by Barry Eisler
“Have you ever seen Murakami spending time with them?”
She shook her head. “No.”
“How about Yukiko?”
“Not really. Her English is pretty bad.”
Inconclusive. She didn’t know anything. I was starting to doubt that she’d be of much help after all.
I looked at my watch. It was almost five. The sun would be coming up soon.
“We should get going,” I said.
She nodded. I paid the bill and we left.
Outside it was damp but not raining. The lamplights on Roppongi-dori created glowing cones of slowly swirling mist. It was as late as it could get without getting early, and the street was momentarily silent.
“Walk me home?” she asked, looking at me.
I nodded. “Sure.”
Halfway through the twenty-minute walk it started raining again.
“Droga!” she swore in Portuguese. “I left the umbrella at Tantra.”
“Shoganai,” I said, turning up the collar of my blazer. What can you do.
We walked faster. It started to rain harder. I brushed my fingers through my hair and felt rivulets trickling down the back of my neck.
With about a half-kilometer to go, a huge crack of thunder rang out and it really started pouring.
“Que merda!” she exclaimed with a laugh. “We’re doomed!”
We ran for it, but to no real avail. We got to her apartment and ducked under the overhang in front of the rear entranceway. “Meu deus,” she said, laughing, “I haven’t gotten drenched like that in forever!” She unbuttoned her dripping coat, then looked at me and smiled. “Once you’re already wet, it’s actually kind of nice.”
Wisps of vapor were rising off her damp dress. “You’re steaming,” I observed.
She glanced down, then back at me. She pushed a few strands of clinging hair back from her face. “That run made me warm,” she said.
I wiped water from my face and thought, Time to go.
But I remained.
“Thanks for an interesting evening,” she said, after a pause. “You’re not a bad guy, for a stalker.”
I gave her a half-smile. “That’s what people tell me.”
There was an odd moment of quiet. Then she stepped in close and hugged me, her face against my shoulder.
I was surprised. My arms moved reflexively around her.
Just a little comfort, I thought. You were rough on her before. Let her go feeling good.
I was distantly aware that this sounded like a rationalization. It troubled me vaguely. Ordinarily I get along well without.
I could feel her soft shape, the heat of her, conducted with electric clarity through the wet of our clothes.
I felt my body responding. I knew she felt it, too. Ah, shit.
She lifted her head from my shoulder. Her mouth was very close to my ear. I heard her say, “Come inside.”
The last person I’d gotten involved with when I should have treated her only as an asset was Midori. I was still paying the price on that one.
Don’t be stupid again, I thought. Don’t get too close. Don’t blur the line.
But the thoughts were disconnected. No one seemed to be listening.
She’s a bargirl. You don’t know where her loyalties lie.
That one was unconvincing. No one had directed her against me—I was the one who had been pursuing her. She hadn’t needed to warn me about the bugs. My gut told me she wasn’t dissembling.
She put a hand on my chest. “You haven’t . . . been with someone for a long time,” she said.
I reminded myself that this was part of the reason I’ve lived so long.
“Why do you say that?” I asked.
“I can tell. The way you look at me.”
Her hand pressed closer. “I can feel your heart,” she said.
Between her hand over my heart and her hips at my crotch, she might as well have been administering a polygraph.
I looked out at the street beyond the overhang. The rain was coming in at gray angled streaks. One of my hands moved to her cheek. I closed my eyes. Her skin was wet from the rain and I thought of tears.
She lifted her head and I felt the side of her face settle against mine. Her head moved up and down just slightly, as though in time to some music I could almost hear. I kept my eyes closed, thinking, Don’t do it, don’t be stupid.
I could hear my own breath, flowing through my nose, moving past my teeth.
I started to pull back, sliding my wet cheek past hers. She moved one of her hands to the back of my neck and stopped me.
I shifted my head slightly. The corners of our mouths brushed together. I felt her breath on my cheek.
Then we were kissing. Her mouth was warm and soft. Our tongues entwined and simultaneously I thought Oh you fucking idiot and Oh that feels so good.
My hands found their way inside her coat to her waist. She took my face between her palms and kissed me harder.
I squeezed her hips, then ran my hands up and over the curve of her ribs to her breasts. Her nipples were hard under the wet fabric of her dress. Her body radiated heat. I heard myself groan. It sounded like capitulation.
She stepped back and fumbled in her purse. She pulled out a key and looked at me, her eyes dark, her breathing heavy.
“Come inside,” she said.
She turned and put her key in the lock. The door slid open and we went in.
We kept kissing in the elevator on the brief ride to the fifth floor. On the way down the corridor we were pulling at each other’s clothes.
We moved inside her apartment, into a foyer at the end of a short hallway. There was a living area beyond. Everything was dimly illuminated by the reflected gray light of the street without.
She closed the door behind me and pushed me back against it. She started kissing me again, hungrily, her hands unbuttoning my shirt. Ordinarily I don’t get comfortable in a place until I’ve had a chance to look around it, but the narrow hallway, with Naomi between me and any potential attackers, wouldn’t have worked well for an ambush. I didn’t pick up any danger vibes, at least not of those kind. And Harry’s bug and video detector was blessedly quiescent.
I eased her coat off her shoulders and let it fall behind her. She kissed my neck, my chest, while her fingers worked on my belt and pants. I reached around and undid the zipper at the back of her dress. I moved the straps off her shoulders and the dress slipped soundlessly to the floor. I felt her kick off her shoes.
She pushed my blazer back, but the wet material clung to me. I shrugged out of it and pulled off my shirt. She put a warm hand against my belly for a moment as though to freeze me in that position. I felt the diamond bracelet, a small cold circle around her wrist. Then she reached lower and started to ease my pants down. I stopped her so I could get my shoes and socks off first. Pants-pooled-at-the-ankles is too helpless a posture for me.
I stepped out of my pants and undershorts and kicked them aside. She pushed me back against the door again, circled her arms around my lower back, and pulled us tightly together. Her breasts and belly pressed against me, warm and soft and insanely inviting, and at that instant I didn’t care what this was all going to cost me. What it might cost her.
I took her face gently in both my hands and eased her head back slightly. I looked into her eyes. In the dim light of the hall they seemed to have their own quiet luminescence.
Her hands dropped to my hips and she lowered herself in front of me. I watched her, breathing faster now. The door was cold on my naked back and then her mouth engulfed me and for a moment I couldn’t feel anything else.
One of her hands rose to my belly and I took it in mine, then let it go. My head dropped back against the door with a quiet thump. Some stray hair brushed against my thigh. I could feel every strand of it, as though I’d been stroked with hot filament.
One of my hands drifted down and traced the edge of her ear, the curve of her cheek, the line of her jaw. I exhaled hard, tightening my ab
domen until there was nothing left in my lungs, then breathed in sharply through my nose.
I dipped my fingers under her chin and tried to draw her upward.
She tilted her head back and looked up at me. “I want to finish,” she said.
I stooped, placed my hands on her upper ribs, and raised her to her feet. I slipped one arm behind her neck and the other under her ass, stepped forward, and scooped her up. She laughed in surprise and clasped her arms around my neck.
“There’s something I want to finish,” I told her.
The living room was attached to a small kitchen and an only slightly larger bedroom. I headed toward the latter. I was dimly aware of my hard-on swaying before me like some absurd blind man’s cane as I walked.
There was a futon on the floor just inside the bedroom doorway. I stepped onto it and gently set her down on her back. She slipped her arms from around my neck, her palms brushing past my ears and face. I reached down with both hands and eased the thong over the flat of her pelvis. She raised her hips and the garment moved over the curve of her ass. I pulled it past her ankles and tossed it aside.
I put my hands on the futon on either side of her and kissed her throat, her breasts, her belly. I made my way to the creases of her thighs. She grabbed a fistful of hair at the back of my head and pulled hard enough to make it hurt, but I made her wait longer before I gave her what she wanted.
When I did, she exhaled sharply and tightened her grip on my hair. I drew my knees up and took her ass in both hands, raising it off the futon. I heard her say, “Isso, isso, continua,” felt her other hand move to the back of my neck. I glanced up. Her stomach muscles were clenched tight, her breasts trembling slightly from the action of my head and hands.
I took my time with her. She tasted clean and salty and sweet. Her fingers ran through my hair, sometimes grabbing, sometimes pulling, in time to the way I was touching her. I didn’t rush it, even when the pressure of her hands urged me faster.
I heard her say, “Isso,” again, over and over. Her legs rose behind me and tightened across my ears, and her voice was suddenly far away, reaching me as though from underwater. Her legs tensed further, her knuckles dug into my scalp. Then her body slowly unwound and sound came back into the room.
I lowered her back to the futon and looked at her. The gray light of the room had grown a shade brighter. It picked up the green in her eyes, and without thinking, I said, “You’re beautiful.”
She reached up and took my face in her hands. “Agora, venha aqui,” she said in Portuguese. Come here.
I went to her. She reached down for me but I found my own way in.
I slid my hands under her arms and around to her face. I dipped my head forward and closed my eyes, the way I had once been taught to pray. I felt her lips against my face, mouthing silent words.
A minute went by, maybe two. Our movement together, back and forth, gradually slowed, like waves advancing and receding on a beach. More than that and I knew I was done.
She arched her head up to mine and the kiss quickened. I felt a sensation, like purring or a low growl, across her lips and tongue.
“Agora, mete tudo,” she said, her mouth moving against mine. Now, everything now.
She pushed against me, not holding anything back. I held her face in my hands and kissed her harder. She raised her knees and I felt her thighs and ankles sliding against my hips. We moved faster. She locked her legs around my back. I heard her moan something in Portuguese. My back arched and my toes dug into the futon, and I let myself go with a long kussouu that sounded as much like pain as pleasure.
The strength flowed out of my body and I felt suddenly heavy. I lay down on the futon beside her, facing her, my hand resting lightly on her belly.
“Isso, foi otimo,” she said, turning her head to me. That was delicious.
I smiled. “Otimo,” I repeated. My limbs felt jellified.
She covered my hand with hers and squeezed my fingers. We were quiet for a moment. Then she said, “Can I ask you something?”
I looked at her. “Sure.”
“Why were you so reluctant, at first? I could tell you wanted to. And you knew I wanted to.”
I closed my eyes for a moment, flirting with sleep. “Maybe I was afraid.”
“Afraid of what?”
“I’m not sure.”
“I’m the one who should have been afraid. When you said you had something you wanted to finish, I half thought you were going to try to spank me again.”
I smiled, my eyes still closed. “I would have, if you’d deserved it.”
“I would have made you sorry.”
“You didn’t. You made me happy.”
I heard her laugh. “Good. You still haven’t told me what you were afraid of.”
I thought for a moment. Drowsiness was settling on me like a blanket.
“Of getting involved. Like you said, I haven’t been with someone for a long time.”
She laughed again. “How can we be involved? I don’t even know who you are.”
With an effort, I opened my eyes. I looked at her. “You know better than most,” I said.
“Maybe that’s what scares you,” she replied.
If I stayed any longer I would fall asleep. I sat up and ran a hand over my face.
“It’s okay,” she said. “I know you have to go.”
She was right, of course. “Yeah?” I asked.
“Yeah.” She paused. Then: “I’d like to see you again. But not at the club.”
“That makes sense,” I said, my mind having defaulted to its usual security setting. She furrowed her brow at my response. I saw my mistake, smiled, and tried to correct. “After tonight, I don’t think I could respect that ‘no below the waist’ rule, anyway.” She laughed at that, but the laughter wasn’t entirely comfortable.
I used the bathroom, then made my way back to the foyer, where I pulled on my still-wet clothes. They were cold and clinging.
She came over as I was lacing my shoes. She had combed her hair back and was wearing a dark flannel robe. She looked at me for a long moment.
“I’ll try to help you,” she said.
I told her the truth. “I don’t know how much you can really do.”
“I don’t either. But I want to try. I don’t want . . . I don’t want to wind up someplace where I can’t find my way back.”
I nodded. “That’s a good reason.”
She reached into a pocket of the robe and pulled out a piece of paper. She extended her arm to hand it to me, and I noticed the diamond bracelet again. I reached out and took her wrist, softly.
“A gift?” I asked, curious.
She shook her head slowly. “It was my mother’s,” she said.
I took the paper and saw that she had written a phone number on it. I put it in my pocket.
I gave her my pager number. I wanted her to have a way to contact me if something came up at the club.
I didn’t say, “I’ll call you.” I didn’t hug her because of the wet clothes. Just a quick kiss. Then I turned and left.
I made my way quietly down the hallway to the stairwell. I could tell she thought she wasn’t going to see me again. I had to admit that she might be right. The knowledge was as damp and dispiriting as my sodden clothes.
I came to the first floor and looked out at the entranceway to the building. For a second I pictured the way she had hugged me here. It already seemed like a long time ago. I felt an unpleasant mixture of gratitude and longing, streaked with guilt and regret.
And in a flash of insight, cutting with cold clarity through the fog of my fatigue, I realized what I hadn’t been able to articulate earlier, not even to myself, when she’d asked me what I was afraid of.
It had been this, the moment after, when I would come face-to-face with knowing that it would all end badly, if not this morning, then the next one. Or the one after that.
I used the rear entrance, where there was no camera. It was still raining when I got outside
. The day’s first light was gray and feeble. I walked in my wet shoes until I found a cab, then made my way back to the hotel.
12
THE NEXT DAY I contacted Tatsu via pager and our bulletin board, and arranged to meet him at noon at the Ginza-yu sento, or public bath. The sento is a Japanese institution, albeit one that has been in decline since not long after the war, when new apartments began to feature their own tubs and the sento became less a hygienic necessity and more a periodic indulgence. But, like all indulgences that are valued not just for their product but for their process, the sento will never entirely disappear. For in the unhurried rituals of scrubbing and soaking, and in the perspective of profound relaxation that can only be derived from immersion in water that the meek might describe as scalding, there are qualities of devotion, and celebration, and meditation, qualities that are necessary concomitants to a life worth living.
Ginza-yu exists at both geographical and psychological remove from the nearby shopping glitz for which its namesake is best known, hiding almost slyly in the shadow of the Takaracho expressway overpass, and making its presence known only with a faded, hand-painted sign. I waited in a doorway across the street until I saw Tatsu pull up in an unmarked car. He parked at the curb and got out. I watched him turn the corner into the bathhouse’s side entrance, then followed him in.
He saw me as I came up behind him. He had already taken off his shoes, and was about to place them in one of the small lockers just inside the entrance.
“Tell me what you have,” he said.
I retracted a bit as though hurt. He looked at me for a long moment, then sighed and asked, “How are you?”
I bent and took off my shoes. “Fine, thanks for asking. You?”
“Very well.”
“Your wife? Your daughters?”
He couldn’t help smiling at the mention of his family. He nodded and said, “Everyone is fine. Thank you.”
I grinned. “I’ll tell you more inside.”
We put our shoes away. I had already purchased the necessary accoutrements at the convenience store across the street—shampoo, soap, scrubbing cloth, and towels—and handed Tatsu what he needed as we went in. We paid the proprietor the government-mandated and -subsidized four hundred yen apiece, walked up the wide wooden stairs to the changing area, undressed in the unadorned locker room, then went through the sliding glass door to the bath beyond. The bathing area was empty—peak time would be in the evening—and, like the locker room, almost Spartan in its unpretentiousness: nothing more than a large square space, a high ceiling, white tile walls dripping with condensation, bright fluorescent lighting, and an exhaust fan on one wall that seemed forlorn from its long and losing battle with the steam within. The only concession to an aesthetic not strictly utilitarian was a large, brightly colored mosaic of Ginza 4-chome on the wall above the bath itself. We sat down to scrub.