Killing Commendatore

Killing Commendatore (2018)

Haruki Murakami - born in Kyoto in 1949 and now lives near Tokyo. His work has been translated into more than fifty languages, and the most recent of his many international honors is the Hans Christian Andersen Literature Award, whose previous recipients include J. K. Rowling, Isabel Allende, and Salman Rushdie. www.harukimurakami.com

(Translated from the Japanese by Philip Gabriel and Ted Goossen) 

 

 

 

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Chapter 2 -  They Might All Go To The Moon

I am very sorry, but I don’t think I can live with you anymore,” my wife said in a quiet voice. Then she was silent for a long while.

This announcement took me by complete surprise. It was so unexpected I didn’t know how to respond, and I waited for her to go on. What she’d say next wasn’t going to be very upbeat—I was certain about that—but waiting for her to continue was the most I could manage.

We were seated across from each other at the kitchen table. A Sunday afternoon in the middle of March. Our sixth wedding anniversary was the middle of the following month. A cold rain had been falling since morning. The first thing I did when I heard her news was turn toward the window and check out the rain. It was a quiet, gentle rain, with hardly any wind. Still, it was the kind of rain that carried with it a chill that slowly but surely seeped into the skin. Cold like this meant that spring was still a long ways off. The orangish Tokyo Tower was visible through the misty rain. The sky was bereft of birds. All of them must have quietly sought shelter.

“I don’t want you to ask me why. Can you do that?” my wife asked.

I shook my head slightly. Neither yes nor no. I had no idea what to say, and just reflexively shook my head.

She had on a thin, light purple sweater with a wide neckline. The soft strap of her white camisole was visible beside her collarbone. It looked like some special kind of pasta used in some specific recipe.

Finally, I was able to speak. “I do have one question, though,” I said, gazing blankly at that strap. My voice was stiff, dry, and flat.

“I’ll answer, if I can.”

“Is this my fault?”

She thought this over. Then, like someone who has been underwater for a long time, she finally broke through to the surface and took a deep, slow breath.

“Not directly, no.”

“Not directly?”

“I don’t think so.”

I considered the subtle tone of her voice. Like checking the weight of an egg in my palm. “Meaning that I am, indirectly?”

She didn’t answer.

“A few days ago, just before dawn, I had a dream,” she said instead. “A very realistic dream, the kind where you can’t distinguish between what is real and what’s in your mind. And when I woke up that’s what I thought. I was certain of it, I mean. That I can’t live with you anymore.”

“What kind of dream was it?”

She shook her head. “I’m sorry, but I can’t tell you that here.”

“Because dreams are personal?”

“I suppose.”

“Was I in the dream?” I asked.

“No, you weren’t. So in that sense, too, it’s not your fault.”

Just to make sure I got it all, I summarized what she’d just said. When I don’t know what to say I have a habit of summarizing. (A habit that, obviously, can be really irritating.)

“So, a few days ago you had a very realistic dream. And when you woke up you were certain you can’t live with me anymore. But you can’t tell me what the dream was about, since dreams are personal. Did I get that right?”

She nodded. “Yes. That’s about the size of it.”

“But that doesn’t explain a thing.”

She rested her hands on the tabletop, staring down at the inside of her coffee cup, as if an oracle was floating there and she was deciphering the message. From the look in her eyes the words must have been very symbolic and ambiguous.

My wife puts great stock in dreams. She often makes decisions based on dreams she had, or changes her decisions accordingly. But no matter how crucial you think dreams can be, you can’t just reduce six years of marriage to nothing because of one vivid dream, no matter how memorable.

“The dream was just a trigger, that’s all,” she said, as if reading my mind. “Having that dream made lots of things clear for me.”

“If you pull a trigger, a bullet will come out.”

“Excuse me?”

“A trigger is a critical part of a gun. ‘Just a trigger’ isn’t the right expression.”

She stared at me silently, as if she couldn’t understand what I was getting at. I don’t blame her. I couldn’t understand it myself.

“Are you seeing someone else?” I asked.

She nodded.

“And you’re sleeping with him?”

“Yes, and I feel bad about it.”

Maybe I should have asked her who it was, and when it had started. But I didn’t want to know. I didn’t want to think about those things. So I gazed again outside the window at the falling rain. Why hadn’t I noticed all this before?

“This was just one element among many,” my wife said.

I looked around the room. I’d lived there a long time, and it should have been familiar, but it had now transformed into a scene from a remote, strange land.

Just one element?

What does that mean, just one? I gave it some thought. She was having sex with some man other than me. But that was “just one element.” Then what were all the others?

“I’ll move out in a few days,” my wife said. “So you don’t need to do anything. I’m responsible, so I should be the one who leaves.”

“You already decided where you’re going to go?”

She didn’t answer, but seemed to have already decided on a place. She must have made all kinds of preparations before bringing this up with me. When I realized this, I felt helpless, as if I’d lost my footing in the darkness. Things had been steadily moving forward, and I’d been totally oblivious.

“I’ll get the divorce procedures going as quickly as I can,” my wife said, “and I’d like you to be responsive. I’m being selfish, I know.”

I turned from the rain and gazed at her. And once again it struck me. We’d lived under the same roof for six years, yet I knew next to nothing about this woman. In the same way that people stare up at the sky to see the moon every night, yet understand next to nothing about it.

“I have one request,” I ventured. “If you’ll grant me this, I’ll do whatever you say. And I’ll sign the divorce papers.”

“What is it?”

“That I’m the one who leaves here. And I do it today. I’d like you to stay behind.”

“Today?” she asked, surprised.

“The sooner the better, right?”

She thought it over. “If that’s what you want,” she said.

“It is, and that’s all I want.”

Those were my honest feelings. As long as I wasn’t left behind alone in this wretched, cruel place, in the cold March rain, I didn’t care what happened.

“And I’ll take the car with me. Are you okay with that?”

I really didn’t need to ask. The car was an old, stick-shift model a friend of mine had let me have for next to nothing back before I got married. It had well over sixty thousand miles on it. And besides, my wife didn’t even have a driver’s license.

“I’ll come back later to get my painting materials and clothes and things. Does that work for you?”

“Sure, that’s fine. By ‘later,’ how much later do you mean?”

“I have no idea,” I said. I couldn’t wrap my mind around the future. There was barely any ground left under my feet. Just remaining upright was all I could manage.

“I might not stay here all that long,” my wife said, sounding reluctant.

“Everyone might go to the moon,” I said.

She seemed not to have caught it. “Sorry?”

“Nothing. It’s not important.”

By seven that evening I’d stuffed my belongings into an oversized gym bag and thrown that into the trunk of my red Peugeot 205. Some changes of clothes, toiletries, a few books and diaries. A simple camping set I had always had for hiking. Sketchbooks and a set of drawing pencils. Other than these few items, I had no idea what else to take. It’s okay, I told myself, if I need anything I can buy it somewhere. While I packed the gym bag and went in and out of the apartment, she was still seated at the kitchen table. The coffee cup was still on top of the table, and she continued to stare inside it…

“I have a request, too,” she said. “Even if we break up like this, can we still be friends?”

I couldn’t grasp what she was trying to say. I’d finished tugging on my shoes, had shouldered the bag, and stood, one hand on the doorknob, to stare at her.

“Be friends?”

“I’d like to meet and talk sometimes. If possible, I mean.”

I still couldn’t understand what she meant. Be friends? Meet and talk sometimes? What would we talk about? It’s like she’d posed a riddle. What could she be trying to convey to me? That she didn’t have any bad feelings toward me? Was that it?

“I’m not sure about that,” I said. I couldn’t think of anything more to say. If I’d stood there a whole week, running this through my head, I doubt I’d have found anything more to add. So I opened the door and stepped outside.

When I left the apartment I hadn’t given any thought to what I was wearing. If I’d had on a bathrobe over pajamas, I probably wouldn’t have noticed. Later on, when I looked at myself in a full-length mirror in a restroom at a drive-in, I saw I had on a sweater that I favored while working, a gaudy orange down jacket, jeans, and work boots. And an old knit cap. There were white paint stains here and there on the frayed, green, round-neck sweater. The only new item I had on were the jeans, their bright blue too conspicuous. A random collection of clothes, but not too peculiar. My one regret was not having brought a scarf.

When I pulled the car out from the parking lot underneath the apartment building, the cold March rain was still falling. The Peugeot’s wipers sounded like an old man’s raspy, hoarse cough.

I had no clue where to go, so for a while I drove aimlessly around Tokyo. At the intersection at Nishi Azabu, I drove down Gaien Boulevard toward Aoyama, turned right at Aoyama Sanchome toward Akasaka, and after a few more turns found myself in Yotsuya. I stopped at a gas station and filled up the tank. I had them check the oil and tire pressure for me, and top off the windshield washer fluid. I might be in for a very long trip. For all I knew I might even go all the way to the moon.

I paid with my credit card, and headed down the road again. A rainy Sunday night, not much traffic. I switched on an FM station, but it was all pointless chatter, a cacophony of shrill voices. Sheryl Crow’s first CD was in the CD player, and I listened to the first three songs and then turned it off.

I suddenly realized I was driving down Mejiro Boulevard. It took a while before I could figure out which direction I was going—from Waseda toward Nerima. The silence got to me and I turned on the CD again and listened to Sheryl Crow for a few more songs. And then switched it off again. The silence was too quiet, the music too noisy. Though silence was preferable, a little. The only thing that reached me was the scrape of the worn-out wipers, the endless hiss of the tires on the wet pavement.

In the midst of that silence I imagined my wife in the arms of another man.

I should have picked up on that, at least, a long time ago. So how come I didn’t think of it? We hadn’t had sex for months. Even when I tried to get her to, she’d come up with all kinds of reasons to turn me down. Actually, I think she’d lost interest in having sex for some time before that. But I’d figured it was just a stage. She must be tired from working every day, and wasn’t feeling up to it. But now I knew she was sleeping with another man. When had that started? I searched my memory. Probably four or five months ago, would be my guess. Four or five months ago would make it October or November.

But for the life of me I couldn’t recall what had happened back in October or November. I mean, I could barely recall what had happened yesterday.

I paid attention to the road—so as not to run any red lights, or get too close to the car in front of me—and mentally reviewed what had happened last fall. I thought so hard about it that it felt like the core of my brain was going to overheat. My right hand unconsciously changed gears to adjust to the flow of traffic. My left foot stepped on the clutch in time with this. I’d never been so happy that my car was a stick shift. Besides mulling over my wife’s affair, it gave me something to do to keep my hands and feet busy.

So what had happened back in October or November?

An autumn evening. I’m picturing my wife on a large bed, and some man undressing her. I thought of the straps on her white camisole. And the pink nipples that lay underneath. I didn’t want to visualize all this, but once one image came to me, I couldn’t stop. I sighed, and pulled into the parking lot of a drive-in restaurant. I rolled down the driver’s-side window, took a deep breath of the damp air outside, and slowly got my heart rate back to normal. I stepped out of the car. With my knit cap on but no umbrella I made my way through the fine drizzle and went inside the restaurant. I sat down in a booth in the back.

The restaurant was nearly empty. A waitress came over and I ordered coffee and a ham-and-cheese sandwich. As I drank the coffee I closed my eyes and calmed down. I tried my best to erase the image of my wife and another man in bed. But the vision wouldn’t leave me.

I went to the restroom, gave my hands a good scrub, and checked myself in the mirror over the sink. My eyes looked smaller than usual, and bloodshot, like a woodland animal slowly fading away from famine, gaunt and afraid. I wiped my hands and face with a thick handkerchief, then studied myself in the full-length mirror on the wall. What I saw there was an exhausted thirty-six-year-old man in a shabby, paint-spattered sweater.

As I gazed at my reflection I wondered, Where am I headed? Before that, though, the question was Where have I come to? Where is this place? No, before that even I needed to ask, Who the hell am I?

As I stared at myself in the mirror, I thought about what it would be like to paint my own portrait. Say I were to try, what sort of self would I end up painting? Would I be able to find even a shred of affection for myself? Would I be able to discover even one thing shining within me?

These questions unanswered, I returned to my seat. When I finished my coffee the waitress came over and refilled my cup. I asked her for a paper bag and put the untouched sandwich in it. I should be hungry later on. But right now I didn’t want to eat anything.

I left the drive-in, and drove down the road until I saw the sign for the entrance to the Kan-Etsu Expressway. I decided to get on the highway and head north. I had no idea what lay north, but somehow I got the sense that heading north was better than going south. I wanted to go somewhere cold and clean. More important than north or south, however, was getting away from this city.

I opened the glove compartment and found five or six CDs inside. One of them was a performance of Mendelssohn’s Octet by I Musici. My wife liked to listen to it when we went on drives. An unusual setup with a double string quartet, but a beautiful melody. Mendelssohn was only sixteen when he composed the piece. My wife told me this. A child prodigy.

What were you doing when you were sixteen?

I called up the past. When I was sixteen I was crazy over a girl in my class.

Did you go out with her?

No, I barely said a word to her. I just looked at her from a distance. I wasn’t brave enough to speak up. When I went home I used to sketch her. I did quite a few drawings.

So you’ve done the same thing from way back when, my wife said, laughing.

True, I’ve done the same thing from way back when.

True, I’ve done the same thing from way back when, I said, mentally repeating the words I’d spoken to her.

I took the Sheryl Crow CD out of the player and slipped in an MJQ album. Pyramid. I listened to Milt Jackson’s pleasant, bluesy solo as I headed down the highway toward the north. I’d make the occasional stop at a service area, take a long piss, and drink a couple of cups of hot black coffee, but other than that I drove all night. I drove in the slow lane, only speeding up to pass trucks. I didn’t feel sleepy, strangely enough. It felt like I’d never be sleepy again in my whole life. And just before dawn I reached the Japan Sea coast.

In Niigata I turned right and drove north along the coast, from Yamagata to Akita Prefecture, then through Aomori into Hokkaido. I didn’t take any highways, and drove leisurely down back roads. In all senses of the word I was in no hurry. When night came I’d check in to a cheap business hotel or run-down Japanese inn, flop down on the narrow bed, and sleep. Thankfully I can fall asleep right away just about anywhere, in any type of bed.

On the morning of the second day, near Murakami City, I phoned my agent and told him I wouldn’t be able to do any portrait painting for a while. I had a few commissions I was in the middle of, but wasn’t in a place where I could do any work.

“That’s a problem, since you’ve already accepted the commissions,” the agent said, his tone harsh.

I apologized. “There’s nothing I can do about it. Could you tell the clients I got in a car accident or something? There are other artists who could take over, I’m sure.”

My agent was silent for a time. Up till now I’d never missed a deadline. He knew how seriously I took my work.

“Something came up, and I’ll be away from Tokyo for a while. I’m sorry, but in the meantime I can’t do any painting.”

“How long is ‘for a while’?”

I couldn’t answer. I switched off the cell phone, found a nearby river, parked my car on the bridge over it, and tossed that small communication device into the water. I felt sorry toward him, but I had to get him to give up on me. Have him think I’d gone to the moon or something.

In Akita I stopped at a bank, withdrew some cash, and checked my balance. There was still a decent amount in my personal account. Credit card payments were automatically deducted…For the time being I had enough to continue my trip. I wasn’t using that much each day. Gas money, nights in business hotels, that’s about the size of it.

At an outlet store outside Hakodate I purchased a simple tent and a sleeping bag. Hokkaido in early spring was still cold, so I also bought some thermal underwear. Whenever I arrived in a place, I looked for an open campground, set up my tent, and slept there, in order to save money. Hard snow still covered the ground and the nights were cold, but because I’d been spending nights in cramped, stuffy business hotel rooms I felt relieved and free inside the tent. Hard ground below, the endless sky above. Countless stars sparkling in the sky. That and nothing else.

For the next three weeks I wandered all over Hokkaido in my Peugeot. April came, but it looked like the snow wasn’t going to melt anytime soon. Still, the color of the sky visibly changed, and plants began to bud. Whenever I ran across a small town with a hot springs I’d stay in an inn there, enjoy the bath, wash my hair and shave, and have a decent meal. Even so, when I weighed myself I found I’d lost eleven pounds.

I didn’t read any newspapers or watch TV. My car radio had started acting up from the time I arrived in Hokkaido, and soon I couldn’t hear anything on it at all. I had no clue what was happening in the world at large, and didn’t care to know. I stopped once in Tomakomai and did laundry at a laundromat. While I waited for the clothes to finish I went to a nearby barbershop and got a haircut and shave. At the shop I saw the NHK news on TV for the first time in a long while. I say “saw,” but even with my eyes closed I could hear the announcer’s voice, whether I wanted to or not. From start to finish, though, the news had nothing to do with me, like events happening on some other planet. Or else some fake stories somebody had cooked up for the fun of it.

The only news story that hit home was a report on a seventy-three-year-old man in Hokkaido who’d gone mushroom gathering in the mountains and been attacked and killed by a bear. When bears wake from hibernation, the announcer said, they’re hungry and irritable and very dangerous. I slept in my tent sometimes, and when the mood struck me I took walks in the woods, so it wouldn’t have been strange if I were the one who’d been attacked. It just happened to be that old man who got attacked, and not me. But even hearing that news I felt no sympathy for the old man who’d been so cruelly butchered by a bear. No empathy came to me for the pain and fear and shock he must have experienced. I felt more sympathy for the bear. No, “sympathy” isn’t the right word, I thought. It’s more like a feeling of complicity.

Something’s wrong with me, I thought as I stared at myself in the mirror. I said this aloud, in a small voice. It’s like something’s messed up with my brain. Better not get near anyone. For the time being, at least.

Toward the latter half of April I was sick and tired of the cold, so I bid Hokkaido farewell and crossed back over to the mainland. I drove from Aomori to Iwate, from Iwate to Miyagi, along the Pacific coast. The weather got more springlike the farther south I drove. And all the while I thought about my wife. About her, and the anonymous hands caressing her this very moment in bed somewhere. I didn’t want to think about it, but I couldn’t think of anything else.

The first time I met my wife was just before I turned thirty. She was three years younger than me. She worked in a small architecture firm in Yotsuya, held a second-level architect certificate, and was a former high school classmate of the girl I was dating at the time. She had straight hair, wore little makeup, and had rather calm-looking features (her personality was not all that calm, but I only understood that later on). My girlfriend and I were on a date and happened to run into her at a restaurant. We were introduced, and I basically fell for her right then and there.

She wasn’t exactly a standout in terms of looks. There wasn’t anything at all wrong with her appearance, but neither was there anything about her that would turn any heads. She had long eyelashes, a thin nose, was on the small side, and her hair, which fell to her shoulder blades, was beautifully styled. (She was very particular about her hair.) On the right side of her full lips was a small mole, which moved in marvelous ways whenever her expression changed. It lent her a slightly sensual air, but again this was only if you paid close attention. Most people would see the girl I was going out with at the time as far more beautiful. But even so, one look was all it took for me to fall for her, like I’d been struck by lightning. Why? I wondered. It took a few weeks for me to figure out the reason. But then it suddenly hit me. She reminded me of my younger sister, who had died. Reminded me very clearly of her.

Not that they looked alike on the outside. If you were to compare photos of the two of them, most people would be hard-pressed to find any resemblance. Which is why at first I didn’t see the connection either. It wasn’t anything specific about her looks that made me remember my younger sister, but the way her expression changed, especially the way her eyes moved and sparkled, was amazingly like my sister’s. It was like magic or something had brought back the past, right before my very eyes.

My sister had also been three years younger than me, and had a congenital heart valve problem. She’d had numerous operations when she was little, and though they were successful, there were lingering aftereffects. Her doctors had no idea if those aftereffects would get better on their own, or cause some life-threatening issues. In the end, she died when I was fifteen. She’d just entered junior high. All her short life she’d battled those genetic defects, but never failed to be anything other than positive and upbeat. Until the very end she never grumbled or complained, and always made detailed plans for the future. That she would die so young was not something she factored into her plans. She was naturally bright, always with outstanding grades (a lot better a child than I was). She had a strong will, and always stuck to whatever she decided to do, no matter what. If she and I ever quarreled—a pretty rare occurrence—I always gave in. At the end she was terribly thin and drawn, yet her eyes remained animated, and she was still full of life.

It was my wife’s eyes, too, that drew me to her. Something I could see deep in them. When I first saw those eyes, they jolted me. Not that I was thinking that by making her mine I could restore my dead sister or anything. Even if I’d wanted to, I could imagine the only thing that would lead to was despair. What I wanted, or needed, was the spark of that positive will. That definite source of warmth needed to live. It was something I knew very well, but that was, most likely, missing in me.

I managed to get her contact info, and asked her on a date. She was surprised, of course, and hesitated. I was, after all, her friend’s boyfriend. But I kept at it. I just want to see you, and talk, I told her. Just meet and talk, that’s all. I’m not looking for anything else. We had dinner in a quiet restaurant, and talked about all kinds of things. Our conversation was a little nervous and awkward at first, but then became more animated. There was so much I wanted to know about her, and I had plenty to talk about. I found out that her birthday and my sister’s were only three days apart.

“Do you mind if I sketch you?” I asked.

“Right here?” she asked, glancing around. We were seated at the restaurant, and had just ordered dessert.

“I’ll finish before they’re back with dessert,” I said.

“Then I guess I don’t mind,” she replied doubtfully.

I took out the small sketchbook I always carried with me, and quickly sketched her face with a 2B pencil. As promised, I finished before our desserts arrived. The important part was, of course, her eyes. That’s what I wanted to draw most. Back within those eyes there was a deep world, a world beyond time.

I showed her the sketch, and she seemed to like it.

“It’s very full of life.”

“That’s because you are,” I said.

She gazed for a long time at the sketch, apparently taken with it. As if she were seeing a self she hadn’t known before.

“If you like it, I’ll give it to you.”

“I can have it?” she said.

“Of course. It’s just a quick sketch.”

“Thank you.”

After this we went on more dates, and eventually became lovers. It all happened so naturally. My girlfriend, though, was shocked that her friend stole me away. She was probably thinking that we might get married. So of course she was upset (though I doubt I ever would have married her). My wife, too, was going out with someone else at the time, and their breakup wasn’t easy either. There were other obstacles to overcome, but the upshot was that half a year later we were married. We had a small party with a handful of close friends to celebrate, and settled into a condo in Hiroo. Her uncle owned the condo and gave us a good deal on rent. I used one small room as my studio and focused on my portrait work. This was no longer just a temporary job. Now that I was married I needed a steady income, and other than portrait painting I had no means of earning a decent living. My wife commuted from our place by subway to the architecture firm in Yotsuya. And it sort of naturally came about that I was the one who took care of everyday housework, which I didn’t mind at all. I never minded doing housework, and found it a nice break from painting. At any rate it was far more pleasant to do housework than commute every day to a job and be forced to do work behind a desk.

I think for both of us our first few years of marriage were calm and fulfilling. Before long we settled into a pleasant daily rhythm. On weekends and holidays I’d take a break from painting and we’d go out. Sometimes to an art exhibition, sometimes hiking outside the city. At other times we’d just wander around town. We had intimate talks, and for both of us it was important to regularly update each other. We spoke honestly, and openly, about what was going on in our lives, exchanging opinions, sharing feelings.

For me, though, there was one thing I never opened up about to her: the fact that her eyes reminded me so much of my sister who’d died at twelve, and that that was the main reason I’d been attracted to her. Without those eyes I probably never would have tried to win her over as eagerly as I did. But I felt it was better not to tell her that, and until the very end I didn’t. That was the sole secret I kept from her. What secrets she may have kept from me—and I imagine there were some—I have no idea.

My wife’s name was Yuzu, the name of the citrus fruit used in cooking. Sometimes when we were in bed I’d call her Sudachi, a similar type of fruit, as a joke. I’d whisper this in her ear. She’d always laugh, but it upset her all the same.

“I’m not Sudachi, but Yuzu. They’re similar but not the same,” she’d insist.

When did things start to go south for us? As I drove on, from one roadside restaurant to another, one business hotel to another, randomly moving from point A to point B, I thought about this. But I couldn’t pinpoint where things had begun to go wrong. For a long time I was sure we were doing fine. Of course, like many couples, we had some issues and disagreements. Our main issue was whether or not to have children. But we still had time before we had to make a final decision. Other than that one problem (one we could postpone for the time being), we had a basically healthy marriage, on both an emotional and physical level. I was sure of that.

Why had I been so optimistic? Or so stupid? It’s like I’d been born with a blind spot, and was always missing something. And what I missed was always the most important thing of all.

In the mornings, after I saw my wife off to work, I’d focus on my painting, then after lunch would take a walk around the neighborhood, do some shopping while I was at it, and then get things ready for dinner. Two or three times a week I’d go swimming in a nearby sports club. When my wife got back we’d have a beer or some wine together. If she called me saying she had to work overtime and would grab something near the office, I’d sit by myself and have a simple dinner alone. Our six years together were mostly a repeat of those kinds of days. And I was basically okay with that.

Things were busy at the architecture firm, and she often had to work overtime. I gradually had to eat dinner alone more often. Sometimes she wouldn’t get back until nearly midnight. “Things have gotten so hectic at work,” she’d explain. One of her colleagues suddenly changed jobs, she said, and she had to pick up the slack. The firm was reluctant to hire new staff. Whenever she came home late, she was exhausted and would just take a shower and go to sleep. So the number of times we had sex went way down. Sometimes she even had to go in on days off, too, to finish her work. Of course I believed her. There wasn’t any reason not to.

But maybe she wasn’t working overtime at all. While I was eating dinner alone at home, she may have been enjoying some intimate time in a hotel bed with a new lover.

My wife was outgoing. She seemed quiet and gentle but was sharp and quick-witted, and needed situations where she could be more social and gregarious. And I wasn’t able to provide those. So Yuzu went out to eat a lot with women friends (she had lots of friends) and would go out drinking with work colleagues (she could hold her liquor better than me). And I never complained about her going out on her own and enjoying herself. In fact I might have encouraged it.

When I think about it, my younger sister and I had the same kind of relationship. I’ve always been more of a stay-at-home type, and when I got back from school I’d hole up in my room to read or draw. My sister was much more sociable and outgoing. So our everyday interests and activities didn’t overlap much. But we understood each other well, and valued each other’s special qualities. It might have been pretty unusual for an older brother and younger sister the ages we were, but we talked over lots of things together. Summer or winter, we’d climb up to the balcony upstairs where we hung our laundry, and talk forever. We loved to share funny stories, and often had each other in stitches.

I’m not saying that’s the reason why, but I felt secure about the relationship my wife and I had. I accepted my role in our marriage—as the silent, auxiliary partner—as natural, self-evident even. But maybe Yuzu didn’t. There must have been aspects of our marriage that dissatisfied her. She and my sister were, after all, different people with different personalities. And of course, I wasn’t a teenage boy anymore.

By May I was getting tired of driving day after day. And sick of the same thoughts looping endlessly around in my head. The same questions spun around in my brain, with no answers in sight. Sitting all day in the driver’s seat had given me a backache, as well. A Peugeot 205 is an economy car, and the seats weren’t exactly high quality, the suspension noticeably worn out. All the road glare I’d stared at for hours was giving me chronic eyestrain. I realized I’d been driving pretty much nonstop for over a month and half, restlessly moving from one spot to another as if something were chasing me.

I ran across a small, rustic therapeutic hot springs in the mountains near the border between Miyagi and Iwate, and decided to take a break. An obscure hot springs tucked away deep in a valley, with a small inn that locals would stay in for days to rest and recuperate. The room rate was cheap, and there was a communal kitchen where you could cook simple meals. I enjoyed soaking in the baths and sleeping as much as I wanted. I sprawled on the tatami, read, and recovered from the exhaustion of all that driving. When I got tired of reading I’d take out my sketchbook and draw. It had been a long time since I’d felt like drawing. I started off sketching flowers and trees in the garden, then drew the rabbits they kept there. Just rough pencil sketches, but people were impressed. Some asked me to draw their portraits. Fellow lodgers, and people who worked at the inn. People just passing through my life, people I’d never see again. And if they asked, I’d give them the sketches.

Time to get back to Tokyo, I told myself. Going on like this would get me nowhere. And I wanted to paint again. Not commissioned portraits, or rough sketches, but paintings I could really concentrate on, and undertake for myself. Whether this would work out or not I had no clue, but it was time to take the first step.

I’d planned to drive my Peugeot across the Tohoku region and return to Tokyo, but just before Iwaki, along Highway 6, my car breathed its last. There was a crack in the fuel line and the car wouldn’t start. I’d done hardly any maintenance on the car up till then, so I couldn’t complain when it gave out. The one lucky thing was that the car gave up the ghost right near a garage where a friendly mechanic worked. It was hard to get parts for an old Peugeot in a place like that, and would take time. Even if we repair it, the mechanic told me, it’s likely something else will soon go wrong. The fan belts looked sketchy, the brake pads were ready to go, and the suspension was nearly shot. “My advice? Put it out of its misery,” he said. The car had been with me for a month and a half on the road, and now had nearly seventy-five thousand miles on the odometer. It was sad to say goodbye to the Peugeot, but I had to leave it behind. It felt like the car had died in my stead.

To thank him for disposing of the car for me, I gave the mechanic my tent, sleeping bag, and camping equipment. I made one last sketch of the Peugeot, and then, shouldering my gym bag, boarded the Joban Line and went back to Tokyo. From the station I called Masahiko Amada and explained my situation. My marriage fell apart and I went on a trip for a while, I told him, but now I’m back in Tokyo. Do you know of any place I could stay? I asked.

I do know of a good place, he said. It’s the house my father lived in for a long time by himself. He’s in a nursing home in Izu Kogen, and the house has been unoccupied for a time. It’s furnished and has everything you’d need, so you don’t have to get anything. It’s not exactly a convenient location, but the phone works. If that sounds good, you should try it out.

That’s perfect, I told him. I couldn’t have asked for more.

And so my new life, in a new place, began.

 

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Chapter 10 - As We Push Our Way Through the Lush Green Grass

When I was fifteen my younger sister died. It happened very suddenly. She was twelve then, in her first year of junior high. She had been born with a congenital heart problem, but since the time she was in the upper grades of elementary school she hadn’t shown any more symptoms, and our family had felt reassured, holding out the faint hope that her life would go on, without incident. But in May of that year her heartbeat became more irregular. It was especially bad when she lay down, and she suffered many sleepless nights. She underwent tests at the university hospital, but no matter how detailed the tests the doctors couldn’t pinpoint any changes in her physical condition. The basic issue was supposed to have been resolved back when she’d had her operations, and the doctors were baffled.

“Avoid strenuous exercise, and follow a regular routine, and things should settle down soon,” the doctor said. That was probably all he could say. And he wrote out a few prescriptions for her.

But her arrhythmia didn’t settle down. As I sat across from her at the dining table I often looked at her chest and imagined the defective heart inside it. Her breasts were beginning to noticeably develop. Her heart might have problems, but her flesh continued growing nonetheless. It felt strange to see my little sister’s breasts grow by the day. Up till then she’d just been a little child, but now she’d suddenly had her first period, and her breasts were slowly starting to take shape. Yet within that tiny chest, my sister’s heart was defective. And even a specialist couldn’t pinpoint the defect. That fact alone had my brain in constant turmoil. I spent my adolescence in a state of anxiety, fearful that, at any moment, I might lose my little sister.

My parents told me to watch over her, since her body was so delicate. While we attended the same elementary school I always kept my eye on her. If need be, I was willing to risk my life to protect her and her tiny heart. Though the opportunity never presented itself.

She was on her way home from junior high one day when she collapsed and lost consciousness while climbing the stairs at Seibu Shinjuku Station. She was rushed by ambulance to the nearest emergency room. By the time I got home and then raced to the hospital, her heart had already stopped. It all happened in the blink of an eye. That morning we’d eaten breakfast together, said goodbye to each other at the front door, me going off to high school, she to junior high. And the next time I saw her she’d stopped breathing. Her large eyes were closed forever, her mouth slightly open as if she were about to say something. Her developing breasts would never grow.

The next time I saw her she was in a coffin. She was dressed in her favorite black velvet dress, with a touch of makeup, her hair neatly combed. She had on black patent-leather shoes and lay faceup in the modestly sized coffin. The dress had a white lace collar, so white it looked unnatural.

Lying there, she appeared to be peacefully sleeping. Shake her lightly and she’d wake up, it seemed. But that was an illusion. Shake her all you want, but she would never awaken again.

I didn’t want my sister’s delicate little body to be stuffed into that cramped, confining box. Her body should be laid to rest on a much more spacious place. In the middle of a meadow, for instance. We would wordlessly go to visit her, pushing aside the lush green grass as we went. The wind would slowly rustle the grass, and birds and insects would call out from all around her. The raw smell of wildflowers would fill the air, pollen swirling. When night fell, the sky above her would be dotted with countless silvery stars. In the morning a new sun would make the dew on the blades of grass sparkle like jewels. But in reality she was packed away in some ridiculous coffin. The only decorations were ominous white flowers that had been snipped by scissors and stuck in vases. The narrow room had fluorescent lighting that was drained of color. From a small speaker set into the ceiling came the artificial strains of organ music.

I couldn’t stand to see her be cremated. When the coffin lid was shut and locked, I couldn’t take it anymore and left the cremation room. I didn’t help when the family ritually placed her bones inside a vase. I went out into the crematorium courtyard and cried soundlessly by myself. During her all-too-short life, I’d never once helped my little sister, a thought that hurt me deeply.

After my sister’s death, our family changed. My father became even more taciturn, my mother even more nervous and jumpy. Basically I kept on with the same life as always. I joined the mountaineering club at school, which kept me busy, and when I wasn’t doing that I started oil painting. My art teacher recommended that I find a good instructor and really study painting. And when I finally did start attending art classes, my interest became serious. I think I was trying to keep myself busy so I wouldn’t think about my dead sister.

For a long time, I’m not sure how many years, my parents kept her room exactly as it was. Textbooks and study guides, pens, erasers, and paper clips piled on her desk, the sheets, blankets, and pillows on her bed, her laundered and folded pajamas, her junior high school uniform hanging in the closet—all untouched. The calendar on the wall still had her schedule written in her tiny writing. It was left at the month she died, as if time had frozen solid at that point. It felt as if the door would open at any moment and she’d come inside. When no one else was at home I’d sometimes go into her room, sit down on the neatly made bed, and gaze around me. But I never touched anything. I didn’t want to disturb, even a little, any of the silent little objects left behind, signs that my sister had once been among the living.

I often tried to imagine what sort of life my sister would have had if she hadn’t died at twelve. Though there was no way I could know. I couldn’t even picture how my own life would turn out, so I had no idea what her future would have held. But I knew that if only she hadn’t had a problem with one of her heart valves, she would have grown to be a capable, attractive adult. I’m sure many men would have loved her, and held her gently in their arms. But I couldn’t picture any of that in detail. For me, she was forever my little sister, three years younger, who needed my protection.

For a time after she died I drew sketches of her, over and over. Reproducing in my sketchbook, from all different angles, my memory of her face, so I wouldn’t forget it. Not that I was about to forget her face. It will remain etched in my mind until the day I die. What I sought was not to forget the face I remembered at that point in time. In order to do that, I had to give form to it by drawing. I was only fifteen then, and there was so much I didn’t know about memory, drawing, and the flow of time. But one thing I did know was that I needed to do something in order to hold on to an accurate record of my memory. Leave it alone, and it would disappear somewhere. No matter how vivid a memory, the power of time was stronger. I knew this instinctively.

I would sit alone in her room on her bed, drawing her, sketching her face over and over. I tried to reproduce onto the blank paper how she looked in my mind’s eye. I lacked experience then, and the requisite technical skill, so it wasn’t an easy process. I’d draw, rip up my effort, draw and rip up, endlessly. But now when I look at the drawings I did keep (I still treasure my sketchbook from back then), I can see that they are filled with a genuine sense of grief. They may be technically immature, but it was a sincere effort, my own soul trying to awaken my sister’s. When I looked at those sketches, I couldn’t help but cry. I’ve done countless drawings since, but never again has anything I’ve drawn brought me to tears.

There’s one other effect my sister’s death had on me—a very severe case of claustrophobia. Ever since I saw her be placed in that cramped little coffin, the lid shut and locked tight, and taken away to the crematorium, I haven’t been able to go into tight, enclosed places. For a long time I couldn’t take elevators. I’d stand in front of an elevator and all I could think about was it automatically shutting down in an earthquake, with me trapped inside that confined space. Just the thought of it was enough to send me into a choking sense of panic.

These symptoms didn’t appear right after my sister’s death. It took nearly three years for them to surface. The first time I had a panic attack was soon after I started art school, when I had a part-time job with a moving company. I was the driver’s assistant in a covered truck, loading boxes and taking them out, and one time I got mistakenly locked inside the empty cargo compartment. Work was done for the day and the driver was checking to see if anything was left behind in the cargo compartment. He forgot to make sure if anyone was still inside, and locked the door from the outside.

About two and half hours passed until the door was opened and I was able to crawl out. That whole time I was locked inside a sealed, cramped, totally dark place. It wasn’t a refrigerated truck or anything, so there were gaps where air could get in. If I’d thought about it calmly, I would have known I wouldn’t suffocate.

But still, a terrible panic had me in its grip. There was plenty of oxygen, yet no matter how deeply I breathed in, I wasn’t able to absorb it. My breathing got more and more ragged and I started hyperventilating. I felt dizzy, like I was choking, and was overwhelmed by an inexplicable panic. It’s okay, calm down, I told myself. You’ll be able to get out soon. It’s impossible to suffocate here. But logic didn’t work. The only thing in my mind was my little sister, crammed into a tiny coffin, and hauled off to the crematorium. Completely terrified, I pounded on the walls of the truck.

The truck was in the company parking lot, and all the employees, their workday done, had gone home. Nobody noticed that I wasn’t around. I pounded like crazy, but no one seemed to hear. If I was unlucky I might be shut inside until morning. At the thought of that, it felt like all my muscles were about to disintegrate.

It was the night security guard, making his rounds of the parking lot, who finally heard the noise I was making and unlocked the door. When he saw how agitated and exhausted I was, he had me lie down on the bed in the company break room. And gave me a cup of hot tea. I don’t know how long I lay there. But finally my breathing became normal again. Dawn was coming, so I thanked the guard and took the first train of the day back home. I slipped into my own bed and lay there, shaking like crazy for the longest time.

Ever since then, riding elevators has triggered the same panic. The incident must have awoken a fear that had been lurking within me. And I have little doubt this was set off by memories of my dead sister. And it wasn’t only elevators, but any enclosed space. I couldn’t even watch movies with scenes set in submarines or tanks. Just imagining myself shut inside such confined spaces—merely imagining it—made me unable to breathe. Often I had to get up and leave the theater. If a scene came on of someone shut away in a confined space, I couldn’t stand to watch. That’s why I seldom watched movies with anyone else.

One time on a trip to Hokkaido I had no choice but to stay overnight in one of those capsule hotels. My breathing became labored, and I couldn’t sleep, so I went outside and spent the night inside my car. It was early spring in Hokkaido, still quite cold, and the whole night was like a nightmare.

My wife often kidded me about my panic attacks. When we had to go to a floor high up in a building she would precede me in the elevator and would wait there, enjoying me huffing and puffing my way up sixteen or so flights of stairs. But I never explained to her why I had that phobia. I just told her I’ve always had a fear of elevators.

“Well, it might be healthier for you to walk,” she said.

I also had a feeling akin to fear about women with larger than normal breasts. I don’t know if that has anything to do with my sister, or the way her breasts were just beginning to develop when she died. Still, I’ve always been attracted to women with more modest breasts, and every time I see them, every time I touch them, I remember my sister…Don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t sexually interested in my sister. I think I was just looking for a certain type of scene. A finite scene, lost and never to return.

On Saturday afternoon my hand was resting on the chest of my married lover. Her breasts weren’t particularly small, or large. Just the right size, they fit neatly into my palm. Her nipples were still hard in my hand.

She’d never come to my house on a Saturday. She always spent the weekends with her family. But that weekend her husband was on a business trip to Mumbai and her two daughters were staying over at their cousin’s house in Nasu in Tochigi. So she came to my place. And like we did on weekday afternoons, we leisurely enjoyed sex. Afterward we lay there in a lazy, indolent silence. Like always.

“Would you like to hear what the jungle grapevine turned up?” she asked.

“Jungle grapevine?” I suddenly couldn’t think of what she was talking about.

“Don’t tell me you forgot? The mystery man in the big white house across the valley. You asked me to look into this Mr. Menshiki the other day.”

“Ah, that’s right. Of course I remember.”

“I found out a little bit about him. One of my housewife friends lives near him, and she could gather some info on him. Would you like to hear it?”

“Of course.”

“Mr. Menshiki bought that house with the gorgeous view about three years ago. Another family was living in it before then. They’re the ones who built the house, but those original owners only lived there about two years. One sunny morning they suddenly packed up all their belongings and left, and Menshiki took their place. He bought the house, which was practically brand-new. How that all came about, though, nobody knows.”

“So he didn’t build the house himself,” I said.

“That’s right. He moved into a container that was already there. Like a quick-witted hermit crab.”

That was unexpected. I’d been positive he was the one who built that house. That’s how closely I’d linked his image—probably corresponding to his wonderfully white hair—with that white mansion on top of the mountain.

She continued. “Nobody knows what kind of work he does. What they do know is that he never commutes to work. He stays in his house all day, probably on his computer. His study is full of those devices. Nowadays if you know what you’re doing, you can find out most everything online. A man I know is a surgeon who works entirely from home. He’s crazy about surfing and doesn’t want to leave the ocean.”

“A surgeon can work entirely from home?”

“They send him all the images and information about the patients, which he analyzes and then creates the protocols for the operations, sends these to the on-site staff, and monitors the operations remotely, sometimes giving them advice. Sometimes he uses a remote magic hand device to actually perform operations. That kind of thing.”

“What an age we live in,” I said. “I wouldn’t like to have anyone operate on me like that.”

“I wonder if Mr. Menshiki is doing something similar,” she said. “No matter what kind of work he’s doing, he’s pulling in enough income. He lives alone most of the time in the huge house, occasionally goes on long trips. Probably trips abroad. In his house he has a home gym with lots of exercise machines, where he works out whenever he has a chance. There’s not an ounce of fat on him. He mostly prefers classical music, and has a substantial listening room. A pretty luxurious life, wouldn’t you say?”

“Where’d you get all these details?”

She laughed. “You seem to underestimate women’s information-gathering skills.”

“You could be right.”

“He has four cars altogether. Two Jaguars and a Range Rover. Plus a Mini Cooper. He seems to like British cars.”

“Mini Coopers are made by BMW these days, and I believe Jaguar was purchased by an Indian corporation. So it’s hard to call either of them British cars.”

“The Mini he drives is an older version. And whatever corporation bought Jaguar, it’s still a British car.”

“Did you find out anything else?”

“Hardly anybody ever comes to the house. Mr. Menshiki prefers solitude. He likes to be alone, likes to listen to classical music and read a lot. He’s single and well off, yet almost never brings women home. For all appearances he lives a very simple, orderly life. Makes you think he might be gay. Though there’s some evidence that points in the other direction.”

“I’m thinking you must have a well-placed source of information.”

“She’s not there now, but until not long ago he had a maid who’d come in a few times a week. She’s the one who took out the garbage, went shopping for him at the local supermarket, where there were other housewives from the neighborhood and they’d start chatting.”

“I see,” I said. “That’s how the jungle grapevine gets formed.”

“You got it. According to her, there’s a kind of forbidden chamber in the house. He instructed her never to enter it. He made it quite clear.”

“Sounds like Bluebeard’s castle.”

“Exactly. People often say that, right? That every house has a skeleton in the closet.”

That reminded me of the painting Killing Commendatore hidden away in the attic. That might be a skeleton hidden in a closet too.

She went on. “The woman never did find out what was in that mystery room. It was always locked. But anyway, that maid doesn’t work there anymore. Maybe she got fired for being a bit too talkative. He seems to be doing all the housework himself now.”

“He told me the same thing. That aside from a once-a-week cleaning service he takes care of all the household chores himself.”

“He seems very touchy about his privacy.”

“Be that as it may, but isn’t the fact that you and I meet like this spreading through your jungle grapevine?”

“I doubt it,” she said in a quiet voice. “First of all, I’m very careful that it doesn’t. And second, you’re a little different from Mr. Menshiki.”

“Meaning…,” I said, translating this into words that were easy to understand, “…that there are things about him that lend themselves to rumor, but not with me.”

“We should be thankful for that,” she said cheerily.

After my little sister died all kinds of things started to go wrong. The metalworking company my father operated went downhill, and he was so busy dealing with that he hardly ever came home. The atmosphere at home became strained. Long, heavy silences reigned over the house. It hadn’t been that way when my sister was still alive. I wanted to get away from it all, and got even more absorbed in painting as a way to escape. Eventually I decided to attend art school and major in painting. My father was dead set against it. You can’t earn a decent living painting, he argued. And I don’t have the money to help raise an artist. The two of us argued about it. My mother intervened to smooth things over, and though somehow I was able to attend art school, my father and I never did reconcile.

If only my sister hadn’t died, I sometimes thought. If she’d lived, my family would have been so much happier. Her sudden disappearance made our family fall apart. Our home became a site where people lashed out and hurt each other. I felt helpless, knowing I could never fill in the hole my sister had left behind.

I stopped drawing pictures of her. After I entered art school the things I wanted to paint were phenomena and objects that didn’t have intrinsic meaning. Abstract paintings, in other words. Things in which all sorts of meanings were encoded, where new semantic meaning arose from the interweaving of one sign and another. I plunged into a world that aimed at that type of completeness, and was able to breathe normally for the first time in forever.

Creating those kinds of paintings, though, didn’t lead to any decent jobs. I graduated, but as long as I stuck to abstract painting my father was right—I had no hope of earning any money. So in order to make a living (I’d already left my parents’ home and needed to earn money for rent and food) I was compelled to take on portrait work. By doing a conventional job, painting those utilitarian paintings, I was somehow able to survive as an artist.

And now I was about to paint a portrait of Wataru Menshiki. The Wataru Menshiki who lived in the white mansion on top of the mountain across the way. The white-haired man the neighbors had heard all sorts of rumors about, this clearly intriguing person. He had picked me out, hired me for a huge fee to paint his portrait. But what I discovered was that at this point I wasn’t even able to paint a portrait. Even that kind of conventional, utilitarian art was beyond me. I’d truly become hollow, an empty shell.

We should wordlessly go to visit her, pushing our way through the lush green grass. This random thought struck me. If we could, how truly wonderful that would be.