The glass bricks transform the facade into a movie screen…

There is so much drama in those curtains, longing in the drops of water, and mystery in the fireplace. The stars of this story, which is set in Hiroshima and designed by Hiroshi Nakamura, are the trees.

Charles Mudede—who writes about film, books, music, and his life in Rhodesia, Zimbabwe, the USA, and the UK for The Stranger—was born near a steel plant in Kwe Kwe, Zimbabwe. He has no memory...