“What about your mother?” I asked. “Did she come back with you?”
“Mmm.” That was Yuki saying yes. “She’s up in Hakone with that one-armed guy. Sorting out her photos of Kathmandu and Hawaii.”
“And you didn’t want to stay in Hakone?”
“I didn’t feel like it. There’s nothing for me to do there.”
“Just thought I’d ask,” I said. “Tell me, what exactly is there for you to do on your own in Tokyo?”
One of her patented shrugs. Then, “I can hang out with you.”
“Well, I couldn’t ask for more myself. However, trying to be realistic, pretty soon I ought to be getting back to work. I can’t afford to keep running around with you forever. And I don’t want handouts from your father either.”
Yuki sneered. “I can understand your not wanting to take handouts from my parents, but why do you have to make such a big deal about it? How do you think it makes me feel, dragging you all around the place like this?”
“So you want me to take the money?”
“If you did, I wouldn’t feel so guilty.”
“You don’t get it, Yuki,” I said. “I don’t want money for being your friend. I don’t want to be introduced at your wedding reception as ‘the professional male companion of the bride since she was thirteen.’ Everyone would be tittering, ‘professional male companion, professional male companion.’ I want to be introduced as ‘the boyfriend of the bride when she was thirteen.’ ”
Yuki blushed. “You turkey. I’m not going to have a wedding reception.”
“Great. I don’t like weddings. All those absurd speeches and the bricks of wedding cake you’re supposed to take home. Strains the boundaries of propriety. But all I want to say is, you don’t buy friends. Especially not with expense account money.”
“That makes a good moral for a fairy tale.”
“Wow! You’re finally getting the proper gift of gab. With practice we could be a couple of stand-up comics.”
Shrug.
“But seriously, folks, …” I cleared my throat. “If you want to hang out with me every day, Yuki, I’m all for it. Who needs to work? It’s just pointless shoveling anyway. But we have to have one thing clear: I’m not going to accept money for doing things with you. Hawaii was different. I took money for that. I even took the woman thrown in. Of course, I thought you weren’t ever going to talk to me again. I hated myself for allowing the whole business about payment for services to happen at all. From now on, I’m doing things my way. I don’t want to answer to anybody, and I don’t want to be on somebody’s dole. I’m not Dick North and I’m not your father’s manservant, whatever his name is. You don’t need to feel guilty.”
“You mean you’ll really go out with me?” Yuki chirped, then looked down at her polished toenails.
“You bet. You and me, we could be this pair of outcasts. We could be quite an item. So, let’s just relax and have a good time.”
“Why are you being so kind?”
“I’m not.”
Yuki traced a design in the dirt with the tip of her sandal. A squared spiral.
“And I’m not a burden on you?”
“Maybe you are and maybe you aren’t. Don’t worry your pretty little head about it. I want to be with you because I like you. Sometimes when I’m with you, I remember things I lost when I was your age. Like I remember the sound of the rain and the smell of the wind. And it’s really a gift, getting these things back. Even if you think I’m weird. Maybe you’ll understand what I mean some day.”
“I already know what you mean.”
“You do?”
“I mean, I’ve lost plenty of things this far in my life too,” said Yuki.
“Well, then, there you are,” I said.
She said nothing. I returned to looking at the visitors to the shrine grounds.
“I don’t have anybody I can really talk to but you,” Yuki spoke up. “Honest.”
“What about Dick North?”
Yuki stuck out her tongue. “He’s a goon.”
“Maybe he is and maybe he isn’t. But I think you should know, he does good, and he’s not pushy about it. That’s pretty rare. He may not be up to your mother’s level, and he may not be a brilliant poet. But he genuinely cares for your mother. He probably loves her. He’s a good cook, he’s dependable, he’s considerate.”
“He’s still a goon.”
Okay, okay. Yuki obviously had her feelings on the matter. So I changed the subject. We talked about the good times we had in Hawaii. Sun and surf and tropical breezes and piña coladas. Yuki said this made her hungry, so we went to eat pancakes and fruit parfaits. Then we took in a movie.
The following week, Dick North died.
Dick North had been doing the shopping on a Monday evening in Hakone and had just stepped out from the supermarket with a bag of groceries under his arm when a truck came barreling down the road and slammed into him. The truck driver confessed that he didn’t know what possessed him to gun full-speed ahead in such poor road visibility. And Dick himself had made a telling slip. He’d looked to his left, but was one or two breaths behind in checking his right. A common mistake among people who have lived overseas for any length of time and have just returned to Japan. You haven’t gotten used to cars driving on the left-hand side yet. In most cases, you come away with chills, but sometimes it’s worse. The truck sent Dick sailing into the opposite lane, where he was battered again by an oncoming van. He died instantly.
When I heard the news, the first thing that came to mind was going shopping with Dick at a probably similar supermarket in Makaha. How knowledgeably he selected his purchases, how he examined the fruit and vegetables and unembarrassedly tossed a box of Tampax into the shopping cart. Poor bastard. Unlucky to the last. Arm blown off in Vietnam when the guy next to him stepped on a mine. Running around morning to night putting out Amé’s smoldering cigarettes. Now dead on the asphalt holding onto a load of groceries.
His funeral saw him returned to his rightful family, his wife and child. Neither Amé nor Yuki nor I attended.
I borrowed the Subaru back from Gotanda and drove Yuki to Hakone that Tuesday afternoon. It was at Yuki’s urging. “Mama can’t get by on her own. Sure, there’s the maid, but she’s too old to do anything and she goes home at night. We can’t leave Mama alone up there.”
“Yeah, it’s probably good for you to spend some time with your mother,” I said.
Yuki was flipping through the road atlas. “Hey, you remember I said bad things about him?”
“Who? Dick North?”
“Yeah.”
“You called him a goon,” I said.
Yuki stowed the book in the door pocket, rested her elbow on the window, and turned her gaze to the scenery ahead. “But you know,” she said, “he wasn’t so bad. He was nice to me. He spent time telling me how to surf and all. Even without that arm, he was a lot more alive than most people with two arms. Plus, he took good care of Mama.”
“I know.”
“But I said nasty things about him.”
“You couldn’t help yourself,” I said. “It’s not your fault.”
She looked straight ahead the whole way. She didn’t turn to look at me. The breeze blowing in through the window ruffled her bangs.
“It’s sad, but I think he was that sort of person,” I said. “A nice guy, maybe even worthy of respect. But he got treated like some kind of fancy trash basket. People were always dumping on him. Maybe he was born with that tendency. Mediocrity’s like a spot on a shirt—it never comes off.”
“It’s unfair.”
“As a rule, life is unfair,” I said.
“Yeah, but I think I did say some awful things.”
“To Dick?”
“Yeah.”
I pulled the car over to the shoulder of the road and turned off the ignition.
“That’s just stupid, that kind of thinking,” I said, nailing her with my eyes. “Instead of regretting what you did, you
could have treated him decently from the beginning. You could’ve tried to be fair. But you didn’t. You don’t even have the right to be sorry.”
Yuki looked at me, shocked and hurt.
“Maybe I’m being too hard on you. But listen, I don’t care what other people do. I don’t want to hear that sort of talk from you. You shouldn’t say things like that lightly, as if saying them is going to solve anything. They don’t stick. You think you feel sorry about Dick, but I don’t believe you really do. If I were Dick, I wouldn’t want your easy regret. I wouldn’t want people saying, ‘Oh, I acted horribly.’ It’s not a question of manners; it’s a question of fairness. That’s something you have to learn.”
Yuki couldn’t respond. She pressed her fingers to her temples and quietly closed her eyes. She almost seemed to have dozed off, but for the slight flutter of her eyelashes, the trembling of her lips. Crying inside, without sobs or tears. Was I expecting too much of a thirteen-year-old girl? Who was I to be so self-righteous? Still, whether or not she was thirteen, whether or not I was an exemplary human being, you can’t let everything slide. Stupidity is stupidity. I won’t put up with it.
Yuki didn’t move. I reached out and touched her arm.
“It’s okay,” I said. “I’m very narrow-minded. No, to be fair, you’ve done the best that can be expected.”
A single tear trailed down her cheek and fell on her lap. That was all. Beautiful and noble.
“So what can I do now?” she spoke up a minute later.
“Nothing,” I said. “Just think about what comes before words. You owe that to the dead. As time goes on, you’ll understand. What lasts, lasts; what doesn’t, doesn’t. Time solves most things. And what time can’t solve, you have to solve yourself. Is that too much to ask?”
“A little,” she said, trying to smile.
“Well, of course it is,” I said, trying to smile too. “I doubt that this makes sense to most people. But I think I’m right. People die all the time. Life is a lot more fragile than we think. So you should treat others in a way that leaves no regrets. Fairly, and if possible, sincerely. It’s too easy not to make the effort, then weep and wring your hands after the person dies. Personally, I don’t buy it.”
Yuki leaned against the car door.
“But that’s real hard, isn’t it?” she said.
“Real hard,” I said. “But it’s worth trying for. Look at Boy George: Even a fat gay kid who can’t sing can become a star.”
“Okay,” she smiled, “but why are you always getting on Boy George’s case? I bet you must really like him, deep down.”
“Let me think about that one,” I said.
Yuki’s mother’s house was in a large resort-housing tract. There was a big gate, with a pool and a coffee house adjacent. There was even a stop-and-shop minimart filled with junk food. No place someone like Dick North would have bought groceries at. Me either. As the road twisted and turned up the grade, my friendly Subaru began to gasp.
Halfway up the hill was Amé’s house, too big for just a mother and daughter. I stopped the car and carried Yuki’s bags up the steps to the side of the stone embankment. Down the slope, between the ranks of cedars, you could make out the ocean by Odawara. The air was hazy, the sea dull under the leaden glaze of spring.
Amé paced the large, sunny living room, lit cigarette in hand. A big crystal ashtray was overflowing with bent and crushed Salem butts, the entire tabletop dusted with ashes. She tossed her latest butt into the ashtray and came over to greet Yuki, mussing her hair. She wore a chemical-spotted oversized sweatshirt and faded jeans. Her hair was uncombed, eyes bleary.
“It’s been terrible,” said Amé. “Why do these horrible things always happen?”
I expressed my condolences and inquired about the details of yesterday’s accident. It was all so sudden, she told me, she felt out of control, confused, uncertain. “And of course the maid came down with a fever today and won’t be in. Now of all times, a fever! I’m going crazy. The police come, Dick’s wife calls, I don’t know what they expect of me.”
“What did Dick’s wife have to say?”
“I couldn’t make it out,” she said. “She just cried. And when she wasn’t crying, she mumbled so I could barely understand what she was saying. And me, in this position, what was I supposed to say? … What was I supposed to say?”
I shook my head.
“I told her I’d send along Dick’s things as soon as I could, but then the woman was crying even more. It was hopeless.”
She let out a big sigh and collapsed into the sofa.
I asked her if she wanted anything to drink, and she asked for coffee. For good measure, I also cleared away the ashtray and cocoa-caked mugs, and wiped off the table. While I waited for the water to boil, I tidied up the kitchen. Dick North had kept a neat pantry, but already it was a mess. Dirty dishes were piled in the sink, cocoa had been dribbled across the stainless steel cooktop, knives lay here and there smeared with cheese and who-knows-what, the lid of the sugar container was nowhere in sight.
Poor bastard, I thought as I made a strong pot of coffee. He tried so hard to bring order to this place. Now in the space of one day, it was gone. Just like that. People leave traces of themselves where they feel most comfortable, most worthwhile. With Dick, that place was the kitchen. But even that tenuous presence was on its way out.
Poor bastard.
I carried in the coffee and found Amé and Yuki sitting on the sofa. Amé’s head rested on her daughter’s shoulder. She looked drugged and drained. Yuki seemed ill at ease. How odd they appeared together—so different from when they were apart—how doubly unapproachable.
Amé accepted the coffee with both hands and drank it slowly, preciously. The slightest glow came to her eyes.
“You want anything to drink?” I asked Yuki.
She shook her head with no expression whatsoever.
“Has everything been taken care of?” I asked Amé. “The business about the accident, legal matters, and all that?”
“Done. The actual procedure wasn’t so difficult. It was a perfectly common accident. A policeman came to the house to tell me the news, and that was it. I told them to contact Dick’s wife, and she handled everything. I mean, I had no legal or even professional relationship with Dick. Then the wife called here. She hardly said a word, she just cried. She didn’t even scream, nothing.”
A perfectly common accident.
Another three weeks and Amé wouldn’t remember there ever was someone in her life named Dick North. Amé was the forgetful type, and, unfortunately, Dick was forgettable.
“Is there anything I can do to help?” I asked.
“Well, yes. Dick’s belongings,” she muttered. “I told you I was going to return them to her, didn’t I?”
“Yes.”
“Well, last night I put his things in order. His manuscripts and typewriter and books and clothes—they all fit in one suitcase. There wasn’t that much stuff. Just one suitcase full. I hate to ask, but could you deliver it to his wife?”
“Sure. Where does the family live?”
“I don’t know exactly. Somewhere in Gotokuji, I know. Could you find out for me?”
Yuki showed me the study where Dick’s things were. Upstairs, a long, narrow garret at the end of the hall, what had originally been the maid’s room. It was pleasant enough, and naturally Dick had kept everything in immaculate order. On the desk were arranged five precision-sharpened pencils and an eraser, an unqualified still life. A calendar on the wall had been annotated with meticulous handwriting.
Yuki leaned in the doorway and scanned the interior in silence. All you could hear were the birds outside. I recalled the cottage in Makaha. It had been just as quiet, and there had been birds too.
The tag on the suitcase, also in Dick’s hand, had his name and address. I lugged it downstairs. With his books and papers, it was much heavier than it looked. The weight yet another reminder of the fate of Dick North.
“T
here’s not much here to eat,” said Amé. “Dick went out to do the shopping and then all this happened.”
“Don’t worry. I’ll go to the store,” I said.
I checked the contents of the refrigerator to see what she did have. Then I drove down to town, to the supermarket where Dick had spent the last moments of his life, and purchased four or five days’ worth of provisions.
I put away the groceries, and Amé thanked me. I felt like I was merely finishing up the task that Dick had left undone.
The two women saw me off from atop the stone embankment. The same as in Makaha, only this time nobody was waving. That had been Dick’s role. The two stood there, not moving, gazing down on me. An almost mythological scene, like an icon. I heaved the gray suitcase into the backseat and slid behind the wheel. Mother and daughter were still standing there when I turned the curve and headed out of their sight. The sun was starting to sink into an orange sea. How would they spend the night? I wondered.
That one-armed skeleton in the eerie gloom of the room in Honolulu, it was now clear, was Dick North. So, who could the other five be?
Let’s say my old friend, the Rat, for one. Dead several years now, in Hokkaido.
Then Mei, for another.
That left three. Three more.
What was Kiki doing there? Why did she want to show me these six deaths?
I made it down to Odawara and got on the Tokyo-Nagoya Expressway. Exiting at Sangenjaya, I navigated my way into the suburbs of Setagaya by map and found Dick North’s house. An ordinary two-story suburban home, very small. The door and windows and mailbox and entry light—everything seemed to be in miniature. A mongrel on a chain patrolled the front door. There were lights on inside the house, the sound of voices. Dick’s wake was in progress. At least he had somewhere to come home to.
I took the suitcase out of the car and hauled it to the front door. I rang the doorbell and a middle-aged man appeared. I explained that I’d brought Dick’s things; my expression said I didn’t know any more than that. The man looked at the name tag and grasped the situation immediately.