Aren’t they marvelous? These winds? Machiko-san said. When I clean up every year on the night of the fifteenth, I get so many breezes blowing into the hall like this. But whenever I clean up during the beginning of the month, in the mornings, the winds blow toward the outdoors from inside this hall, you know. The spirits of the people enshrined in this temple, whenever Obon approaches, turn into these soft gentle breezes and return to their hometowns or villages, and when Obon’s over, they properly come back here like this. I so wanted you to feel these winds for yourself, Naoto-kun. Frankly, I was waiting all day long for you to come here.
I was listening to Machiko-san’s words as if they were coming from somewhere distant. They were accompanied, as in a song, by a magical rhythm. I think we probably stood there for nearly an hour, transfixed in a dream-like state, our entire bodies exposed to the soft breezes that kept blowing in, one after another, entangling us in their wispy, whirling embraces before whooshing past us toward the principal deity at the back.
It was around December of that year when Machiko-san died.
One morning, after she didn’t show up for some time, the abbot went to her bedroom and found her lying dead, apparently as if she’d just fallen asleep. According to the physician who had rushed over and examined her, it seemed to be a cerebral hemorrhage, but some suspicion still lingered. Nonetheless, since Machiko-san was the daughter of a historic temple, and since she was also a long-time sufferer of a chronic disease, the police didn’t demand an autopsy, so Machiko-san’s cause of death was never clearly determined.
My younger sister and I stayed with her constantly, attending her wake and funeral. Her face was peaceful, never losing its smooth radiance for the entire three days prior to the cremation.
It might be a sin to say that my body’s such a bother to me now, but I no longer feel like I really need it all that much. For several months before passing away, Machiko-san often used to talk like that. She also used to say something like, Lately, I think I’ve finally realized what it is to die. You see, to die is to pass through. If you’re passing through a small tunnel that’s all bumpy and rough going, it’s going to be quite painful and uncomfortable, but if the tunnel were all smooth and glossy like porcelain, then it wouldn’t be tough at all, right? My body may be in ruin now, but as if to make up for that, I feel like all the bumpy things in the tunnel I have to pass through have disappeared, that the tunnel is surely all smooth by now. And then one day, suddenly, I feel I’ll be able to quietly pass through this tunnel and leave for another world.
And just like that, just like those words of hers, she slipped away smoothly from this world, leaving me behind.
After we finished seeing Machiko-san off to the distant yonder, we went back home. My younger sister went to school in the afternoon, but I was on a break, so I spent that day alone. The weather during the three days after she died was so warm and bright that you couldn’t believe it was winter. For a while, with my legs under the leg-warming kotatsu table, I was vacantly basking in the soft light of the Indian summer shining through the window. And then, when I entered my private room, I closed the curtains and sat down on the bed and—for the only time in all my life—wept so bitterly that I completely fell apart, heart and soul.
Sitting down in the main hall, gazing at the figure of Sakyamuni—its black surface gleaming in the morning light, which was getting brighter by the moment—I thought about what Machiko-san had once said; about how humans and animals, and even stones and flowers, and even the air itself are all like a dream, connected as one, and that the people living today, and the people who have died, and even the people who are about to be born, are all merely manifestations of just one single person called you. I also thought about Ichiro Tsuneoka, who preached the daily asceticism of devoting your heart and soul to letting people thrive, letting your partner thrive, making them all happy, making them grow, and giving them protection; and that to do your best to become empty, day after day, so that you may give yourself to others, so that you may forgive them, and help them grow, is to find yourself on the road to your own happiness. I also thought about the lady Buddhist who wrote that you’ll be grateful for everything, if you see that the way you live will be the way you die; that you’ll have peace of mind if you see that living with passion is to one day die with passion.
They’re all trying to say the same thing, ultimately. However, at the time, even though I appreciated their words, I felt as if I was crouched down with my arms around my knees in a place that was far removed from their state of mind.
In the afternoon that day, I returned to Tokyo. From Haneda I called Mrs. Onishi and informed her of my mother’s demise.
At the other end of the line, the missus said, I feel so sorry, sir. You must be exhausted.
Suspecting that her husband was beside her, I briefly thanked her for her constant support and promptly hung up.
19
THE WEATHER IN TOKYO was fine too. The sea off the coast of Haneda, visible through the window of the monorail train, was dazzling, as if sprinkled with powdered glass, but the scenery on the whole looked rather artificial and cheap. I transferred to the Yamonote Line in Hamamatsucho, got off at Akihabara, and then walked up to Iwamotocho Station, a stop on the Toei Shinjuku Line. The city of Tokyo I saw then, for the first time in four days, was a maelstrom of crowds; whether inside a train, or on a station platform, or in the electric district of Akihabara, which I spotted from the corner of my eye when I was in traveling in the train, it was utter chaos, swarming with people, even though it was a weekday afternoon. An office worker, a college student, a high school student in uniform, a foreigner, a mother holding her small child’s hand, a young woman with her hair dyed a brilliant red, a blond-haired boy holding a musical instrument, a rosy-cheeked, middle-aged man with a tumbler of cheap sake in one hand, a young man continuously muttering to himself, a woman in a mourning dress, a police officer, a driver for a courier service, and all kinds of blue-collar workers—in effect, people of every stripe imaginable, totally unrelated to each other—were jostling one another in a disorderly fashion, filling up empty spaces in countless places.
The sight of this urban tableau, nihilistic and mostly lifeless, instantly awakened in me a sense of futility, suffocation, and contempt beyond description. It seemed like you could find everything here, when in reality there was nothing. Even if everything was one—as Machiko-san had said—even if each and every individual in the crowd I saw before me was a manifestation of myself, this oneness was only, in the end, emblematic of a cold alienation.
I reached my apartment around five, filled the bathtub with hot water, and took a bath straightaway. As I soaked in the warm tub, heaving sighs of pleasure over and over again, I could feel several days worth of fatigue melting away in the hot water clouded with bath powder.
From the opened bathroom window, the only thing visible was the rough, gray wall of the rice store next door, but the sunlight, which was still quite luminous, was shining in, freely passing through the tiny gap between two buildings. It then suddenly occurred to me that, via this small window, the trajectory of light was seamlessly connecting me to the celestial heights of the boundless blue sky. With this epiphany, I underwent a radical transformation, and gained a far more intuitive understanding of what Machiko-san was saying, at least to a certain extent.
Machiko-san often used to say, If you run after only those things you can see, you’ll end up falling into despair, no matter what it is that you’re going after.
It may indeed be the case that we can’t see that the truth of everything you find in the here-and-now lays hidden.
After getting out of the bathtub and getting dressed, my cell phone rang. The call was from Eriko. Where have you been all this time?
Come to think of it, we hadn’t been in touch at all since Tanabata, the Star Festival. Although my cell phone showed some records of incoming calls from her, I simply wasn’t in the mood to answer the phone at the time.
Hearing Eriko’s voice, I remembered the promise I made to accompany her to Suwa on Friday the twelfth, which was the next day.
I’m sorry, I said. I went back to Kitakyushu, after a long time, since I was on my long-awaited holiday, you know. Besides, you’d said that you were going to be busy with work this week. I just returned a short while ago.
Since she asked about my whereabouts, I suspected that she must have stopped by my apartment, so I answered her truthfully, believing that it would be useless to lie. Still, I really wasn’t up to traveling to Suwa tomorrow; it felt downright tedious.
How unusual, she said, you, going back to your hometown.
I hadn’t returned in more than two years, after all. By the way, you called me a few times, right?
You had me worried, what with the trip tomorrow and my father and mother looking forward to meeting you.
I got careless and forgot to take the cell phone along. Sorry about that.
I started to think that you might have just skipped town to avoid going to Suwa altogether, that you couldn’t stand the idea of going there. Although she spoke jokingly, her words had a subtle sting to them.
Not true, I said. I wasn’t thinking like that at all. I mean, I’m back here now, aren’t I?
But honestly, you don’t have to force yourself, you know. You weren’t up to it in the beginning anyway.
I was amazed that she could say such a thing after accusing me of chickening out and telling me that her parents were looking forward to seeing me. But on the other hand, I realized how momentous this trip to Suwa was to
her. I didn’t have the heart to break a promise, and it also felt like a drag to spend the weekend in the apartment, so despite whatever high hopes she had, whatever she was scheming to carry out, I reconsidered and saw that our relationship wouldn’t turn into anything decisive just because of one visit to her parents’ home.
In fact, now that I thought about it, traveling with Eriko, which was something I hadn’t done in ages, might be just what I needed at the moment; it would be a perfect diversion.
Where should we meet tomorrow, and at what time? I asked.
I’ve bought tickets for the Azusa departing from Shinjuku at ten. But if you’re tired, we could leave on a slightly later train.
Right. So we’ll rendezvous at Shinjuku then?
Yeah, let’s.
The prospect of getting up alone tomorrow and then going to Shinjuku didn’t thrill me. I was awfully tired for sure. I wanted to sleep together with Eriko, at least for the night.
Well, in that case, I said, how about staying the night over at my place tonight?
Shall I? Eriko said, sounding delighted suddenly. I felt somewhat relieved.
I’ll come pick you up in my car. First we can shop for gifts for your folks and then have dinner.
Got it. I’ll see you at the usual place in Aoyama at seven.
Roger that.
I hung up and glanced at my watch. It was already past six. I changed into my street clothes in a hurry and left the apartment.
When I came back with Eriko after shopping and having dinner, it was past ten. As expected, my body felt heavy and I was also feeling this stinging, mental fatigue, so the two of us slipped into bed at once. Eriko was down to her underwear and I was reading a book while caressing her derrière, when a worry suddenly popped into my head, making me close the book and ask her, Do you think it’d be all right if we slept together like this when we’re over there?
Eriko closed the magazine she was reading, turned to face me, and said, giggling, Oh yeah, about that. My bedroom is on the second floor, and my father and mother’s is downstairs, you see. After consulting with my mother, I’ve decided to have you sleep in the guest room on the second floor. Eriko then went on to eagerly explain the many different layouts of her house, tracing the bed pad with her finger and mentioning a series of names of the tourist attractions she planned to take me to, saying that we’d be at one place tomorrow and another on Saturday, all the while driving home the point that the plan was, strictly speaking, just a plan before adding that her parents weren’t going to accompany us on the Suwa tour, but the four of us would, instead, dine on Saturday at her father’s favorite restaurant by the Suwa Grand Shrine.
I was silently listening to the detailed plan she’d arrived at in consultation with her mother, but then I blurted out, So we’re going to be sleeping separately, after all.
No worries. I’m not going to lock my door, Eriko said, looking into my eyes and laughing mischievously.
Sounds like I’ll be sneaking into your bedroom under cover of night, I said, joining her in laughter, and then asking whether her room had a bed. Eriko nodded.
Well in that case, I said, we better make damn sure it doesn’t creak too much, or else your father’s going to come running up the stairs with a golf club in his hands.
Making Eriko lie on her back, I pressed my body over her and rubbed my slightly hardened thing against the area where the round bone of her abdomen was jutting out. I then said, See, like this, as I jolted my waist up and down.
Ew! Stop imagining strange things, Eriko said, as she giggled and wound her arms around my neck and drew her lips closer.
When I pulled my body away from her after she came, she wrapped her hands around my still-erect cock with her eyes closed, as usual, and began to stroke it. I caught her wrist, pulled her hand away, and said, that’s not necessary. While I had no particular reason to decline, there was something annoying about the warm, raw texture of Eriko’s palms.
Eriko had opened her eyes and was looking into my eyes for a while, when she suddenly got up and tucked up the blanket that was covering the lower half of my body. She then sat squatting like a frog on the bed, before positioning her large butt toward my head and, after inserting my thing into her mouth, tonguing me with heart and
soul. Since she still had a lot to learn, her teeth, as usual, were scraping against the shaft at times, so it wasn’t all that great, but since I didn’t have much of a choice, I bent forward and rammed the tip of my nose right onto the goosefleshed skin in the crack of her ass and sniffed the sweet and sour scent of a woman, while placing my hands around her slender waist and squeezing it tight. Before long I began to ejaculate into her mouth.
While the tip of my penis touched the inner wall of her mouth and her tongue, a whopping four days’ worth just kept rushing out, on and on, like water spraying out from an out-of-control, gyrating hose. This was the first time I came directly in her mouth since we began seeing each other.
Eriko closed her mouth, and with her cheeks puffed up in the way they did whenever she took powdered medicine, she looked my way and smiled before yanking out two tissues and spitting out the contents of her mouth. But as I observed her doing so, she put on a show for me by stirring what was still left with her tongue and swallowing it.
As I gazed at this performance, I wondered why she’d even bother. Even though I’d probably get used to it eventually, I was burdened with the kind of guilt you feel when you happen to see a hobo in the street; and, to my disgust, it was just like being with Teruko Onishi.
Eriko snuggled against my chest and curled up, so I hugged her with all my heart, but deep inside, I was wondering whether she was overdoing it a little, whether she’d lost sight of herself.
20
WHEN WE BOARDED THE Matsumoto-bound limited express train departing at ten in the morning, Eriko recounted many stories about when she was little, growing up in the town of Suwa. She also spoke of her junior high and high school days, including her first crush. She was in the eighth grade and the object of her infatuation was her classmate called Kushida-kun. For their first date, they went to see a movie, a remake of Jesus Christ Superstar. Eriko said that she still remembered very well how Kushida-kun, on their way back home, had enthusiastically talked about Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s work, Cancer Ward.
Whatever happened to Kushida-kun, I wonder, Eriko murmured.
I�
�m sure, just like you right now, he must be remembering you, and talking about the same thing to somebody.
He was a bit like you. I’ve always had a thing, I guess, for odd people.
Eriko then went on to say that she wanted to hear stories about my childhood days, that she’d never heard me speak that much about them.
As I told you last time—I went on to say—"I don’t have any proper stories to tell; all I have are memories I don’t care to recall. We were terribly poor, and until junior high, I used to dream about one day living in a large house. I used to believe that I could make that happen. That’s about it.
"I was bright, though. In fact, so bright that the people around me used to be amazed. When I was around three, I was the kind of cheeky kid who memorized Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Lost World in its entirety."
And then I recited an opening passage of the book, which I still remember today.
"My heart was pounding, as I approached Professor Challenger’s living room. If he found out that I was a journalist from the Daily Gazette … Well, plenty of reporters have already suffered serious injuries, having been punched or pushed from staircases by the professor. When I knocked on the door, an ox-like voice answered back from inside."
I stopped reciting there, and said to Eriko, By the way, your father’s voice doesn’t sound like an ox’s, does it?
Relax, Eriko said, laughing. "My father is a mild-tempered man, and, besides, his room is on the first floor.
But it’s just so incredible! she went on. How on earth could you hold all that inside your head for nearly thirty years? I mean, just how does your head work anyway? I’ve always wondered about that, you know. I’ve always found it miraculous.
As I’ve been saying for some time now, I replied, shrugging, there’s nothing to it—I’m not super-talented, nor do I have some sort of superpower, and it’s not as if I tried to memorize all that, you know.
The Part of Me That Isn't Broken Inside Page 22