Reiko’s letter smashed the illusory castle that I had built on that fragile hypothesis, leaving only a flattened surface devoid of feeling. I would have to do something to regain my footing. It would probably take a long time for Naoko to recover. And even then, she would probably be more debilitated and would have lost even more of her self-confidence than ever. I would have to adapt myself to this new situation. As strong as I might become, though, it would not solve all the problems. I knew that much. But there was nothing else I could do: just keep my own spirits up and wait for her to recover.
Hey, there, Kizuki, I thought. Unlike you, I’ve chosen to live—and to live the best I know how. Sure, it was hard for you. What the hell, it’s hard for me. Really hard. And all because you killed yourself and left Naoko behind. But that’s something I will never do. I will never, ever turn my back on her. First of all, because I love her, and because I’m stronger than she is. And I’m just going to keep on getting stronger. I’m going to mature. I’m going to be an adult. Because that’s what I have to do. I always used to think I’d like to stay seventeen or eighteen if I could. But not anymore. I’m not a teenager anymore. I’ve got a sense of responsibility now. I’m not the same guy I was when we used to hang out together. I’m twenty now. And I have to pay the price to go on living.
“SHIT, WATANABE, what happened to you?” Midori asked. “You’re all skin and bones!”
“That bad, huh?”
“Too much you-know-what with that married girlfriend of yours, I bet.”
I smiled and shook my head. “I haven’t slept with a girl since the beginning of October.”
“Whew! That can’t be true. We’re talkin’ six months here!”
“You heard me.”
“So how’d you lose so much weight?”
“By growing up,” I said.
Midori put her hands on my shoulders and looked me in the eye with a twisted scowl that soon turned into a sweet smile. “It’s true,” she said. “Something’s different, kinda. You’ve changed.”
“I told you, I grew up. I’m an adult now.”
“You’re fantastic, the way your brain works,” she said as if genuinely impressed. “Let’s go eat. I’m starved.”
We went to a little restaurant behind the literature department. I ordered the lunch special and she did the same.
“Hey, Watanabe, are you mad at me?”
“What for?”
“For not answering you, just to get even. Do you think I shouldn’t have done that? I mean, you apologized and all.”
“Yeah, but it was my fault to begin with. That’s just how it goes.”
“My sister says I shouldn’t have done it. That it was too unforgiving, too childish.”
“Yeah, but it made you feel better, didn’t it, getting even like that?”
“Uh-huh.”
“O.K., then, that’s that.”
“You are forgiving, aren’t you?” Midori said. “But tell me the truth, Watanabe, you haven’t had sex for six months?”
“Not once.”
“So, that time you put me to bed, you must have really wanted it bad.”
“Yeah, I guess I did.”
“But you didn’t do it, did you?”
“Look, you’re the best friend I’ve got now,” I said. “I don’t want to lose you.”
“You know, if you had tried to force yourself on me that time, I wouldn’t have been able to resist, I was so exhausted.”
“But I was too big and hard,” I said.
Midori smiled and touched my wrist. “A little before that, I decided I was going to believe in you. A hundred percent. That’s how I managed to sleep like that with total peace of mind. I knew I’d be all right, I’d be safe with you there. And I did sleep like a log, didn’t I?”
“You sure did.”
“On the other hand, if you were to say to me, ‘Hey, Midori, let’s do it. Then everything’ll be great,’ I’d probably do it with you. Now, don’t think I’m trying to seduce you or tease you. I’m just telling you what’s on my mind, with total honesty.”
“I know, I know.”
While we ate lunch, we showed each other our registration cards and found that we had registered for two of the same courses. So I’d be seeing her twice a week at least. With that out of the way, Midori told me about her living arrangements. For a while, neither she nor her sister could get used to apartment life—because it was too easy, she said. They had always been used to running around like crazy every day, taking care of sick people, helping out at the bookstore, and one thing or another.
“We’re finally getting used to it, though,” she said. “This is the way we should have been living all along—not having to worry about anyone else’s needs, just stretching out any way we felt like it. It made us both nervous at first, like our bodies were floating a couple of inches off the floor. It didn’t seem real, like real life couldn’t really be like that. We were both tense, like everything was gonna get tipped upside down any minute.”
“A couple of worrywarts,” I said with a smile.
“Well, it’s just that life has been too cruel to us till now,” Midori said. “But that’s O.K. We’re gonna get back everything it owes us.”
“I’ll bet you are,” I said, “knowing you. But tell me, what’s your sister doing these days?”
“A friend of hers opened this swanky accessory shop a little while ago. My sister goes there to help out three times a week. Otherwise, she’s studying cooking, going out on dates with her fiancé, going to the movies, vegging out, and just plain enjoying life.”
Midori then asked about my new life. I gave her a description of the layout of the house, and the big yard, and Seagull the cat, and my landlord.
“Are you enjoying yourself?” she asked.
“Pretty much,” I said.
“Coulda fooled me,” said Midori.
“Yeah, and it’s springtime, too,” I said.
“And you’re wearing that cool sweater your girlfriend knitted for you.”
That was a shocker. I glanced down at my wine-colored sweater. “How did you know?”
“You’re as honest as they come,” said Midori. “I’m guessing, of course! Anyhow, what’s wrong with you?”
“I dunno. I’m trying to whip up a little enthusiasm.”
“Just remember, life is a box of cookies.”
I shook my head a few times and looked at her. “Maybe it’s because I’m not so smart, but sometimes I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”
“You know how they’ve got these cookie assortments, and you like some but you don’t like others? And you eat up all the ones you like, and the only ones left are the ones you don’t like so much? I always think about that when something painful comes up. ‘Now I just have to polish these off, and everything’ll be O.K.’ Life is a box of cookies.”
“I guess you could call it a philosophy.”
“It’s true, though. I’ve learned it from experience.”
WE WERE DRINKING OUR COFFEE when two girls came in. Midori seemed to know them from school. The three of them compared registration cards and talked about a million different things: “What kind of grade did you get in German?” “So-and-so got hurt in the campus riots.” “Great shoes, where’d you buy them?” I half-listened, feeling as if their comments were coming from the other side of the world. I sipped my coffee and watched the scene passing by the shop window. It was a typical university springtime scene as the new year was getting under way: a haze hanging in the sky, the cherries blooming, the new students (you could tell at a glance) carrying armloads of new books. I felt myself drifting off a little and thought about Naoko, unable to return to school again this year. A small glass full of anemones stood by the window.
When the other two went back to their table, Midori and I went out to walk around the neighborhood. We visited a few used bookstores, bought some books, went to another coffeehouse for another cup, played some pinball at a games cent
er, and sat on a park bench, talking—or, rather, Midori talked and I grunted in response. When she said she was thirsty, I ran over to a candy store and bought us two colas. I came back to find her scribbling away with her ballpoint pen on some lined paper.
“What’s that?” I asked.
“Nothing,” she said.
At three-thirty, she announced, “I gotta get going. I’m supposed to meet my sister in the Ginza.”
We walked to the subway station and went off in different directions. As she left, Midori stuffed the piece of lined paper, now folded in four, into my pocket. “Read this when you get home,” she said. I read it on the train.
I’m writing this letter to you while you’re off buying drinks. This is the first time in my life I’ve ever written a letter to somebody sitting next to me on a bench, but I feel it’s the only way I can get through to you. I mean, you’re hardly listening to anything I say. Am I right?
Do you realize you did something terrible to me today? You never even noticed that my hairstyle had changed, did you? I’ve been working on it forever, trying to grow it out, and finally, at the end of last week, I managed to get it into a style you could actually call girlish, but you never even noticed. It was looking pretty good, so I figured I’d give you a little shock when you saw me for the first time after such a long time, but it didn’t even register with you. Don’t you think that’s awful? I’ll bet you can’t even remember what I was wearing today. Hey, I’m a girl! So what if you’ve got something on your mind? You can spare me one decent look! All you had to say was “Cute hair,” and I would have been able to forgive you for being sunk in a million thoughts, but no!
Which is why I’m going to tell you a lie. It’s not true that I have to meet my sister in the Ginza. I was planning to spend the night at your place. I even brought my pajamas with me. It’s true. I’ve got my pajamas and a toothbrush in my bag. I must be an idiot! I mean, you never even invited me over to see your new place. Oh well, what the hell, you obviously want to be alone, so I’ll leave you alone. Go ahead and think away to your heart’s content!
But don’t get me wrong. I’m not totally mad at you. I’m just sad. You were so nice to me when I was having my problems, but now that you’re having yours, it seems there’s not a thing I can do for you. You’re all locked up in that little world of yours, and when I try knocking on the door, you just sort of look up for a second and go right back inside.
So now I see you coming back with our drinks—walking and thinking. I was hoping you’d trip, but you didn’t. Now you’re sitting next to me chugging down your cola. I was holding out one last hope that you’d notice and say, “Hey, your hair’s changed!” but no go. If you had, I would have ripped this letter up and said, “Let’s go to your place. I’ll make you a nice supper. And afterward we can get in bed and cuddle.” But you’re about as sensitive as a steel plate. Good-bye.
P.S. Please don’t talk to me next time we meet in class.
I rang Midori’s apartment from the station when I got off the train in Kichijoji, but there was no answer. With nothing better to do, I ambled around the neighborhood looking for some part-time work I could take after classes started. I would be free all day Saturday and Sunday and could work after five o’clock on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays, but finding a job that fit my particular schedule was no easy matter. I gave up and went home. When I went out to buy groceries for dinner, I tried Midori’s place again. Her sister told me that Midori hadn’t come home yet and that she had no idea when she’d be back. I thanked her and hung up.
After eating, I tried to write to Midori, but I gave up after several false starts and wrote to Naoko instead.
Spring was here, I said, and the new school year was beginning. I told her I missed her, that I had been hoping to be able to meet her and talk. “In any case,” I said, “I’ve decided to make myself strong. As far as I can tell, that’s all I can do.
“There’s one other thing. Maybe it just has to do with me, and you may not care about this one way or the other, but I’m not sleeping with anybody anymore. That’s because I don’t want to forget the last time you touched me. It meant a lot more to me than you might think. I think about it all the time.”
I PUT THE LETTER in an envelope, stuck on a stamp, and sat at my desk a long while staring at it. It was a much shorter letter than usual, but I had the feeling that Naoko might understand me better that way. I poured myself an inch and a half of whiskey, drank it down in two swallows, and went to sleep.
THE NEXT DAY I found a job near Kichijoji Station that I could do on Saturdays and Sundays: waiting on tables at a smallish Italian restaurant. The conditions were nothing much, but transportation and lunches were included. And whenever somebody on the late shift took the day off on a Monday, Wednesday, or Thursday (which happened often) I could take their place. This was perfect for me. The manager said they would raise my pay once I had stayed with them for three months, and they wanted me to start that Saturday. He was a far more decent guy than the clown who ran the record store in Shinjuku.
I TRIED PHONING Midori’s apartment again, and again her sister answered. Midori hadn’t come back since yesterday, she said, sounding tired, and now she herself was beginning to worry: did I have any idea where she might have gone? All I knew was that Midori had her pajamas and a toothbrush in her bag.
I SAW MIDORI in class on Wednesday. She was wearing a deep green sweater and the dark sunglasses she had often worn that summer. She was seated in the last row, talking with a slightly built girl with glasses I had seen once before. I approached her and said I’d like to talk to her after class. The girl with glasses looked at me first, and then Midori looked at me. Her hairstyle was, in fact, somewhat more womanly than it had been before: more grown-up.
“I have to see somebody,” Midori said, cocking her head slightly.
“I won’t take much of your time,” I said. “Five minutes.”
Midori removed her sunglasses and narrowed her eyes. She might just as well have been looking at a crumbling, abandoned house some hundred yards in the distance.
“I don’t want to talk to you. Sorry,” she said.
The girl with glasses looked at me with eyes that said, She says she doesn’t want to talk to you. Sorry.
I sat in the seat on the right end of the front row for the lecture (an overview of the works of Tennessee Williams and their place in American literature), and when it was over, I did a long count to three and turned around. Midori was gone.
April was too lonely a month to spend all alone. In April, everyone around me looked happy. People would throw their coats off and enjoy each other’s company in the sunshine—talking, playing catch, holding hands. But I was always by myself. Naoko, Midori, Nagasawa: all of them had gone away from where I stood. Now I had no one to say “Good morning” to or “Have a nice day.” I even missed Storm Trooper. I spent the whole month with this hopeless sense of isolation. I tried a few times to speak to Midori, but the answer I got from her was always the same: “I don’t want to talk to you now,” and I knew from her tone of voice that she meant it. She was always with the girl with glasses, or else I saw her with a tall, short-haired guy. He had these incredibly long legs and always wore white basketball shoes.
April ended and May came along, but May was even worse than April. In the deepening spring of May, I had no choice but to recognize the trembling of my heart. It usually happened as the sun was going down. In the pale evening gloom, when the soft fragrance of magnolias hung in the air, my heart would swell without warning, and tremble, and lurch with a stab of pain. I would try clamping my eyes shut and gritting my teeth, and wait for it to pass. And it would pass—but slowly, taking its own time, and leaving a dull ache behind.
At those times I would write to Naoko. In my letters to her, I would describe only things that were touching or pleasant or beautiful: the fragrance of grasses, the caress of a spring breeze, the light of the moon, a movie I’d seen, a song I liked, a book t
hat had moved me. I myself would be comforted by letters like this when I would reread what I had written. And I would feel that the world I lived in was a wonderful one. I wrote any number of letters like this, but from Naoko or Reiko I heard nothing.
At the restaurant where I worked I got to know another student my age named Itoh. It took quite a while before this gentle, quiet student from the oil painting department of an arts college would engage me in conversation, but eventually we started going to a nearby bar after work and talking about all kinds of things. He also liked to read and listen to music, and so we’d usually talk about books and records we liked. He was a slim, good-looking guy with much shorter hair and far cleaner clothes than the typical arts student. He never had a lot to say, but he had his definite tastes and opinions. He liked French novels, especially those of Georges Bataille and Boris Vian. For music, he preferred Mozart and Ravel. And, like me, he was looking for a friend with whom he could talk about such things.
Itoh once invited me to his apartment. It was not quite as hard to get to as mine: a strange, one-floored apartment house behind Inokashira Park. His room was stuffed with painting supplies and canvas. I asked to see his work, but he said he was too embarrassed to show me anything. We drank some Chivas Regal that he had quietly removed from his father’s place, broiled some smelts on his charcoal stove, and listened to Robert Casadesus playing a Mozart piano concerto.
Itoh was from Nagasaki. He had a girlfriend he would sleep with whenever he went home, he said, but things weren’t going too well with her lately.
“You know what girls are like,” he said. “They turn twenty or twenty-one and all of a sudden they start having these concrete ideas. They get super realistic. And when that happens, everything that seemed so sweet and lovable about them begins to look ordinary and depressing. Now when I see her, usually after we do it, she starts asking me, ‘What are you going to do after you graduate?’”