by Kōbō Abe
I listened. Everywhere, always, there was utter silence, not a sign of life stirring.
I thought I might leave the girl and go over for a look around the contest site. But if when I came back she and the wheelchair had disappeared like everything else, then there was no point in going. I touched her, and she felt dry and powdery. As if molding her out of clay, I tried pinching her here and there; after a time it did seem she had regained some bit of humanness. She was whispering something. I bent my ear down close to the apparent source of her voice.
“Touch me….”
Layers of skin and muscle hung so slackly around her melted bones that I was unable to tell with any certainty which crease was her groin. I kept fondling her, touching every wrinkle I could find. Her breath started coming faster, her whole body grew moist, and finally she fell asleep.
Smoothing out “tomorrow’s newspaper,” I spread it out on the floor. The lead story contained a graphic description, filled with all manner of details, of the passionate mating between the horse-man with two penises and Masked Woman, holder of the orgasm record. The horse-man had tried to use both his penises, but had run into difficulty because of the corset. Finally he had made do just with his extra one. Nevertheless, everyone who watched the performance had been strongly impressed. The reporter’s name, in parentheses, was “(Horse).”
I find it impossible, however, to accept such a thing as a past which has not yet begun.
I started to walk, pushing the wheelchair. I knew my way around the building fairly well. It had to be the second floor we were on, so all I needed to do was find a passage leading either up or down. The stairs all seemed to have crumbled and fallen, so my only hope was that hatchway in that lavatory. I kept on walking. As I walked I drew a map in my head, alternately drawing lines and erasing them. There should have been one lavatory in every section, but for some reason I rarely came across any. When I did find one every once in a while, everything was always firmly fastened down. There was never even enough room to poke an arm through.
Dozens of hours went by, and the beam from my flashlight began to weaken. My original optimism began changing to a breathless fear, as though I were rolling down a steep hill. I inserted the batteries in the listening device and tried calling, covertly at first. Speaking to no one in particular, I asked casually for directions.
When I grew tired I took the batteries out and inconspicuously embraced the girl. Sometimes I would have an erection myself. The girl’s wrinkles grew deeper and deeper, and she seemed to recede farther and farther from human shape.
Finally the flashlight batteries went dead. I turned to the listening device and began to scream, abandoning all pride. It was the horse I called to. I admitted that I was sick, and swore over and over in as loud a voice as I could muster that I would be a perfect patient.
I can no longer see my watch, so I do not know how many days have gone by. Our provisions have run out, and so has our supply of drinking water. Even so, whenever I grow tired I take out the batteries and put my arms around the girl. She hardly ever responds any more. One of these times the batteries in the listening device will go dead, too, and then I will be able to go on holding her without fear of anyone.
I gnaw on the quilt made of the girl’s mother and lick drops of water oozing from the concrete walls, clinging tightly to this secret rendezvous for one that no one can begrudge me now. However much I may resent the fact, “tomorrow’s newspaper” has stolen a march on me; and so, in the past called tomorrow, over and over I continue certainly to die.
Embracing a tender, secret rendezvous for one …