You also saw the opposite pattern. A twenty-six year-old clutched her newborn baby and jumped into the sea on a stormy early summer day. The note she left nearby read, “After I gave birth I realized that to bring a child into the world at this time is like planting summer grass seeds at the end of autumn. What can become of one fated to die so soon? It’s a pity. I want to take the blame for that. I’m sorry, baby. I’m taking you away to be born again in a better world.” Thus went her sicko-lullaby. The outraged public’s hardcore backlash against this woman was particularly vicious. “What kind of bitch could expect to be forgiven when she apologized first so that she could die with peace of mind?”
Before that mother-child love suicide, at the peak of the rainy season, the corpses of two men were discovered inside a parked car in Aokigahara. Exhaust was running in through a hose. They were students at the same university in the city, where they apparently hung out quite a bit. They were holding hands, their wrists bound together by rope, and, in what appeared to be painful homemade tattoos, each had the name of the other etched into his arm with these words: “Chung-chi, Blood for Life” and “Kôsuke, Blood for Life.” All the more horrifying, each had a couple hundred cc’s of the other’s blood, which was of a different type, injected into his own body. There was also evidence they’d taken narcotics. It must have been some kind of weird sexual union for them. I was devastated again and privately sentenced those assholes to death. The method of punishment would be draining their blood until they died of blood loss.
In the shadow of each incident like that were the stagnant and stale frustrations of the unseen concerned parties, people in positions like mine who were surely fuming. But the news accounts couldn’t touch more than the tiniest piece of the surface, and most of what they did cover was distorted anyway. Even with Inoue, they started out with taglines like “pure-hearted youth of today follow His Young Majesty in death,” but once they learned of the existence of the document, reporters started describing a fanatical cult before you could say boo. That’s why I know I’m probably being too reckless by relaying these stories with news reports as my only sources and without knowing the individual circumstances.
Even so, I can still be certain that there were some threads connecting the various incidents to Inoue’s document. The media also reported subsequent love suicides as related to Inoue’s words, which, in turn, shaped the public’s understanding. Internet service providers were asked to delete uploads of Inoue’s document voluntarily. Most providers complied, but the request wasn’t legally binding, and there were more than a few individual servers that went under the radar. And if you factor in how it could be circulated via email too, it was virtually impossible to obliterate the document altogether.
An exasperated Tokyo Special Prosecutor must have thought a message still needed to be sent even though the document couldn’t be destroyed, so more than three months after he died, Inoue was charged with felonious homicide. (Years later, he was found guilty, but it didn’t make the news.)
It was all so ludicrous I couldn’t stand it. If you’re part of a love suicide, you’ll get sentenced to death for murder? How the hell is that supposed to deter anyone from dying? The craziest part was the overwhelming public support for these measures.
Inoue was hated that much. There were even vitriolic rants on various newspaper’s online message boards – with choice comments like “mother fucking grim reaper.” While I was in a place where I knew I was safe and definitely wouldn’t be killed, suicide instructions appeared one after the other, preying on the weaknesses of earnest people who were precariously teetering on the edge. Someone would whisper into the ear of a person who was really trying to make it and say, “We’re just letting you live. That’s why it’s so painful. If you die, you truly can be yourself.” That’s the kind of malicious crime that should be outlawed! Even if only for show, they could say a law was powerful enough to eliminate that kind of behavior, and maybe that would deter such cruelty.
From my perspective, society was hoping to manufacture a sense of security by hating Inoue. Including my mom. She would express indignation over the way the media and courts dealt with Inoue, but without even noticing it herself, she also had her own way of putting down Inoue and Miko. She’d tell me, “The type to get spirited away was too serious, or maybe you’d say too pure.” I learned this later after I’d found it on the net, but she’d ripped that comment off from a psychiatrist who was quoted widely in the national papers. The fact that lots of people were “spirited away” notwithstanding, after Inoue’s document circulated, they were portrayed as fragile innocents who didn’t have the strength to resist, and with that, the climate of bitterness spread. I wasn’t “spirited away” myself, which I didn’t think was cause to feel either proud or ashamed. It just didn’t happen. That’s all. People who scorn me for that must want to avoid looking at how they are really the ones ruled by their own weaknesses and dependencies. But Inoue’s existence offends them the most because he talked about not having been “spirited away” like it was a dishonor.
I feel compelled to defend Inoue, so I’ve had to put aside my problems with what he wrote and did. I have to suffer living with him.
My mom reached her limit in the dog days of summer. Her daily routine had grown unnatural and disrupted. She listened to the radio until daybreak and slept until the afternoon. She was sick of feeling like a pest who didn’t belong in the mountain lodge and lost the will to do anything. I wasn’t in great shape either, caught in the straightjacket of my guilty conscience and irritability.
We were rescued from this stalemate around the end of July, when Kisaragi scored a job at a variety store in Jiyûgaoka. She decided to go back down the mountain and start a new life with Udzuki. They could fit another two people in the car and asked if we’d like to join them. I declined, but my mom jumped at the chance. I was secretly relieved.
The night before the three of them left, we had a cozy going-away party just for us. Even then, my mom was incorrigible with her news anchor-esque rundown of the latest headlines. I couldn’t get over her inability to forget about current events for just one night, especially since she was about to leave, but the spirit of the evening had me feeling generous, so I complimented her, “You’ve gotten pretty good at talking while listening to the radio. Simultaneous interpretation is a real talent.”
“According to the latest survey, twenty-three percent of the population feels hopeful about Her New Majesty, eighteen percent does not, and fifty-six percent doesn’t feel one way or the other.” Mom relayed what she heard, and, with that, the good mood I’d managed to muster abruptly soured.
“What kind of survey is that? Who cares how much support there is for Her Majesty? What’s the point?”
Kisaragi was similarly disturbed and grumbled, “Yeah. It’s not a celebrity popularity poll after all. When the mourning period ends, I suppose Her New Majesty will get to work.”
That didn’t jibe with what I was thinking, but Udzuki was even more annoyed and said, “When Her Majesty gets to work, you’ll be getting to work too, Kisaragi. And with everyone getting busy like that, we’ll go all narcoleptic again when Her New Majesty dies. I don’t give a rip if Her Majesty is still in the dumps. I want to be gettin’ busy either way.”
“I know what you mean by ‘getting busy’ – don’t be such a jerk.”
I teased the two of them, saying, “So you and Kisaragi would fall into the twenty-three percent who feel hopeful about Her Majesty?”
“Hardly,” Udzuki replied, facing Kisaragi instead of me. “I’m narrow-minded. So, I don’t give a damn about anything that’s not right in front of me.”
Kisaragi explained to Mokuren and me, “That’s where I screwed up. I found a job, but he didn’t yet, so he gets mad at the idea that everything will get brighter after the succession ceremony and that more people will hit the job market.”
“Hell yeah. Is Her Majesty gonna hire me? Is she planning to run an Imperial Employm
ent Bureau or some kind of human resources outfit? She doesn’t have the power or authority to create jobs. You’re talking out your ass.”
“Kisaragi, are you holding out hope for Her New Majesty?”
“I don’t know. I wasn’t really thinking in terms of Her Majesty so much as what I’ve got to deal with, with this guy. But maybe some kind of change will come. You know how when one thing starts, another thing ends.”
“They said the same thing about His Young Majesty.” I could sense the sarcasm and exasperation in my own voice, but I couldn’t help myself.
“Well, stories start with beginnings, right? Like you can’t have hopes without something bad happening first to open up room for better expectations?”
Udzuki looked mortified and spewed, “What’s your deal, Kisaragi? Are you so bored that you actually care about Her Majesty?”
“Oh, I entertain myself just fine. But we are regressing back to the days before His Young Majesty.”
“Seems so,” I nodded in agreement.
Maybe it had it something to do with the fact that she was still observing the period of mourning, but compared to His Young Majesty, Her New Majesty came across as formal and stiff like Their Previous Majesties. She was truly an exceptional case, so during the initial phase of succession, hopes, or fears depending on one’s outlook, ran high that she might say something bold and audacious, but she dodged all such expectations. Even so, people still hoped her conventional demeanor would only last until the official period of mourning ended the following March and that then she’d let her true colors show.
Udzuki said, “I get the sense Her Majesty wanted to be able to go on with her life unnoticed. So, I think we ought to stop paying attention to her. There’s nothing rude about ignoring someone who wants to be ignored. I’m more concerned that what Kisaragi keeps yapping about is boring.”
“I have high hopes for Her Majesty too,” my mom entered the conversation. “Like Kisaragi was saying, there’s something radical about her. Like she’ll make a difference that affects us all.” My mom was doing the hustle by herself, looking like a fool, and working my last nerve.
Exasperated, I snapped, “Why is everyone so hung up on Majesties?”
“Because Her Majesty is single and a middle-aged woman. Honey, think about what that means. A single woman at that age is assuming such an important position. She’s going to serve as an inspiration for other single women her age not to give up and to believe that it won’t be long before their day comes too.”
There was an element of bragging to that comment coming from my mom, who’d worked on her own to raise me when I was a teenager. I’m not trying to say she never suffered in the process, but she didn’t have it that bad. She got alimony, real estate income, and child support payments, and she only worked at the register four half-days a week for about ten years. I’d be lying if I described her as a woman who did it all on her own. And anyway, I was the one who had to listen to all her bitching and moaning back then. It was like who was looking after whom? Who was the parent? At least that’s how I see it.
“If that’s the case, Mom, why don’t you get started on your own new project?”
“My computer? I will. I’m definitely going to start learning how to use it when I get back home. It’ll be a way to honor Shôji’s last request. I wonder if Her Majesty uses a computer? She probably does. Nowadays, you can’t work unless you know how to use a computer, I guess.”
“Can you imagine real-time live chats with Her Majesty? That’d be sweet,” Udzuki said.
Kisaragi barked, “See! Even you think Her Majesty matters! You can’t ignore her either.”
“Speaking of jobs, what is Her Majesty’s job? Mom, do you know? Does it involve inspiring middle-aged women?”
“Well, I’d say just being a female leader, a woman in charge, the lady who runs the show, who keeps shop. That already counts for something.”
“What, so she runs a restaurant too?”
Udzuki’s question seemed serious, which ticked me off. “What, are you brain-dead? My mom was just trying to say that her work entails hosting foreign diplomats and stuff.”
Mokuren cooly added, “Oh, so she’s a restaurant hostess because she’s a woman, huh?”
“Her Majesty’s a hostess? Isn’t that a little nasty?” Who knows what Udzuki was imagining?
Mokuren wasn’t going to let the issue go and said, “Hostesses are employees, so I suppose you’d rather call her mama-san?”
Udzuki still didn’t get it. “Her Majesty is a downtown mama-san!”
Mokuren pushed back, “Not downtown. More like in a palace surrounded by a moat!”
Udzuki belted out a tragic “a mama-san trapped behind a moat!” He pretended to swoon. “Doesn’t ‘mama’ mean mother in English?”
“What on earth is this child talking about?” I feigned a pensive glance at Kisaragi, laughed, and continued, “Haven’t you yourself called my mom ‘Iroha’s mama’?”
“No, seriously. Check this out. You can call a single middle-aged woman a mama, but that doesn’t mean she’s a mother.”
“A mama’s job isn’t necessarily mothering.” What the hell was I saying?
“I have no freaking clue what you’re talking about,” Udzuki protested in a loud voice. “Her New Majesty is a Majesty, and she’s nothing else, right? So why are you going on and on about all this? Can’t you just leave it alone? Gimme a break already!”
“Udzuki is right. It’s best to stop.” I wanted the conversation to end too.
But my mom was too engrossed and said, “Times have changed. Before His Young Majesty came on the scene, no one gave Majesties a second thought.” She was really bothering me. She went right back to the same subject even after I tried to shift gears.
“Yeah, I didn’t even know who all those little old men were. I knew the word Majesty, but had no idea what one did, nor did I care to know.” Even Mokuren got caught up in the conversation.
Udzuki concurred, “I still don’t know. What do they do anyway?”
“Weren’t you the one who wanted this conversation to stop?”
“Well yeah. I don’t have a problem with not knowing. It’s not like knowing will solve my personal problems.”
My mom couldn’t stop though and said, “There’s so much they do, like the important task of praying for everyone in this Island Nation and other things I learned as a child.”
I ignored her and asked Udzuki, “What personal problems do you mean?”
“Well, number one is a job. But that’s not all. It’s possible for me to get by without a job right now. That problem is really more a question of time. Number two is Kisaragi. I’m worried about her. What’s our life together going to be like considering the current climate, what might happen with Her Majesty, and all the other external factors around us?”
“Udzuki, that is so typical! Only you would be able to say something that embarrassing right in front of me. But you’re so thick-skinned that it doesn’t bother you to blurt stuff out without thinking about what you’re saying. You’re insensitive like that, so insensitive that I end up having to deal with my weaknesses all on my own.”
“You’re saying that I’m thickheaded, cold, and insensitive?”
“You’re not listening to what ...”
“What are your weaknesses, Kisaragi?” I asked in the interest of fairness.
“Udzuki might be special, but I’m normal, so they’re the same as anyone else’s.” Kisaragi’s tone suddenly took on a touch of irony. “I feel pretty low saying this to you, Iroha, but I’ll go ahead and say it. I’ve been reading that document. It was a total shock. I felt like parts of myself were being explained right there in the words I was reading. Some parts were too hard to understand, but I still more or less got the gist. It freaked me out.”
She caught me off guard with that, and I lit into her with a cross-examination. “So, I guess that means you understand what happened next?” I immediately felt ashamed and,
without waiting for a reply, said, “I’m sorry. You don’t have to answer that.”
But Kisaragi did answer, with sincerity. “I don’t think anyone can understand those actions. Even if a lot of people claim to sympathize, they’re doing so based on their individual misinterpretations. In my case, I was a little envious that someone could still feel the freedom to die even when he talked about being powerless and meaningless. And to feel the freedom to write a document like that and have people read it. I mean, I could write a suicide note, but it wouldn’t be the same. If I wrote one and died, people would ignore or quickly forget about it. It would be a waste. I couldn’t die believing that my death would even matter.”
Udzuki drew a deep breath like he wanted to say something, but no words came out.
It was heart-rending for me to hear Kisaragi describe with such clarity feelings I’d had too. But, at the same time, that damned document had turned Inoue into the root of all evil. Still, I couldn’t simply condemn him for being so popular.
“Why are you really leaving? Is it just because you got the job? Wouldn’t you be happier staying here, Kisaragi?”
“Because it’s a bad idea to get too cozy. I don’t go for that sort of thing. And Mokuren and Udzuki hate it too, right?”
“That’s right. But even though we might have made the decision to be more independent, I’m worried we’re handing our futures over to Her Majesty.” It seemed like Udzuki was talking to himself.
I thoroughly identified with Kisaragi’s uncertainty despite the fact that our personalities were nothing alike.
“You two have to come back. You’ll always be welcome here. And hurry back right away if you’re on the verge of being ‘spirited away’ or something.”
“Oh, Iroha! Are you the owner now?” Kisaragi glanced at Mokuren.
Mokuren teased me. “Seriously. You plan on staying for the rest of your life? Not that I’d mind, of course, but ...”
Lonely Hearts Killer Page 12