plays video games. The cops are looking for you all over Osaka. But they would never suspect a furniture removalist van. We’ve smuggled things before in them and you can trust me, cops just aren’t interested in that kind of vehicle.’
‘How much will it cost?’
‘You can afford it. I’ve seen that envelope of yours.’
Taro felt his jacket pocket. The envelope was still there and seemed reasonably thick.
Shion grinned. ‘It was the object in the other pocket that persuaded me to keep my hands to myself.’
He was referring to Koki’s pistol. Unless Shion had exchanged it for a brick, Taro could feel its presence in a jacket pocket as well.
‘He has been told he’s taking you to Aokigahara Woods,’ Shion continued, ‘but he would take you all the way to the Okinawa Islands with the kind of money you’ve got.’
‘Aokigahara Woods will do,’ affirmed Taro.
‘Well, I’ll always be your friend,’ said Shion, reaching out to shake Toki’s hand. ‘Or at least I will be friends with the woman on your chest. She’s stunning and she will never let any man hold her hand. She will be the perfect guide into the suicide forest.’
44
There was a warning sign: “If you are contemplating suicide, please reconsider.” The sign was by the walking track and the words were in bold print. At the bottom of the sign there were details in smaller print, including a hotline to call. Taro walked right past it on his hike with barely a glance.
The forest around the track was dense, dark and cool. Mosquitoes and leaches were ready to pounce at the slightest opportunity and there were numerous other more patient bugs lurking in the dense forest that would feast on Taro given the chance. And they would get their chance. Aokigahara Forest was littered with the skeletons of lost souls who had been just like Taro, looking for a way out when all was lost. At the base of Mount Fuji was where they had found it. Sometimes the bodies were discovered quickly, sometimes they remained hidden until the annual police, volunteer and journalist search picked them up.
Although there was a haunted silence emanating through the forest, Taro’s ears were ringing from the hip hop music Ryota had been blaring all the way there. The man had barely spoken to him during the whole journey. He had barked at him to take off his business jacket on account of its conspicuousness in a removalist van. And he had told Taro where to get out on the edge of the forest.
Taro had gone along with everything. Shion was right that he couldn’t have reached Aokigahara Woods without this kind of assistance. Now he was here and at last he felt back in control of his life - even if it turned out to be merely to find a quiet place to put to work the belt around his waist.
‘Excuse me. Have you seen a man in a red jacket?’
Taro shuddered with surprise. The man came from nowhere. He was middle aged with large glasses and a bald patch. He had on a backpack and there was a water bottle attached to his belt. The man possessed the stern demeanour of officialdom but he was certainly too awkward to be a cop. Taro relaxed ever so slightly.
‘No, I haven’t.’
The man dabbed his perspiring forehead with a large piece of square blue cloth. He continued walking up the track towards Taro.
‘I thought he may have come this way. I saw him back down at the picnic area. He was behaving suspiciously. I thought he might have been contemplating suicide.’
‘Really?’
The man reached Taro. He sighed and put his hands on his hips, looking around the forest. ‘I called after him and he ran. That might mean he was up to something or it might just mean he was jumpy. There are plenty of people who think this place is full of ghosts.’ He looked at Taro more intently. ‘You didn’t see him then?’
Taro shook his head.
The man held up an unlabelled bottle of pills. ‘He dropped these. They might have been his intended method of suicide. Then again they might be legitimate medication which he depends on. I’m just a volunteer here. I’m not a doctor.’
He didn’t see the punch coming. He fell to the ground, blood streaming from his nose.
Taro picked the bottle out of his hand. ‘He might depend on them but I want them. Don’t worry, if I see him out there, I’ll share the bottle. As for you,’ he kicked the man in the stomach, ‘you don’t even have the decency to let someone who’s been hounded all his life do something about it. If your only reason for living is trying to give other people a reason to live, I should kill you right here.’
The man pulled a phone out of his pocket and fumbled over it in a desperate attempt to call for help. Taro stomped on it and the fingers holding it. The subsequent scream did not quell the usual chattering of the forest - this was a place that had grown well used to screams.
The man tried to talk to Taro, only for the air to be kicked out of his lungs.
‘You think I’m being cute?’ Taro yelled. ‘You think your will to live is bullet proof. It’s people like you that have made this world so empty and all you’ve left for people like me is to rehabilitate or else.’ He extracted his gun and brushed the man’s cheek with the barrel. ‘I could blow your head off right now and people would just think you’d decided to join the fun of the forest.’ He straightened up and unscrewed the medicine bottle. ‘Let’s see what one of these tastes like.’ He plucked out one of the powdery white pills and bit down on it with his back molars. ‘Not bad at all. It fizzes off the tongue. You must want to try one.’ Taro pried open the man’s jaw and tipped some of the pills into it.
The man was too oxygen deprived to spit them out. He started choking. Taro unclipped the water bottle off his belt and tapped a couple down the man’s throat. He grabbed onto the man’s forehead and held it still.
‘If it doesn’t kill you,’ said Taro, ‘at least it’ll put some revenge in your heart. You’ll know that buried away in the suicide statistics are a few like me. Better to forsake the lot.’ He dropped more pills into the man’s mouth. ‘Wow, there won’t be any left at this rate.’
There came the cracking of twigs and the pounding of feet. It sounded like a charging animal. Before Taro could turn, two large hands pushed into him. He was flung away, landing heavily on a bed of rocks and branches to the side of the track. He didn’t relinquish his grip on the pistol; he took aim at his attacker.
It was an old man. His white hair and beard contrasted sharply with his darkly suntanned skin. He was lean and lithe despite his years. He held out his hands in surrender. There was a thin smile on his face.
‘I bleed, son,’ he said. ‘Be careful.’
The hands were strong and calloused. They had thrown Taro a long way. Not since Aso’s room had Taro been dealt with so comprehensively. The only difference was now he had a gun to call on.
‘Yes, you do,’ said Taro, ‘and maybe I’ll blow a hole into you just to prove it.’
The man’s smile widened, the corners of his mouth disappearing into his beard. He casually undid the buttons of his short sleeve shirt and pulled it open. Amongst the chest and stomach muscle was a shockingly long, contorted scar. ‘You don’t need to prove anything,’ he whispered, his eyes searing with life. He set about rebuttoning his shirt. He glanced down at the Good Samaritan on the ground who was frantically coughing and spitting pills from his mouth. ‘I’m going to help your friend over here,’ he said to Taro. ‘And then I’m going to help you.’
‘You got of lucky the first time,’ Taro said as he picked himself up. ‘Try saving me again and I’ll blow your head off.’ He sprinted away deeper into the forest.
45
Taro was sitting back against a tree in a quiet patch of forest; he had just put the pistol into his mouth when a large blackbird swooped overhead and landed on a branch. It was so black it might have been dipped in oil. It hopped and settled into its perch on the nearest tree to Taro’s.
Had it seen this before? Perhaps it knew what he was going to do. Were blackbirds some kind of vulture? Was it waiting to feast on his corpse? Taro was repulsed by
the thought.
‘You’d better talk a walk,’ he said menacingly. ‘I don’t want you near me.’
The crow seemed to look away a moment but its near eye soon came back to Taro. Taro carefully aimed his pistol at it and fired. Despite the sharp recoil, there was an explosion of feathers and blood as he hit his target. Taro walked up to where the crow had fallen. The body was decimated but the head was still intact. Taro picked it up and returned to his position. The eyes were still staring at him.
‘Court is now in session,’ said Taro. ‘The charge is murder. Crow, is this the man that shot you?’ Taro nodded the head. ‘Did you do anything to provoke this action?’ He shook the head. ‘So, you were an innocent bird sitting on a branch? You didn’t have a mind to eat his dead body? Or to call in your friends to share the feast?’ He shook its head. ‘Well, the court’s verdict is clearly guilty. Would you like to have the death penalty applied?’ He nodded its head. ‘That’s understandable. It was a very callous crime. Would you like the bullet to go in the head or in the stomach?’ He pointed the beak at his neck. ‘In the neck? That would be very slow and messy. You’re a very nasty crow, aren’t you? The neck is closer to the head than it is the stomach, so the head it will be. That will be the court’s decision.’
Taro noticed drops of blackbird’s blood running down his wrist. ‘Disgusting.’ He