Tokyo Zangyo

by Michael Pronko

  “When Mayu jumped?”

  “Yes. And with Onizuka.”

  Toshiko shook her head. “He pushed them?”

  “He just said he was there. We’ll see if that story holds up on further investigation. He has a lot of explaining to do and it might take some time to figure out what’s true or not.”

  “At least it wasn’t my ex-husband. Or Steve.” Toshiko nodded in quick bounces, taking in the information. “Nakata was the last one to see Mayu alive?”

  Hiroshi nodded.

  Toshiko looked away. “Nakata was the one my husband knocked out at the funeral.” She chuckled bitterly. “He was right about that anyway. Is he OK?”

  “Your husband? He hired a private investigator who helped crack the case. We’ll release him and I guess he’ll go back to work in the Philippines.”

  “And what about Steve?”

  “His cultural visa is still valid,” Hiroshi said. “But it’s hard to say since he was arrested in a marijuana bust.”

  “Marijuana isn’t so serious. Mayu said she smoked it when she studied in America,” Toshiko blurted out, then quickly covered her mouth.

  “Don’t tell anybody, but so did I,” Hiroshi whispered.

  Toshiko nodded. “And Suzuna?”

  Hiroshi held up his hand. “There’s a long list of crimes she, and the group, committed. Suzuna seemed in charge, but there are so many extenuating circumstances.” Hiroshi wondered if Suzuna could get off without any serious charges. Maybe she couldn’t escape everything.

  “I’ll get the lawyer on it. And our local Diet member’s mother shops here, so I also spoke to her about Suzuna.”

  “Make sure the lawyer presents it as revenge. More of a game, with no intent to harm, just to embarrass. And have the lawyer contact Mistress Emi. The women know how to find her. And be sure they say they left Onizuka on the roof alive.”

  Toshiko said, “I got it. Thank you. I… I feel… well, I kept all my feelings submerged for so long, getting married and getting Mayu through the whole system. I was so stupid. I should have let my emotions guide me, tell me how to do things better. If I had…”

  “I’ve got to go,” Hiroshi said. “I’ve been up all night and barely slept this week.”

  Toshiko looked at him. “You work too much.”

  “Sometimes,” Hiroshi said. “But not always.” He turned to leave. “And by the way, the media will probably descend on you once the story gets out. Why not close up and take a vacation?”

  “Vacation? I’m going to stay open. I’ll be ready for the media this time. In fact, I welcome the chance to tell Mayu’s story right.”

  Chapter 41

  Too tired to go back home, where he’d certainly fall deep asleep and be unable to make up in time to meet Ayana, Hiroshi took the train back to the station. Akiko was at work in the office.

  Hiroshi hung his overcoat on the rack and slumped in his chair. “Make copies of everything that Chizu gave us, and everything we had on Mayu’s and Onizuka’s bank accounts. I’m going to hand all of this to Watanabe. Let him get Senden.” Hiroshi pushed himself up from his chair and headed for the espresso machine.

  Akiko looked at him.

  Hiroshi looked at her. “Watanabe and the Tax Agency can have this Senden case. They’ll have more traction, and more teeth, than we could muster.” He pressed the button for a double espresso.

  When the grinder quieted, Akiko said, “OK.”

  “I forgot to get my tetanus booster. And I better get my bandage changed.” Hiroshi gulped his coffee.

  Akiko kept her eyes on the screen, making backup copies of the files.

  Outside the clinic, Hiroshi ran into the chief. “What are you doing here?”

  “Blood pressure pills,” the chief said. “I kept losing them. So my wife made me leave them here. Then she calls me. Or the clinic calls me. I got too much on my mind to remember little things like this.”

  They stepped inside.

  Hiroshi said, “So, are we going to move on the ministry? That Suzuki is in this thick.”

  The chief held his palm up. “You know, I’ve been thinking about that. As much as I’d like to ding Suzuki, I think we should wait. We already caught him gambling with an employee accused of criminal actions in a company he’s supposed to be overseeing. So, why don’t we just tell Suzuki we’re still investigating, leave it open and let him sweat it out,” the chief said.

  “That sounds all right,” Hiroshi said.

  The chief swallowed his pill and took a little white cup of water from the nurse, the same one who’d come to his office earlier.

  The chief crumpled his little cup. “That’s what we need more of. Thinking ahead. Let’s get on it.”

  The chief walked out and the nurse rolled her eyes.

  “Double shift?” Hiroshi asked her.

  “Someone called in sick.” She got a tetanus booster out for Hiroshi and another nurse came over with a fresh bandage and arm sleeve. The bandage hurt coming off his arm, but Hiroshi was too tired to react.

  When he got back to his office, Takamatsu was talking with Akiko about Steve’s confession. “Akiko tells me you’re passing up a chance to look through files full of numbers.”

  “I thought I’d bounce it to someone else for a change.” Hiroshi frowned at Akiko, who smiled back at him.

  “You must be tired. You might regret the chance to dig into this later—”

  “I’m sure I won’t,” Hiroshi said. “Is that what you came to my office for?”

  “I came to see Akiko, actually,” Takamatsu said. “Like always. Oh, and Sakaguchi needs you. The American guy.”

  “Someone prepared the statement?” Hiroshi asked.

  Takamatsu pointed at Akiko. “She listened to the tapes and put it together. She’s a whiz.”

  Akiko took a lot of the load off. Hiroshi looked at her and she frowned at him again. He turned to Takamatsu. “How is the private eye, Shibutani?”

  Takamatsu tapped his cigarette lighter in his hand. “I stopped by the hospital. He can talk, but he wouldn’t say anything about what happened. That means he’s fine. That generation, they keep things quiet. That guy Ota is handling the office for Shibutani while he recovers.”

  “He was a tough one, to get beaten up like that,” Hiroshi said. “I hope Ota finds out who did it.”

  “Shibutani said Ota was clever, and thorough.” Takamatsu hummed. “I’ll see if I can help them somehow.”

  “You two must be exhausted,” Akiko said to them.

  Takamatsu smiled. “I got a few hours while our Americanized accountant here was busy piecing the numbers together. Anyway, I have a date tonight.”

  Hiroshi thought for a minute and then shook his head at Takamatsu. “Don’t do that.”

  “Don’t do what?” Akiko asked.

  “You don’t want to know,” Hiroshi said.

  Takamatsu laughed. “Just a little background research.” He laughed louder.

  Hiroshi said, “If you compromise this investigation, Sakaguchi will put you on suspension forever.”

  “What date?” Akiko asked.

  “You don’t want to know. Really you don’t,” Hiroshi said.

  Takamatsu saluted with his lighter in hand and walked off.

  ***

  Hiroshi found Sakaguchi in the hall outside the interrogation room with Steve inside.

  “Glad to have this one over,” Hiroshi said.

  “Those company and government people are a pain. They always say how they sacrifice for the greater good of Japan, but they expect everyone else to sacrifice more to keep the system running to their advantage. They are born into it, educated for it, and believe in it like a religion. If you came from the poor section of Osaka like I did, you would have understood that from the beginning.”

  “You should take vacation time after the surgery.”

  “I will, but after that, I don’t think I’ll like being stuck with office work while I wait for it to heal. In sumo, you get righ
t back out there. Ueno said it’s driving him crazy.”

  “Ueno’s walking better now, and it’s good to slow down.”

  “I’ll be out for the surgery from Thursday. Akiko got me set up to watch movies on a laptop.” Sakaguchi handed him the papers for Steve to sign.

  “I’ll take care of this.”

  Sakaguchi nodded and hobbled off. Hiroshi felt like chasing after him and helping him, but let him go.

  Steve looked a lot calmer, though puffy gray bags under his eyes told another story.

  Inside the room, Hiroshi sat down across from him. “So, how did you like Japanese jail?”

  Steve said, “It’s like the opposite of jazz.”

  “Here’s the form for you to sign.” Hiroshi opened the folder on the table and pulled out a pen. It was all in Japanese.

  Steve looked at it. “Don’t I even get to know what I’m signing?”

  “I’m not going to translate it word by word. But if you want that, you can go back to the cell and contact a lawyer and translator. That could take a week, maybe more.”

  Steve looked at it. “And if I sign it now, I walk out of here?”

  Hiroshi said, “That’s it.”

  Steve looked at the Japanese papers in front of him. He reached for the pen, signed and handed the pen back to Hiroshi. “So now what?” Steve asked.

  “Now, you thank me,” Hiroshi said.

  “OK. Thank you.” Steve managed a small bow of the head. “I need my saxophone.”

  “I’ll walk you out.”

  At the registration desk, the clerk checked the papers and went inside the storage room to find Steve’s saxophone. When Steve saw the case, he was visibly relieved.

  “Don’t you want to check it?” Hiroshi asked.

  “I’m learning to trust, along with expressing thanks and apologizing all the time.”

  ***

  Hiroshi went back to his office to get his coat. He ransacked his brain for why Ayana was so insistent to go out. He had an hour before meeting her to figure it out. If not, he’d bluff his way through, or throw himself on her mercy and confess he had no idea.

  Hiroshi got in a taxi outside the station. The late afternoon sun was turning everything a dark amber yellow, with shadows in between. At the first intersection from the station, Hiroshi saw Steve sitting on a bench at the corner, his saxophone case beside him, checking everything carefully. He didn’t trust that much, apparently.

  Hiroshi told the driver to pull over. He rolled the window down and shouted, “Steve, come on, let me give you a lift.”

  Steve looked up, surprised.

  “Come on,” Hiroshi shouted. “Get in.”

  Steve clicked his case shut, walked over to the taxi, and leaned in. “So, this is Japan. First the cops arrest you and then they give you a lift.”

  Hiroshi scooted over to make room. “C’mon, where are you headed?”

  Steve got in. “Nippori.”

  “A gig?”

  “Yeah, kind of.”

  “Which club?”

  “Just by the station.” Steve opened his case and started checking his sax again.

  “Mayu bought it for you, didn’t she?” Hiroshi asked.

  Steve looked surprised. “How did you know?”

  “Lucky guess. It looks expensive.”

  “American Selmer Mark VI. I have no idea where she found it.” Steve took a big breath and caressed the keys before putting it back in place and clicking the case shut. “I don’t know how those jazz and blues musicians could survive jail. I was in for a few days. It was clean. I didn’t get beaten or called names. And yet, I’m completely wiped out.”

  They talked about jazz until the taxi driver asked where to stop by Nippori Station.

  The taxi pulled over and Steve started to get out, but stopped halfway. “Why don’t you come with me? If you have a few minutes.”

  Hiroshi checked his watch. He had time before he met Ayana. He paid the taxi driver and followed Steve upstairs onto a crossover to the other side of the station where a path sloped upwards along a concrete embankment.

  At the top, Steve stopped for Hiroshi to catch his breath. “You OK?”

  “I probably got less sleep than you last night.” Hiroshi nodded to go on. His cellphone buzzed. It was a message from Ayana. “Shinjuku, west exit, seven sharp. Dress nice.”

  They walked past a few houses before the pavement turned to a stone pathway ringed by mossy earth. Hiroshi realized they were in Yanaka Cemetery.

  Knee-high stone walls marked off the rectangular grave sites. Inside each area, polished stone markers rose to various heights like tall buildings in an earthbound neighborhood. Next to the central gravestones were five-tiered stupas, stone lanterns, flowering shrubs and Japanese maple trees. Cherry trees grew out of the common areas between the rows. With their leaves gone, the craggy branches spread out like a grandparents’ fingers over the graves below.

  Hiroshi realized where Steve was headed.

  Steve stepped up two steps into the site where Hiroshi had followed Suzuna. The granite stone was buffed to a gleam and Mayu’s name and dates, blacked inside the carved characters, stood out strongly.

  Hiroshi put his hands together and bowed deeply.

  Steve brushed away leaves and opened his case on the stone wall encompassing the small, immaculate lot. He twisted the saxophone neck into place and fiddled with the mouthpiece, all the time sucking on a reed. He slipped it into place, clamped it and gave a few puffs. He fingered the keys, reset the neck, loosened and tightened the reed, and reset the neck again.

  Then, starting to play so softly that Hiroshi could hardly hear, Steve stood up, closed his eyes, faced Mayu’s grave and started to play.

  His melody flowed from long, full notes to shorter ones, modulating higher, moving lower, growing in strength, unlocking emotions. Steve’s rhythm was slow and gentle, in no hurry, and his sound held soft attention to subtleties and semitones.

  When Steve took a breath, Hiroshi could hear the clack of the tall, thin memorial boards held in racks as an offering. Covered in Buddhist scripture, each wooden board was a miniature stupa, layered from bottom to top in symbolic curves—earth, water, fire, wind, emptiness. Jostled by the wind, their clack-clack punctuated Steve’s melody with counterpoint and odd rhythms.

  An old woman stopped to listen, staring at Steve. Maybe the sax felt like a violation in her ancestral burial grounds. She watched and listened intently until three schoolgirls in white sailor uniforms came giggling by. They let their hard, heavy randoseru backpacks fall onto the stones, surprised to hear music along the route they took to school every day. They soon skipped away, giggling.

  A group of mothers on pedal-assisted, new-generation mama-chara bicycles turned back to tell their pre-school children in the seats behind to listen, but they didn’t stop.

  And then a group of young people in their early twenties, everyone dressed in the same freshers’ outfits, appeared. They stopped chatting when they got close and slowed their pace to listen, clumping together in the stiff black and white outfits all new employees wore for job interviews and initial training. They were probably coming from their soon-to-be company. The work year started in April.

  They didn’t listen long, and returned their attention to their new workmates, tuning out the song Steve was playing and losing themselves in their new working life as shakaijin, official members of society.

  When Steve finished, he looked at the stone grave and let the sax loosen and hang from his neck strap.

  Hiroshi was surprised to see the old woman still there listening from the stone pathway. She put her hands together, then smiled and waved at Steve.

  Steve waved back, and she walked away.

  “That was for Mayu,” Steve said. “I just wrote it, inside. In my head.”

  “What are you going to call it?” Hiroshi asked.

  Steve started putting his sax away. “Zangyo. ‘Overtime’ is the one word I’ll never forget in Japanese.”<
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  Chapter 42

  Ayana was waiting at the south exit of Shinjuku Station. Hiroshi saw her immediately in the crowd. She was really dressed up in a long skirt and a chic coat. She looked as beautiful as she always appeared to him.

  Ayana watched him approach her through the chaotic trajectories of the crowd. Her frown deepened as he got closer.

  He pulled her into a quick hug, but she pushed him back and held him at arm’s length.

  “What?” Hiroshi asked.

  “I said dress nice.”

  Hiroshi looked down at himself. His jacket was wrinkled, his shirt untucked and he ran his hand over his face, brushing the stubble. He rubbed one shoe along the back of his pants, avoiding her eyes. “I—”

  “You smell like smoke.”

  Hiroshi smelled his sleeve, suffused with smoke from the file storage room. He’d been too tired to notice.

  Ayana took a breath. “And you didn’t sleep all night and didn’t go home and didn’t follow my request for this special day.”

  “This case was—”

  Ayana took a big breath.

  Hiroshi closed his eyes, searching for some magical words to change her reaction, but he felt like his brain had shut down. “Where did you plan for us to eat?”

  Ayana pointed at the tall skyscrapers of West Shinjuku, down the wide road a short walk from the station.

  “A fancy restaurant?”

  Ayana nodded.

  “One of those up in a skyscraper hotel? Waiters in tuxedos, a cozy table by the window, champagne in a bucket, small dishes on big white plates, and dessert with our names on it?”

  Ayana nodded. “I had to make the reservation two weeks ago.”

  “Panoramic windows, oceanic feeling gazing at the horizon?”

  “Too bad you’re not dressed for it.”

  “I’m not only not dressed for it, I’m barely awake for it.” Hiroshi looked at the closest line of skyscrapers. They looked like massive stupa squared off, with none of the curving, complex meanings real stupa carried. They stretched blindly skyward in solid steel and stone, as if angry at the earth’s gravity. The higher they were built, the emptier they became. It made Hiroshi dizzy. He looked away.

  Ayana said, “Did you finish the case?”