ME

by Tomoyuki Hoshino

  * * *

  That Sunday at work on the sales floor I got into a confrontation with Tajima, the supervisor, and was then royally chewed out by the store manager. Tajima had come in just before me when I was hired as a contract employee; from the very beginning we hadn’t gotten along. When after three years I was deemed reliable and hired as a regular staff member, Tajima had been the lone dissenter.

  He must having been waiting that day to pounce on me for something. The elderly lady I was serving wanted the simplest sort of digital camera, so that she could take photos of her great-grandchild. I had recommended to her the easiest-to-use model, with the least likelihood of photographic failure. As it happened, there were no other customers around, so when she said that she wouldn’t be able to remember it all, I wrote down for her the basic operations for taking snapshots. All the time she was telling me about her son and his grandchild, her great-grandson, saying that even though her son and grandson kept promising to send baby photos, they hadn’t, thus obliging her to buy a camera, so that she could have her own. She expressed amazement at having lived so long as to see her own great-grandchild. It seemed, she said, only yesterday that she was holding her grandson in her arms, and now he was himself a father. It felt quite unreal to her. She was speaking loudly, as though hard of hearing.

  Picking up on our chat, Tajima stepped over and called me into a corner. “Going overboard in pampering customers,” he said softly, “is not good for business. Ring up the sale and send her packing.”

  “Yes,” I replied in the same half-whisper. “I could understand your concern if I were neglecting other customers, but there aren’t any. So why are you getting on my case?”

  “Are you blind?” He glared at me with contempt as he pointed to several new arrivals at the counter. Then he sputtered: “If you’re going to act like a contract worker, then go back to being one.”

  “Why don’t you put in for a transfer?” I countered. “After all, you’re alone in the world.”

  Tajima had the habit of licking his lips when he lost his temper. He looked at me for a moment without a word, then erupted again: “You’re not cut out for this kind of work! You really should go back to being on contract, so that you can chase your dream of becoming a photographer and die like the lowlife bum you are!”

  I pretended to look dejected and edged toward him with my head bowed.

  “Get back to work!” he barked, and at that moment I shot my head up straight, leaving me slightly below Tajima. My intention had been to bump him on the chin, but I hadn’t moved in close enough, so instead I got his nose. There was a soft popping sound as he covered his nostrils. When the nearby customers turned toward us, he removed his hand to reveal dribbling blood.

  It was all the worse that we were on the sales floor. The few Sunday customers set off quite a commotion, with someone threatening to call the police. And that was what brought the store manager’s wrath down on me, though I suppose it was also he who kept Tajima from pressing charges, knowing that it had been a private argument.

  * * *

  It was after ten when we left work. Looking forward to being off the next day, Yasokichi, a drinking buddy my age, and Minami-san, who had his own issues with Tajima, proposed that we head for a pub.

  “Well done!” exclaimed Minami-san, as we raised our glasses. “But what did he do to so piss you off so bad?”

  I gave him a rundown of what had happened.

  “Nagano-kun, do you really want to be a photographer?” he asked, completely missing the point.

  “You pushed the wrong button,” chimed in Yasokichi knowingly. “That’s what made him go off the rails.”

  “No, I’m not that touchy . . . What pissed me off was hearing about it from Tajima . . .”

  “But you even get annoyed when I mention it!” Yasokichi grumbled.

  “So what are you aiming for anyway?” Minami-san asked.

  “Pushing buttons,” said Yasokichi, pointing to me, “is what got him into a fight with his old man—and caused him to move out.”

  “I didn’t simply ‘move out.’ I wanted to be independent, on my own. Don’t put words in my mouth!”

  “Hitoshi here seems to have a propensity for rubbing people the wrong way.”

  “After graduating from photography school, I looked for work but got rejected at every turn. So I wound up as a job-hopping part-timer. My old man kept bugging me about getting a ‘real’ job, and things grew increasingly tense between us. And that’s why I ended up living alone.”

  “But then you became a full-timer anyway.”

  “Yeah.”

  “So are you back in your father’s good graces?”

  I shook my head without saying anything, and the three of us fell silent for a moment.

  “It’s a delicate issue and hard to explain. I don’t understand it myself.”

  “I’ll come out and say it: you still want to be a photographer. So Tajima deliberately provokes you—”

  “No way. I’ve given up on it all. The fact that I even had that dream still causes me a lot of pain. When I was young my father got transferred a lot, so I went from school to school without ever fitting in anywhere. My parents got worried and tried to find a hobby that might interest me, so when I entered middle school they gave me a single-lens reflex camera. Back then we were still using film.”

  “What was the model?” asked Yasokichi.

  “An EOS,” I replied, making no effort to hide my annoyance at the unwelcome question.

  “You got an EOS when you entered middle school? Wow, some pampered rich kid you must’ve been!”

  “Come on . . . I suppose being an only child I was a bit spoiled, and my parents probably felt guilty since we moved around so much. But I got into it and set up a camera club at school, and that made them happy, and my father in particular seemed proud that I put in the effort to do something I really wanted to do. But then, in my last year of high school, when I explained that instead of going to college I wanted to become a photographer, he hit the roof, saying that very few people can make a living this way, and that I ought to get a degree instead. That’s when things starting going downhill between us.”

  “That must have been hard on your father too.”

  “He finally caved when my mother said that if I really had my heart set on going to photography school, it might not be such a bad idea for them to fork out the money. But when I couldn’t find employment after I graduated, he lorded it over me with his told-you-so sermonizing, saying that I should have gone to a proper university after all, that it was too late now, and that I would have to make the best of it on my own. I have to admit that I’d let myself be carried away by wishful thinking, and seeing my dream shattered gave me a huge shock. I didn’t know what to do and drifted for a while doing part-time jobs. Still, those questions about getting a real job or thinking seriously about the future were a total pain in the ass, and it ticked me off when my father needled me about it.

  Hitoshi, he’d say, you and I are alike in having no outstanding talent and thus we are stuck with having to follow the straight-and-narrow path of white-collardom. But you can’t let yourself be brokenhearted at disappointment. There are all sorts of other dreams you can pursue even while working for a company. For example, I could never have become an automobile designer, but I still find plenty of satisfaction in selling the cars I like.

  “He would rattle on like that, but I knew he had no interest whatsoever in cars and detested being a dealer. I remember that once, when he and my mother had gotten into a row, he raged about how he was merely putting up with his job, saying that if he didn’t have a family to support, he’d give it all up and become a ceramist. Instead, he remained a mediocre cog in the sales machine, with no particular achievements to boast of. I got fed up with it all and told him to look in the mirror before starting in on me.”

  As I talked, I was putting the beer away big time. I had thought I was drinking because I was in high spirits, but then
I realized that my real intention was simply to get sloshed. I didn’t know what it was, but something was causing me unbearable pain.

  I’m the type who falls asleep when drunk. Already my eyelids were starting to droop.

  “Have you told Tajima any of this?”

  “I tried hard to get along with him in the early days, and so I bravely opened up about what was weighing on me.”

  “He disliked you even from the beginning.”

  “It seems so.”

  “Why?”

  “I guess I do things that rub people the wrong way,” I said, trying to make a joke at my own expense. When I first appeared on the scene, I had been working part-time at the nearby Yoshinoya. My only source of pleasure was going to the local Megaton and fooling around with the cameras on display. I had resolved to give up on photography and had left my own cameras behind when I bolted out of my parents’ house, yet I remained interested in the latest models and would keep up by checking them out on the Internet and reading specialty magazines. And that made me realize that what I liked was not so much photographs as cameras.

  I’d go to Megaton every day and hang around. The employees soon got used to seeing me, and I’d have friendly chats with them, including Tajima. To make up for the fact that I was a customer who never purchased anything, I would pile on a little extra helping when they’d come into Yoshinoya for a bite to eat.

  Once a Megaton customer called to me, apparently taking me for an employee. It was, I suppose, an easy mistake to make, as I was casually dressed in navy-blue chinos and a brown jacket, similar to the actual employees. I looked around and, seeing no clerk, offered my assistance. When it came to knowledge of the latest products, I could hold my own against any of the staff and so played my role to perfection, even surprising myself at just how smooth my sales pitch was. The customer clearly had an itch, and I knew just where to scratch. As it happened, he was looking for information rather than an immediate purchase and so, having heard my spiel, left the store quite content.

  Another customer had been observing us and then came to me to ask about the most popular models. I instinctively guided him to the top-sellers, explained their strengths and weaknesses, and, when he seemed to waver, asked for what purpose he chiefly intended to use the product. With that matter cleared up, I made a further suggestion and, when he again appeared to vacillate, pushed the hidden pluses of the camera. Finally, for good measure, I added: “Actually, I own and regularly use this one myself—in black—and, to tell you the truth, I’m so comfortable with it that I wouldn’t want any other. But that’s just between you and me.”

  And with that I clinched the sale, though now I was in trouble, having, of course, no access to the merchandise. The customer suddenly looked suspicious, when Nakamura, a staff member who knew me, came to my rescue, along with Tajima. And so the purchase went off without a hitch.

  Impressed by my prowess, Nakamura told me that I ought to leave Yoshinoya and come to work for Megaton, saying that if I was interested, he’d be happy to put in a good word for me with his superiors. And so I landed an interview. Tajima, suspecting that I had been trying to con the customer out of his money, voiced his skepticism to the hiring committee, but in the end it was Nakamura’s recommendation that won the day.

  Reminiscing about it all, I found myself dozing off—slipping from memories to dreams. I was running away from a pursuer. All I remember is feeling relieved at not yet having been caught.

  Drifting awake, I heard Minami-san say to Yasokichi: “You need to be more solid, you know, in the hips . . .”

  “Are you talking about sumo?” I asked.

  “Go back to sleep, Hitoshi,” said Yasokichi.

  “Yasokichi’s a lightweight.”

  Minami-san’s eyes had also turned glassy. Whenever he got plastered, he’d start in on personal evaluations. “Am I no better than Hitoshi?” he asked Yasokichi.

  “Nagano’s heavy. You’re light as a balloon.”

  “Am I a balloon?”

  “He’s saying I’m solid and sedate?” I piped up.

  “Nah. You’re morose. There’s something dicey about you. Yasokichi has a touch of charm—but take away his buoyancy and he could be real trouble. As I say, you’re dicey.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” I retorted.

  “You see? You make people feel like they have no idea what you’re going to do next.”

  “Just because I head-butted Tajima? Well, I only played dirty because Tajima is himself a dirty player. I was just giving him a dose of his own medicine.”

  “Yes, you two may be similar.”

  “Cut the crap.”

  “It’s not crap. You and Tajima are both simple souls: when you’re hurt, you don’t heal. And that makes you dangerous. That’s all I’m saying.”

  “Yeah, now I can see it too: you two have a lot in common,” Yasokichi affirmed.

  “We’re nothing alike!” I snapped.

  “Tajima was a fine young man when he first joined the company, with a positive outlook on things. He’s a man of talent and skill who can be plugged in here and there to perform a variety of tasks. But when he feels underappreciated, he gets his back up against the wall. And that’s made him embittered. He takes pride in being the only one who can do this or that, when, in fact, anyone could. And then he feels hurt. So when Nagano came along, the touted camera expert, Tajima couldn’t take it.”

  “Minami-san, I thought you suggested we go out for drinks to cheer me up, but now I feel more hounded than ever. I’m going home.”

  “Let’s call it a night then. Nagano’s about to get all teary.”

  I walked with them as far as the Hiyoshi Station ticket gate. As a parting shot, Minami-san added for good measure, “Don’t let yourself get all worked up about Tajima. If you do, you’ll wind up just like him.”

  “I was hurt today,” I replied reproachfully. “And I won’t be getting over it.”

  * * *

  My spirits remained low when I returned to my apartment. As I put the key in the lock and opened the door, I decided to hit the sack without bothering to shower first. But then I noticed that the light was on in the dining room and was immediately enveloped in tepid air and the smell of cooking. I could hear the sound of the television, and from the other side of the sliding door in front of me came a voice: “Dai-chan? You’re home so late!” A moment later its source stood before me: an elderly woman I had never seen before.

  “I’m sorry!” I said, panicking, as I started to back away. “I’m in the wrong place!”

  “What are you saying? This is your place, isn’t it? You must be upset at my sudden visit, but you’re the one who’s at fault here, you know. You’ve changed your cell phone number, haven’t you? You should have told me. You promised me you’d call the next day, but then you didn’t, and when I tried to call, I couldn’t get through. And you responded to none of my messages. I thought something must have happened. I was afraid you might have gotten yourself caught up with some loan shark. I almost called the police. But then Kasumi said I should just look for you here. So I dropped everything and came. Now don’t just stand there, come on in!”

  I did as I was told and took off my shoes. The silly question I was about to pose—Who the hell are you?—died on my lips. I could tell from her voice and manner of speaking exactly who she was: Daiki’s mother.

  But why was she here? Unless she was involved with the police, she had no way of knowing my address. Was it a sting operation? I’d heard of would-be victims of remittance fraud playing along in order to help the police arrest the culprits. But I had given her my own account number, so there was no need for any such charade.

  So what was the scam? What sort of scheme was I caught up in?

  “Your face tells me you’ve been drinking. Do you need anything to eat? I’ve prepared something simple . . .”

  “No thanks,” I answered cautiously, taking my place onstage.

  “How are you feeling? Have you
been overdoing it?”

  “I’m all right.”

  “Did you solve that problem involving your friend?”

  “Yeah. You came to the rescue all right—and I’m grateful.”

  She persisted even as I kept giving her brusque answers. “Dai-chan, are you sure you’re not hiding anything from me?”

  She’s closing in on me! I thought, bracing myself. For a moment I contemplated confessing everything and returning all of the money. It occurred to me that if I opened up in that way I might get off the hook. But I hesitated, unable to reply to her question. After an awkward lull in our exchange, I gave up any hope of conning her this way.

  “Well, to be honest, I haven’t touched that money yet. So let me give it all back to you.”

  “What? Do you mean the story about your friend in trouble was a lie? If so, what was the money for? I really don’t understand. Do you think you can get any old tale past your mother? Don’t be ridiculous! Parents can always see through their children’s shenanigans, and I smelled a rat from the beginning. So tell me what’s going on!”

  She was shouting now, stubbornly keeping this charade going. It was irritating and also rather creepy. Here I was more or less leveling with her, so why did she have to drag this out? But was it really a charade? And if not . . . what it would it mean if Daiki’s mother really thought I was him?

  It was a horrifying idea. Suddenly I didn’t care about getting arrested; I just wanted out. Get me back to reality! I silently pleaded.

  “Okay, okay, I did something stupid. It was just an impulse. I didn’t mean any harm. It just happened . . .” Clinging to that idea, I told her the whole story. I thought that I could somehow reset everything that had happened since I picked up Daiki’s cell phone. I didn’t know that it was already too late.

  Mother heard my confession, only to fly into another rage: “Of all the nerve! So you say you’re not my son? Fine. If you want to treat your old mother like a stranger, go right ahead! You’ve been neglecting me all this time anyway. In exchange, I won’t hold back either—I’d been telling myself not to intrude. I was waiting for you to tell me. But I’ve had enough, so I’ll ask you anyway: are you going to marry Mamiko-chan or not?”