She took us into the living room and we sat down on the plush sofas. In contrast to Mrs Azuma’s house, this place was almost entirely Western in appearance. No scrolls on the wall, no ancestral shrine, and certainly no ornamental dolls in glass cases.
‘So nice of you to come.’
I could see from the way Kimiko looked at Sarah that she worshipped her teacher. To have her in her home was something she’d be bragging to her friends about come Monday morning.
‘Nice of you to have us,’ Sarah said, adopting her schoolmistress tone. ‘We’re not disturbing you?’
Kimiko shook her head emphatically. ‘I wasn’t doing anything. There’s nothing to do around here anyway.’
Kimiko fetched us a drink, then joined us on the sofa beaming from ear to ear.
Still in school teacher mode, Sarah got right to the point. ‘I thought I’d bring James round to meet you. He’s here studying ghosts.’
Kimiko gave me a quizzical look and I gave her a nod as though to say: ‘yep, it’s as weird as it sounds’.
‘He’s been finding out about the Reiko Shimura case and wanted to talk to someone about it. You’re one of about three people in Izumi with fluent English, so I thought you might be able to tell us something.’
Kimiko flashed Sarah a broad smile. ‘Thank you. You’re always helping me out at school.’
‘Is she a good teacher?’ I asked, already knowing the answer.
‘She’s the best. She’s the best teacher in the school by miles. Everyone thinks so.’ Kimiko flapped her arms around wildly and for a moment I thought she was going to lunge forward and throw her arms round Sarah. Whatever her intentions, she managed to restrain herself.
‘You told me your sister was in the same year as the students who died,’ Sarah said, returning to the purpose of our visit. I appreciated that she didn’t want to get too touchy-feely with her students.
‘Yeah, that was our first year, after we came back from the States. We had no idea anything like that could happen here. We thought we were coming from the most dangerous country in the world to the safest.’
‘Did your sister know Reiko?’ Sarah asked.
‘Yeah, but she wasn’t a big friend or anything. She knew her to say “hello” to.’
I felt a bit sorry for Kimiko. I was certain she would have been happier playing cards with us or talking about boys or whatever teenage girls liked to do.
‘Did she hear any rumours about Reiko after she disappeared?’
‘Some people said she was having an affair with an older man. But that was just a rumour. My sister didn’t believe it. She said Reiko wasn’t that kind of girl.’
‘What about the boys in the class? Were there any rumours about them?’
Kimiko looked unsure about this. ‘Some of the boys were in love with her, I think.’
‘Anyone in particular you remember?’
Kimiko shook her head.
‘What about Kenji Azuma?’
I was surprised Sarah had come out and named the poor lad, especially to a student. What would her doting host mother think? But Kimiko shook her head. The name didn’t ring a bell and I was quite relieved that it didn’t.
‘I did hear a story from my sister about the time after Reiko disappeared.’ She trailed off and looked around anxiously, as though to check no one was listening in on our conversation.
‘What was it?’ Sarah was sitting on the edge of the sofa, a little impatient now. Of the two of us, it seemed to be her showing the greater urgency.
‘Well, it was something that Jun said to her just before he died.’ Kimiko leaned in, her smile gone and her voice lowered to a whisper. ‘He’d said he’d seen Reiko.’
‘Seen her?’ I exclaimed.
‘Yes. He said she wasn’t dead.’
‘Where did he see her?’ I asked, leaning forward, so we were all huddled in a little group round the coffee table.
‘He said he saw her more than once, as though she were following him. But whenever he tried to speak to her, she disappeared. And there was another thing.’
I felt a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach.
‘He said that his girlfriend had seen Reiko too. She was Reiko’s best friend, but Reiko still wouldn’t speak to her. She disappeared as soon as she saw her.’
‘What about the other two, Hideki and Saori? Do you know if they saw anything too?’ Sarah asked.
Kimiko shook her head. ‘I don’t think my sister knew them so well. But people said they were quite depressed before their death, so maybe they saw the same thing as Jun and Kanae.’
‘Reiko?’ Sarah whispered the name, as though she too was convinced she could be overheard.
Kimiko nodded her head solemnly. ‘People were frightened. The school was shut, some students refused to come to school for months and some families moved away. It’s like there was a curse.’
‘Is that what they said?’ I asked.
‘Yes. They said that anyone who saw Reiko died within a week.’
I leaned back on the sofa, feeling faint. I now knew for certain that all the people who’d followed Reiko to the grave had one thing in common. They had all seen her in the week before their deaths.
First Jun and Kanae, her closest friends, dying in the grounds of the school. Even if she didn’t know what had happened to Hideki and Saori, it was easy enough to infer. And then there was Charlie. I had always assumed he was on the edge of sanity even before he set foot in Izumi. I had assumed that the visions he saw were the product of a sick mind. But even if that were true, I had no reason to believe I was any saner.
Kimiko’s words reverberated round my head, making me dizzy. Anyone who saw Reiko died within a week. My rational self told me it was nonsense. Superstitious nonsense. The usual drivel teenagers come out with to explain something they don’t understand. A cock-eyed theory to explain away a series of tragic events. They couldn’t have seen Reiko. Reiko was dead.
Anyone who saw Reiko died within a week. Jun claimed to have seen her. As did Kanae. As did Charlie. And all of them were dead within a week.
I tried to steady myself, but I felt sick – my stomach was heavy, as though I were carrying a dead-weight. I saw Sarah look over at me with concern.
Anyone who saw Reiko died within a week. It was ridiculous. It lay in the realms of the absurd, along with goblins and leprechauns, mermaids and sirens, orcs and elves. It lay in the realms of fairy tales told at bedtime, Jack climbing the beanstalk, Cinderella going to the ball and Snow White choking on the apple. I never believed those stories, so why should I believe this one? There was no curse, no visitor from beyond the grave. Everything could be explained, even my dream of the woods. Everything was in the mind. Everything.
I would be on the first train out of Izumi in the morning and I would leave it all behind. I would look back and laugh about it in years to come, laugh about how I bought into the whole idea of ghosts and goblins. How I actually believed for a moment that I was cursed.
In any case, I had no possible connection to Reiko. I hadn’t known her in life like Jun or Kanae, and she hadn’t known me. There was no possible reason for me to be cursed, any more than there had been for Charlie.
I collected myself and sat up. I wasn’t going to die within the week. I wasn’t going to give in so easily to these poisonous ideas. I had more than a few days to live, more than a few years. And one day the village of Izumi would be a distant memory.
I didn’t feel well as we left Kimiko’s house. I felt a crushing anxiety as we waved goodbye to her, ran the canine gauntlet and returned to Sarah’s car. The conversation had been illuminating, but not in a comforting way. Of course Kimiko had no way of knowing that I too had seen Reiko, that the curse she spoke of could equally be applied to my case.
Sarah asked if I wanted to go home and have some rest and I said that I did. I didn’t really want to be out and about, at least not with a curse hanging over my head. However much I tried to discredit the thought, I found mys
elf counting the weight of evidence. The first thing I’d wished for on waking up was for a longer stay in Izumi, so I could sort things out with Sarah, but I was now counting the hours until I got on that train. I wanted to get away from Izumi, to put miles between myself and Reiko, to return to the safe haven of Osaka. The sight of Yoshi hurtling to his death no longer held any fear for me. In fact, my whole time in Osaka seemed like a distant age of innocence and simplicity.
In the car on the way back to Sarah’s apartment I closed my eyes. I wanted to avoid any further sightings of Reiko. I was fearful now of anything that produced a reflection: car windows, shop fronts, the rearview mirror in the car. I wondered how I’d react if I saw her sitting behind us on the back seat. I didn’t want to find out.
‘What are you going to do?’ Sarah asked, after we made it in. ‘I really need to get some things from the shop. Do you want to stay here or come with me?’
I didn’t want to be left on my own, but nor did I want to go out. ‘I’ll stay,’ I said finally. ‘I’ll just lie low and hope for the best.’
‘Just stay away from anything with a reflection,’ she said, like a mother warning a wilful child to keep away from the road.
For a while after Sarah left, I lay on her bed and stared at the ceiling, tying to devise a strategy for getting through my remaining time in Izumi. I was working on the absolute certainty that once I left Izumi behind, I’d be in the clear, that whatever was happening was specific to Izumi. I’d discussed it with Sarah: one of the cardinal rules of ghostly behaviour in all the literature was that they did not travel. They had their haunting patch and that was that. Of course, Charlie had returned to Osaka and killed himself, but judging by his notes, he’d already lost his mind by the time he boarded the train. Whatever had been out to get him, had already done its job.
My greatest asset in surviving my remaining time in Izumi had to be Sarah. If it hadn’t been for her, I might have already gone the way of Charlie. She had provided protection from whatever demons were undermining my mental stability. She had shown understanding and sensitivity far beyond the call of duty. She had also provided a roof over my head. If she hadn’t been there to distract from the visions and explain away the dreams, the monsters might have got me already.
I decided my best strategy was to lie there and wait for Sarah to get back, then when Sarah got back, to lie there some more and not let her out of my sight. Then to go to Mrs Azuma’s and eat, drink and try to forget. The only thing that genuinely frightened me was sleep and what dreams might come visiting. I remembered Edgar Allan Poe calling them ‘little slices of death’. I had died once already, in the dark woods, and I didn’t want to die again. I could of course drink so much that I lost control of my faculties, but then I was afraid of what I might do in my senseless state. I could try not to sleep, but lack of sleep might make me vulnerable.
Stay calm, I told myself, and think pleasant thoughts.
Sarah arrived back laden with shopping bags, relieved to find me in good spirits. I explained that I’d been lying there thinking pleasant thoughts, and outlined my strategy to her.
After unpacking the bags, she came and sat down beside me with a cup of tea and we chatted about inconsequential things. Showing genuine affection, she linked her arm in mine and rested her head on my shoulder.
And there we stayed, not moving, not even speaking much, just huddled together, seeking comfort in one another’s company. I felt none of the embarrassment I’d felt the night before, none of the frustration at my inability to perform, but only a sense of wellbeing, knowing that Sarah was with me, that she was an amulet against all misfortune. With her at my side I would see out my last night in Izumi and return to the old life with my sanity intact.
21. THE LAST SUPPER
In 1143, a tax-collector from the imperial court paid a visit to Izumi and recorded a frank opinion in his journal. He wrote that Izumi lived under an ancient curse and that the spectre of death haunted every wretched house in the village. He described seeing rotting corpses in a field, the result of some bitter local feud. It was a sight which made him long for the comfort and safety of the capital.
In 1621, the fifth year of the reign of emperor Genraku, an itinerant Buddhist monk, entered the village of Izumi, just north of the Great Shirakawa gate. He stopped for the night at a small inn and there the devil came to him in a dream and took him to the house of a local lord where he showed him the gateway to hell.
More than two centuries later, in the year following the opening of Japan to the West, the local lord made a last ditch stand against the advancing imperial army. Seeing that all was lost, he retreated to the sanctuary of his castle and there butchered his entire family and retinue in cold blood, sparing no soul.
Then, in the first decade of the 21st century, five high school students died in mysterious circumstances within the space of a month. A year later a foreign research student came to Izumi to learn more about its turbulent history for his doctoral thesis. He cut his visit short, made the long journey back to his dormitory in Osaka and hung himself that same night.
Four years following Charlie’s death, I found myself on the eve of my own departure, trying to understand what the fates had in store for me and whether I too would enter the pantheon of Izumi legends. In years to come, I too might become a cautionary tale for foolhardy research students.
It was dark as we set off to see Mrs Azuma for my last evening. Sarah had packed her overnight bag and I had brought all my belongings, with the object of going straight to the station in the morning. Sarah assured me it would be a fun evening, though I suspected she was glad we would be spending my last night in separate rooms. No doubt she wouldn’t want to go through a repeat of my previous night’s performance. I had to accept that our brief fling was coming to an end. Whatever happened, I would be getting on the train in the morning and leaving Sarah behind. I told myself I had to get used to the idea.
We didn’t speak much on the way to the house. I kept my head down, still fearful of what I might see caught in the headlights or sat in the backseat of the car. Sarah, for her part, seemed preoccupied.
‘Mrs Azuma told me on the phone she was having some people round,’ she announced as she stopped the car in front of the house.
‘Anyone you know?’ I wasn’t in a very social mood, even it might prove a distraction.
‘She wouldn’t say. Actually she was all mysterious about it. Said you’d be interested in them too.’
Mrs Azuma opened the door before we’d even reached it and clapped her hands in excitement at our arrival. ‘Welcome, welcome,’ she cried, patting us both on the back.
She ushered us in and hopped about while we removed our shoes and stepped into the courtesy slippers already laid out for us. She was even more hyper than usual.
‘I’m so sad you’re leaving. You’ve been a good friend for Sarah,’ she said, as though Sarah were her socially challenged daughter. ‘So tonight is a special evening. Tonight is your last supper.’
I didn’t know if she’d intended the religious reference, but it did seem an unfortunate choice of phrase. At least Sarah was amused, flashing me a conspiratorial wink as we made our way into the sitting room.
I’d been warned there were people coming to dinner, but I was still unprepared for the row of faces greeting us. Shirakami-san, the man we’d found pining away in Reiko’s old classroom, sat at the extended table looking up quizzically as we entered. Next to him, wearing a dark jacket and unable to muster a greeting sat Odagiri-san, the man who had loved Reiko in life and become one of the suspects in her disappearance. Finally, adding a little class to the line-up was Aya, smiling warmly, presumably relieved to see us join the grim little gathering.
I was struggling to understand why these people had been assembled here and for whose benefit. I presumed it must have had something to do with me. I couldn’t believe these people were Mrs Azuma’s special friends.
Sarah and I exchanged fumbled greetings with S
hirakami-san and Odagiri-san, neither of whom looked pleased to see us. We said our hellos, they said theirs, but it was up to Aya to provide a bridge.
‘Odagiri-san and Shirakami-san are shy about speaking English,’ she said. ‘I’ve been trying to encourage them.’
Neither of the two looked particularly encouraged. Odagiri-san grunted something inaudible while Shirakami-san looked at the table.
‘We didn’t know you’d be here,’ Sarah said.
‘Neither did I,’ Aya replied. ‘I only got a call this afternoon. Mrs Azuma said you were coming for dinner.’
Shirakami-san spoke for the first time, making an attempt to join the conversation. ‘Azuma-san is a famous cook in Izumi.’
‘Is this the first time you’ve come here?’ I asked him, doing my own bit to be sociable.
He nodded his head. I looked at Odagiri-san to see if he was going to join in and he followed Shirakami-san’s lead with the briefest of nods. I got the impression he was deeply suspicious of me. Perhaps it was understandable after he’d watched me snooping around the school. I assumed they knew the reason I’d come to Izumi – from what I knew of the place, word travelled fast.
For a while we sat in embarrassed silence. Aya looked inhibited by the presence of her male colleagues, while Sarah was still coming to terms with the weird congregation Mrs Azuma had assembled for our benefit. As for Mrs Azuma, she was beetling around in the kitchen in her usual frenetic manner. The sounds of food preparation reached us loud and clear, providing a welcome distraction from the stilted atmosphere round the table.
She was back after a few minutes bearing some starter dishes which looked just as sumptuous as the first time she’d cooked for me, but with more of everything. The food relieved some of the pressure to make conversation and it was quickly followed by bottles of beer, which no one wasted any time in pouring. For her part, Mrs Azuma seemed happy to leave us to our devices.
Reiko Page 17