The Gossamer Fly

by Meira Chand

  She sat quite still, her back against the cold, rough wall. Her heart thumped, unable to take it in. She had been prepared for every terror but this. Her mind was filled by only one picture. That of Shojiro’s open mouth coming down upon Hiroko’s lips, fixing there like a thirsty, sucking animal. It shocked her most that Hiroko could, without protest, allow Shojiro’s mouth to rub upon her own. The shivering began again in her, shaking the bones from her flesh. Her teeth chattered against each other. She turned on her side between the quilts, pulling her knees up, holding herself in a tight ball.

  Later, she heard the door slide open and Hiroko came in, stepping carefully over Natsuko. Slipping into bed she sighed loudly and fell asleep. But beside her Natsuko lay awake, looking at the curve of her back.

  9

  An early morning mist wreathed the mountains. A grey kitten ran across the yard, a power saw whined over the paddy fields from the village. The bushes were festooned with spider webs. It was impossible to ignore the fine clear feeling of the morning. Coming out of the door of the workshop she had seen the bush, and following behind Hiroko, stopped. It was nearly as tall as Natsuko’s shoulder, of tiny, densely packed leaves, covered with the chiffon of cobwebs. Caught within these was the dew, the bush shimmered like rhinestones, reflective and gleaming. Bending close Natsuko looked down and saw each drop of water like mercury, trembling upon the webs. Deeper within the leaves were small black spiders and the bodies of flies marooned in gauze. Discarded beyond the nets was the dry, hollow thorax of a large brown moth. In the pond came a splash of water from the quick tail movement of a fish. Sun swept down over the thatch, in the yard shadows were short and clear. In the middle of this brilliance the night seemed a dream, filling another dimension. She was tempted to doubt it had ever been.

  But then they went into the dark earthen-floored entrance of the cavernous main house. Looking up again she saw the rafters, solid and huge under the massive roof, crossing and recrossing the space above her and the memory of her dreams blew through her again.

  Soon after breakfast an ambulance came, sleek, glossy and ill-fitting in the yard before the dilapidated thatched house. It took the old woman away. They heaved her onto a stretcher and carried her out. Huddled in blankets there was nothing to see but the thin grey hair of her head, flattened and rubbed away, the pale skin of the scalp showing through. Hiroko’s sister-in-law climbed into the ambulance with the old woman. After it drove away the yard seemed suddenly depleted. Immediately, Hiroko drew back all the heavy shutters in the house. Whole walls opened up filling the house with air and light, driving out darkness and stale smells. Hiroko gave Natsuko a bucket of disinfectant water, and together they washed the matting. Hiroko swished up the quilts, stripping them of their white covers, heaving them over bamboo poles outside to air. Soon the house smelt sweet and astringent. In the brighter light Natsuko saw the uneven sag of the large cross beams under the roof, the smooth facets of chiseling along the grain.

  Hiroko spoke little. Her hands were wet and red, busy in dusting and shaking, or down on all fours, washing and wiping, her hips stuck up in the air. Soon Natsuko was tired, her back ached, her fingers were all wrinkled and shrunken from the water, her knees full of plaited indentations from the matting. At midday Hiroko stopped, and in the kitchen took from a shelf a plastic cup of instant dried noodles. On to these she poured boiling water and left them to soften. She handed them to Natsuko with an apple, and half a bag of rice crackers glazed with soya sauce and crumbled seaweed. Natsuko took it all outside. Sitting on a stone by the pond, amongst the potted shrubs, she ate hungrily, drawing up the thin noodles from the hot soup, blowing to cool them, before pushing them into her mouth with the chopsticks.

  Munching the apple she walked back to the bush she had seen in the morning. Only a few drops of dew still trembled in the webs. The spiders crawled about the surface, busy at the bodies of ants. The nets were dry, the bush looked tired and dusty. In the back of the workshop she could hear Shojiro. Not wanting to go in she walked along a narrow flagged path, round the side of the workshop, curious where it led. It came to a stop in front of a wall and two small cryptomeria trees.

  Turning back she saw him then, staring at her through a window. He welled up before her, unexpected, like something in her nightmares. The glass of the window was thick and dusty, through it his face unclear, as if behind a curtain, mottled by watermarks and smears, then he was gone. She hurried quickly away, but as she came round the corner of the building he was there in front of her, grunting and beckoning.

  The night was before her again. Her mind cut off, and she followed him numbly. The stones of the path were large and uneven, jutting up in thick wedges, green and mossy. Once her foot slipped awkwardly, but Shojiro in his dark cloven socks, trod with the ease of an animal. He turned to grin at her. And having faced him, having seen again his shape and feel, her dread lessened slightly. She wondered if the night had not really been part of a bad dream. For in the sunlight everything seemed without menace. In front of her the canvas socks, the soft pull of sweater on his shoulders, the straight, thick spikes of hair lying close to his head, seemed harmless. In her mind the night receded and seemed in this sunny yard to hold no reality. The sun on the thatch, the cobwebby bush, the still grey pond before her were all clear and exact in outline. Daylight presented things as they were. It played no deceiving tricks. She was relieved by this temporary reprieve. For a while there was nothing more than what she could see.

  In the backroom of the workshop Shojiro led her to a low tank of murky liquid. Before it at floor level, a shallow, basin-like seat was hollowed out of the floor and filled by a cushion of old paper, still holding the indentation of Shojiro’s buttocks. Between the tank and the seat a deep shaft opened into the floor. Shojiro gestured to Natsuko to watch him, as he sat down on the cushion and against the tank. Dipping his hands into the cloudy liquid he pulled out a wooden frame with muslin stretched across it. Light glowed through it as he brought it out, liquid dribbled down his arms. He balanced the frame across the tank and took up a long-handled metal scoop, holding it out to Natsuko, pointing to a bath of thick liquid beside the tank.

  The handle of the scoop was wet and chalky where Shojiro had gripped it, and warm still from his hand. She dipped the scoop in the bath and stirred, pushing down deep, then bringing it up to the surface. The mixture was thick as porridge, and the colour of dirty sand. As she stirred the thin, milky top disappeared and a lumpy substance oozed up from below, spilling over the sides of the scoop. It smelled as sour as vomit. Shojiro pointed to the baskets of shrub and rock in the next room, to the vat of liquid, still simmering gently, indicating it was all in the tank. What she stirred, Natsuko realized, was liquid paper. Curious, she filled the scoop several times as Shojiro directed, emptying it into the bank before him. Then, motioning her to stop, he beckoned her forward.

  She did not like standing so near him. Sitting down beside the tank, his head came only to her waist. He appeared a legless midget, his limbs lost beneath the floor in the cramped shaft. Looking down upon him she saw the soft flesh inside the collar of his sweater, a thick vein at the base of his neck. Around his chin were bristles stubbly as the thatch on the house. He turned, twisting round at the waist, reaching out to a packet of cigarettes and matches beside the cushion. The red wool of his arm touched her leg. Cupping the match in his hand he lit the cigarette. His lower lip pushed out supporting it, showing the wet pink inner skin. The night passed through her like a shadow. Then again it was gone. He turned back to the tank, smiling and grunting for her to watch. Propping the cigarette up in an empty tin, a bright label of mackerel about it still, he picked up the wooden frame and plunged it into the liquid. Shaking backwards and forwards he scooped it up and plunged it back several times. Finally he lifted it out, and she saw a fine glutinous layer, clinging to the muslin. Draining it quickly he stood the frame against the tank, and from beside him removed a bamboo mat covering a pile of raw, wet paper. It remind
ed Natsuko of a cake of bean curd, or the grey top of the camembert cheese her mother sometimes brought. Its surface held the indentation of the bamboo mat. Shojiro tipped the new layer of paper flatly from the frame on to the pile and covered it up again.

  Forgetting her fear she watched him add several new layers in this manner, fascinated at the sudden materialization from this murky liquid of raw paper. Shojiro was quick and skilful, scooping and shaking deftly. When he looked at her his eyes were bright and friendly, and she allowed herself to smile. Then abruptly he stopped, scrambled up from his seat, and taking her arm guided her outside. But uneasy again at his touch, she pulled herself free and followed at a distance.

  He stopped outside the shed Hiroko had locked Natsuko in the evening before. Now the doors were open wide, light flooded inside. It did not seem the same place. From a distance she saw baskets and sacking, the coils of rope, the box she had sat on, the dusty window. She saw other things too, a bicycle, tins of chemical, an old gas fire, and stacks of wide, greenish wooden planks. Beside the outbuilding was another yard, and here the long green planks stood vertically against supports. On them sheets of damp paper were spread, whitening and drying in the sun.

  She followed Shojiro into the big outhouse. The baskets and piled oddments surrounded her again. Shojiro was bending over the stacks of wet paper. She stood beside him and watched. From one corner of the pile he rolled up a single edge of paper between the ball of this thumb and a finger. Slowly, carefully, he peeled it all the way back. A thin layer, limp as damp muslin came away in his hand. Gently, he smoothed this on to the wooden board, pulling out the wrinkles skilfully. On the fragile paper his thick hands were pink and soft from the tank. After finishing several boards he began to take them, one by one, outside into the yard.

  She heard him stacking them in place, the noise of the wood dragging on the gravel. Bending over a pile of damp paper she touched it gently. It was cold. She peeled back a corner with her nail. The edge was fuzzy as blotting paper, and came away in little soft slubs when she rubbed it between her fingers. She tried pulling as Shojiro had done, but instead of rolling easily off, a thick strip, several layers deep, tore off the length of the block. It hung damply from her fingers in a ribbon. Across the surface of the pile was a deep step, its edge lined by the many thin stratas of paper. She stared at it in horror.

  The light cut out abruptly. Looking up she saw him there, the door swinging nearly shut behind him, anger in his face. He strode to where she stood, the strip of paper still hanging from her fingers. It was again dark in the room. The narrow gap between the two doors let in a long shaft of light.

  Gesturing and grunting his babbled language, he took her roughly by the shoulders, and began to shake her.

  His gobbled words spewed over her in a rush of warm, sour breath. Then, suddenly, his anger finished. He stopped, letting go of Natsuko’s shoulders. She turned and ran then, quickly, through the door.

  Daylight burst in her eyes. Squares of drying paper swung white and tall above her head, glaring painfully into her mind. Turning from them she ran past the old thatched house and workshop, out into the road, down towards the river.

  There was no clear idea in her mind of what she should do. But she could not go back. That was the only thing of importance in her mind. Once she saw him, running, high above her, across the bridge. She crouched even lower behind a bush on the dry river bed, but he did not look down. Then again, she heard his odd grunting noises came from the road along the river. She flattened herself against the stony bank, and prayed he would not see her. Huge, tightly packed stones stretched away above her in a diamond pattern, to meet the white safety guard of the road. For a moment he stood there, a maroon blur, then he turned away. She waited a while behind the bush, but he did not come back. She heard nothing more.

  The river sloped steeply downwards, the force of its descent broken at its steepest part, into several wide steps, so that the river, when full, was a series of waterfalls. But now the bed was dry, covered thickly by long grassy weeds and bushy shrubs. It looked as if it had never seen water. Only a narrow stream moved sluggishly against the opposite bank, trickling weakly over the steps. Near the bridge, behind Natsuko, was the iron ladder, flat against the wall she had climbed down. It ended several feet above the ground. Jumping the last part, she landed badly, cutting her knee. She dabbed at it with her skirt, but blood ran down inside her sock, drying there, sticky and hard.

  Keeping close to the stony wall of the bank, she walked cautiously, watching all the time for Shojiro or Hiroko. When she reached the first of the steps in the river bed she sat, sliding her legs down over it as far as she could before jumping. Her skirt pulled up behind her, something coarse scratched the back of her legs. When she stood up she saw the step was almost to her shoulder, covered by long mossy weed. Where the river trickled narrowly it was silky with slime, sleek and glossy behind the falling water. But where it was dry the weed was grey and furry, scratchy as a loofah. Ants crawled in and out of it, dandelions grew in cracks between. A strong, earthy smell hung in the air. Down here the weeds were high and tangled about her feet, half hiding discarded hardware and garbage. She trod carefully around a patch of broken glass beside a rusted pushchair, and a pile of old tyres. Propped against a tuft of weed was an unbroken pane of glass. Crushed under its weight long-stemmed grasses had yellowed and lay, pressed and flat, each blade unmoving, as if in a painting, stiff and still. A broken pink plastic baby bath stood filled with leaves and dirty rainwater. In it floated a spider, dead and bloated, its legs spread limply like a starfish. Before her the river bed stretched away in a further series of steps, then regained its level and wound on between deep wooded hills. Along the stepped section the great stone banks soared up, reminding her of the fortress walls at the castle in Himeji. Perched high above her houses stared straight down into the river, grey tiled roofs crowded darkly into one another.

  In the late afternoon sun everything looked very still, far away and quite removed from Natsuko, as if she walked here in a dream. But then she thought of the farmhouse, the dark rooms, the workshop, the tanks of liquid paper, the bushes of spider webs, and that too was possessed of an unreal quality. She began to feel she moved only in dreams, drifting from one world to another. They stretched out behind her like links in a chain, each cell sealed and separate, connected only by her presence in them. Trying then to remember each event and feeling that dragged so heavily upon her, she felt a painful rushing in her head.

  She walked on, weeds knotting about her feet, brushing roughly on her bare legs. Above the sky was broken with clouds, the weather was changing, a light breeze had sprung up. Behind the constant dull throb in her head and the confused emotions, one thought held firm. She could not go back. Not until tomorrow, not until it was time to go home. High above the setting sun broke through dark clouds, spearing a window of a house, setting it briefly ablaze, shiny and orange, so that for a moment she thought it was fire. Then clouds blew across and it was gone.

  When she first saw them she hid quickly behind a bush, watching cautiously. But they were small children, much younger than herself. She did not feel threatened, it was safe to walk on. But passing them they looked up and called to her, friendly and excited, crouched in a circle amongst the weeds. She saw the insect boxes then. They held up the little meshed wire cages, and called her to look.

  Crouching there among them, she felt their pleasure and excitement. The faces about her were round and smooth as pebbles, the almond eyes, bright as jet, incised clearly in their faces. They did not stop talking. Words poured from them, the sounds jumping freely in the air around Natsuko, loose and easy. There were no shadows in their faces. They were happy at capturing a large stag beetle.

  ‘Isamu did it …’

  ‘… and I held open the door …’

  ‘… and he pushed it in.’

  ‘… with a twig.’

  ‘I’m not going near it.’

  ‘It fell over on its
back.’

  Their voices clattered about her, stretchy as elastic. In the little mesh boxes the shelly backs of beetles moved darkly. They pushed Isamu’s box near her face. Small grey crickets jumped about, in their midst the huge solid beetle, armoured and crusty, the enormous antlered mandibles waving before it.

  She stayed with them for a time, parting the grasses, looking under stones for insects. Once she found a large green cricket, juicy and bright. They showed her how to catch it, cupping her hands round the stem it sat on, shutting them quickly, one over the other. But in her palm she felt the light tickle, and thought of the body, the muscular thighs jumping against her flesh, and opened her hands, letting it free.

  It was darkening all the time about her, difficult any longer to see individual leaves and grasses. Shadows began to clump things together, diffusing them to broad outlines. The children gave her some sweets and a few rice crackers in a cellophane bag.

  ‘Goodbye.’ Their voices sounded back to her as they climbed the low bank, and waved before turning into a cluster of houses.

  Natsuko sat for a long while on a stone, looking at their homes, the white squares of forgotten quilts hanging from upstairs windows, airing still as the dew came down. They were small houses, wooden and faced by bark, with deep tiled roofs, and small cramped gardens of short thick trees. She watched the lights, one by one, go on behind the windows and grow brighter, while the outlines of the houses faded into the sky. The quilts were pulled in. A smell of frying and piquant soup drifted to her. Above, the bats were already out, fluttering darkly against the last light, twittering like loose screws in the sky. At last there was nothing left but the night, stamped with the brilliant frames of windows. In them Natsuko saw small figures laying out beds, stirring pans. Once or twice she recognized one of the insect box children. A woman with a baby strapped to her back carried things back and forth across a room, another nursed a crying child. There was a smell of burning everywhere. Outside back doors long metal chimneys smoked in a row from heating baths. Natsuko watched the life of each house run into the next. Children played together, utensils were borrowed, women chatted to each other through kitchen windows over sinks. You could put out a hand from any one of the windows, and touch the house next door. The people in these homes were never alone. Natsuko watched them, envious and fascinated. The sky was now an inky stain. She stood up and walked on then, feeling shuttered, small and totally alone.