I can neither nod nor shake my head. My heart is throbbing harder and my palms have gone sweaty like slices of bacon defrosted a minute earlier. All I can do is to cast down my eyes.
The man repeats the same line once again.
“Listen, Miss. We become speechless when things do not come up as we have expected, don’t we?”
Shaking my head, I am taken with a fit of coughing.
The man of large build in the front passenger seat again turns around and says, “How about this peach-flavored candy? This one should be good for your throat.”
The moment I look up, my teary eyes meet the driver’s in the rearview mirror. His eyes are telling nothing. They look apathetic and lack not just depth but nuances of emotions as well.
Because the windows of this Mercedes are all covered by dark screens except for the windshield, it’s not easy to recognize familiar streets.
“It starts to drizzle,” says the man on my right.
“Excuse me, sir, but I’m wondering if we’re really going to the party as you’ve mentioned a little while ago.”
“No, we won’t. There will be no party. I made it all up. I’m sorry.”
I lower my eyes again, biting my lower lip.
“Is there any problem with that? You look like you’re about to cry.”
I shake my head, clenching my fists on the short pleated skirt.
“Good.” He nods contentedly.
“But…could you please tell me where we’re heading, sir?”
“You’re my guest and a guest must leave everything to the host, no?”
*
Four days ago: According to the Web News, cherry trees started flowering in the southern parts of the Japanese Archipelago. After I jogged two miles around the track in the athletics stadium of our high school, I went straight to the gymnasium to catch Takeshi but found that he had already gone home. The dying sun was coloring the clouds crimson. Walking back across the schoolyard, I opened my Mobile and tried to speak to him but he kept saying that he had nothing to talk about and that I was persecuting Takeshi with insanely obsessive questioning. ‘You might as well see a psychiatrist,’ he said, ‘because you’re not even aware that you’ve been stalking me.’
Three days ago: Takeshi and Maya were both absent from school. According to a teacher, they had a cold. After school was over, I spent my time in studying in the school library where I spotted Reiko. She was seated alone at the innermost corner of the library. Although she seems to be cautious not to attract anyone’s attention, it was not difficult to find her weeping. I hesitated to ask her if something bad had happened.
Two days ago: We had a fine rain around two o’clock in the afternoon. After the rain, the bright and clean sky came back and a rainbow appeared. I paid a visit to Takeshi’s thirty-six-year-old Kendo master after school. He welcomed me to his three-bedroom apartment even though I made no appointment with the master. He was handsome, tall, muscular, and well-proportioned. He had a smiling chubby wife, a chubby six-year-old son, and a slender four-year-old daughter who undoubtedly took after her father and was very adorable. His smiling chubby wife served me a blueberry tart and a cup of Assam tea. Tart wasn’t fresh, slightly dried and hardened, but tea tasted good. The Kendo master asked me if I had visited Takeshi in sickbed. He seemed to be worrying that Takeshi might be suffering from not an ordinary cold but more serious disease. In his clean and cramped study there was a huge poster showing the monochrome photograph of a group of half-naked men carrying a portable shrine on their shoulders. ‘The photo was shot in Kyoto on a festival day,’ the Kendo master explained. A group of men all wore nothing but a tight loincloth called fundoshi which looked very much like a G-string. They all twisted their faces into an agonized but, at the same time, ecstatic look. Their bulging muscles heavily glistened with perspiration and each of their dark and thick underarm hairs was exposed like a woman’s pubic hair. I hesitated over whether I had to reveal how much information I had of Takeshi’s secret to the Kendo master. But, when his pretty daughter rushed into the study and primly sat on her father’s laps, I decided not to disclose it.
Yesterday: Maya came to school but stayed away from me all day, while Takeshi absent himself again but sent me an e-mail to meet me by appointment. Reiko still appeared depressed about something and remained incommunicative just like the day before. Nothing seems to be in its right place anymore. Or have there ever been so-called the Right Place in my life? In the evening, when my mother was preparing a meal, she gave herself a small cut on the forefinger. She was cutting a chicken into fillets at the moment.
According to my mother, she used to have a discussion on international politics in a four-year women’s college. Then, before getting married, she was having a discussion about Japanese traditional cuisine in a cooking school. Today she is having a discussion about a popular soap opera with other wives in a shopping mall.
After dinner, I skimmed through Cahier de Secret in my room.
There were now hidden three skeletons in my closet. They were visible only to my eyes. Each had a name card attached to its cranium, Reiko, Takeshi, and Maya respectively. I was given the license to do anything to them.
This morning: It had been raining since dawn. I woke up late as I had been in every Saturdays.
At lunchtime: It had stopped raining around eleven-thirty. According to the News at noon, a woman of twenty-six jumped off the top of a department store in Shinjuku and crashed herself into a male passerby who happened to be a well-known fashion designer. She was killed instantaneously and the designer still in a coma. My mother made a grimace and said, ‘There seems to be no longer any safe place left now. Wherever you go, people are much the same. They simply fall. They fall to the ground from a higher place. You need a parasol.’
Six hours ago: I was studying infinitesimal calculus.
Five hours ago: I was struggling to memorize a chronological list of Chinese dynasties.
Three hours ago: I was still struggling to memorize a chronological list of Chinese dynasties.
One and a half hours ago: There was a fever of Saturday evening in the air. I was on my way to the Shinjuku station plaza to meet Takeshi. While I was being carried away by the swarms of people in an underground passage, someone called me by name to stop. The voice was in a very excited tone. And its owner was Maya’s uncle who wore a casual shirt and a cardigan with no necktie. He smiled at me contentedly. I was impressed by his remembering my face and name. ‘You and I have just broken the laws of probability,’ he exclaimed, ‘four million people come and go everyday in this Shinjuku station.’ He was accompanied with a well-dressed elderly couple. I made an orderly bow at an angle of fifteen degrees to each of three respectively.
Maya’s uncle promised me to take me to a very fine motsuyaki restaurant specialized for grilled entrails and giblets. Then he glanced down his large and gaudy titanium-cased wristwatch that was decorated with gold and diamonds. After we exchanged sayonara and parted from each other in the underground passage, I went up a crowded stairs out to the ground. And, as I crossed the station plaza, I had a call from Takeshi who would like to change a part of the schedule for today’s appointment. He wanted me to meet him at a fast-food restaurant that was located two blocks off the main street.
An hour ago: I was drinking a medium-sized Coca-Cola at the fast-food restaurant, waiting for Takeshi to appear.
Forty-five minutes ago: I was drinking a small-sized milkshake at the same fast-food restaurant, waiting for Takeshi to come.
Half an hour ago: I was drinking a small-sized Coca-Cola at the same fast-food restaurant, still waiting for Takeshi to show himself up.
Twenty-five minutes ago: A middle-aged man in a dark three-piece suit came in, looked around, approached me, called me by name, and told me that Takeshi was waiting for me not at this place but at a cafe in Shibuya. Then he introduced himself as Takeshi’s uncle. He knew that Takeshi had a chat with me in the shower room.
About twenty-thre
e minutes ago: I peeked into an immaculately polished dark Mercedes-Benz and noticed that there were two other men who looked anyone but ordinary people. As the driver took a backward glance at me with a cold stare, I felt weak at the knees but there seemed to be no way other than getting into the Mercedes since Takeshi’s uncle was hurrying me up from behind.
About twenty minutes ago: Takeshi’s uncle took his Mobile out of a breast pocket and called my mother and politely explained her that he was Takeshi’s uncle and that we were now on our way to a French restaurant in Ginza to meet Takeshi and his family over there. The family will give a party to thank Takeshi’s friends for their kindness while he was ill. I realized in a flash that it was a fabrication and suspected that the middle-aged man in a dark three-piece suit must have been what Takeshi meant by the consequences I would have to take. I hadn’t had known, until then, that Takeshi had an uncle who was a member of a Yakuza Family.
About eighteen minutes ago: I was in the Mercedes, suffering from panic attack. The scent of eau de Cologne which Takeshi’s uncle wore was too much.
About fifteen minutes ago: I was in the Mercedes, suffering from vertigo.
About ten minutes ago: I was still in the Mercedes, suffering from nausea.
About seven minutes ago: As I tried to soothe my nerves, I remembered a scene out of the blue. My parents and I had a day trip to Tokyo Disneyland last August. On our way home, at dusk, we were stuck in a traffic jam. In Japan, just like in England, cars are driven on the left-hand side of the road and, because we were planning to turn left at the next traffic light about thirty yards ahead, my father kept his Toyota in the waiting line of cars on the left lane. He was waiting his turn patiently while he was driving his Toyota at a creep. Just then a dark Mercedes passed us and made its way through the right-hand side of the road and cut in the forefront of the waiting line. ‘Did you see it?’ exclaimed my father, looking truly offended. My mother responded to his grumble as quickly as a bullet train, ‘Darling, that’s why they can afford such an expensive imported car.’
About five minutes ago: The driver parked the Mercedes in the underground parking lot of a high-rise apartment in Aoyama. The lot number was E-17 that was picked out by the headlight. As soon as I stepped out of the dark Mercedes, I vomited gastric juices. The large man with fat fingers gave me a stick of chewing gum. It had the flavor of green tea. The driver was watching me curiously as if he were observing an exotic pet.
About a minute ago: I was going up in an elevator with Takeshi’s uncle, the driver, and the large man with fat fingers. Staring up at the position indicator of the elevator, Takeshi’s uncle told me in a low voice the name of the university he had graduated from. It was the well-known private university that nationally ranked third last year. I was told that he studied law but failed the National Bar Examination five times. He eventually gave up the dream of becoming a lawyer and succeeded to his father’s profession instead, which happened to be a leading member of a Yakuza Family.
And, now, we are standing in front of the door of the room 3005 on the thirtieth floor and Takeshi’s uncle is waving his hand toward a tiny liquid-crystal-display on an intercommunication phone. He repeats the same words in a particular tone of voice as if to amuse a baby.
“Hello, Kitty. Daddy is here.”
*
There is a young woman who wears a jersey sweater and a pair of jeans in a chic three-bedroom apartment. You can view the expanse of Tokyo at night from a huge window in the living room. The woman is probably in her early twenties and, to me, looks quite good-looking even though she wears no make-up.
“What’s the girl?” She asks, shooting me a glance.
“My nephew’s classmate.”
“Takeshi-san’s? Are you his steady?”
“No, I’m not,” I answer her quickly.
She seems to have been studying Chinese. You can hear some tips on Chinese pronunciation that are coming out of two keg-shaped speakers set on both sides of a desktop computer. She says she is upset because Takeshi’s uncle has given her no call prior to this visit.
“Come on. You look pretty with no makeup on.”
Then he hands her a tiny gift box that is tied up with a golden ribbon.
She says, ‘What’s this?’ and he answers with a weary smile that she shouldn’t look sour in front of all other men.
He hastily adds, “I hope this one makes you happy.”
“It depends what’s in the box,” she responds and giggles like a high school girl.
As she excuses herself into the bedroom, I go to the bathroom and retch, but nothing comes out of my throat.
When the young woman reappears, she wears a tight minidress with a leather jacket on. She shows off the new earrings for pierced ears to the large man and the driver.
‘How do I look?’
“You look gorgeous,” says Takeshi’s uncle with a rather embarrassed smile, “Enjoy yourself at shopping.”
When she is about to leave the apartment with the driver, she turns to me and waves her fingers playfully.
“Your school uniform is pretty cool.”
*
“Do you know why you’re here?”
“Yes, I do, sir.”
“Shall we promote mutual understanding then? Tell me.”
“Because I did something wrong to your nephew Takeshi-san, sir.”
“That’s right. You’re very quick to assess the situation. I’m quite impressed.”
“Thank you very much, sir.”
Takeshi’s uncle is now seated face to face with me over a glass coffee table.
“Can you guess what I’m trying to do here then?”
“Yes, I do, sir.”
“Tell me.”
“You’re going to intimidate me, sir.”
“That’s right. How reasonable you are. This time you almost moved me.”
“Eh…because I have been scared, no, terrified already, would you mind my going home, sir?”
“Shh…shhh. I’m not finished yet.” He grins with a curious look.
“I’m really truly earnestly sorry, sir,” I say in a tearful voice.
“I heard that you were blackmailing my nephew.”
“No, no, it cannot be true. There is some kind of misunderstanding here, sir.”
“Shh. I hate poor excuses and I despise those who give me such excuses.”
“I’m really truly deeply sincerely sorry, sir.”
Then I start coughing from fear and from the scent of eau de Cologne he wears.
“I know it would be unworthy of a man of my age and my profession to intimidate a well-mannered schoolgirl like you not to bother my nephew, but I have to give you a lesson here tonight because my nephew seems to hate anyone or anything that would stress him out and, more than anything, I don’t want you to be a Yakuza like me in the future.”
“Oh, but…” I become absentminded for a moment.
“Blackmailing is one of our trades, Miss, not yours. Do you follow me?”
“Ah, yes, I think I do follow you sir. Perhaps.”
“Good. Let’s begin.”
Then Takeshi’s uncle opens a thick photograph album on the glass coffee table.
“This guy used to be a well-to-do businessman, except that he owed us some amount of money. He was a compulsive gambler and always lost money on the horses, the cycles, the bikes, the boats, and the Pachinko that now becomes the world-famous Japanese pinball game for Buddha’s sake. So we proposed that he should sell one of his retinas or of kidneys. And this is the picture of the guy before he gambles his fortune away on all those races and Pachinko. He looks healthy and happy, doesn’t he? And this one is the scene of the operation done by doctors we appointed. And the next one shows you how his body transformed after the operation. You can clearly see the difference between before and after he met us. By the way most doctors we hold in leash are disqualified from various reasons. Usually shameful ones, we must say.”
Suddenly, the large man who has b
een playing a shooting game on a home theater turns around toward me.
“But that guy did pay back his debt in the end by throwing himself under a train last year after we had let him insure his life with an insurance company.”
“Which is incidentally one of our subsidiary,” adds Takeshi’s uncle. “Without helping each other, you can never make the world go round this smoothly.”
I wheeze out an apology: “I won’t never blackmail your nephew Takeshi-san. I promise. I’m having an asthma attack now so please let me go.”
“I can’t hear you.”
“I’m really awfully truly sorry, sir.”
“Have a listen. Greed breeds blindness on which we feed. Stay away from the playground where people like us are hanging around. Do not ever try to take a walk or cut across or peek in there. Get a view of our playground only from afar. You are safe as long as you stay within the limits of your daily routine. Study hard and be a good girl. Do you follow me?”
“Yes sir. I’ll never forget what you’ve just said, sir.”
And I am taken with a fit of coughing.
“Do you want some candy?” asked the large man with fat fingers.
Takeshi’s uncle continues.
“This is a well-bred wife of an executive in a shipbuilding company who made some speculations in hedge funds with one of our stock brokerage firms. Later we had to do some heavy exaction of debts and this executive lost not only all of his real estate but also of his parents. Now his beautiful wife is working for our escort service agency to pay back her husband’s debt. And this is the picture of her in a family snapshot before she meets us and this one is the very sensual picture of her at work after she has met us. You don’t want to see your mother being tied up with straw ropes like this, do you? There are a lot of S&M clubs such as this in Roppongi. You know what I’m talking about, don’t you?”
A Japanese Schoolgirl Page 16