In distinct contrast to the morning, the streets were now packed with people. And the Woman in the Purple Skirt decided to reveal her special ability to the director.
“Watch me,” she told him, and then she turned her back to him and made her way, with quick, gliding movements, just like an ice-skater, through the crowds.
The director laughed heartily. “Good! Very good!” he said, applauding from afar. The Woman in the Purple Skirt smiled brightly, looking back over her shoulder, and then waited for him to catch up. When he’d reached her, she set off again, smoothly threading herself through the crowds. Again she stopped, glanced back at him, and waited for him to catch up, smiling delightedly. The scenario was repeated again and again. Whenever the Woman in the Purple Skirt had her back to him, the director readjusted his baseball cap repeatedly.
At 1:00 p.m., the two of them stood in front of one of the chain bookshops just by the station, browsing the books laid out in boxes for passersby. The director was paging through a monthly lifestyle magazine with “Special Issue on Ramen” in big letters on the cover; the Woman in the Purple Skirt had her head in a film magazine. But rather than reading her magazine, she kept peering over at his—she did this every time the director turned a page. I couldn’t hear them, but reading her lips, I could tell she was saying, “Oh, wow, that looks so good!” It seemed they were going to have ramen for lunch.
At 1:10 they left the bookstore, and the place they headed to next was at the end of a little alley, which they entered after walking through the area of shops and restaurants near the station. It was a twenty-four-hour izakaya, where they serve alcohol and cheap snacks. So they weren’t going to have ramen for lunch.
The director greeted the staff casually—Domo!—as he pushed his way through the split curtains in the doorway. The place was jam-packed, even though it was a Sunday (or maybe because it was a Sunday). I perched myself on a stool at the far end of the counter.
“Suimasen!” the director barked. He signaled to the staff that he wanted to order. This, this, and this, he said. He was the one who decided what they’d have; the Woman in the Purple Skirt sat in silence. Amid the hubbub of all the customers, the director’s loud, easy laughter occasionally reached my ears; I heard not a peep from the Woman in the Purple Skirt. It seemed the director was a regular here. About an hour after coming into the izakaya, he turned to one of the chefs working at the other end of the bar and barked, “Suimasen!” again. “Get me some of that spicy stuff you know I like!” That spicy stuff? What was that? Ah, menma: chili-marinated bamboo shoots.
The director was really knocking back the drinks. In the time that the Woman in the Purple Skirt had had two lemon sours, he’d managed to down seven glasses of beer. At some point, an obviously inebriated person sitting next to them inquired: “Excuse me for asking, but would you mind telling me the story of the two of you?”
The director went bright red. “What do you think? Have a guess.”
“Aw, okay. Well, are you her dad?”
“Correct!” the director declared.
Next, they ate a pot of kimchi gukbap. Surely they had to have eaten their fill by now, I thought. But no: to cap things off, they ordered a single toasted rice ball. This they ate together, intimately, sharing the same plate, breaking off morsels with their chopsticks.
It was 4:45. They had been eating and drinking for three and a half hours. They emerged from the tavern and onto the shopping street full of restaurants and bars, walked past the station, and headed straight for the bus terminal. The Woman in the Purple Skirt didn’t seem too bad—she was quite steady on her feet—but the director appeared to be zonked. They were propping each other up as they walked, and as I followed them, I glanced behind me a few times: I hadn’t actually paid for the three glasses of beer, the dish of foil-baked enoki mushrooms, or the soy sauce–marinated firefly squid I’d had at the izakaya, and was worried that one of the waiters would come chasing after me, but fortunately nothing like that happened.
At 5:01, the Woman in the Purple Skirt spoke briefly to the director, who was now slumped on a bench in the bus terminal. Without waiting for a reply, she headed toward the little kiosk and came back with a bottle of some sports drink. She sat down next to him, took off the cap, and handed the drink to the director. He took a swig, and then they proceeded to take swigs from the bottle in turn.
Almost immediately a bus came. The 5:05. But they didn’t board it. The director was looking pale, and he was making some sort of appeal or excuse to the Woman in the Purple Skirt, waving his hand in front of his face. “If I get on now, I think I’ll throw up.” Almost immediately after that, the director hurried off to the men’s room. The Woman in the Purple Skirt sat down on the bench, a lonely little figure, and enjoyed the last few sips of the sports drink. Then she looked down at her lap and examined her nails. She really did remind me of Mei-chan, my old friend from elementary school.
At 5:15 the director returned, looking refreshed. “Sorry! Sorry to keep you waiting!” he said, wiping his mouth with a handkerchief. Now it was the Woman in the Purple Skirt’s turn to visit the restroom. Finding himself alone, the director began tapping away at his cell phone. Suddenly he looked up, as if just remembering something, and patted the top of his head. “Oh God. I don’t have it,” he said. He undid the buckles of his shoulder bag. “Ah, here it is.” He pulled out his baseball cap and put it on. Then he started rummaging around again. “Oh God. Where are they? . . . Where are they? . . . Where are they?”
This time, though, it was a lost cause. He was looking for his fancy sunglasses. The ones he’d left in the izakaya, up against the wall on the table they’d been sitting at. The sunglasses I was wearing at that very moment, in fact. They were very nice—so much nicer than my cheapo ones. So sleek and lightweight—especially when you considered their size. With tomohiro embossed in gold letters on the inside of the arms.
After going through his bag countless times, the director eventually gave up. He buckled his bag, and then pulled his cap down hard over his eyes.
At 5:35 a bus pulled in. The seats were all occupied by high school girls carrying tennis rackets. Shall we let this one go, too? I saw the Woman in the Purple Skirt ask the director. No, let’s get on, he replied.
They boarded the bus. I also got on, letting one person, then another, then another, get on before me. The two of them stood in the narrow aisle: I also stood, though with my back turned. I had ended up right next to them. It was quite safe, though. The closer I was, the more unlikely they were to be aware of me. Behind me I heard them having a conversation. It went something like this.
Woman in the Purple Skirt: “I’m wondering what I should get my niece for her birthday.”
Director: “You still haven’t decided?”
Woman in the Purple Skirt: “No.”
Director: “How about a stuffed animal?”
Woman in the Purple Skirt: “Yes, that might do. . . .”
Director: “She’s the one-year-old, right?”
Woman in the Purple Skirt: “No, that’s my nephew. My niece is six.”
Director: “Oh. Oh yeah. You told me.”
Was that the best they could do? On and on they went, prattling about what she should buy her niece. In the end she decided she would consult her older brother on her next visit home.
Her older brother. So she had a family.
I was pretty sure the director had a daughter, who would be going to elementary school next year, but she didn’t come up in the conversation. I assumed the Woman in the Purple Skirt was aware that the director was a father? Well, I suppose I myself had only just learned that the Woman in the Purple Skirt had a family. An older brother, and a niece, and a nephew.
At 6:05 they got off the bus. It was the usual stop—the view up the street that I always saw. Holding hands, the two of them walked along, just a few feet ahead of me. They crossed at
the crosswalk, proceeded right through the arcade, and then a little ways ahead entered the bakery she knew so well. The Woman in the Purple Skirt took a tray, and on it they put two cream buns and a pack of sandwiches bound in plastic wrap. The Woman in the Purple Skirt paid. Altogether, the purchase came to 740 yen.
As of yet, not a single person had noticed her. How would they all react, I wondered—when they realized that the woman in this couple nestling so close together was actually the Woman in the Purple Skirt?
“Hey, guys! The Woman in the Purple Skirt has come home—with a man!”
As I imagined it, the first person to become aware of this would be a fellow pedestrian walking along the street. In a frenzy, he would dash into a nearby shop and, breath ragged with excitement, announce the news to the proprietor, who would then go and tell the proprietor of the shop next door, who would then go and tell the proprietor of the shop next to his. The customers would all hurriedly set aside their shopping and rush outside, and all the other pedestrians would quickly part ways to give the approaching couple room to pass. With throngs of people on either side of the street, it would be as if the couple had just got married and were walking down the aisle. “Congratulations!” someone in the crowd would shout, unable to hold himself back a moment longer. The children, who until that moment would have been hanging back in the shadows of the signboards lining the street, would all hop about merrily, putting their fingers in their mouths and giving wolf whistles. The shopkeepers would all press forward and shower the Woman in the Purple Skirt with presents. “Please, dear!” they would cry affectionately. “A little gift from us!” From the fishmonger, a whole carp; from the florist, a bunch of roses; from the sake shop, a massive bottle of sake. All of a sudden—perhaps it had been waiting on standby—a TV camera would zoom in for a close-up of the couple’s faces. A microphone would be thrust in their direction. “Tell us how you’re feeling right now!” And the Woman in the Purple Skirt would turn to face the camera. . . . But just then, briefly, something else would flash up in the camera’s field of view. What the hell is that?
“Oh no! It’s not, is it?!”
“It’s the Woman in the Yellow Cardigan!”
* * *
• • •
As they emerged from the bakery, the couple once again joined hands and started walking along the road. I waited while they walked about thirty feet. But no one showed any reaction at all.
On they walked, sometimes holding hands, sometimes linking arms, first past the pharmacy, then past the dry goods store, then past the fishmonger, the butcher, the fruit-and-vegetable shop, the florist, and then past the sake store. Not a single person, whether the other pedestrians, the owners of the shops, or the shoppers, showed any reaction. Not one of them seemed to realize that the person who had just passed by was the Woman in the Purple Skirt.
The two of them walked to the very end of the shopping street, with no one paying them the least bit of attention, and then headed toward the residential district, which was now swathed in darkness. And that night, the director stayed over in her apartment.
The following day was a Monday—the first Monday of the month. Which meant the hotel manager would attend the morning meeting.
“Ten bath towels, ten hand towels, five bath mats, ten sets of cups and saucers, five wineglasses, five champagne glasses, and three teapots.” The officer was reading from a notepad he held in his hand. He had an unusually stern look on his face.
“It’s not clear whether these items were taken by hotel guests, or whether they have gone missing within the hotel itself. . . .”
Here he paused for a moment and slowly scanned the room.
“And these are just the items from last month alone. I find it hard to believe that they’ve simply been misplaced. I can only conclude that someone has taken them home with them. Starting today, I’m going to require each floor’s supervisor and the individual room maids to carry a checklist around with them, and to take inventory for every room each time it’s cleaned. I hope I make myself perfectly clear.”
When the housekeeping officer departed, the staff immediately erupted in protest.
“What the heck is he implying?! It’s like he suspects us!”
“Overbearing twerp! What does he mean, take inventory each time? If he’s so worried, why doesn’t he come and inspect the rooms himself! Outrageous.”
“Truly. Anyway, why would anyone want to steal ten or twenty cups and glasses at a time? To use at home? I doubt it!”
“No way! Not those things.”
“The director is always bowing and scraping to that guy. That’s why that guy thinks it’s okay to be so condescending to us. . . .”
“The director is the older one, right? Why doesn’t he just tell him to shut up!”
“Oh, he’s never going to do that. Not the director. He’s got other things on his mind.”
“. . .”
“Hey, did any of you see? Those two have both taken the day off today. . . .”
“They did yesterday too.”
“Yuck! They’ve got nerve, haven’t they!”
“Do you know how much the director’s ‘little lady friend’ gets paid?”
“How much?”
“One thousand yen per hour. One thousand yen!”
“One thousand yen? That’s more than the supervisors get!”
“Is that true?” Supervisor Tsukada, listening in silence till now, leaned forward. “Is that really how much his ‘little lady friend’ is getting?”
The truth was far from clear, but before you could blink an eye, everybody was telling everyone else that the Woman in the Purple Skirt was getting one thousand yen per hour. This won her yet another batch of enemies, without her even being aware of it. As soon as word got out that she and the director were in a relationship, everyone had immediately stopped referring to her as “Hino-chan.” But now the entire staff, including the supervisors, started simply ignoring her.
One thing I can say about this line of work, though, is that if people ignore you, it doesn’t make much difference.
As a hotel maid who had completed her training, the Woman in the Purple Skirt had no difficulty finishing any job that was assigned to her, even if nobody spoke to her the entire day. There was no need, none at all, for her to have a chat with anyone over the course of the day. The Woman in the Purple Skirt went about her work with a total lack of concern on her face.
She maintained that expression when she passed other staff in the corridors, even if they were older. One time, I got a nice little surprise: I was waiting to get in the elevator when the Woman in the Purple Skirt came rushing out of it, and we almost collided. But she was holding in her hands a trash bag, which knocked against me, causing me to lose my balance and fall flat on my bottom. The Woman in the Purple Skirt didn’t even give me a glance, and she fled the scene without saying a word.
I pretended to be picking a fuzz off the floor, then regained my composure and got into the elevator. A sweet fragrance pervaded every corner. It was the scent of the Woman in the Purple Skirt. Supervisor Tsukada described the scent as “rotten bananas.” “You can always tell where the director’s little lady friend has just been—from the stink of her perfume!”
I assumed the director liked her to wear it. And it wasn’t only perfume that she had taken to wearing: nowadays she occasionally came to work wearing nail polish. Needless to say, this was against the rules. When Supervisor Hamamoto, who could not let this pass, told her to remove it, the Woman in the Purple Skirt simply left the room. The staff had been trying to give her the silent treatment, but it was beginning to seem like the other way around.
Incidentally, it wasn’t only that one night that the director stayed over at the Woman in the Purple Skirt’s place. He visited her after that too, several times. Sometimes he stayed the night after a date. Sometimes he would just pop over in his
car after work. Checking my diary, I see that the week before last, on Monday, he stayed overnight. On Tuesday he didn’t go over. Neither did he go over on Wednesday. On Thursday, though, he went over, and stayed the night. On Friday, Saturday, and Sunday he didn’t visit. Looking at this week, I see that on Monday he stayed over. On Tuesday and Wednesday he didn’t visit. On Thursday I thought he was going to stay the night, but he stayed for just two hours and then left.
Mondays and Thursdays. Very possibly the arrangement is that on those days he at least pays a visit, even if he stays the night only sometimes.
The next day, the Woman in the Purple Skirt smells even more overpoweringly of that perfume. As she opens the door to the café, the other staff screw up their faces in disgust, hold their fingers to their nose, and, as if at a given signal, all get up to leave. With her usual look of utter indifference, the Woman in the Purple Skirt sits herself down at the six-person table they have just vacated and quietly pours herself a complimentary cup of hojicha.
If this was what things were like for her at work, what about where she lived? I’m afraid that things had changed here too. The Woman in the Purple Skirt had stopped coming to the park as soon as she started her relationship with the director. At first the children would look upset not to see her—“Mayu-san hasn’t come today either. . . .” But after two weeks, her name stopped passing their lips. Now they had an entirely new form of amusement: unicycles. Not every child had a unicycle of their own: there were only two in total. They would amuse themselves in their usual ways, taking turns pedaling or dividing themselves into teams and having relays all around the park. As the races reached a fever pitch, occasionally the riders would come spilling out onto the sidewalk and the road. The cars would blare their horns, and passersby would make disagreeable faces, but the children would not be deterred from their games. The route took them first to the elementary school and then back to the park. Along the way they would pass a heavily perfumed woman who stood at the pay phones in front of the convenience store. Little did they realize that she was the “Mayu-san” they used to know.
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