Grotesque

by Natsuo Kirino

  We moved to the coffee shop in the basement and sat around a table. But the only one I paid attention to was Yurio. He sat in a chair some distance from us, his posture straight and erect. Yuriko’s beautiful son. No matter how adoringly I gazed at his face, he had no idea that my eyes were on him. I could stare to my heart’s content. The waitresses, the waiters, even the middle-aged man who looked like the manager shot self-conscious glances at Yurio from time to time. Did he make them restless too? The coffeehouse—such a shabby little place—suddenly seemed to sparkle. To see all these people admiring Yurio only increased my pleasure. I took delight in feeling so much more superior than they.

  Seating Yurio at some remove from our table was Mitsuru’s idea. She had some things related to Takashi Kijima and Yuriko she wanted to talk about and she didn’t want Yurio to hear.

  “What did you and Yuriko-san do after you left high school?” she asked Takashi.

  Takashi Kijima looked at me as I gazed over at Yurio.

  “Do you know?” Mitsuru asked me.

  “No. Once Yuriko left the Johnsons and started living on her own, we never communicated. I didn’t know what to do. My father would call from Switzerland all the time, worrying about her. And then my grandfather went crazy over your mother; keeping up with Yuriko was the last thing on my mind.”

  “There was talk among the other students,” Mitsuru said. “They said Yuriko became a model for the magazine an-an. I was amazed. I went to the bookstore and thumbed through the copy they had on the shelf. I can remember it even now. She was modeling the latest surfer fashion, so the lines of her body were exposed but they were absolutely perfect. And the makeup she had on was so stunning it just took my breath away. But I didn’t see any more pictures of her after that.”

  Mitsuru tried to draw me in but the smile soon vanished from her face. Yes, it was unlikely that I would have followed her career.

  “Yuriko-san appeared in all kinds of magazines,” she said. “So why did she disappear so suddenly? She didn’t specialize in a particular look, and she never appeared in the same magazine twice.”

  She was known as the phantom model. I can imagine what happened. More than likely Yuriko, with her lust for men, had affairs with either the photographer or the art director or one of the men around her. She got a reputation for being an easy lay, the people at the magazine lost respect for her, and then she didn’t get any more work there.

  Kijima’s fat ugly face broke into a smile; it was clear he was recalling those days from the past. “That’s right. Yuriko was just too gorgeous, her face too perfect to appeal to the needs of the magazines of the time. And she exuded too much sexuality. If she’d still been a junior high student they might have been able to use her. But once she turned eighteen, she became such a stunning beauty she even outdid Farrah Fawcett. At the time there just wasn’t much one could do with a woman like that. It’s different, now that we have models like Norika Fujiwara.”

  Kijima spoke like a true professional. He took a cigarette out of his purse and lit it.

  “She was only about five feet seven inches tall, which doesn’t quite cut it as a runway model, and she was too Western-looking to make a good actress. There weren’t any other opportunities. Nothing else but to go after men who were rolling in dough. It was during the height of the Bubble Economy. I had men who were making a killing in real estate come up to me—since I was her agent—and fan a whole handful of ten-thousand-yen notes under my nose. All that for one or two hours with Yuriko. They’d pay three hundred thousand yen.”

  Mitsuru glanced in my direction. “Kijima, do you have to talk like that? It’s not appropriate.”

  “Oh, sorry.” Kijima apologized.

  “You made a killing too, didn’t you?” I asked.

  Kijima, lost in dreams of his days of wine and roses, avoided looking at me. He scratched his saggy jowls with a fat finger.

  “Well, yes. I did make some mistakes in my youth. But after all, I was thrown out of school very suddenly—thanks to your betrayal.”

  “It wasn’t a betrayal. Professor Kijima wrote in his letters that she came seeking advice,” I said.

  Kijima shrugged it off.

  “It was a betrayal. Your friend here had long nurtured a violent jealousy of Yuriko. It was her nature.”

  “You’re wrong. She was worried about Yuriko,” Mitsuru said.

  “Is that what you think? Well, I suppose we should just let bygones be bygones, but I have a whole host of things I’d like to get off my chest.” Takashi Kijima spoke sarcastically. “I was going into my senior year of high school, you know. I was eighteen. When I got home my old lady was crying and my little brother just stared at me angrily and refused to speak. As soon as my old man got home, he started smacking me on the side of the face. Ever since then, I’ve had trouble hearing out of my right ear. My old man was a southpaw, and when he struck you he packed a bigger wallop than expected. I didn’t cry, but it stung like hell. My dad yelled, ‘I don’t want to have to look at you. Don’t ever show your face to me again!’ My mother tried her best to smooth things over, but it was hopeless. My old man was stubborn. So I told him, ‘You wanted to do her too. Yuriko told me. You threw us out of school because you couldn’t have her!’ As soon as I said that he popped me again in the ear, right in the same place, with even more force. Then I yelled, ‘You idiot! I’ll see you at my hearing!’ He said, ‘I’ve tolerated quite enough. Just put yourself in Yuriko’s place.’ But the truth was, Yuriko enjoyed doing what she did. When I think of it now, I realize I should have just agreed with whatever he said. I guess that’s why I cried when I read the old man’s letters. He’s getting along in years. And I suppose I’m still haunted by the past.”

  “Come on, get to the point,” I said. “What became of you and Yuriko?”

  “Oh, once we both got thrown out of our homes we decided to live together, so we went out to find a condominium. We needed about three million yen, but between the two of us we had a lot of money stashed away. We rented a high-class apartment in Aoyama. We wanted a place in Azabu, but it was too close to the school, so we let it go. The place we got was a two-bedroom apartment; we each had our own room. The next day, I took Yuriko out with me and got to work. I took her first to modeling agencies and got her set up with jobs there. But the modeling work never lasted long; I already told you why that was. Sooner or later Yuriko started picking up her own customers, dragging them back to her room in our apartment. No, it’s not a lie. Yuriko was a natural slut.”

  I nodded with an exaggerated gesture. That’s it. Yuriko was the kind of woman who couldn’t live without “water.” She needed water to promote her decay.

  “Around that time a man turned up asking to be her patron. He’d made an instant killing in real estate. I thought I would have to find another apartment, but I ended up not having to move out because he took Yuriko off with him to Daikanyama. He put out the capital and kept Yuriko for a mistress. Soon, Yuriko had no use for a manager. I was left with the apartment in Aoyama; after a while the rent got too much for me, so I had to move out. Thus began my fall. Quite a story, huh?”

  Mitsuru, who had been listening silently, pursed her lips and said, “What I don’t understand is, if you and Yuriko were living together, why’d you let her go into prostitution? What was it between you two?”

  “What was it, I wonder?” Kijima gazed up at the ceiling. “To be perfectly blunt, the two of us had a business arrangement, and our only concern was making a profit.”

  “You weren’t romantically involved, even with Yuriko as beautiful as she was?”

  “Not a chance. I’m homosexual.”

  I gasped. How reprehensible! How could Yurio have been left in the hands of such a monster? I looked instinctively toward the boy. At some point Yurio had put on a set of headphones and was nodding lightly in time to the music, his eyes closed. Mitsuru started tapping her front teeth with her fingernail: tap, tap, tap.

  “Have you been that way sin
ce high school?”

  “I don’t know. I have to admit it’s strange myself—for a homosexual to have tailed after Yuriko that way. I guess there was something about her that excited men, but I never felt it myself. After we started living together, I found myself attracted to a man who occasionally came to visit her. He was a middle-aged yakuza. And I noticed I was feeling jealous of Yuriko. That’s when I knew.” Kijima closed his eyes slightly, clearly taking delight in his self-revelations. “After Yuriko and I split, I began managing others, men as well as women. I had the know-how, so business was good. Yuriko and I would meet up again once in a while and I’d pass her some business. But for a number of years we went out of our way to avoid each other.”

  “Why?” Mitsuru asked.

  “We’d both changed. I got fat and Yuriko got old. We both knew all about the other’s glory days. There had been a time when all Yuriko had to do was walk down the street and she’d have men tripping over themselves to get to her. They were like putty in her hands. But in later years she couldn’t get a decent customer if she tried. I knew she’d lost her selling power. And I couldn’t lie about it. So Yuriko grew distant. I was relieved when she stopped contacting me. That’s when it happened, you know. When I learned about her murder. And not much later, news of Kazue’s murder made the rounds. I started to realize how dangerous my line of work had become. That’s why, when Johnson asked me to look after Yurio, I was eager to accept. It was like some kind of penance for me.”

  “You shouldn’t keep Yurio at your place,” I said.

  “Why not?”

  Mitsuru looked up in surprise. And so I said with perfect clarity, “Well, I’m his family. And besides, you can’t say that Kijima’s line of work or that Kijima himself offers a good environment for a young man. I’ll take care of Yurio. He can go to school from my place. I’ll contact my father in Switzerland. I’m sure he’d send a little money to support Yurio.”

  To tell the truth, ever since Yuriko’s death I hadn’t had any contact with my father in Switzerland. What a cold man. But if he knew about Yurio, I was sure he’d send money.

  “Well, you’re entitled to your opinion, but…” Kijima gave my face and body the once over and smirked. I suppose he didn’t think it appropriate for a spooky-looking woman like me to be taking care of such a handsome boy. I stood up angrily.

  “Fine. Let’s just ask Yurio himself.”

  I went over to where Yurio was sitting. He had his eyes closed and was swaying to the music. I don’t know if he sensed my presence or not. But he opened his blind eyes. His eyelashes were long, the irises brown, and the whites of his eyes translucent. He was so beautiful. Dark eyebrows hemmed his eyes dramatically.

  “Yurio-chan,” I began, “won’t you come to your aunt’s house? I’ll be happy to look after you. You’ve been living with your father for such a long time, I think you should live with a Japanese woman for a bit. Wouldn’t you like that?”

  Yurio smiled, flashing brilliant white teeth.

  “I’m the only family you have to look out for you now. Come to my house. Let’s live together, shall we?”

  I could feel my heart pound as I tried to persuade Yurio. To have had this sprung on him so suddenly…he could easily say no, and that would be the end of it.

  “Will you buy me a computer?” Yurio asked, as he gazed off into space.

  “Are you able to use a computer?”

  “Sure. I learned in school. All I need is the right software. If I have a sound-based system I can use all kinds of technology. I create music on the computer, so I really need to have one.”

  “Well, then, I’ll buy one for you.”

  “Great. Then I guess I’ll go live with you.”

  I was lost in my fantasy. All I could do was repeat over and over to myself, “I’ll buy one for you. I’ll buy one for you.”

  • 3 •

  I brought Yurio to live with me in P Ward in my grandfather’s government-sponsored apartment. While Yurio was under Johnson’s care, he had been placed in a facility in Osaka that specialized in caring for the blind. Since he had been there from his first year of elementary school, practically raised there, in fact—he would occasionally lapse into the saka dialect when he spoke. It made me laugh. He had a face that was so beautiful it was out of this world, but he was straightforward and taciturn. His only interest was listening to music. He was a very bright young man who hardly needed any special attention. He was so beautiful. And here I was so closely related to him. I could hardly believe it was true.

  A person’s fate is a curious thing. I truly believed I was reliving those quiet, peaceful days I had enjoyed earlier with my grandfather. Back when he had depended on me—helpless, vulnerable. And now here was Yurio, blind, who had to rely on me as well. I imagined he enjoyed living with me.

  “Have you heard from your father?” I asked Yurio.

  I was worried about Johnson trying to take Yurio away, so I would ask him this tentatively from time to time.

  “He called Uncle Kijima’s place any number of times. But I never actually lived with my father for long. I like Uncle Kijima much better.”

  You like him? I thought, racked with jealousy.

  “What do you like about that irresponsible creep?”

  “He’s not irresponsible. He was very kind to me. He told me if I needed one he would buy me a computer. He promised.”

  I didn’t have much money at the moment and his talk of computers was making me anxious. “But he never got one for you,” I countered. “Kijima is a schemer. He’d just use the computer as bait to reel you in—and then you’d realize your mistake. No, I rescued you from a devil.”

  “What are you talking about? It doesn’t make any sense.”

  “It’s okay. It’s nothing for you to worry about. It’s just that I had some unpleasant experiences with him in the past and there’s bad blood between us. It’s a long story. I think it’s better if you don’t know. Kijima brought about your mother’s misfortune. I’ll tell you about it when you get older.”

  “I never met my mother, so I don’t care what you tell me about her. I heard about her from my father. I think she probably hated me. When I was small it made me sad, but I’m used to it now. I don’t really think much about it anymore.”

  “Yuriko was a woman who thought only of herself. She wasn’t like me. She used to torment me, so I know just how you feel. I’m going to look after you for the rest of my life, so don’t you worry. You can stay with me forever.”

  Because Yurio had no interests except music, he’d answer a question perfunctorily and then pop his headphones back on. The music that leaked out was some kind of rap in English that I did not understand. At school Yurio had been studying to be a piano tuner. Although his studies were cut short midstream, he didn’t seem to care. He just spent the day listening to music through his headphones, from the time he got up until the time he went to bed.

  “Yurio, what do you want to be when you get older?”

  When Yurio heard me ask another question, he pulled his headset off again. But he didn’t look irritated. “Well, something related to music, I guess.”

  “A piano tuner?”

  “No. I’d like to make music. That’s why I need a computer. I know it sounds strange for me to say this, but I think I have talent.”

  Talent. The word thrilled me. Yuriko had been as beautiful as a monster; now her child, who was her equal in looks, was also blessed with a talent that surpassed others. I wondered how I could help him develop this talent further.

  “I understand. I’ll see what I can do.” I let out a deep sigh and looked around the shabby room. “What if you went to Johnson’s?”

  “Well, I’d like to go to America to get a taste of real rap music. I know my father has family in Boston. He went back after he divorced his Japanese wife. I heard that he just got married again over there, to a woman with a ten-year-old son, and that boy’s his heir, so there’s no reason for me to go see him. I’d only
be in the way.” Yurio sounded relieved to get that off his mind. “All I have is music,” he continued. “It’s my fate to be surrounded by music.”

  I stroked Yurio’s cheek. It was tense. I would replace Yuriko and be the mother he never had. Yurio smiled sweetly.

  “I was starving for a mother’s affection. So I’m really happy to be living here with you, Aunt.”

  Yurio was not able to see, but he more than made up for it by speaking from the heart. I took his hand and pressed it to my cheek.

  “I’m the exact image of your mother. Your mother had a face like this. Just touch it and see.”

  Yurio timidly stretched out his other hand. I grabbed his big, cool hand and brought it to my nose and eyes.

  “People always said your mother and I were really pretty. Here, feel this? Double-fold eyelids. My eyes are large and my nose is thin. My eyebrows look like yours—with a nice elegant arch. My lips are full and pink. They’re like yours too, but I don’t suppose you can tell.”

  “No, I can’t.”

  For the first time Yurio’s response was tinged with sorrow.

  “But I don’t think of my sightlessness as a handicap. I’ve been blessed with a talent to allow me to live immersed in beautiful music. My desire is to hear music and also to make music that no one has yet heard before.”