‘How much extra?’
‘Another two million yen. All you have to do is collect a package for us. It will be brought to you. There’s no effort required on your part.’
‘What’s in the package, Jun?’
‘You don’t need to know. It makes no difference. Think of it as a box of oranges or a sashimi bento. Think of it as a load of dirty laundry. Whatever you want. You’ll never touch it. It won’t be you that carries it – Naoko can do that for you, in return for all the trouble she’s caused.’
‘And what happens if she gets caught? I couldn’t do that to her. No matter what she might have done.’
Jun was emphatic. ‘She won’t get caught. She’s a Japanese woman – all crime in Japan is caused by foreigners, you know this. You’ve experienced it first-hand. Naoko will walk on to Japanese soil with no one raising an eyelid.’
Alex shook his head. ‘This all sounds too much for me.’
‘Think, Alex.’ Jun pointed at his temple. ‘What did you do to deserve this? This way you will wipe the debt out and earn some extra money of your own. Then you can do whatever you want – go back to London, stay in Tokyo, go and spend it gambling in Macau, for all I care. Do you remember sitting in that police cell night after night? Naoko didn’t care about you then, only herself. You don’t owe her a thing – she owes you, and this is her way to repay.’
Alex swallowed a mouthful of sake and thought for a moment. He looked at the older man, watching him calmly, the brawler sitting back in the tub staring arrogantly, impatient to hand out a beating. Alex remembered Jun’s face when he had first approached him in the yard at Ushigome. The furtive glances he had taken from the corner of his eye as he’d sized him up. Then it clicked and he realized he had been set up from the beginning.
He turned to Jun with a crazed expression. ‘You always knew we would end up here. You knew it from the minute you laid eyes on me. Didn’t you?’ he shouted. ‘You saw the trouble I was in and you knew you could manipulate all of this to your advantage. Then you’d have me by the balls. I bet this isn’t the first time you’ve done it. This has been a stitch-up from the moment we met.’
Alex stood up from the tub and climbed out. He took his yukata and slipped it on. The young bodyguard stepped out of the water and blocked the door with a tattooed arm. They all looked at the old man, calm and unmoved in the bathtub.
‘I don’t think you understand the situation here,’ Jun said. ‘They aren’t asking you. They’re telling you. They don’t care about the money now. If you don’t go through with this, it will end badly for everyone.’
He looked down at Jun, sitting in the murky water. ‘I can’t do it,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry.’
Before he could turn there was a blow to the back of his head and Alex fell forward on to the wooden banking around the bath. A knee struck his back and pinned him there, his chest crushing under the weight. Two hands shoved at his head and his face plunged down into the water before he could take a breath. He gagged as the hands pushed him deeper into the bath, his nose and throat filling and the heat burning the back of his sinuses as his arms flailed helplessly in the air above him. When the hands pulled him clear, he inhaled the slew of water in his mouth, choking again as he was pushed back under. Soon he was lying on the floor of the bath house, gasping for breath, staring up at the tattooed body standing over him. He saw Jun’s face as he crouched down, and wiped the hair away from his eyes. His expression was almost pitiful.
‘Remember what I told you,’ Jun said. ‘Uchi soto. From now on, you’re either inside or outside.’
27
SHE WRAPPED HER legs around his waist and pulled him into her and he ran a hand through the sheen of her blue-black hair, so thick he could see every strand shining. Her eyes half closed, breathing unknown words in whispers beyond his ear, the ceiling fan flickering above them, rippling over the bed sheets; he looked over at the blue suitcase sitting alone on the cold, tiled floor.
Naoko reached up and turned his face towards hers. She peered deep into his eyes, searching for the thought that was hidden there, and ran a hand along his back, over the uneven, scarred skin, and began to move faster. He tried to keep his gaze in constant motion, over the ink lines of her tattoo rising and falling on the swell of her flank, the bamboo forest, a peacock eye staring straight up from her hip. She was moving beneath him, the fan eddying chilled air over them in gusts, her sweat-soaked hair stuck to her shoulders in knots. He took a handful and gripped close to her scalp, his other arm leveraged against the carved mahogany headboard, angled to block his view. The suitcase was still there in the corner of his eye and he was staring at it now, over his shoulder, twisting more hair in his fist, as if she weren’t there. Naoko saw the look on his face, the isolation, and she called out to him. He looked down at her as if he had just come back into the room after a reverie.
‘I don’t like it,’ she said. ‘What’s up with you?’
Alex lay back on the bed, breathing hard. ‘Nothing,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry.’
Naoko touched a hand to his chest and he pushed it away. Sweat was running from him. They lay together for a while in silence, their bodies not touching, his flesh separated from hers, and then he sat up on the edge of the bed. He tried to keep his eyes moving around the room, taking in the generic furniture, the patterned wallpaper, the creased bedlinen, anything except the place that his gaze kept returning to: the suitcase lying on the floor, the shadow of the ceiling fan turning steadily over it.
‘Tell me what’s wrong, Alex,’ she said.
He felt dizzy for a moment and stood up to find his balance. ‘Nothing’s wrong,’ he said. ‘I’m going to take a shower.’
She was at the table on the balcony when he came out of the bathroom and began to towel himself dry. He pulled on a pair of shorts and a T-shirt and stepped outside into the closeness of the night. The porch lights were on and mosquitoes swarmed the glowing bulbs, rattling against the glass as they burned their wings. Traffic sounded shrill horns from far below. Naoko carefully tapped the ash from her cigarette. She kept her eyes turned down as she spoke.
‘You are angry at me, aren’t you? Even though you’re trying so hard to hold it inside.’
He tried to deny it but the hesitation betrayed him. ‘I always knew you were trouble. From the first moment I saw you, it was obvious.’
Naoko looked up at him with her dark, wide eyes. The lights of the city were sparkling in them, ferocious oranges and vivid greens.
‘You mean like jaja uma?’ she said.
‘Yes. Like a horse. A crazy, untameable horse.’
‘But I don’t always want to be this way.’
‘What do you want?’
‘I want some peace. I want to belong somewhere.’
He glanced away, over the edge of the balcony, down into the dark channel of the river. The surface of the water was thick with tangled palm fronds.
Naoko stubbed out her cigarette. ‘Have you thought any more about my offer?’
‘Which offer?’
‘Of moving to Osaka with me.’
‘A fresh start?’
‘Why not? We both need to make a change.’
Alex gave an ironic smile. ‘Moving to Tokyo was supposed to be my fresh start. That didn’t work out so well. Maybe I’m not suited to new beginnings.’
‘You have a good heart. Surely that’s what counts?’
There were tiny lizards zigzagging up the white walls of the building, their dark, beady eyes flicking wildly as they moved.
‘Can I ask you something?’ Alex said. ‘When you said you were scared you weren’t going to see me again, did you mean it?’
‘Of course I did.’
‘Do you really believe we can make a life together?’
She looked up at him. ‘Yes, I do.’
‘What if you regret it later?’
‘I already have too much regret. It’s the worst feeling there is. I want to make it work between us. I don’t want
to spend my life waking up and wishing I had done things differently. Wishing I had found a way to solve our problems. I know you feel the same.’
Alex breathed in deeply. The night air tasted hot and moist in the back of his throat. Over the city, clouds gathered in the night, brimming with a pressure that hummed in the darkness. He pictured Naoko waking in the morning and rushing to be ready for the early flight. The two of them sitting together on the plane, her head resting on his shoulder. The magazine she would flick through as the in-flight meal was served. Her face as she waited in line at passport control. He pictured every moment of it and himself next to her, alive to the danger she was unaware of.
‘So do you have an answer?’
‘About Osaka?’
‘Yes.’
He had hoped he would be able to resent her enough to go through with it. But he wasn’t that cynical. He knew there was no other choice.
‘There’s something I want you to do first.’
‘What?’ she asked.
‘I want you to go and look inside your bag.’
He watched through the glass balcony door as Naoko picked up her suitcase and unzipped it and tipped the contents out on to the unmade bed. Her clothes and shoes and underwear came spilling out and the plastic package followed. She picked it up and turned it over in her hands, looking at him from inside the brightly lit room, her face slackened in confusion. Alex stood up from the table and opened the door and went inside.
‘What’s this?’ she asked.
‘Honestly, I don’t know.’
‘What’s it doing in my bag?’
‘Five million yen.’
Naoko frowned. The delicate lines on her forehead creased. ‘What are you talking about?’
‘That’s the reason it’s in your bag,’ Alex said. ‘Five million yen.’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘Where do you think I got the money, Naoko? I was locked up, with nowhere to turn. I had to borrow the jidan money and this is how they want me to pay them back.’
‘You put this in my suitcase?’
He shook his head.
‘Then how did it get there?’
‘It was put there while you were in the bath.’
‘The room-service people?’
‘Yes.’
‘And you let them do this?’
‘It doesn’t matter. I was always going to tell you it was in there.’
‘You still haven’t told me what’s inside.’
‘I think it’s drugs.’
Naoko held the package up to the light, trying to find any indication of the contents hidden beneath the layers of silver tape. She turned it over in her hands but it was wrapped too tightly to make anything out.
‘What kind of drugs?’ she asked.
Alex tried to smile but the tension showed on his face. ‘The illegal kind.’
She picked up her toiletries bag from the bed and opened it and took out a small nail file. Holding the package in one hand, she slit open a corner and peered inside. She turned the parcel over and held one hand below the opening. A handful of small white crystals, like shards of pure quartz, spilled out into her palm. She held them up to the light to examine them closer.
Alex said, ‘It looks like crystal meth.’
‘What’s that?’
‘Shabu. Speed. At least, that’s what I think it is.’
She looked at him in disbelief. ‘You think?’
‘I’m not an expert. We can take some and find out if you want?’
Naoko turned the crystals over in the palm of her hand, as if she were looking for clues. ‘The plan was to let me carry this through customs at the airport? Walk through without any idea what was inside my bag?’ Her voice was low and gentle, directed inwards, as if she were talking to herself.
Alex wanted to take a step towards her but his feet were rooted to the spot. ‘I would never have gone through with it,’ he said.
‘But you considered it.’
‘I had to make it look that way. I had no choice. The people I’m dealing with are serious, Naoko. We’re both in too much danger to refuse.’
He could see that she wasn’t listening any more. The anger was mounting on her face and her eyes were vacant, as if she were watching an image come into focus in her mind.
‘All the time we were in the islands you knew this was going to happen. You took me there as a smokescreen to make sure I was relaxed and off-guard, just so I wouldn’t be suspicious when you got me to this hotel room. You’ve been lying to me the whole time, haven’t you?’
He took a step forward and she took an equal step back as he did so. Her face displayed the true depth of her feelings about his betrayal. She dropped the parcel on the bed and turned on her heels, opening and then slamming the door behind her as she ran out into the corridor. Alex ran after her. He followed her along the pale, carpeted corridor, past the rows of numbered doors and through the emergency exit on to the fire stairs. He was barefoot and the steel treads tore at his soles as he sprinted down the levels, trying to catch her before she reached the lobby. He grabbed her on the thirteenth-floor landing and Naoko fell against him and they both tumbled into the whitewashed corner. There were tears in her eyes and she refused to look at him.
‘I didn’t do it,’ he kept saying, trying to position himself in her eyeline. ‘I didn’t go through with it. I could have just kept quiet but I knew I had to tell you. I wanted to keep you out of danger. You’ve got to grant me that.’
‘I’m not granting you anything,’ she shouted. ‘You fucking liar.’
He was trying to use a calm tone to soothe her but his voice kept shaking. ‘I know this looks bad but I never would have let you do it. I promise. I always knew I was going to tell you eventually.’
‘What difference does that make?’
‘I know how to solve this without you being in any danger.’
‘How?’
‘I’ve thought this through. There’s another way.’
‘What other way?’
‘I’ll do it. I’ll carry it in my bag. That way I take the risk, not you.’
She began to come together behind her tears. She wiped her wet eyes with the back of her hand. ‘But what if you get caught? What happens then?’
Alex tried to shrug casually. ‘Then I go back to jail.’
‘That’s insane,’ she said, drawing out the words for emphasis.
He looked into her eyes, kneeling before her, his face almost touching hers. ‘What choice do I have?’ he said.
A door opened below them and they could hear voices and footsteps descending the stairwell. Alex checked over the metal bannister to make sure they hadn’t been seen.
He turned to Naoko. ‘Let’s go back to the room and talk there. We can’t stay out here or someone will get suspicious. Then we’re both in trouble.’
She looked at her knees as she thought it over and then reached out a hand for him to help her up. ‘Okay. Let’s go,’ she said softly.
28
THE PARCEL WAS still on the bed when they returned to their room, lying there openly, almost brazenly, like some totem of disaster. Alex picked it up and opened the wardrobe and placed it inside to hide it from sight. He felt better as soon as it was gone. Naoko lit a cigarette and smoked in deep, nervous gasps.
‘I’m having trouble processing all of this,’ she said. ‘My head is spinning.’
‘I know this must be a shock to you. If there was any way I could have avoided this happening, I would have. It’s the only way.’
‘You have some history with drugs, don’t you?’ she said. ‘If I’d known that when I met you, I might have made a different choice.’
He sat on the foot of the bed with his elbows resting on his knees. ‘I don’t take drugs,’ he said. ‘I’ve never done anything worse than smoke a joint. That’s the truth.’
‘What about all the trouble you had in London?’
He held his chin in his hands and looked at her from
beneath his brow.
‘You listen to Hiro too much.’
‘Who am I supposed to listen to, Alex? You won’t tell me anything.’
He paused for a moment. ‘I promised myself when I left London that I would forget about it, that’s all. I don’t want to drag my past around with me everywhere I go.’
‘It seems to me that’s exactly what you’re doing.’
‘Everything Hiro told you was completely back to front. I wasn’t involved with drugs and I didn’t have a habit. It was my brother, Patrick. I just took the blame for him. My parents were so devastated when he died that I couldn’t face making it worse for them. They always thought I was a disappointment and wanted someone to be at fault for the death of their perfect son. Why not me?’
‘So you let everyone think you were to blame?’
‘It seemed the right thing to do. I had to protect Patrick’s reputation and my parents drew their conclusions quickly anyway.’
Naoko took a long drag and let the smoke trickle from her mouth. ‘You probably think that’s heroic, don’t you? A noble self-sacrifice? You probably think you saved your family from heartache by letting them believe that version of events? What a futile, empty gesture. Why wouldn’t you tell them the truth?’
‘Because they didn’t want to hear it.’
She looked at him with clear, sharp eyes. ‘No,’ she said. ‘It’s what you want. You want to play the martyr. You prefer failure so you can escape the responsibility of having to succeed.’
‘That’s ridiculous,’ Alex said. He shook his head dismissively but Naoko continued. She had the look of someone who had stumbled on a long-hidden truth.
‘You made the same choice with us as well,’ she said. ‘I wanted to keep our relationship secret to protect us both. But you came to the gallery on the night of the private view because you wanted to test my loyalty. Not everyone can afford to take such risks. Some of us have to live in the real world and carry on the best we can. You always think you’re so generous when,actually, you’re thinking of yourself. You know why? Because it always has to be about you, doesn’t it?’
Last Stop Tokyo Page 19