Unknown Victim by Kay Hadashi (classic books for 11 year olds .TXT) 📕

The interior of the restaurant was nothing like the drab exterior. Everything was painted white, and the linoleum floor was pristine. There were no tables to sit at, only a long counter in a horseshoe shape, with chairs filling the length of it. Most of the chairs were filled with people with black hair. The sound of voices was a mixture of English and something else, she wasn’t quite sure what. Mixed with that was lively but quiet foreign pop music with a high-pitched female singing. The strange thing, however, was that a conveyor belt ran along the length of the counter before turning and going back again in a circular pattern. Small single-serving plates of food under transparent lids were carried along the conveyor, traveling through the restaurant as though they were on a road trip. Millie led Gina to a pair of chairs at a narrow bar.

“This kind of sushi place is called a Kaiten, or conveyor belt. They’re popular in Hawaii and Japan. Do you have one in Cleveland?”

Gina watched as plates passed her by, wondering what was on them. She recognized a few as sushi, but others were too elaborately arranged to guess. “Not in Little Italy.”

A waitress brought them mismatched cups of tea. Gina sneaked a sniff of hers before taking a sip. She did her best not to shudder at the bitterness of some sort of tea.

“Green tea. Not everybody likes it at first,” Millie said. She took a plate and set the lid aside, exposing a small ball of rice with a red piece of meat on it. “Do you eat fish?”

“Not until after it’s been cooked. What is it?”

“Ahi. That’s yellowfin tuna. Most people consider it the tuna with the best flavor.”

“Okay, so, I know this sushi stuff is really popular, but I’ve never had it. Honestly, I don’t understand why it isn’t cooked, and even what’s happening with food going by on a conveyor belt.”

“I guess it does seem strange to be served like this. It’s a fad that started about twenty years or so ago. The idea is that you take a plate of what you like, and have as many or as few as you want. The different colors of plates are different prices, so you have to watch out for that. It can get expensive in a hurry. You keep all your plates until it’s time to pay, and the waitress tallies up the total.”

“You eat here a lot?”

“Not often. It’s more of a special occasion place, or when I need to meet with someone. It’s a little out of the way for me to come here.”

Gina watched something go by on a plate. “How do I know what I might like?”

Millie took a plate off the belt and set it in front of Gina. “This is called inari. There’s no fish, just rice and a miso flavoring inside that wrapper.”

Gina inspected the chopsticks in front of her before setting them down again. “Are there forks?”

“Only for the haoles.” Millie showed Gina how to hold the sticks in her hand. “Just think of them as extensions of your fingers to pick something up. It’s more of a finesse thing that strength. The harder you squeeze with them, the more something can go wrong.”

On first try, Gina was able to grab the peculiar lump of wrapped rice and take a bite of it. She inspected the inside of it as she chewed.

“Not just rice. There’s another flavor.”

“That’s the miso and the wrapper.”

“This is something real? I’m eating real sushi?”

“Very real and very popular.” Millie put another plate of something in front of Gina, this one with a piece of raw fish held down to a ball of rice with a belt of something green. “I wanted to meet with you this evening, Gina, not just for dinner.”

“Uh oh. Am I fired already?”

“Why would you be fired?”

“I don’t know. My crew barely got any work done today, the house still isn’t finished inside, and Felix said the outside needs to be painted pretty soon. And then there was a problem this morning.”

“First of all, whatever happens with the house is none of your problem. You’ve been hired to manage the gardens. Don’t let anybody talk you into something else.”

“The roofer, Kenzo, seems to have my number. He’s had me up on the roof helping, and with the new hot water tank. At least Felix is satisfied working alone in the house putting up wall board.”

“If Kenzo asks for your help, it means he needs it,” Millie said. “I heard about the man on the porch. That’s not your fault.”

“Sure feels like it. It held up my crew for a while, until I sent a couple of them to the hardware store to get a few things, more as a way of finding something productive for them to do. A full day spent, and there’s not much to show for it. Who told you about the man on the porch?”

“Things like that get around in a hurry. We call it the coconut wireless,” Millie said.

“My mother has a word for that in Italian, but it’s not very polite.”

“You speak Italian?”

“Not as well as my mother would like me to. She came from Italy to marry my father and always wanted my sister and me to learn fluent Italian.”

“She came as a picture bride?” Millie asked.

“The first time she was in Cleveland, it was as a study abroad student in high school. That’s when she met my dad. At the end of the year, she went home. I guess they wrote letters back and forth for a couple of years, until he splurged and went to Italy to visit her for a few weeks.”

“It’s a sweet story. When did they get married?”

“Not for a while. After coming home from Italy, Dad went to the police academy. Once his training was done and he had a full-time job, he went back to Italy on vacation and