The End of the Moment We Had

by Toshiki Okada

  TOSHIKI OKADA

  THE END

  OF THE

  MOMENT

  WE HAD

  translated by

  SAM MALISSA

  PUSHKIN PRESS

  CONTENTS

  TITLE PAGE

  THE END OF THE MOMENT WE HAD

  MY PLACE IN PLURAL

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ABOUT THE PUBLISHER

  COPYRIGHT

  THE END OF THE

  MOMENT WE HAD

  THE SIX OF THEM were in a clump, talking loudly, relentlessly, sometimes shouting, from the moment they stepped into the last car of the Hibiya Line metro. They carried on, leaning against the glass of the conductor’s booth, sliding their backs along the lateral bar. You’d think they were trying to drown out the rumble and screech of the train. But no one on the train there with them was thinking that. They were stuck with these guys. They couldn’t escape the shouting. Robbed of their solitude, they stared at the screens of their phones, or at the ads, or at the floor. No one said a word. Some maybe were thinking, these guys will get off at Roppongi, so it won’t be much longer. Which was what happened.

  The six guys were drunk, but it wasn’t until they got to Roppongi that they realized how drunk they were. The doors opened, they were sucked out, and they were still shouting. It wasn’t one conversation, each was talking with whoever happened to be nearest them, so Minobe with Suzuki, Azuma with Yukio, Yasui with Ishihara. But more or less they were a group. All drunk. They were louder than anyone else around, but they didn’t notice nor care, or maybe it was their intention to be loud. As they climbed the stairs to the exit, they never once lowered their voices. At the wicket they lined up behind one another, as if it were a ritual, to pass through the same gate, shouting the whole time. Ishihara was the last in line, and when he fumbled through his pockets and couldn’t find his ticket, he yelled out to Yasui, who was in front of him and at that instant about to pass through the barrier. Yasui stopped in his tracks, and Ishihara pressed up behind him, crotch to ass, and the two tried to pass through the barrier as one. The sensor went off, beeping its high pitch, and the flaps of the electronic barrier slammed shut on them. No problem. Yasui and Ishihara busted through with the full force of their drunkenness and fell forwards onto the ground. The others were right there watching, howling with laughter, loud as ever.

  Moving in a mass, they made their way above ground, where, afraid they wouldn’t be able to hear each other, they raised their voices even more. At one point they must have figured they could turn it down a notch and still be heard. Even so, definitely, they were loud. As they headed towards their destination—the SuperDeluxe club-slash-event space—their voices made it to the other side of the street and bounced back, even through the clamour of Roppongi Drive. The endless flow of cars and exhausts, and on top of that a jumble of noise. Clamour: it gets caught up in an invisible whorl, gets warmed by night air and starts to rise, rise until it’s looking down over the whole scene, the dots of light blurring as they grow more distant, bleeding into each other until they look like thick haze hanging heavily over the ground.

  When Yasui was little, he had gone up to the observation deck of Tokyo Tower and been startled by how all the cars below seemed like toys. It had been during the day, but the night laid itself over this memory and he now saw the buzz of Roppongi from a bird’s-eye view. He was at the back of the group, rubbing his thigh where the flaps of the ticket barrier had slammed into him. A bruise was forming, but he didn’t know that yet. He and Ishihara—trashed, semi-conscious, words tumbling out of their mouths—were going on about girls. Ishihara’s eyes were glazed over. When Yasui asked Ishihara where are we going again?, Ishihara didn’t answer, maybe because the question didn’t register. So Yasui just followed along. It wasn’t really clear that anybody knew where they were going, though it appeared they were going somewhere.

  There wasn’t a moment when one of them wasn’t shouting. The configuration of the group was constantly changing, like when Minobe and Suzuki turned around to stare at the girl who’d just passed, saying something at high volume about her legs—really just the back of her knees—and Azuma and Yukio brushed by them and ended up at the front of the pack. And then Minobe, who had been talking with Suzuki, suddenly yelled something to Azuma and Yukio about the girl, and Azuma yelled something back. Yasui tried to catch what they were saying but didn’t quite get it, because he’d been in the middle of a sentence talking to Ishihara, and Suzuki was basically shouting stuff to himself. You get the picture: a mash of meaningless noise.

  When they stumbled into SuperDeluxe, the eight o’clock performance was still waiting to start. But they almost didn’t get to the place at all. The sign for SuperDeluxe was small and not easy to see if you’re not looking for it, and the six of them were talking (or shouting) away, paying no mind to anything. They were almost down the slope of the hill, when Azuma, regaining awareness, noticed that the Nishi-Azabu intersection was up ahead, growing larger as they got closer, and wondered if they’d gone too far. He kind of mumbled it to himself, which no one heard, and they all kept going. Finally, Azuma was totally sure they were way past where they were supposed to go, so he stopped, and said loudly, loudly enough so the other five stopped to listen, hey, I think we like went too far. But even though he was shouting, it still somehow sounded like he was talking to himself. He looked over his shoulder, up the hill. Then he turned his whole body around and started back the way they came. The others didn’t say anything, they turned and followed. Just like that. They were paying much more attention now, and this time they spotted the sign for SuperDeluxe, which was so nondescript that the six of them started moaning loudly about it, before pushing open the door to the place and spilling inside.

  It was a wide room with a low ceiling, which made the space feel flat. Low tables were set up randomly, surrounded by sofas and chairs of different shapes and materials. The furniture was purplish and yellowish, although it was hard to say for sure because the space was dark and the lighting was tinted. Some of the seats were covered with shag. There were stools with pink reptile-skin covers, and big plastic things that weren’t quite sofas or benches but had curves that made them look warped. Almost all the seats were taken. Along the farthest wall was the stage, which was painted white and had mic stands and guitars and amps and chairs, and a tangle of cords snaking between them. Right in front of the stage was the only open spot, a low table and exactly six chairs, which Yasui saw and hurried to claim. The others followed. They dropped their stuff and made their way to the bar. They ordered individually and paid for their own drinks. They all got beer.

  SuperDeluxe was supposed to have some kind of performance that night, but five of the six guys didn’t know that. They had just come as a drunken mass. They didn’t know what was supposed to happen, a performance or whatever, or even that the place they were in held performances. The only one who knew anything was Azuma. He had heard about the performance from a girl he’d met at the movies a couple of days before. She’d said she was nineteen. It was a small movie theatre in Shibuya, open only a few years, the upholstery on the seats still smelling like a clothing store.

  *

  She looked nineteen, for sure. On account of her skin. But her face was busted. It was like she knew better than anyone how busted her face was, and that made her extra-friendly, and you could see that in her face too, which only made it worse. It was all smushed and embarrassed-like, hard to look at. There were plenty of empty seats in the movie theatre, as always, but there I was, watching the movie with her sitting next to me, on my left. For the whole movie I tried to make my left side cold and unwelcoming. When it was over, the left half of my body was numb
. That numbness went away, but it feels like it’s still there, waiting just under my skin. As soon as we got into SuperDeluxe, I started wondering if she was here. I looked around the room a bunch of times. The room, everything between the concrete walls and the floor, felt kind of soft, because of the pulse of all the people, the smell of everything, and the music and the lights. I prayed I wouldn’t spot her, but I kept looking for her.

  How I met this girl: A couple of days ago I pre-bought two tickets to a movie, one was for this other girl I was seeing—I guess she was my girlfriend, whatever—but then she texted me that she couldn’t make it, and I was like that’s cool. I figured I could sell her ticket, no problem. Some days in March are warm and some are cold, and it was cold that day, but I waited outside the theatre to catch someone who was otherwise going to pay full price at the box office. A guy showed up first, so I didn’t offer. Next was another guy. Then several more guys, and guys with girls, so I just looked upwards. Near the top of a building, there was a square electronic billboard, like it was floating in the sky, playing through a loop of ads over and over and over. Then, finally, a girl came by. That was her. I might have been pickier, but I guess I was worried that she was my last chance. She was pretty chunky, like she snacked all the time or something, and the way she walked was like sad and apologetic. But I said hi anyway. She came over, and she bought the ticket, and we were standing there, and I started regretting the whole thing right then. We went down the stairs together, and she started asking questions: Do you go to the movies a lot? What kind of movies do you like? Why do you like that kind of movie? Do you go to a movie because who’s in it or who directed it? I was hoping to escape and went and took a seat in the middle of a row, but she hustled after me, fast for someone her size—I swear, I felt the air shake with her mass—and she dropped herself into the seat next to me. The questioning didn’t stop: So when you like a movie, they release the soundtrack, right, are you the type who buys the soundtrack? She would have kept going with the interrogation, but the lights began to dim. Commercials and trailers, one after the next after the next, taking forever like usual. Finally the movie started. It was a Canadian movie, about four teenage girls, and they each go through stereotypical teenage experiences. The plot didn’t make a big deal of itself, but there didn’t seem to be anything like structure either, everything just happened randomly. I got bored partway through and pretty much gave up on watching it. Instead I just sat there listening to the English that I didn’t understand and telling myself what a fool I was, waiting to sell my extra ticket to some girl and getting what I deserved. I played the whole scene over and over again in my head—spotting her and, for some crazy reason, saying hi—and actually it felt way more real than anything happening on the movie screen. Then the movie ended.

  As soon as the lights came on, she started talking again. Umm, what did you think of it? It was pretty good, right? Maybe not so good? If you ask me, I guess I think it was like great. You know there was that one black actress? And the guy who played her older brother? I heard he’s like in a theatre group, like it’s his theatre group, or a performance group, one of those, you know? I’m not just telling you to show that I know stuff, I’m more like, wow, he really knows what he’s doing as an actor, that’s what I meant. What did you think about him? Don’t you think he’s good? And like, oh right, I heard a rumour he’s going to be in a performance, the day after tomorrow or something, at a place in Roppongi, I mean it’s not a rumour, it’s like true, I just for some reason said it was a rumour, and like they never perform in theatres, they always do it in like clubs or bars and stuff, their show, or I guess their performance, they’re like performers, but they don’t use a stage set or anything, they just like get a mic and improvise, something like that, yeah.

  When I told the guy about this performance, he said, maybe I’ll go. I know he was just saying that, but I forced myself, I went out of my way to believe him, so I just came out and said, oh really, then why don’t we go together. I did it because I didn’t want to think he was just saying he’d go, and because if he wasn’t just saying it, I wanted to see if things could go farther, and because some small part of me really thought he wanted to go. I knew exactly what would happen if I said, why don’t we go together, but I said it anyway, because like if I had a positive attitude and gave it a shot, it would happen, so I came out and said it as sincerely as I could. I said it all brightly, to cheer myself on. Even if he saw right through to my trembling little ulterior motive—though I don’t think it was anything sinister like ulterior, I think it was sweet and kind of innocent—even if he saw through me, I told myself I didn’t care. Which of course was a lie, if he saw through me I’d just want to die. When I was about to say, why don’t we go together, I thought that as soon as I finished saying it, I should stare into his eyes as hard as I could. So I did. I knew that he might get put off by me giving him that kind of look, but I did it anyway. Then when I was staring into his eyes, I knew that I had to really plead with my eyes or it wouldn’t work, and I didn’t let myself think it wouldn’t work because it was my eyes, in my face. If I looked away quickly because I knew it was putting him off, that would be even worse, and I mean I knew right away that even if I stared into his eyes, nothing was going to happen, but I forced myself to stare into his eyes for a while—a really short while, maybe just a few seconds. But it wasn’t working, like I knew it wouldn’t, and I gave up. For a moment I didn’t know where I should look next, which was how I ended up looking hard at the wall. It was like throwing a lump of clay against the wall as hard as I could and it was just sticking there. A light grey spot, hardly noticeable, but it leaves a stain that never comes out, and even though it’s basically totally meaningless, there it is forever, so that’s what I decided to stare at. I tried to make it mean something by looking at it, even though it didn’t want to be given any meaning.

  To be honest, by that point in time I was totally sick of myself. But I was telling myself that I always get sick of myself too quickly. The lobby of the movie theatre had posted these magazine articles about the movies they were showing. The two of us were standing there, me kind of leaning against the wall, kind of like talking. Maybe fifty centimetres above my right shoulder there was on the wall this cut-out little article from a magazine I know the name of but have never read. From where he was standing, my head was in the way of him seeing the article, not that he was trying to see it, he was probably just thinking about getting out of there. I leant against the wall all heavy, like I couldn’t move if I wanted to, so he felt like he couldn’t just leave me there. I made him feel that way. Of course he knew I was just putting it on. But all he could do was stand there. He didn’t lean against the wall like I did, he just stood there. He stood there for a whole hour, until his feet ached.

  The two of us were talking about something, but there was suddenly a break in the conversation, like a gap between us. I remembered that before the movie started we were talking about soundtracks, but the movie started and the conversation got cut off, so I thought I would bring that back up again, and I did. Umm, I’ve actually been wondering something this whole time, so, before the movie started, we were talking about this, right? I mean I just wanted to go back to that, you know? So like are you the type who buys soundtracks of movies you like? That’s what I asked before, remember, and you said you’re not a soundtrack buyer, right? And then I was like, why not? And that’s when the movie started, I mean it was just the trailers, but we couldn’t really talk any more, so that’s where the conversation ended, right? You remember all that, right? So can we pick up where we left off? And when I asked that, he said sure. So I did. So when you say you don’t buy soundtracks, why is that? To be honest, I am really curious, like do you have a reason? When I was asking him this, I leant even more of my body weight against the wall. I wanted him to lean on the wall too, so we could be leaning the same way on the same wall, except that he was going to be facing me and talking to me, so I was like inviting him to
join me. But not surprisingly, he didn’t lean. Though I have to say it was a pretty subtle invitation. I knew it probably didn’t even get through to him.

  So he said, yeah, when it comes to soundtracks, sometimes I want to buy it right after I’ve seen the movie, and especially if it’s like a good movie, or like if the music made a strong impression, so sometimes I feel like I have to buy it—and I said, uh huh, yeah. He kept going, so, yeah, I get it, sure, but you know, every time I go and buy one, and I’ve bought a bunch, it’s always like, I mean I’m saying this from experience here, because I’ve bought a whole bunch, but don’t you always just get tired of the soundtrack like almost right away? No? Maybe you don’t, but I do, you know, and at some point I realized that, and I was like, okay, from now on, no more soundtracks for me, so I stopped. He was still standing there, not leaning on the wall. I thought what he was saying was so right on. I mean, I was pretty impressed. Yeah, I totally get what you’re saying, I said, I mean totally! And then I felt like I was kind of floating. I got nervous, I had to say something, so I blurted out, I guess I should stop buying soundtracks too. But as soon as I said it, that floating sensation got worse, I didn’t feel like I had got anywhere. All he said was, it’s whatever you want, buy ’em or don’t. And I said, oh, right, you’re so right. And I kept going, basically everyone’s got their preferences—or, you know, not preferences, but you know what I mean—and so like everyone’s different, right? So everyone can buy them if they want or not buy them if they don’t, is what you’re saying, right? He said, sure. Oh god, I was so unbelievably stupid, when I said, I guess I should stop buying soundtracks too, I mean what kind of a statement is that, I have no clue—I should just shut my mouth and die. But even if it was a statement, the response is obvious, so saying something like that like it’s a statement, I mean it was so lame, but I said it, and thinking about myself saying it, I was like oh my god, I’m the worst, my life is over, and I actually said that out loud, which I didn’t even realize until after I said it, I’m so stupid I should just die, and he must have been thinking the exact same thing. When he heard me say my life is over, he made a confused face, or I’m pretty sure he did. But he wasn’t making that face to be mean or anything, it just happened, which actually made it hurt even worse, and I had no idea what to do next. I never know what to do next. I’m always about to fall apart, which I guess is selfish of me, or weak. I couldn’t stop thinking about our soundtrack conversation when I said, I guess I should stop buying soundtracks too and he said, it’s whatever you want. But what he really meant to say was make up your own fuckin’ mind, moron. And I finally realized it, I mean I only just realized—too late—but that’s what it was. It took me this long to understand that I really am a moron. I felt humiliated, even though it was too late to do anything about it, and my body started getting all hot. But maybe I was getting hot from something besides humiliation, maybe something a little different, but I’m a moron, so I don’t really know what else it could be. But either way, I was getting hot, and I felt like I needed to say something, and I ended up saying something totally stupid. Today’s like my lucky day, I’m the worst at getting tickets, I know I should have pre-brought a ticket ’cause it’s cheaper that way but I didn’t, but I mean because of, you know, I got my ticket for cheaper so I totally got lucky, really. So I really, I want to say thanks—and then I took the quickest little breath, like as if I was swimming, and I kept going. But I know if there was an extra ticket, that means that there was supposed to be someone else (with you), so like, sorry, um, if it’s no big deal, and I mean if it is, then don’t worry about it, but I’d like to know (your) name, first name only would be okay, or like a nickname, but I just want to know what I can call (you). By that point I was barely keeping it together. By the way, about the (you) (in parentheses), that’s because I wanted to say it out loud but couldn’t even do that. Before I knew what I was doing, I told him he could call me Miffy, which is my screen name, and it’s so lame I’ve never actually told it to anyone who I know in real life, but I went and told him. I wasn’t sure any more if I was saying the words I was thinking, if they were coming out of my mouth and he heard them, or if they were all still in my head, unsaid, which meant they never reached him and I just wanted to say them, I couldn’t tell. My body was still feeling hot, but it was like I didn’t know which part of my body felt hot. And I just kept talking. I had to find out his name. If I didn’t, then I would be totally worthless. That terrified me. The heat in my body made me feel like I was somehow outside the moment I was living in. That made me get reckless, and want to stay that way, so I really went for it. Sorry, um, I just want to ask again, it totally doesn’t have to be a real name, just anything, like a screen name would be fine, I just wanna know, what should I call (you)? is what’s on my mind, I mean, I’ve just really been wondering, I mean, wanting to ask, so, like, I’m asking now, um. That’s what I said to him. But in the end he never told me his name. He didn’t lie or make up a screen name, he just ignored the question, so even though I tried, it didn’t mean anything, which was like the worst. In the hour or so since the movie ended, how many stupid mistakes had I made? It’d be like counting stars, and I didn’t feel like counting. If I tried, I would just feel worse and worse, I’d probably want to die, so I didn’t. I thought that my body was getting hotter because it didn’t want to live any more. I knew I was losing him. I knew he wasn’t actually listening to anything I was saying, that he wouldn’t remember any of it. But he felt like he couldn’t just ditch me, so he stood there pretending to listen, zoning out, thinking about whatever. Like what would be the funniest song to play over this pathetic situation, or something like that. Normally that would embarrass me to death, but I was already torturing myself plenty, so getting ignored wasn’t anything I was worrying about. He was saying something to me. At that moment I didn’t have the energy to understand him. But I could get the idea, he was making moves to leave, and sure enough he made a little apologetic face and right away said goodbye and walked off, footsteps hurrying towards the movie theatre exit. When I was completely out of sight, he slowed down, then looked over his shoulder to make sure I wasn’t like stalking him. Then he called his girlfriend, the one who was supposed to go to the movies with him, and told her the movie was shit, he slept through half of it. They talked about other stuff, then made plans to meet up, and he got on a different subway from the one he would usually take to go home.