Out

by Natsuo Kirino

  Masako waved quickly and went into the changing room, while Yoshie, satisfied with her ruse to get rid of Kuniko, sipped at her paper cup of sugary coffee.

  Masako changed quickly and then casually picked up two plastic aprons that belonged to women who had apparently moved on to other jobs. She slipped them into her bag. She had also stuffed several pairs of latex gloves in her pocket. Going back to the lounge, she sat down next to Yoshie. The tatami mat was still warm where Kuniko had been sitting. As she was pulling out her cigarettes, Yayoi, who had also changed, came up and began to sit down with them, but Masako warned her off with a nod. 'Well, I'll be going then,' Yayoi said, obviously reluctant to do so; and she wandered off towards the door, turning several times to look back anxiously at Masako.

  As she disappeared around the corner, Yoshie whispered urgently: 'What's this all about? I won't be able to stand it if you don't tell me.'

  'Just listen and try not to act shocked,' Masako said, looking her straight in the eye. 'Yayoi's killed her husband.' Yoshie's mouth hung open for a moment, her chapped lips trembling. 'Not act shocked... ?' she whispered at last.

  'I know,' said Masako. 'But it's true, and there's no way to undo it. I've decided to try to help her, and I want to know if you'll help, too.'

  'Are you out of your mind?!' Yoshie shrieked, but then, realising there were people around, lowered her voice. 'She should go turn herself in - right now.'

  'But she's got little kids, and he was beating her. She did it in self-defence. You can see the relief on her face.'

  'But she killed him,' Yoshie gulped.

  'How many times have you thought you'd like to kill your mother-in-law?' Masako watched her face stiffen.

  'Lots,' she said, draining her coffee cup. 'But thinking about it and actually doing it are two different things.'

  'They are. But something made Yayoi cross that line. And it does happen, doesn't it, Skipper? That's why I'm going to do what I can to help.'

  'Do what!?' Yoshie's voice rang out across the room this time and nearly everyone turned to look. The group of Brazilian men, camped out in their usual spot against the wall, peered curiously at her. 'There's nothing you can do,' she continued, seeming to shrink into herself. 'Nothing.'

  'Still, I'm going to try,' said Masako.

  'But why should you? Why should I? The whole thing gives me the creeps - becoming accomplices to a murder.'

  'Not accomplices,' Masako insisted. 'We didn't kill him.'

  'But I'm sure they send people to jail too for dumping dead bodies.'

  'Yes, maybe,' said Masako. 'Dumping them .. . or dismantling them a bit, either one.'

  'What do you mean?' said Yoshie, her tongue running back and forth over her lips as she tried to cope with this new puzzle. 'What are you planning to do?'

  'I'm going to cut him up and throw away the pieces. Then Yayoi can go on just as before, as though nothing's happened. They'll register her husband as missing, and that'll be the end of it.'

  'Forget it,' said Yoshie, shaking her head stubbornly. 'I couldn't. Not that.'

  'Fine,' said Masako, reaching across the table with her hand open. 'Then pay back the money I lent you last night. Now.' Yoshie sat quietly for a time, a pained expression on her face, while Masako stubbed out her cigarette in the empty coffee cup. A repellent smell of sugar, instant coffee and ashes briefly filled their nostrils; but Masako ignored it and lit another cigarette.

  'All right then,' said Yoshie finally, having apparently made up her mind. 'I can't give you back the money, so I guess I'll have to help.'

  'Thank you. I knew I could count on you, Skipper.'

  'But there's one thing you've got to tell me,' said Yoshie, looking up at her. 'I'm doing this because you helped me out, but why would you be willing to do something like this for Yayoi?'

  'I'm not sure I know myself,' said Masako. 'But I can tell you this: if you'd been the one in this fix, I'd have done the same for you.' There seemed nothing left to say, and Yoshie fell silent.

  -

  Nearly everyone else had left the factory when Masako and Yoshie walked down the stairs at the main entrance. A gentle, earlymorning rain was falling, and Yoshie went to get the umbrella she'd left in the rack next to the door. Masako hadn't brought one and was facing a wet walk to the parking lot.

  'I'll see you at my house at nine, then,' she said.

  'I'll be there,' said Yoshie, straddling her bicycle and pedalling wearily off into the rain. Masako watched her go and then started for the parking lot at a brisk pace; but before she'd gone more than a few steps she noticed a man standing in the shadow of the sycamore trees that lined the road. It was Kazuo Miyamori, dressed now in a white T-shirt, jeans and a black cap. He was staring at his feet and holding out a clear plastic umbrella, without making any effort to keep his own head covered, which was soaking wet.

  'How do you say "Go to hell" in Brazilian?' Masako said as she walked past him. He looked up, apparently confused, and started after her.

  'Umbrella,' he said, waving it at her.

  'I don't want it,' she said, brushing it away. 'Not from you.' The umbrella fell on the cracked sidewalk and lay there. The road was deserted and the clatter it made echoed in the silence. Masako could sense that Kazuo was taken aback. She remembered the hurt look on his face two nights ago when Yayoi had ignored his greeting. He's just a baby, she thought. She realised that he was following her, and as she turned to look at him it occurred to her that his lost expression made things more complicated. But the dark eyes under the brim of the cap were the same ones she'd seen in the reddish moonlight the night before.

  'Leave me alone!' she shouted at him.

  'I'm sorry,' he said, coming quickly around in front of her and placing his hands on his solid chest. She knew this meant he was apologising 'with all his heart', but she still ignored him and turned right, down the street that led by the abandoned factory, the street where he had attacked her. She could tell that he was still following her, but she felt only a vague apprehension and the desire to drive the memories of the attack out of her head.

  'Will you come tonight?' he asked.

  'You're dreaming,' she said.

  'But... ' he murmured as she broke into a run. The delivery bay of the old factory came quickly into view. The brown metal shutters where he had pinned her showed no sign of any dents as they went on rusting in the rain. The grass she had trampled in her attempt to get away bore no trace of the struggle. Suddenly, she was filled with rage that everything could go on as before, as if nothing had happened. The humiliation and self-loathing of last night came rushing back and she stopped, waiting for him to reach her. She was so furious she didn't know what she might do; but Kazuo, unsuspecting, approached, with the umbrella now in his hand again, and stood looking at her.

  'Now get this straight,' she hissed. 'If you ever try this again I'm going to the police . . . and to management and you'll be out of a job.'

  'I understand,' he said, nodding as if in relief. Then his dark face looked up at her. She finally realised that he'd been terrified that she would tell someone.

  'Don't get all excited. I haven't forgiven you for anything.' She turned on her heel and walked away, and this time she knew he wasn't following her. She didn't turn around until she reached the entrance to the parking lot, but when she did, she could see him still standing where she'd left him.

  'Idiot!' she wanted to call out, but she suppressed the urge, unsure exactly who to take it out on. She looked around for her Corolla and found it parked in the same spot. She tried to imagine the object in the trunk, and it suddenly seemed strange beyond belief that dawn had come as usual, that it should be raining so normally, when that utterly lifeless thing was still in there. And then she realised that everything, even that pig of a young man who'd just been apologising to her so desperately, only reminded her of the body in the trunk; and it wasn't really the Miyamori boy she wanted to punish so much as the lifeless Kenji - and herself for getting caught up
in all this.

  She unlocked the trunk and opened it a bit. Peeking in, she could see grey pants and a few inches of hairy leg sticking out below the cuff - exactly the place Yayoi had touched the night before to see if the body was still warm. The skin was pale, and the hair seemed slightly dirty somehow, like a fraying rag. 'A thing. It's just a thing,' she muttered, closing the trunk.

  BATHROOM

  1

  Masako stood in the bathroom doorway, listening to the sound of the rain through the window. Nobuki, who had apparently been the last one to use the bath, had drained the water and replaced the plastic cover. Though the walls and tiles were dry now, the room was still filled with the clean smell of bath water, the smell of a quiet, peaceful home. Masako felt the urge to throw open the window and let in the damp air from outside.

  The little house seemed to be demanding all sorts of things of her: to be swept from top to bottom, to have its overgrown yard weeded, the smell of cigarettes purged, to have the sizeable loans owed on it repaid. Still, despite all its urgent demands, Masako could never bring herself to feel that this was really her home. Why was it that she always felt unsettled here, like a temporary lodger?

  When she had pulled out of the parking lot with Kenji's body in the trunk, she had already come to a decision. Once she got home, she went straight to the bathroom to begin thinking about how to lay out the corpse and get the job done. Though she knew the feeling was possibly the sign of a sick mind, there was a part of her that was exhilarated by the challenge. She stepped barefoot into the tiled washing area and lay down on her back. She and Kenji were roughly the same height, so he should easily fit if they laid him out at an angle like this. It was ironic but fortunate that Yoshiki had insisted on the architect making this part of the house larger than usual.

  Masako could feel the cool of the tiles on her back as she lay looking out the window. The sky was grey and without depth. Remembering the sight of Kazuo Miyamori standing in the rain, she rolled up the sleeve of her shirt. The bruise on her arm had clearly been left by his large thumb, and it occurred to her, that it had been a long time since she'd felt such strength from a man's hands.

  'What are you doing?' said a voice from the dark doorway. Sitting up, Masako could see Yoshiki, still in his pyjamas, staring in at her from the dressing area. 'What are you doing in there?' he asked again. Masako jumped up and stared back at him as she rolled down her sleeve. He was barely awake and hadn't yet combed his wispy hair or put on his glasses, but there he was, watching her with a sour look on his face. The way he scowled when he was trying to focus on something reminded her of Nobuki.

  'Nothing,' she said. 'I was just thinking of taking a shower.' Yoshiki listened to her awkward lie and then looked past her, out the window.

  'It's raining,' he said. 'Won't be hot today.'

  'I know, but I got all sweaty at the factory.'

  'Suit yourself. But for a second there I thought you'd gone crazy.'

  'Why would you think that?'

  'What would you think if you saw somebody staring off into space and then suddenly flopping down on the bathroom floor?' It made Masako uncomfortable to realise that he'd been watching her through the open door for some time. But then it seemed that recently Yoshiki had been watching both Nobuki and her from a distance, as if maintaining the space between them were part of his defence.

  'You might have told me you were standing there,' she said. He merely shrugged without answering, and Masako squeezed past him out of the room. 'Do you want some breakfast?' she called back, heading for the kitchen without hearing his reply. Dumping some beans into the noisy coffee grinder, she set about making their usual meal of toast and scrambled eggs. It had been some time now since the house had been filled in the morning with the smell of rice cooking in the automatic steamer. When their son had suddenly stopped needing a lunch for school, there was no more call for a large pot of rice.

  'Pretty gloomy,' Yoshiki muttered, looking out the window as he sat down at the table after washing his face. It struck Masako that the comment could apply to their household as easily as to the weather. It seemed suffocating, somehow, to face her husband across the breakfast table on such a rainy morning, without even the cheerful patter of the television or the radio. She rubbed her temples, which were throbbing from exhaustion. Yoshiki took a sip of coffee. As he opened the newspaper, a heavy bundle of advertisements slipped out on to the table. Masako gathered them up and began skimming the supermarket inserts.

  'What happened to your arm?' he asked abruptly. Masako looked up with a puzzled expression. 'Your arm,' he repeated, pointing at the spot. 'You've got a bruise.'

  'I bumped it at the factory,' she said, frowning slightly. Whether he believed her or not, he dropped the subject, but Masako remembered that she'd been thinking about Kazuo Miyamori's thumb while she was staring at the bruise. Yoshiki was sensitive about this kind of thing and was no doubt suspicious. Still, he wasn't asking any more questions - probably because he didn't really want to know anything about her. Resigning herself to his lack of interest, she lit a cigarette. Yoshiki, who didn't smoke, turned irritably toward the window.

  Suddenly, they heard the sound of someone charging down the stairs. Yoshiki tensed visibly as Nobuki appeared in the doorway dressed in an oversized T-shirt and sloppy, knee-length pants. As he entered the room, Masako could see him switch off the noisy, youthful energy he'd had a moment before and shroud his face behind a blank stare. Still, the mask couldn't hide the eyes which seemed dissatisfied with everything they saw, or the large mouth clenched in hostility. In some ways, he was the image of Yoshiki as a young man. Nobuki went straight to the refrigerator and began drinking from the bottle of mineral water.

  'Use a glass,' Masako said, but he ignored her and went on drinking. As she watched his recently developed Adam's apple bob up and down, she felt herself losing control. 'You may not want to say anything,' she said, getting up from the table, 'but I know you can hear me.' She tried to wrench the bottle out of his hand, but he elbowed her aside. The blow was painful - the boy had suddenly grown so tall and solid - and Masako slumped heavily against the sink. Nobuki, looking as though nothin g had happened, slowly replaced the cap on the bottle and put it back in the refrigerator.

  'I don't care if you don't talk,' she said, 'but you can't act like that.' Nobuki mugged astonishment and looked down at her dully; and as he did so, she thought again how like a total stranger her own son seemed - a stranger she didn't like much at that. On an impulse, she reached out and slapped him. The skin on his cheek, which she had touched for only an instant, was taut and smooth, with no trace of the baby fat he'd had so recently. Her palm stung where she'd hit him. He stood for a moment, startled, and then pushed past her and disappeared into the bathroom without a word.

  She didn't know what she was hoping for; it seemed as though everything she said or did was as useless as sprinkling water on a scorching desert. She stared at her bright red palm for a moment and then looked over at Yoshiki; but he sat motionless, eyes glued to the newspaper, as if he had no son, as if there had never been a boy named Nobuki in his life.

  'I give up,' she said. 'It's hopeless.' To the extent he seemed to notice him at all, Yoshiki had apparently given up on the boy as well. All in pursuit of some sort of spiritual goal. Yoshiki seemed to find less evolved beings irritating. For his part, Nobuki still bore a grudge against his father for having failed to support him during his crisis at school. In the end the three of them were so completely estranged that it was hard to understand why they even lived together.

  If I were to tell them that there was a dead body in the trunk of my car, how would they react, Masako wondered. Would Nobuki be so shocked that he'd finally say something? Would Yoshiki be so furious that he'd hit her? No, they probably wouldn't even believe her. Masako was beginning to suspect that she was the one who'd grown away from her little family, but that didn't make her feel especially lonely.

  A short time later both her husband a
nd her son had made their hurried departures for work and the house was quiet again. Masako finished her coffee and lay down on the sofa in the living room for a nap, but she found it hard to get to sleep.

  -

  The bell on the intercom rang.

  'It's me.' Yoshie's voice sounded timid. Masako had half expected her not to come at all, but Yoshie was too loyal for that.

  When she opened the door, she found her friend dressed in the same shabby clothes she'd had on that morning at the factory, a faded pink T-shirt and sweat pants that were worn at the knees. She peered into the house, apparently terrified.

  'It's not here,' said Masako, pointing at the car parked next to the door. 'It's in the trunk.' Yoshie seemed to shrink away from it. 'I'm sorry,' she said, 'but I just can't do this. You've got to let me back out.' She had barely spoken when she pushed her way into the entrance hall and threw herself down prostrate on the floor. Masako stood watching her grovel like a frog, wondering idly when Yoshie had started perming her hair. She had expected something like this to happen and was hardly surprised. 'If I say "no", will you go running to the police?' she asked finally. When Yoshie looked up, her face was pale.

  'No,' she said, shaking her head. 'Never.'

  'But you still can't pay back the money. In other words, you'll send your daughter on her school trip, but when it comes to a once-in-a-lifetime favour, you can't be bothered.'

  'But Masako, this isn't any normal favour. You're talking about helping out with a murder.'

  'I said it was "once-in-a-lifetime".'

  'But it's murder,' Yoshie repeated.

  'So you'd do it if it were something else? If it were robbery or burglary? Is it really all that different?' said Masako, as if turning the question over in her own mind. Her friend's eyes widened in shock and Masako laughed quietly.

  'It is different,' Yoshie murmured.

  'Who says so?'