Little Pieces
I live with my sister. Who is convinced she is Marie Antoinette reincarnated. I'm not joking. Neither is she---she really believes it. "Why," I ask her, "would an eighteenth-century French queen be reincarnated as a twenty-first-century Japanese office girl?" She answers, "She wasn't French, she was Austrian." "Yes, I know, but--" "You know nothing, nothing!"
My sister is convinced she has a tragic destiny. Two months ago she refused an offer of marriage from a man who was everything a woman could ask for in a husband---handsome, brilliant, with a good job rapidly getting better... Besides, he genuinely loves my sister. I know he does. He told me. Now and then he would take me out for coffee and, so to speak, pour his heart out to me. "I don't think she realizes," he said. "I don't think she understands. I don't understand myself. No woman has ever made me feel the way your sister does. It's... I don't know... You believe me, don't you?" "Yes." "Well, tell her, then. Speak to her for me. Plead my case."
Which I was only too happy to do. "Don't you see he loves you?" I said. "Yes," she said, "I know." "Well?" "You're too young to understand." "Let's pretend I'm not," I said; "let's pretend for once that I'm a normal human being and that you can talk to me, you know, more or less normally. Woman to woman, so to speak."
"If I marry him, he'll murder me."
"Murder you!"
"Yes, murder me! You look at him and see a handsome face, a friendly smile! I look at him and see..."
"Well? You look at him and see what?"
"What he really is!"
With that, in tears, she flung herself out of the kitchen and into her bedroom, slamming the door behind her.
I think my sister is emotionally disturbed. I wish there was something I could do for her. But the truth is I simply don't know what to do. I'm at a loss. Sometimes I feel her disturbance, or whatever it is, infecting me. Just last night I woke up suddenly. It was pitch dark. I heard a noise, like the creaking of a floorboard, and I thought, "My sister's going to murder me!" I was paralyzed with terror. After a time I was able to master my fear, convince myself I was being ridiculous, but it was long before I could get back to sleep, and now, sipping my morning tea, I feel just awful.
"I think I'll call in sick today," I say to my sister.
"Oh?"
"I don't feel well. I couldn't sleep last night."
"Funny, neither could I."
***
I have to talk to somebody, and there's only one person I can think of who might understand and advise me---my sister's boyfriend, or ex-boyfriend, the man she refused to marry. There would be nothing strange in my calling him. They used to sometimes take me with them when they went to a movie or out to dinner or something, and he and I seemed to have a natural affinity for one another. I don't mean to suggest there was anything of a sexual nature between us---there certainly wasn't; but I did enjoy his company, and he enjoyed mine, or seemed to, and sometimes we even went out just the two of us, with my sister's knowledge and permission, sometimes even her encouragement. He was sort of like an older brother to me, and at times I think I was sort of like an older sister to him---I've already mentioned my role as his confidante vis-à-vis my sister. Does he know, I wonder, the strange fancies my sister is subject to? He can hardly not know them, they are so much a part of her. On the other hand, would so normal a man, one so clearly marked out for success of every kind, have fallen so deeply in love with someone so... disturbed? "Disturbed"---it's the only word I know. I really don't know what is at the root of my sister's trouble.
***
My supervisor is not pleased to hear from me. I am a cashier at the Rally supermarket on Route 5, a roughly ten-minute walk from our apartment. "I have never called in sick before," I remind her, and she grants that in the two years I have worked there I have been steady and dependable---but that, she hastens to add, is hardly an excuse for dereliction now. Dereliction! "I am sick and can't work today," I say with quiet finality. "If that's a firing offense, fire me." I snap the phone shut, not giving her a chance to reply.
What would turn a pretty young woman like her into such a bitch? I knew her before she became a supervisor; she was really nice. Well, I suppose she has her problems like everyone else. Now she has to find someone to replace me, failing which she may even have to fill in for me herself.
My sister's gone to her office, the apartment is empty and quiet, I can go back to bed now and get some sleep. Strange, though---I no longer feel sleepy, or even tired. Shall I call back and say I can work after all? No, I'd only look foolish.
Does she really think she's Marie Antoinette? Does she really think Kenichi will murder her? For the first time the thought occurs to me that she's teasing me, having a laugh at my expense. She's twenty-seven, I'm twenty, and when we were growing up her greatest pleasure in life was to bait me, make a fool of me. Once when I was nine and she sixteen she told me that the world would explode on my tenth birthday, and everything, everything would cease to exist. "Where will we go?" I asked her. "You don't understand," she said. We won't go anywhere. We will cease to be." "You mean we'll die?" "No, it's not the same as dying because when a person dies the world remains as it was, but on your birthday everything will cease to be." "Why on my birthday?" "Because that's what's fated." And so on. Of course I didn't believe her, but on the other hand I didn't altogether disbelieve her either, and as my birthday approached my trepidation grew to the point where it was almost unbearable. I said nothing of this to her, and she herself never mentioned it again... I could cite numerous other examples; it's the price you pay for growing up in the shadow of someone so much older. I would have thought that by now she'd put such childish games behind her, but maybe to her I'm still just a little kid whose unfailing credulity is an irresistible temptation. Maybe I should move out, get my own place. Maybe then she'd forget about being Marie Antoinette, marry Kenichi, and get on with her life. Yes, maybe that's what I'll do.
***
The whole day stretches before me, solitary and free. What shall I do? It's a beautiful crisp fall morning; I could go for a walk. Or I could read. There are plenty of books in the apartment. My sister's books. Her bedroom is almost a library, it is so full of books. You almost never see her without a book in her hand. What she gets from all her reading I don't know. She is forever after me to follow her example. Why don't I read this, supposing I read that? I should enrich my mind, develop my thinking powers. Why---so I can go mad, like her? "One genius in the family is enough," I tell her. Yes, it really is time I crawled out from under my sister's shadow and... Well, maybe that's what I'll do today! Find a place to live, a nice quiet little apartment, a room of my own.
A room of my own. I can almost see it---a white room, bathed in sunlight, lace curtains fluttering in the breeze. All I have to do is find it and it's mine! Very well then. I slip on my jacket, it's apt to be a bit chilly at this time of year... What else do I need? Key, wallet, cell phone... Good! Goodbye!
Part II
Of all the stupid, idiotic predicaments! I finally get the older sister off my back, and now the younger one is dogging me! Here's another message from her on my cell phone. What should I do---ignore her? That's what I've been doing, but she doesn't seem to get the point. All right then, I'll call her back, and tell her in no uncertain terms... But that's the trouble. I can't tell her "in no uncertain terms." She's such a sad, lonely, ugly, pathetic little thing; stupid into the bargain; but so kind, so gentle, I can't bear to hurt her!
"Sayaka? It's Ken. Listen---"
"Ken-chan!"
"Yes. Is something wrong?"
"Oh... it's my sister. I'm so worried about her, I wish I knew... wish I understood..."
"Sayaka, listen to me. Your sister and I are no longer... we broke up, you see."
"Then it's... it's final? It's all over?"
"Yes, dear, it's over. I'm sorry."
"I see."
She is silent, and I don't know what to say. I can imagine what a fool I look like to my department head, Mr. Iinami, who has come over to my desk and is squinting at me in some surprise. "Are you on the phone?" he inquires in a voice barely above a whisper, to minimize his intrusion if it is one.
I raise a finger to indicate I'll be with him in a minute and say into the phone, "Sayaka, I have to go now, I'm at work, you see, and my boss---"
"Couldn't you meet me for lunch? I’m downtown."
"Downtown? What are you doing downtown?"
"For a quick cup of tea, if not for lunch. You see, I... I so need to talk to someone... someone older, more experienced..."
"All right, we'll have lunch. What time is it now? Ten past eleven. Do you know the Nakamuraya sushi shop, across the street from the Clock Tower? Meet me there at one."
Mr. Iinami shakes his head and smiles. "Sayaka? Yesterday it was Mayu."
"It still is Mayu. Sayaka is the kid sister of someone I broke up with two months ago. I was... kind of an older brother to her, I guess, and... well, she seems to need someone like me. What she really needs is a good psychiatrist, but I'm not sure I know how to get her to see one."
"Are you sure she isn't in love with you?"
"The thought has crossed my mind."
"Well, let her down gently, Ozawa-kun."
"As gently as I can."
***
This is strange... she isn't here. It's ten past one... It's not like her to be late for a meeting with me. Even if I arrive early, I always find her waiting for me. Hm. Can something have happened to her? Ridiculous---what can have happened? Nothing ever does happen to her, poor child. That's probably the root of what ails her. Or maybe it's because of what ails her that nothing ever happens to her. Anyway. Listen, my dear, I'm in the middle of a working day, I can't stand here all day waiting for you. We said one o'clock. Well, I'll give you five more minutes, and then, you'll have to excuse me, I must be off.
Strange, strange. I can't get it out of my mind, though I really do have other things to think about. Why didn't she show up? Or at least call? Come to think of it, why didn't I call her? I'm lying to myself if I say it didn't occur to me. Of course it did---and yet I didn't call. I used her not showing up as an excuse to wash my hands of her, and now I feel guilty---but why? She stood me up, not the other way around, and if I'm secretly relieved to have been let off the hook, as I admit I am, where's the sin? Where's the crime? She's the kid sister of an ex-girlfriend, which is as good as saying she's nothing to me. If she has an adolescent crush on me, that's her problem---isn't it? Still, maybe I should at least dial her number, to make sure she's not in trouble or something...
"Ozawa-kun!" Iinami-san. "Come, let's go out for a beer. Unless, of course, Mayu-san's waiting for you."
"She is, as a matter of fact."
"Well, off you go then! I can't afford to pay you any more overtime this month."
***
Actually, Mayu is not waiting for me. Mayu is working tonight---not where she thinks I think she's working, which is to say at her office, but where I happened to find out she is really working, which is to say... good God, how complicated life is in the twenty-first century! Is "complicated" even the word? Father Matsui, bless him---he's the priest at my church; yes, I am a Catholic, I was baptized at fifteen, and how many times since then I have fallen away from the church and returned to it and fallen away again I simply do not know anymore, I've lost count---Father Matsui, my true friend and wise counselor over the years, thinks the end of the world is near, very near, and quotes the Book of Revelation to prove it! You laugh, but I'll tell you frankly, he makes a lot more sense to me than the so-called realists who pin their faith on science and economics and mock the notion of salvation through divine grace. Don't get me wrong: I know their arguments as well as they do, I can mock as bitingly as they can. But more and more my mockery leaves a bitter taste in my mouth. Who am I fooling?
No, but... shall I tell you what I think? It is not the end of the world we're living through, not the end, but the beginning. It's not that God created the world---God is creating the world! Yes, yes. I see it now: this is the Creation we're living through. These are the six days. Or perhaps the sixth day. Or perhaps the first. Would Father Matsui be in his office now, I wonder? I must... I must have a talk with him! Oh, Father, please, please be in your office!
***
Where am I? It is strange. I was born in this city, grew up here, have never lived anywhere else---how is it I get lost in it so easily? I have no sense of direction, that's the trouble.
Anyway... anyway! I found my apartment. I recognized it as soon as the man, the agent, ushered me inside. "Yes, this is the place," I said. The agent was surprised. This was only the first of several apartments he'd planned to show me, and his quick success didn't seem to please him.
"What do you mean, 'this is the place'?" he asked.
"Why, this is the place, I saw it in my dream: a white room bathed in sunlight, lace curtains fluttering in the breeze... Last night I dreamed of this very room. Yes, it was this room, this room and no other. Can I move in today?"
"Well, you'll need someone to act as a guarantor. Your father, perhaps?"
"My parents are dead."
"Well..."
"There's only my elder sister," I said. "I'm living with her now."
"Well, that's fine then. Bring your sister to our office, and as soon as the paperwork is done you can move in."
"She works during the week. Will Saturday be all right?"
"Any day except Sunday. Can I drop you somewhere?"
"No, thank you. Would it be possible, do you think... could I just... sit here for a few minutes? Alone?"
"Sit here? But there's nothing to sit on!"
"I'll sit on the floor. Please, I want to so much."
"I'm afraid I... I have to lock up, you see."
"Why? There's nothing to steal, is there?"
"No, that's true. Still..."
"I'll tell you what. You had other places to show me; you were planning to spend a lot more time with me, weren't you? You didn't expect to wrap up our business nearly so quickly. Just let me sit here quietly for an hour, and then come back for me and I'll leave with you. Or maybe I'll even be gone before you come back. Would that be all right?"
"Well, it's highly irregular, but... all right. One hour."
"One hour. Really, you're so kind. I can't thank you enough. And I'll bring my sister to your office on Saturday. Saturday morning."
***
I think... I think I know this park. It looks familiar. That little stream, with the little wooden bridge over it. Didn't my father take me here when I was little? I was five when my father died. Mother told me that he used to take me out every Sunday morning, for a drive or for a walk, just the two of us. My sister had ballet on Sunday morning, and Father and I... "Where did he take me?" I remember asking my mother. "I don't know, dear," she said. Could it have been here?
I'm sure I haven't been here recently. It's quite far from anywhere I ever go. But... surely I've stood on this bridge before? This railing---didn't my father lift me up and sit me on it? Could I be mistaken? Of course I could be---it could have been some other bridge, some other railing, or maybe I'm imagining the whole scene... But then... why did this feeling of having been here before suddenly hit me? I've never had it before. I wonder if my sister would know. It's not likely, if my mother didn't. Still, I'll ask her. Funny: she must remember Father so much more clearly than I do. I hardly remember him at all. And it's funny that we never speak of him---never. You'd think the subject would come up, in the course of conversation, but it never does. Hm. If only I had a better sense of direction! I'll have to stop somebody and ask the way to the subway station---and I so hate to do that!
***
"Ozawa-san! Come in, come in. What a surprise."
"I’m sorry, Father, I should have called."
"Nonsense, nonsense!"
Father Matsui was once a circus clown, and there are times when, even in his cassock, he looks more like a clown than a priest. He's a dwarfish little man, with a slight hump on his back and a perpetual smile on his ruddy face that at times, truth to tell, looks rather foolish. In fact there's little about his exterior that commands respect. His head, with its bald patches and scattered patches of gray hair seeming to form a different pattern every time you see him, is the shape of a soccer ball and seems to sit directly on his shoulders, so insignificant is his neck. I remember once he said to me, very early in our acquaintance, "How would they hang me if I ever came up for capital punishment?" With me at a loss for a reply, he promptly added, "I'd better keep my nose clean so as not to embarrass the state."
"Sit down," he said, "let me get you some tea."
"Father, I've come for your blessing."
"Oh?"
"Bless me, Father, for I have... decided to disappear. To vanish without a word to anyone. You are the last person I will see as my present self. When I leave this church it will be as a nameless, penniless, homeless, aimless beggar. I will spend my days walking, my evenings begging, my nights sleeping in whatever shelter my alms can procure for me..."
"And why this... this..."
"I seem to hear the voice of God telling me this is what I must do."
"If that's a joke, my son, it's not funny, and in fact---"
"---would be blasphemous. I know. No, I'm not joking. It is the service God demands of me. Each of us is called to serve Him in a different way---you as a priest, and me... as what? An up-and-coming young executive at Nomura Securities? Lover of Mayu, who two nights a week sells herself to... well, to people like me..."
"Sells herself?"
"Sells herself. The old-fashioned word for it is whore. One of my friends... well, one of my colleagues (I have no friends) met her at an establishment known in the industry as a kyabakura, a cabaret club. Are you familiar with establishments of that nature, Father?"
"I've heard of them, certainly."
"Well, it seems she works in one two nights a week, telling me she was working late. Which of course she was, so I can't accuse her of lying. I don't accuse her of anything. I only see that... that my present way of life is mistaken, that I must... well, as I said..."
"Shouldn't you at least talk to Mayu-san first? Aren't you too quick to think the worst of her? For all you know, it might be a case of mistaken identity."
"Oh no, Father, it's not mistaken identity, and I am by no means quick to think the worst of her. On the contrary, I was very slow. Before I stationed myself outside the club and with my own eyes saw her enter---and it was long before I could even bring myself to do that---I too assumed it was a case of mistaken identity."
"My son---"
"No, Father, I have made up my mind. If this isn't a sign from God, there is no such thing. Your blessing, Father. I ask, I implore your blessing."
"My blessing you have, no matter what you do. But... mayn't we talk a little longer?"
"Oh, certainly, Father, as long as you like. As long as you can endure my company."
"And you will permit me to be perfectly frank with you?"
"Perfectly."
"I don't mean to pry, but before you started seeing Mayu there was another girl, another woman."
"Yes."
"Her name was...?"
"Tomoko."
"Tomoko. And before Tomoko, I think..."
"I see what you're getting at. 'Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.' My own life is far from blameless. All the more reason---"
"All the more reason, I should think, to stop and reflect before taking a step that, whatever you might say to the contrary, is being taken in the spirit of anger and resentment."
"I say nothing to the contrary. Anger and resentment---yes, and to spare. Just this afternoon I was sitting at my desk and asking myself, could I murder Mayu? Would I be capable of it? And my tentative conclusion---tentative because after all, how well do we really know ourselves?---my tentative conclusion is yes, I could. In today's evening paper there's a story about a deranged man who stabbed a woman, a complete stranger, to death in the street with a fruit knife. He'd bought the knife at a hardware store half an hour before, with the express intention of using it to stab someone. I happened to read the story on the subway here, and the first thought that came into my head was, 'Maybe I'll buy a fruit knife.' So seriously, Father, isn't it better for me to go?"
"My son..." We looked at each other in silence for a time, and when at last he broke the silence it was to say, "We will do the only thing I know how to do in a crisis. We will kneel down and pray. And when we rise from our knees, with God's grace you will know what to do. And, with God's grace, you will do it."
"Do you really believe that, Father?"
"Oh yes, my son. Yes. I really believe that. Would I have become a priest if I didn't? Wouldn't I still be a clown? It's a good life, you know, a clown's..."
Part III
"Tomoko, it's me."
"Ken-chan!"
"May I come in?"
She is silent; the door does not open.
"Please, Tomoko. I must speak to you. You don't..." One feels foolish, talking like this into an intercom. "You don't know what is going on in my soul."
"No, I don't! And I don't want to! I am terrified, terrified of what goes on in your soul!"
"Terrified?" This is a surprise. "Why?"
"Why don't you just... go away!"
"I will, of course, if you want me to." Thank heaven there is no one on the stairs. "You have every reason to... well, to hate me. But..." I try a new tack. "Is Sayaka home?"
"What do you want with her?"
"What do I want with her? Nothing, I... Tomoko, please, I can't talk here, there's someone coming."
There was, in fact, suddenly, the sound of footsteps coming somewhat hurriedly up the stairs. Father Matsui would surely have seen the hand of Providence at work, for the newcomer was none other than Sayaka. "Ken-chan!"
"Sayaka! You were supposed to meet me this afternoon. I was worried."
"I... I'm sorry, I... But come in. Isn't my sister home?"
"She is, but she won't let me in."
"What's the matter with her?"
Sayaka took her key from her handbag and opened the door.
"Where were you?" Tomoko pounced on Sayaka quite as if I weren't there. "I was worried sick!"
"Worried sick about what? I don't have the right to go out any more? You keep me here like a prisoner in a cage. I'm sick of it. I found my own apartment. I'm moving out."
"You're what?"
"Moving out. And if you won't sign as my guarantor, I'll ask Ken-chan. I'm going to take a bath."
With that she moved past us down the hallway.
Tomoko turned to me. Her eyes were wide; there was a look of something like fear in them. She took a step back, then another. She reminded me of something. For a moment I couldn't quite grasp what it was. Then it came to me: the woman in Munch's painting, The Scream. But no sooner had this struck me than her expression changed. What was it welling up behind her eyes---laughter? Yes---wild, mocking laughter! But that too passed almost as soon as I had perceived it. Now there was no laughter, no mockery, only a smile, just an ordinary smile. "Well, since you're here," she said, "you may as well stay for dinner. What is it you 'must speak to me' about?"
"About---"
"Wait a minute. Sayaka!" she suddenly called out. "Sayaka!"
Sayaka, having disappeared into the kitchen, now reappeared at the opposite end of the long hallway. Declining to come closer, she stood, mute and expressionless, waiting to hear what her sister wanted.
"What's this about moving out? What's this about a guarantor?"
"I'm twenty years old. I want to be on my own. I found an apartment. It's just like one I saw in a dream. I recognized it immediately. I told the man I'd take it, but he said I need a guarantor. It's near Makomanai Park. Did Father ever take me to Makomanai Park? As I was walking there this afternoon, I seemed to remember---"
"Father!"
"Yes, Father. Is there some reason we never mention him? It's like there's some taboo or something."
"You want to move out? Is that the way you show your gratitude to me, after all I've---"
"Gratitude!"
"After all I've done for you, all I've sacrificed?"
Sayaka now approached us, walking slowly. About half way to us she stopped again. She stood in the middle of the hall, her left shoulder resting lightly against the wall, regarding us in silence. No one spoke. Why had I come? I was no longer sure. To say goodbye? To beg forgiveness? To propose marriage? I heard Sayaka say, calmly, almost indifferently, "You're mad, Sister. Are you aware of that? You're mad." She turned around and started to walk away, but Tomoko called out, "Wait!", and she stopped.
"Let's all go into the living room," said Tomoko. "I have something to say to you. "And when I've said it, you can judge whether I'm mad or not."
***
Their "living room" is a purely Japanese-style room---tatami floor, cushions instead of chairs, and an alcove in which, over an old-fashioned lantern-like lamp, hung a scroll. I have always been drawn to that scroll. I know little of such things, and have no idea as to its artistic value---it may be trash for all I know. It illustrates a famous poem by the haiku master Basho: "Crow on a withered branch, autumn eve." That's exactly what it shows, and that's all it shows. Tomoko and I found it one day in a dusty little antique shop we happened to wander into. It was very early in our relationship. We looked at it without comment, and then left the shop. The next day I went back and bought it. On our next date I made her a present of it. That's the history of the scroll in Tomoko's "living room."
We had scarcely seated ourselves on the cushions arranged round the low table that was the room's only furniture before Tomoko began. She sat facing Sayaka, and spoke exclusively to her. I may as well not have been there. In fact, I had the odd, eerie feeling that I wasn't---that I had left the church and, just as I had told Father Matsui I would, vanished. I saw and heard everything that went on, but any sense of my being present at the scene was utterly lacking.
"Let me tell you first of all," said Tomoko, speaking quietly and unemotionally, almost monotonously, "that the man you call 'Father' is my father but not yours. We are not sisters. We are nothing to each other. You came into this family when you were four years old. Your father murdered your mother. He stabbed her to death with a bread knife and stuffed her corpse into the trunk of his car. This happened in Tokyo. He then fled with you to Narita Airport, and abandoned you there. You were barely three years old. You were found wandering lost and crying in the airport concourse, clutching a stuffed animal. I'll show you the newspaper clippings; I still have them. The police were called, and you were taken to an orphanage. Your father, meanwhile, had flown to Los Angeles, where some weeks later he was arrested. He was sent back to Japan, tried, and sentenced to life in prison. If he is alive he is still there---unless he's been paroled for good behavior or something, which is possible for all I know. Maybe Ken-chan, with his law school background, can tell us something about that. As to how you came into this family and became my 'sister'---"
"Tomoko, stop!" That was my voice; I heard it distinctly, but no one else seemed to. Neither Tomoko nor Sayaka paid me the slightest attention. Sayaka's eyes were fixed on her sister. What was going on in her mind? Her face revealed nothing---but then, Sayaka's face scarcely ever does, a thought that struck me just then for the first time. Sayaka's face does not register emotion. Could it be paralyzed in some way? Would that account for the odd cast of her features?
"As to how you came into this family and became my 'sister,' my parents had long believed it wasn't healthy for a girl to grow up an only child; they wanted another one, but my mother had had a hysterectomy shortly after I was born, so adoption was the only way. For years they couldn't make up their minds. Then your story hit the papers. My father showed the story to my mother and said, 'Here she is, here's our child.' That's what my mother told me years later. She never told me how she responded to that---whether in astonishment she asked him what on earth he meant, or whether she simply understood him and agreed without any explanation being necessary. Be that as it may, they filed the necessary applications, underwent the necessary tests---"
Without a word Sayaka rose to her feet and walked out of the room. There was no hurried abruptness in her movements, no agitation; she moved like someone who, after sitting in one place for a long time, simply feels like getting up. A moment later we heard her bedroom door close softly. Then we heard nothing.
Tomoko turned to me. "I'll see about dinner," she said, and she too stood up.
***
Left alone, I sat gazing up at the crow on the withered branch. I don't know how long I sat there, in motionless silence, thinking nothing. Then a faint sound from the kitchen---the sound of meat sizzling on a fry pan---startled me out of my reverie. I stood up and walked past the kitchen, where through the doorway I saw Tomoko, her back to me, busy at the stove. At Sayaka's bedroom door I hesitated, then knocked gently. No answer. "Sayaka," I called, for some reason not daring to raise my voice much above a whisper. "Sayaka. It's me. May I come in?" Still no answer. Perhaps she hadn't heard me. I turned the doorknob. Was it locked? No. I only meant to open it a crack, but it seemed to swing open of itself, revealing a brilliantly lit room---brilliant at least in comparison to the dim lamplight of the living room. Sayaka sat cross-legged on the futon in the middle of the floor. Her eyes seem to have been fixed even before I entered precisely on the space that my face now occupied, so she didn't have to move a muscle to confront me.
"May I come in?"
"Of course."
There was only one chair in the room---a little white chair that was evidently of a set with the little white desk. I sat down on it, feeling foolish as only a grown man sitting in a child's chair can. Sayaka saw my discomfort and, patting the space beside her on the futon, said, "Sit here.
"Do you think," I said, "we could turn off the overhead light and turn on this desk lamp instead?"
"Is it too bright?"
"Yes, I rather think it is."
"I like bright lights. When I was little I was afraid of the dark."
"And now?"
"Now not so much."
"Well, could I... Do you mind?" I switched on the lamp, stood up, crossed over to the light switch by the door, and turned off the overhead fluorescent light. "There, that's better, don't you think?"
"Sit here," she said again. "That chair's too small for you."
"Yes, all right. Thank you. Saya-chan..."
"I've decided to quit my job."
"Yes?"
"You want to hear something funny? Wait." She stood up, crossed over to the desk, and from one of the drawers drew out a name card, which she handed me. "Three days ago a rather nice-looking young man---not as nice-looking as you, but still---said to me as I was ringing up his purchases, speaking very low so no one else could hear, 'Listen, I know what you're going through, I can read the expression on your face, I've had it on my own face often enough! I can help you. Give me a call.' And he handed me his card."
"Kenji Miyazawa. Wasn't there a writer of that name?"
"I don't know. My sister's the one who knows about writers, Me, I..."
"What expression would he have seen on your face?"
"I don't know! I was so taken by surprise, I just stared at him, and before I knew it he was gone. Let's call and ask him."
"No, Saya, let's not. There are strange people about nowadays. It's wisest not to encourage them."
"Oh please, Ken-chan, call him."
"Me!"
"If I call, it's maybe asking for trouble. But you... you have a voice that inspires confidence and at the same time..."
"At the same time what?"
"Sends a warning. You're a man of the world. You know your way around. If he has anything nasty in mind, hearing your voice will make him think twice. You can tell him you're my father or something."
"What's this about quitting your job?"
"Well, I'm not going to be a supermarket cashier forever, am I?"
"No, certainly not. What do you have in mind?"
"Maybe I'll go back to school and study Greek drama."
"Oh?"
"No, I'm joking. In high school our drama club performed Antigone."
"Hm."
"What do you think I should do?"
"Really, I... I don't know what to tell you."
"I wish you'd tell me something!"
"Well, going back to school would be a good start. Without an education there's not much---"
"You know what I'd really like to do?"
"What?"
"Start my own business."
"That's interesting. What kind of business?"
"Or better still, marry a rich, rich businessman. Is it possible a rich businessman would want me for a wife? I wouldn't be in his way. I wouldn't mind, you know, if he had affairs with other women."
"You wouldn't? You'd be a very unusual wife, in that case."
"I wouldn't mind at all. I'd even like it. I'd wait up for him no matter how late he came home, and I'd listen while he told me all about the woman he'd just slept with."
"I don't know whether to take you seriously or not."
"Anyway, will you be my guarantor for the apartment I want to rent? I don't want to be under my sister's thumb any more."
"You'd rather be under my thumb?"
"Well, yes, if it came to that. But you'd treat it as what it is, a mere formality. My sister would make a big deal out of it. One more responsibility on her already over-burdened shoulders! She might even refuse, saying I'm not fit to live on my own. I don't want to be dependent on her consent. I want to say to her, 'Sister, I'm moving out.' Not, 'Sister, is it all right if I move out? Will you sign the papers showing you approve?'"
"Well... but you see, Saya-chan, I may be going away... far away... for a long time. I've been..."
"Dinner's burnt!"
Sayaka and I looked at one another. A moment later Tomoko appeared in the doorway. "I burned the dinner," she said. "It's a charred mess. I don't know what happened. My thoughts distracted me. I was thinking about something, and suddenly..." Her eyes filled with tears.
"Let's go out for dinner," said Sayaka. "Ken-chan will treat us."
"You two go. I don't want any dinner."
"Nonsense," I said. "Sayaka's right. "My treat---and I know just the restaurant to take you to! We'll have a feast!"
Part IV
"Let's order another bottle," said Sayaka.
"Are you sure?"
"This is the first time I've ever been drunk!"
"And it feels good?"
"Yes! Wonderful!"
"Well, let me give you the benefit of my long experience and let you in on a little secret. The way you feel right now is the very best feeling wine can give. If we order another bottle you'll get depressed, then maybe sick."
"Waiter!"
The waiter who happened to be passing with a tray of empty plates was not ours, but he came over anyway.
"Another bottle of... this stuff! What is it, Ken-chan?"
"Burgundy."
"It's my first time, I know nothing about wine!"
The waiter smiled thinly, nodded and proceeded on his way.
"Well, I guess you'll just have to find out for yourself," I heard myself murmur. The truth is, I was rather affected myself. I've never been much of a drinker.
"Tell me, Ken-chan... Is what my sister said true?"
"I don't know. What did she say?"
"About... you know, the... about my father and... and..."
"I don't know. It sounds pretty improbable."
"But you know... I'll tell you something strange! As she was speaking, I seemed to... I don't know, I felt these... these memories coming back."
"What memories?"
"Of being alone and terrified in a vast, vast throng..."
Our waiter came with our wine. He uncorked it with all the gusto of a magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat, did a comic little pirouette, and filled our glasses. Sayaka laughed. The waiter bowed.
"To life!" cried Sayaka, raising her glass.
"Sh, keep your voice down." Heads were turning in our direction.
"To life!" she cried again, louder. "Don't talk to me as if I'm a child. Don't you dare!"
"All right, but if we make a disturbance they'll call the police and have us turned out, so let's behave ourselves."
"You're no fun. I wish my sister was here."
"Is she fun?"
"Do you know that she was afraid you would murder her?"
"Afraid I'd murder her!"
"Sh! Keep your voice down!" She giggled.
"What are you talking about?"
"My sister is mad, Ken. Don't you know that? Shall I tell you a thought that occurs to me? A secret, secret thought? It's that right now, right this very instant, she's slitting her wrist in the bath, and I'll get home and find---"
"Sayaka, please!"
"---find her corpse floating in blood. It's all very well for you to say 'Sayaka please'---but you don't know her! You can't imagine..."
"What can't I imagine?"
"Right now, right this very minute, I feel a stabbing pain in my left wrist. If what she said is true she's not my sister, but we still grew up together, nothing can change that, and we're very close, there's a kind of... bond between us. Do you have brothers and sisters, Ken-chan?"
"No, I'm an only child."
"Then you don't know. There's a kind of... a kind of bond... Oh, my head is spinning!"
"You see, I was right. Now you'll get depressed, and---"
"No! I feel wonderful! Fill my glass. Fill it, I said! Because when you feel this wonderful, there's only one thing you want, one thing you want, and that is... to feel more wonderful! Oh, Ken... Do you know what? I think I love you! For the first time in my life I am drunk and in love!"
***
It's 3 a.m. and she's still not home. Should I call the police? They'll laugh at me; they'll say I'm hysterical. If we had to open an investigation for everyone who stayed out past three, they'll say, we'd have our hands full, let me tell you! Take a sleeping pill and go to sleep. You'll wake up in the morning, your sister will be home safe and sound, you'll see.
Yes, maybe I will take a sleeping pill. I should have done it hours ago. If I take one now I won't be able to wake up on time. On time, on time! I spend my whole life being on time! Good old Tomoko, never late, always on time, someone you can really count on!
What's that---my phone? Good heavens, yes, it is my phone! At three o'clock in the morning! It must be her---who else? Only... I'm so exhausted, so disoriented---where is my phone? But what's the matter with me? It's right here in my hand, I was fiddling with it the whole time I was thinking of calling the police. "Hello!"
"Hello, is this Tomoko-san?"
It's not Saya. "Who is this?"
"You don't know me. My name is Mayu Yamazaki, I... I apologize for calling at this hour, forgive me for waking you..."
"You didn't wake me. Mayu Yamazaki?"
"I'm a... I'm a friend of Kenichi-san's... Tomoko-san? Are you there?"
"Yes... yes. A friend of Kenichi-san's. He's very popular. He has a great many friends, a great many---probably a lot more than either of us knows. There are people like that, you know. They have a certain charm, a certain... well, maybe it's charisma. They flash you a smile, and before you know it you're in love. Forgive me, I'm incoherent. I'm dead tired, I can't see straight, let alone think. Anyway, Ken-chan is one of those."
"Yes, he's very attractive. Is he with you?"
"With me? No. With my younger sister. They went out for dinner and she's not back yet."
"Your younger sister!"
"How do you happen to have my phone number, by the way?"
"It was on Kenichi-san's cell phone. I---"
"You made a note of it, in case of emergency. I understand. Well, he's not here."
"If you hate me, I understand, but please---"
"Hate you! Why should I hate you?" Who is this woman? What does she want from me?
"You won't hang up on me?"
"If I hang up on you, it won't be because I hate you but because I am very tired and must get some sleep. I have to work tomorrow... today, I mean."
"I would very much like for us to become better acquainted."
It is on the tip of my tongue to ask why, but something holds me back---my breeding? My early instruction in etiquette and good manners? "Yes, by all means," I hear myself say.
"What time do you finish work?"
"Usually at five, but sometimes---"
"There's overtime. I understand. I am in the same position myself. Suppose, then, we meet tomorrow... today... at seven. We can have dinner."
"Dinner?" I am stupid with fatigue---maybe also with stupidity, I don't know.
"My treat. Please, don't refuse me. I do so much want---"
"Yes, all right, dinner."
"Where is your office?"
"Right downtown. In the Nippon Life Building."
"The Nippon Life Building! My office is in the Nippon Life Building too! What's your company?"
"The Japan Travel Bureau."
"You're a travel agent?"
"Yes."
"It's on the ground floor, I know it well. I arrange my business trips with JTB. We must have seen each other, maybe even spoken to each other. I had a funny feeling right from the start that your voice sounded familiar. All right, I'll be at your office at seven sharp. Agreed?"
"Yes." Anything to end this conversation so that I can go to bed and lose consciousness. I want so, so badly to lose consciousness!
"One more thing."
"What?"
"I know a man who, for a fee, will kill anyone, no questions asked. But we'll talk about that tomorrow. Today, rather. This evening. I've kept you too long already. I'm sorry. Goodnight, Tomoko-san."
"Yes, thank you," I mumble idiotically. I am already asleep, already unconscious.
***
"This is a new life, Saya-chan. Look at that sun! Look! Is that the same sun we woke up to yesterday morning? It is not. Nor are we the same. Oh, Saya-chan, to think... to think..."
"Why are you crying?"
"Let it be. Let me cry. These tears I am not ashamed of, not ashamed to have you see. Saya... listen to me, Saya. Listen."
"Well? I'm listening!"
"Do you feel it too, Saya? That we are not the same people we were yesterday, that that sun, this earth, everything, everything has been transformed? Do you feel it, Saya? Only tell me you feel it too, and I'll... I'll..."
"I do, I do feel it! Oh, Ken..."
"Transformed out of recognition! You call me Ken and I call you Saya, but that's just habit, that's just convention. Ken and Saya is who we were---not who we are. We'll have to begin our new life by taking new names."
"What new names?"
"We'll see. We'll know when the time comes. Listen. First we'll go to Father Matsui and ask his blessing. Then---"
"Who's Father Matsui?"
"The priest at my church. My friend and guardian angel."
"You belong to a church? You're a Christian?"
"I was a Christian. Ken was a Christian. I am nothing. You are nothing. We have no past, or rather... our past was on another planet, in another universe."
"Yes, another universe."
"You see? No matter how incoherently I babble, you understand me. You, only you---"
"I understand nothing, nor want to understand anything, but I love what you are saying, and... and the way you're saying it. Go on. Tell me more."
"We'll go to Father Matsui and ask his blessing, and then we will find a place to raise our child---"
"Our child!"
"Didn't you feel it, Saya? Didn't you feel that we conceived a child? I felt it so... so powerfully. Never, never have I felt anything like that before! Oh, Saya, you mustn't... you're still thinking in terms of the old universe, the old ways. Everything, everything has been transformed!"
"Teach me! Teach me the new and transformed universe. How will we live? Will we have to work? Do we need money in this new universe, or do we simply reach out and take whatever we need?"
"At first, certainly, we will need money, but no more than we already have. And then... but surely you're not afraid of poverty?"
"I am afraid of nothing."
Part V
"May I speak to you for a moment?"
I look up from my drink, none too affably. I don't come here for conversation. I come here to be alone. Not that there's any company to run away from at home, but when I get tired of sitting alone in my apartment I come here, to sit alone among people, as it were. For me, that's socializing.
Who am I? A professor, a learned man. Learned in what? Ancient history, the more ancient the better. That's what I teach, the first civilizations. Sumer. Egypt. Perhaps you've read my commentary on the Epic of Gilgamesh, or my study of the Book of Genesis chapters relating to the patriarch Abraham. The latter, at least, is still in print.
"Well? What do you want to speak to me about?" Probably a former student, charmed at the prospect of renewing our acquaintance. In which case I suppose I should be a little more cordial. Or maybe the expression on my face is more cordial than I know, because the man pulls up a chair and sits down, quite as if I'd invited him to.
"About life," he says.
He is, I would guess, about thirty-five, which is to say nearly half my age. Squint though I do at his face, I see nothing familiar in it. He is the sort of man you characterize at a glance---unjustly, perhaps---as a perfect non-entity. A nine-to-five clerk in a municipal office, mired in stultifying routine, too stupefied even to resent it. Or maybe I see him that way because I want to, because it feeds my malice and my contempt, the only remaining components of my once complex emotional makeup.
"A wide subject," I grumble sourly.
"Listen. If you read the newspapers, and you look like someone who does, you probably know my name. Three years ago I---" A waiter abruptly materializes, and my guest breaks off to order a beer. The waiter looks at me, and I'm not quite sure what gesture I make, or whether I make any, but whatever it is it satisfies him, and with a slight bow he moves off.
"Three years ago I killed three people. Two small children and their mother."
He looks intently at me, as though to gauge how I'm taking this revelation, or confession, or whatever it is. He has counted on shocking me, of course, but I will not give him the satisfaction.
"It wasn't murder," he proceeds. "It was a car accident. I remember nothing about it. Nothing. I woke up one night---at least it seemed like night---in a place I didn't know, which turned out to be a hospital. How I got there, I had no idea until they told me, which wasn't until sometime later. I---"
"Excuse me."
"Yes?"
"Are you telling me this for a reason? And if so, does the reason have to do with me, or with you? Because if the latter---"
"You'd just as soon not know? Well, as to the reason, I confess that something in your face, I don't know what exactly, seemed to... well, I was struck by it. I thought, here's a man of understanding, a man of sympathy."
"You're not skilled in the art of reading faces, that's obvious."
"No?"
"My sympathy, if I ever had any, dried up years ago. I'm sorry. Really, I can't help you."
"Forgive me for contradicting you. I think you can."
The waiter returns, setting a beer down before my guest, and a gin and tonic down before me.
"Try to imagine what it's like," he pursues, "to have done this awful, unspeakable thing, and yet... to remember nothing, nothing!"
"Waiter!"
The waiter pauses, turns to me with a quizzical look, and slowly, as though reluctantly, makes his way back to the table.
"I didn't order this."
"Beg pardon, sir, but---"
He's a man of about my own age who once told me, I think, that he was some sort of corporate big shot who took to waitering after retirement, not as a livelihood but as a hobby. Or maybe that was someone else.
"You certainly did order it," interposes my uninvited guest. "Come, don't give the man a hard time. It's all right," he says to the waiter. "You can go, I'll handle him."
Am I hearing this right? "You'll handle me? What exactly---"
"Please, sir, calm down. All I ask is that you hear me out. The drink's on me. Please."
"But... who are you?" Too late I realize that my question has given him the opening he sought.
"Who am I? I'll tell you. I was nobody in particular, until my accident made me somebody. Nobody in particular... I had a job, a wife, children, a house, a mortgage... 'Nobody,' you see, means 'everybody.' I could have been anybody. I was good at my work, happy in my marriage, a loving father to my two kids, a dutiful son-in-law to my wife's mother... And then came... my accident. About that I can tell you very little. No more than what you must've read in the papers. I'd been working late, and was tired but not exhausted. I had not been drinking---that was established most definitely in court, to the satisfaction of all concerned. I had never had a car accident before. Never so much as a speeding ticket. And then... what happened that night? I know no more than what came out in the investigation: my car had somehow strayed into the lane of oncoming traffic. Had I momentarily fallen asleep at the wheel? I'll never know. And so... a young mother and two small children are dead because of me. Because of me, because of me! Well? Speak!"
"You are a madman!"
"A madman? Yes, in a sense. You can hardly have a thing like that happen to you and be entirely sane. And yet I carry on. After my acquittal---I was charged with negligence resulting in death---my company took me back, my wife remained the rock of support she has always been, my children, who were very small at the time, hardly seem to even know that anything is amiss---"
"You're telling me everything," I cut in sharply, "except the one thing I want to know."
"Which is?"
"Why you singled me out---"
"Ah. Well, that, if you like, is one symptom of my madness. I am bursting with a story that demands to be told. And so I---"
"Latch on to anyone within range unfortunate enough to be sitting quiet and alone when the mood comes over you."
"Forgive me. I did seem to read a certain... sympathy in your face."
"Well, you see how mistaken you were."
"No, I don't think I was mistaken. You are unhappy yourself, perhaps."
"Don't let it trouble you. Are you finished? May I---as we used to say in school---be excused?"
"I came to you because I thought you, as an older man, might have learned, and might teach me, that life is something other than a sick, perverse, cruel joke. It's a lesson I confess I am much in need of."
"Aren't we all!"
"You have read, of course, of the famous love-hotel murder."
"The famous love-hotel murder! No, I have not read of the famous love-hotel murder!"
"It's been in all the papers."
"I don't read the papers."
"I happen, you see to... well, to know the young woman."
"What young woman?"
"The woman who was killed. I know her, I... she worked in a supermarket; I used to... she worked at the cash. It's funny... I'd stop in on my way home from work, to pick up this and that... carton of milk, box of eggs... I always called home just before leaving the office, you see, and my wife would tell me what she was short of, and... there she'd be... I always lined up at her cash, even if another was less crowded, even if another cashier was entirely unoccupied. I guess... I don't know, it was kind of like a schoolboy crush I had on her, perfectly harmless, and yet, though we never exchanged so much as a word, those few minutes I spent in her vicinity... those few minutes were precious to me. Only once I did something... well, something a little mischievous. I don't know what possessed me. I handed her my business card and suggested she call me---oh! not for a minute thinking she would, just... as a kind of joke, you see. I never seriously thought she would call, never, and yet... it was possible! The possibility existed! And knowing it existed seemed to place my life on a whole new footing. I would lie awake at night, my wife sound asleep on the futon beside me, imagining the conversation we might have if she should happen, just for the hell of it, maybe in the same joking spirit in which I'd handed her the card, to call... And now... You are silent, you're not even looking at me, you haven't heard a word I've said... Well, it doesn't matter. You're right, I am a little mad..."
"You say she was murdered?"
"Murdered, yes, she and her boyfriend, in a love hotel room furnished, they say, like something out of the Arabian Nights, bludgeoned to death with an axe... an axe, can you imagine?"
"But... why?"
"No idea. A madman, I suppose. He's still at large, they haven't caught him. May I ask you a question?"
"What?"
"Do you believe in God?"
"Believe in God!"
"Yes, in an immaterial, inconceivable, ineffable spirit who created the universe and---"
"Are you---"
"Mad? We have already agreed that I probably am. Mad or not, I do believe in God. I'm not... I don't know whether the God I believe in is anything like the God of the Bible, Old Testament or New, but I believe in divine omnipotence, divine omniscience, and divine justice."
"Divine justice! How can you... after the story you just told me..."
"Oh, of course, from our human, finite perspective---"
"All right, all right, enough of this! Enough! I didn't come here looking for company, and I've had more than enough of yours! Won't you... won't you please leave me alone at last?"
"Yes, it's high time I was off. My children will be waiting up for me, and I mustn't keep them up too late. Only... how is it, how is it, I wonder, that I was so drawn to you?"
"I can't imagine. Few people are, and though I don't come here often, when I do I generally have no trouble sitting undisturbed until I feel like going home."
"Isn't there something, something you can tell me? I'm sorry if I'm impertinent, but... a strange feeling I have that... you have something to tell me, something that could change my life, give it meaning."
"Meaning, eh? All right. Since meaning is what you're after, I will tell you something. Listen now. This very morning I woke up to find that I had left an element on the stove burning all night. Just imagine. It's a gas stove. The building could have caught fire, and not only I but dozens of others, men, women and children, nodding acquaintances and perfect strangers, could have been burned to death!"
"Terrible! May I ask you... has that ever happened before?"
"No, but it might again. What if I'm going senile?"
"Yes, it's a dreadful possibility, dreadful. My wife's mother, who lives with us, has Alzheimer's. She was such a lively, intelligent woman, and now she has to be prevented from eating her own toilet paper! But wait, let me ask you this: supposing.... supposing God appeared to you as He is said to have appeared to Abraham and Moses, and... this is blasphemy, perhaps... offers you a choice: to live on and on into advanced senility, or... or to be bludgeoned to death with an axe! Which would you choose?"
"The axe. Definitely I'd choose the axe. Definitely."
"Yes, I think I would too. So you see..."