The Briefcase
Page 16
“I see.”
“But so then, if we’re talking about me agreeing to use a mobile phone, that’s a difficult one.”
This was the conversation we had when I suggested that Sensei get a mobile phone.
Whereas once, he would have flatly refused to carry a mobile phone, because I had insisted on the idea, he couldn’t reject it out of hand. I remember a boy I dated a long time ago who, when we would disagree, would go straight to outright denial, but Sensei wasn’t like that. Is that what you called benevolence? With Sensei, his benevolent nature seemed to originate from his sense of fair-mindedness. It wasn’t about being kind to me; rather, it was born from a teacherly attitude of being willing to listen to my opinion without prejudice. I found this considerably more wonderful than just being nice to me.
That was quite a discovery for me, the fact that arbitrary kindness makes me uncomfortable, but that being treated fairly feels good.
“So there’s nothing to worry about if something happens,” I reasoned.
To which Sensei widened his eyes and asked, “Something like what?”
“Anything.”
“So then, what?”
“Um, for instance, you could be carrying something with both hands full when suddenly it starts raining, and there aren’t any public phones nearby, and now it’s crowded with people under the shop awnings, and you have to get home quickly—something like that.”
“Tsukiko, in that situation I would just get wet going home.”
“But what if the thing you’re carrying couldn’t get wet? Like some kind of bomb that would ignite if it got wet.”
“I would never buy anything like that.”
“What if there were a dangerous character lurking in the shadows?”
“It’s just as likely that there would be a dangerous character lurking somewhere when I’m walking down the street with you, Tsukiko.”
“What if you slipped on the wet sidewalk on your way?”
“Tsukiko, you’re the one who falls, aren’t you? I train in the mountains.”
Everything Sensei said was right. I fell silent and cast my eyes downward.
“Tsukiko,” Sensei said softly after a moment. “I understand. I will get a mobile phone.”
What? I asked.
Sensei patted the top of my head and replied, “You never know when something might happen to us geezers.”
“You’re not a geezer, Sensei!” I contradicted him.
“In return . . . ”
“What?”
In return, Tsukiko, I ask you not to call it a cell. Please refer to it as a mobile phone. I insist. I can’t stand to hear people call it a cell.
And that ’s how Sensei came to have a mobile phone. Every so often I call it, just for practice. Sensei has only ever called me from it once.
“Sensei?”
“Yes?”
“Um, I’m at Satoru’s place.”
“Yes.”
“Yes” is all Sensei ever says.This might not be so unusual, but on a mobile phone, it becomes remarkable.
“Will you join me?”
“Yes.”
“I’m so pleased.”
“Likewise.”
At last, an utterance other than “Yes.” Satoru grinned. He came out from behind the counter and went to hang the curtain outside, still grinning. I scooped some more miso paste with my finger and licked it. The aroma of oden cooking filled the bar.
THERE WAS ONE thing I was concerned about.
Sensei and I had not yet slept together.
I was concerned about it in the same way that I might be about the looming shadow of menopause that I already felt or about worrisome gamma-GTP levels in my liver function when I went for a checkup. When it comes to the workings of the human body, the brain, the internal organs, and the genitals were all part of the same whole. I became aware of this because of Sensei’s age.
I may have been concerned, but that’s not to say that I was frustrated by it. And if we never slept together, well, that was how it would be. But as for Sensei himself, he seemed to have quite a different attitude.
“Tsukiko, I’m a bit anxious,” Sensei said to me one day.
We were at Sensei’s house, eating yudofu. Since it was the middle of the day, Sensei had prepared yudofu in an alumite pot for us to eat while we drank some beer. He made it with cod and chrysanthemum greens. When I made yudofu, tofu was the only ingredient. As I sat there, my head a little fuzzy from drinking in the daytime, it had occurred to me that this was how people who didn’t know each other developed a familiarity.
“Anxious?”
“Er, well, it’s been a long time since I was with my wife.”
Oh, I exclaimed, my mouth half-open. I was careful not to let Sensei stick in his finger, though. Ever since that time, Sensei would quickly poke his finger into my half-open mouth if I let my guard down. He was much more playful than I had realized.
“It’s fine, if we don’t do that,” I said hurriedly.
“By ‘that,’ do you mean what I think you mean?” Sensei’s expression was serious.
“Not ‘that,’ per se,” I replied as I readjusted myself, sitting on my heels.
Sensei nodded gravely. “Tsukiko, physical intimacy is essential. No matter how old you are, it’s extremely important.” He had assumed a firm tone, like back in the day when he would read aloud from The Tale of the Heike at his teacher’s podium.
“However, I don’t have any confidence that I’m capable of it. If I were to try when I was feeling insecure, and then if I couldn’t do it, my confidence would be even more diminished. And that is such a formidable outcome that it prevents me from even trying.” The Tale of the Heike continued.
“I sincerely apologize.” Sensei bowed deeply, concluding The Tale of the Heike. Still seated on my heels, I bowed too.
Uh, why don’t I help you? I wanted to say. We could give it a try soon. But, feeling the pressure of Sensei’s solemnity, I didn’t feel like I could say this to him. Nor could I tell him I didn’t give a damn about that. Or that I would rather he just go on kissing and holding me like always.
Since I couldn’t say any of these things, I poured some beer into Sensei’s glass. Sensei opened wide and drank it down, and I ladled some cod out of the pot. Chrysanthemum greens clung to the fish, creating a lovely contrast of green and white. Isn’t that pretty, Sensei? I said, and Sensei smiled. Then he patted the top of my head, as always, over and over.
WE WENT TO all kinds of places on our dates. Sensei preferred to call them “dates,” using the English word.
“Let’s go on a date,” Sensei would say. Even though we lived close to each other, we always met up at the station nearest the location of our date. We would make our separate ways to the station. If we ever ran into each other on the train on the way to meet up, Sensei would murmur something like, Oh-ho, Tsukiko, what a strange place to see you.
The place we went most often was the aquarium. Sensei loved to see the fish.
“When I was a little boy, I used to love to look at illustrated guides to fish,” Sensei explained.
“How old were you then?”
“I must have been in elementary school.”
Sensei had shown me a picture from when he was an elementary student. In the faded, sepia-toned photograph, Sensei was wearing a sailor hat and squinting his eyes as if it were too bright.
“You were cute,” I said.
Sensei nodded and said, “Well, Tsukiko, you’re still cute.”
Sensei and I stood in front of the migratory fish tank that held tuna and skipjack. Watching the fish go round and round in one direction, I was struck by the feeling that we had been standing there like this for a very long time, the two of us.
“Sensei?” I ventured.
“What is it, Tsukiko?”
“I love you, Sensei.”
“I love you too, Tsukiko.”
We spoke these words to each other sincerely. We were always sincere with
each other. Even when we were joking around, we were sincere. Come to think of it, so were the tuna. And the skipjack. All living things were sincere, on the whole.
We also went to Disneyland, of course. As we were watching the evening parade, Sensei shed a few tears. I did too. Each of us, though together, was probably thinking of different things that made us cry.
“There is something wistful about the lights at night,” Sensei said as he blew his nose on a big white handkerchief.
“Sensei, you cry sometimes, don’t you?”
“With few exceptions, geezers are easily moved to tears.”
“I love you, Sensei.”
Sensei didn’t reply. He was watching the parade intently. His profile illuminated, Sensei’s eyes appeared sunken. Sensei, I said, but he didn’t reply at all. Once again I called Sensei, and there was no reply. I held on tightly to Sensei’s arm with my own and gazed out at Mickey and the little people and Sleeping Beauty.
“I had fun on our date,” I said.
“I did too.” At last he replied to me.
“I hope you’ll ask me out again.”
“I will.”
“Sensei?”
“Yes?”
“Sensei?”
“Yes?”
“Please don’t go away.”
“I’m not going anywhere.”
The parade music grew significantly louder, and the little people leapt around. The procession finally began to recede. Sensei and I were left in the darkness. Bringing up the end of the line was Mickey, swinging his hips as he slowly walked along. Sensei and I held hands in the darkness. Then I shivered the slightest bit.
SHOULD I TELL the story of the only time that Sensei ever called me from his mobile phone?
I could hear background noise, which was how I knew he was using the mobile phone.
“Tsukiko?” Sensei said.
“Yes?”
“Tsukiko?”
“Yes?”
In a reversal of our usual roles, I became the one who said only “Yes.” “Tsukiko, you really are such a lovely girl.”
“What?”
That was all he said before abruptly hanging up. I called him right back, but he didn’t answer. About two hours later I called Sensei at home, and this time he answered, his voice perfectly serene.
“What was that, before?”
“Nothing, I just suddenly thought of it.”
“Where were you calling from?”
“By the greengrocery near the station.”
The greengrocery? I echoed.
I bought daikon and spinach at the greengrocery, Sensei replied.
I laughed, and Sensei laughed too on the other end of the line.
“Tsukiko, come quickly,” Sensei said suddenly.
“To your house?”
“Yes.”
I grabbed a toothbrush and pajamas and face lotion, throwing them into a bag and scurrying over to Sensei’s house. Sensei stood at the gate to meet me. He took my hand as we went inside to the tatami room where Sensei laid out the futon. I put sheets on the futon. It was like an assembly line as we made the bed.
Without saying a word, Sensei and I collapsed on top of the futon. It was the first time Sensei had embraced me passionately and deeply.
I spent that night at Sensei’s house, sleeping beside him. In the morning when he opened the rain shutters, the berries on the laurel trees gleamed lustrously in the morning sun. Bulbuls came to peck at the berries. Their warbling song echoed throughout Sensei’s garden. Shoulder to shoulder, Sensei and I gazed out at them.
Tsukiko, you’re such a lovely girl, Sensei said.
Sensei, I love you, I replied. The bulbuls warbled their song.
IT ALL SEEMS like so long ago. The time that I spent with Sensei—at first faint, then deepening in intensity—passed me by. Two years from when we encountered each other for the second time. Three years once we began what Sensei referred to as our “official relationship.” That was all the time we shared together.
And since that time, there’s precious little that could be done about it.
I have Sensei’s briefcase. Sensei left it to me.
His son didn’t much resemble Sensei. He had stood silently before me, bowing, and at that moment something about his stance reminded me vaguely of Sensei.
“You were very kind to my dad, Harutsuna, before he died,” his son said, bowing deeply.
When I heard him speak Sensei’s name, Harutsuna, my tears welled up. And I had hardly cried up until that point. I was able to cry when I thought about him as Harutsuna Matsumoto, like a stranger. I was able to cry when I realized that Sensei had already gone away somewhere, before I ever came to know him well.
Sensei’s briefcase lies beside my dressing table. Once in a while I still go to Satoru’s place. Not as often as before. Satoru doesn’t say anything. He’s always moving about, busy at work. It’s warm inside the bar, and there have been times when I even doze off. One mustn’t behave so poorly in public, I’m sure Sensei would say.
In loneliness I have drifted this long way, alone.
My torn and shabby robe could not keep out the cold.
And tonight the sky was so clear
it made my heart ache all the more.
Sensei taught me this poem by Seihaku Irako at some point. I try reading it and other poems out loud when I’m home alone. I’ve been studying a bit since you passed away, Sensei, I murmur.
Sometimes when I call out, Sensei, I can hear a voice reply from the ceiling above, Tsukiko. I’ve started making yudofu like you, Sensei, with cod and chrysanthemum greens. Sensei, I hope we see each other again one day, I say. And from the ceiling, Sensei replies, Surely we shall see each other one day.
Those nights, I open Sensei’s briefcase and peer inside. The blank empty space unfolds, containing nothing within. It holds nothing more than an expanse of desolate absence.
Copyright © 2012 Hiromi Kawakami
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. English translation © Allison Markin Powell, 2012
Excerpts from Seihaku Irako’s poetry appear with permission from the translators, William Elliott and Katsumasa Nishihara. The excerpts on pages 8 and 9 from “Wandering” are reprinted from The Singing Heart: An Anthology of Japanese Poems, 1900–1960 © 2006.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Kawakami, Hiromi, 1958-
[Sensei no kaban. English]
The briefcase / Hiromi Kawakami ; translated by Allison Markin Powell.
p. cm.
eISBN : 978-1-619-02043-6
1. Women-Fiction. 2. Men-Fiction. 3. Japan-Fiction. I. Powell, Allison Markin. II. Title.
PL855.A859S4613 2012
895.6’36-dc23
2011041521
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