About Onnagata
by Lily Redgrave
46 pages / 11800 words
ISBN: 978-1-61040-471-7
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In a seedy, film noir, alternate Japan, burned-out detective Ed Fujitaka is about to find himself on a case with deep connections to his past. The beautiful Hatoko Karasuhime, an onnagata, or female impersonator, with the Shogun's favorite theater troupe, is being followed by a murderous stalker. Ed is the man Karasuhime wants by his side, in more ways than one. In a glittering world where nothing is ever as it seems, Ed finds himself not only trying to save a client's life, but solve the decade-old murder case that ruined Ed's career.
Sample
By the time the second show of the night rolled
around, bereft of nicotine and way too sober, I found myself adding to
the list of reasons I hated the theater so much.
A good part of it was the fans. The theater had pretty tight security on
hand to make sure the idiot fanboys didn't lop off their own ears to
toss on the stage to Karasuhime, but even so, from the noblemen and
women in the good seats to the common folks down in the pit, the
audience was as much a spectacle as the actors. For the first time, I
had to wonder how the actors and crew handled it.
For the rich folks, considering most of them were dressed in the finest
French and Italian imported couture, I figured they came to see their
peers and show off their finery rather than watch another showing of The
Wisteria Princess. After all, how many times could you see someone die
with five kilos of fake wisteria on their head, two shows nightly?
It was somewhere midway through the second performance, as Karasuhime
recited his lines with a perfect tremor in his voice, that I realized
what it was about him that pushed all of my buttons.
It was that façade. The mask he wore under the greasepaint, but on top
of whatever his real personality might be. And that façade reminded me
of Okita. Something I'd avoided thinking about for years, but I supposed
it made sense in a sick, sad, karmic sort of way.
Okita had been my first partner as a detective for the KMPD. We were a
good match, good enough to cause my marriage to take a nosedive. In the
end, if I could've, I would've died in that musty old warehouse, alone
except for some priest wandering through the night, calling out prayers.
I would've died instead of Okita.