where he was standing out in the desert with no barracks, no guards, no fence, and all that he could see was dirt and cactuses and the beautiful blue sky. As Nino felt Satoshi's arms wrap around them, everyone could suddenly feel the warmth and love that went with it, and they all smiled as they wiped away their own tears.

Jun could have sworn he even heard Satoshi and Nino's final words to each other.

"I love you, Kazunari."

"I love you, Satoshi."