Never before had Fusae cursed the passing of time. But it had been six days since she’d heard from Yuichi, and she suddenly noticed that the rest of the world was about to celebrate the end of the year.
Fusae was born the third child of a tatami craftsman from the outskirts of Nagasaki City. When she was ten, her father-about to depart for the war front-died of tuberculosis, and that same year, her mother had given birth to her second son. Now she was left to care for four children: her fifteen-year-old elder daughter, ten-year-old Fusae, her four-year-old older son, and the newborn infant boy.
Through some relatives, Fusae’s mother found a job working at a restaurant in the city called Seyokan. Her fifteen-year-old daughter was working in a factory as part of the wartime student work corps, so it fell to ten-year-old Fusae to take care of her two brothers.
Occasionally her mother would steal eggs from the restaurant and bring them home. This was the best food they had. Late one evening, her mother still had not come home, so Fusae and her older sister went to the restaurant to find her. The head clerk had discovered her mother stealing eggs, and had tied her to a pillar in the kitchen. The two girls, in tears, apologized for their mother. When their mother saw them, she quietly sobbed, still tied to the pillar.
The rationing system had started by then, and Fusae had to line up with the adults to get her family’s share, her four-year-old brother in hand, the baby on her back. When rations were plentiful, the adults would sometimes let her go to the front of the line, but when commodities were in short supply the frenzied housewives kept pushing her out of the way. The arrogant man in charge treated Fusae and her brothers like stray dogs. He’d shove them aside, tossing their ration of potatoes and corn at them. Fusae and her brother desperately scrambled in the dirt to pick up their potatoes.
How dare you! How dare you make fun of me! Fusae wanted to scream, holding back tears as she grabbed for the potatoes.
Life didn’t get any easier after the war. Miraculously, their family didn’t lose a single member to the atomic bombing, the one stroke of luck they had, her mother said. Fusae graduated from junior high and began working at a fish market. There she met Katsuji, and they were later married. It took her some time to have a child, and her mother-in-law occasionally abused her, but gradually life got easier, and before she knew it she had two daughters and they were able to take a yearly vacation at a hot-springs resort. Fusae kept on working at the fish market even after she got married.
Until now she’d never wished for more time, but waiting in vain for the past few days for word from Yuichi, she’d felt a bitterness about the way time slowed down, something she’d never experienced.
Usually Fusae was busy on New Year’s Eve preparing osechi ryori, the special New Year’s dishes, putting up festive decorations at their door, and getting the New Year’s rice cakes ready, but this year she sat alone in her kitchen.
In the morning, Norio’s wife had brought over a small lacquered box of osechi ryori. “I thought you probably hadn’t done any cooking,” she said. “I noticed the detectives aren’t outside today,” she added.
“The last few days the local patrolman’s been coming by to check on me, but that’s all,” said Fusae. Still, Norio’s wife just had a quick cup of tea and then left, perhaps concerned that the house was still under surveillance.
Katsuji was still in the hospital, but initially he’d been given permission by his doctor to go home for the three-day New Year’s holiday. That was the plan until he complained of pain and nausea, so they decided he would stay in the hospital after all.
Norio, not Fusae, was the one who updated Katsuji on Yuichi. Fusae didn’t know what Norio told him, but when she went to visit her husband there were times she was so uneasy that she started to cry. Katsuji didn’t ask her a thing. Instead, he just complained as usual. A few days before, though, after she’d given him his sponge bath and was getting ready to leave, Katsuji muttered, “Why, when I have one foot in the grave already, do I have to go through something like this?”
Fusae left the hospital room without replying. She didn’t get right on the elevator, but went to a restroom, where she broke down. Katsuji had had a hard life, she thought. They’d both gone through a lot to get to where they were now as a couple.
Fusae vaguely reached out for the box of osechi ryori that Norio’s wife had brought and slid it closer. When she opened the lid, the bright colors of the shrimp leaped out at her. She picked up one of them and realized she hadn’t eaten a thing since breakfast.
It was already past twelve. Fusae planned to visit Katsuji in the afternoon, so she picked out some of the foods she knew he could eat and got a plastic container down from the shelf.
She was just transferring the konbu to the container when the phone rang. For a second, she hoped it was Yuichi, though over the last few days she’d been let down dozens of times. Maybe, she thought, it was Norio, who was worried about her, or perhaps her elder daughter, always concerned about her own children’s future.
Chopsticks still in hand, she answered the phone and heard a familiar young man’s voice.
“May I speak with Mrs. Fusae Shimizu, please?”
He spoke so politely that Fusae replied, “Yes, this is she.”
“Mrs. Shimizu?”
As soon as she said yes, the man turned haughty. Fusae had a bad feeling and clenched the chopsticks tightly.
“Thank you for signing the contract with us the other day. I’m calling about next month’s delivery.”
As the man rattled on, Fusae tried desperately to interject. “What? What are you talking about?”
“Excuse me? As you recall, Mrs. Shimizu, you signed a contract at our office for health foods.”
The man’s words remained polite, though she could sense how irritated he was.
“You do remember this, I hope.”
Fusae was overwhelmed. “Yes, I suppose,” she said. Her knees were shaking. She remembered the young men at the office and how they threatened her. Her hand holding the phone was trembling, too, and the hard receiver banged against her ear several times.
“The contract, as you know, is a yearly contract.”
“A year-a yearly contract?” Fusae said in a low voice, trying to hide her trembling.
“A yearly contract is exactly that. We received your first payment, so next month will be the second. The second payment doesn’t require a membership fee, so it comes to exactly two hundred and fifty thousand yen. How will you be paying? By bank transfer? Or shall we come to collect it? By the way, if you do a bank transfer, the fee for that is your responsibility.”
It wasn’t the man’s voice that scared her. But as she listened, she had the illusion that she was back in that office, forced to sit there, surrounded by those agitated, intimidating men. They’d told her she had to sign and then they’d let her go home, and with a trembling hand she’d picked up the pen. In her mind now, this scene overlapped with the one from years ago, of scrambling to pick up her ration of potatoes that had been flung to the ground.
In a small voice Fusae said, “I… I can’t do that.”
“What? Old woman, what did you say?”
Shaken, Fusae hung up. Almost as if to crush the receiver under her, she leaned into it as she hung up. Silence returned to the kitchen. Fusae collapsed into her chair. The instant she sat down, the phone rang again, shrilly. She didn’t pick up the receiver again, but it was as if she had. She could clearly hear the angry shouts of the man: “Listen, old woman! What the hell do you think you’re doing? You can’t run away! We’re gonna pay you a little visit right now!” Fusae put her hands over her ears, but no matter how much she tried to block out the sound, the phone kept on ringing.
The phone kept on ringing, but at twenty-one rings it finally stopped.
Mitsuyo looked over from the phone by the bedside to the restroom, where Yuichi was.
It was way past checkout time, and if they didn’t hurry they’d have to pay a late fee. She knew this, but still couldn’t bring herself to get out of bed. Yuichi, shut up alone in the bathroom, no doubt felt the same way. The love hotel charged ¥4,200 per night, and they were supposed to be out by ten a.m. But when they did leave, there was nowhere else for them to go.
She’d lost track of how many days she and Yuichi had been wandering, spending the nights in love hotels. In front of the Karatsu police station, when they’d decided to run away together, they’d planned to leave Kyushu as soon as they could. They never discussed it, but they didn’t head for Shimonoseki and the Kanmon Bridge that would take them to Honshu. Instead they spent the days driving back and forth across the border between Saga and Nagasaki, finding a cheap love hotel each night, hurried out every morning by a phone call informing them that their time was up.
She suddenly remembered it was New Year’s Eve and felt oppressed, cornered. Did Yuichi remember what day it was? She knew they wouldn’t bring it up.
This is impossible. We can’t go on running, she’d told herself over and over, but as she repeated the words she’d asked herself: But what’s so impossible? What can’t we run away from? Was this life going from one love hotel to the next really so impossible? Or was it the life she imagined after she lost Yuichi?
She had to do something. But she had no idea what else to do, other than leave this love hotel and search for the next one. As long as she kept on looking for the hotel, another day would pass.
Mitsuyo reluctantly pulled herself out of bed. “Yuichi,” she said in the direction of the toilet. “It’s about time we leave.” No answer, just the sound of running water.
Yuichi was fastening his belt as he emerged from the bathroom and Mitsuyo passed him his socks. Last night she’d rinsed them with water and put them out to dry, but they still felt damp.
“You didn’t sleep, did you?” Mitsuyo said as he tugged on the socks.
“No, I did,” Yuichi said, shaking his head, but she noticed the dark circles under his eyes.
As she watched him put on his socks he said, apologetically, “I woke up a few times, but I think you’re the one who didn’t get much sleep, right?”
“No,” Mitsuyo said, “I’m okay. We should park somewhere and take a nap,” she went on, trying to disperse the heavy feeling that had taken hold of them.
They couldn’t sleep well in the beds in hotels, but strangely enough they slept soundly for an hour or so when they parked their car beside the road, or in a parking lot.
As Yuichi got dressed, Mitsuyo casually opened the guest book on the table.
Here I am again with Takashi. This is the third time for us-By the way, this was our two-month anniversary so we went to see a movie in Hakata and stopped here on the way back. I really like it here-it’s cheap, and clean. Oh, and I definitely recommend the chicken nuggets! They’re probably frozen, but real crunchy!
Without really thinking about it, Mitsuyo continued to read through the girlish writing.
On the next page, in pink fluorescent pen she saw this:
Today Akkun and I did the dirty deed for the first time in a month. Since April we’ve lived far away from each other, which makes me soooo sad. Boo hoo!
Beneath it there was a mangalike sketch of a guy, probably by the girl, and in the dialogue bubble over it, in a stronger hand-no doubt that of the man-were the words I’ll never cheat on you!
Mitsuyo closed the guest book and placed it back on the table.
Just as they were leaving, Mitsuyo turned and looked back at the room. The down comforter had been straightened, but the white sheets underneath were wrinkled and tossed about, a sign of last’s night’s insomnia. Mitsuyo was struck by a sudden thought. Which was bigger-this bed or Yuichi’s car? You can stretch out on the bed, but can’t go anywhere. The car’s more confining, but in it you can go anywhere you like.
Yuichi looked concerned-Mitsuyo was just standing there, spacing out. He tugged her arm.
They walked down the orange-carpeted hallway to the stairs, which were painted white. They put the key in the box at the front desk, and were heading for the half-underground parking lot when they saw a cleaning woman, broom in hand, staring at the license plate of Yuichi’s car. Yuichi came to an abrupt halt and his heels squeaked on the floor. The cleaning woman glanced over in their direction. But she turned right back to his car.
Mitsuyo pulled Yuichi by the arm and ran toward the car. As if trying to sound them out about something, the cleaning woman said, “Excuse me-I wanted to-” but they ignored her and quickly got in the car. Yuichi got in first, and while she was waiting for him to unlock the passenger side, Mitsuyo was exposed to the woman’s eyes.
She avoided looking at her, though, and was soon in the car and they took off. The plastic curtain at the parking lot’s exit licked their windshield as they left, and once outside, the winter sunlight illuminated the car’s interior. Until they left the hotel grounds, Mitsuyo could barely breathe. She knew that if she looked in the rearview mirror she’d see the cleaning woman, broom in hand, watching them go, but something, perhaps fear, kept her from glancing back.
“That woman saw it. Didn’t she,” she said. Yuichi didn’t respond.
Once they were out on the main road, Mitsuyo finally worked up the courage to glance in the mirror. All she could see was a van following them. The cleaning woman, and the entrance to the hotel itself, had disappeared.
“She saw it, I know she did,” she almost shouted.
“Our license plate… She… she saw the number,” Yuichi said. Frightened, he stepped on the gas. The van behind them faded in the distance.
“What should we do? We can’t go on like this… We can’t use this car anymore!”
“Yeah, I know…” Yuichi said.
She had known this day would come. But as one day followed the next, and nothing happened, she’d begun to feel that they weren’t running away so much as pursuing time. But while they made their way from one love hotel to another, reports about Yuichi were making their way down the web of connected highways and roads, down the interstate, crossing prefectural borders, traveling down prefectural and city roads.
“If we keep this car,” Mitsuyo said, “they’ll find us. We have to ditch it.”
When he heard these words, Yuichi gulped.
Mitsuyo knew they couldn’t escape. The only destination awaiting them was jail. She could try to convince herself otherwise, but that was the reality of it. Still, she couldn’t say goodbye to Yuichi. Not yet.
“Let’s ditch this car somewhere! If it’s just the two of us, we can hide out.” Mitsuyo was desperate to get away.
I’ve known Yuichi since grade school, about twenty years, and sometimes I can’t figure out what’s on his mind. Other guys say he’s hard to approach, but I think they’re reading too much into it. I don’t think he’s thinking anything. It’s like he’s a ball that’s left lying on the playground for a couple of days. The kids play with it all day and then when it gets dark someone gives it a final kick and it rolls over by the horizontal bars. The next day someone else gives it a final kick and it comes to rest under a cherry tree… This makes Yuichi sound pretty pathetic, but it never bothered him to be treated like that. He actually prefers it that way. When I suggest we go somewhere for a drive, or go do something, he’s usually happy to oblige. He wouldn’t do it if he didn’t want to, right? I’ve never forced him to do things with me.
Not long after the murder, I actually went over to Yuichi’s house. That evening I e-mailed him from a pachinko parlor and he said he’d drop by on the way home from work. We played the slots for a while, and then went to his house, where his grandmother made dinner for us.
Was he acting? I’ve thought about it a lot, but he seemed the same as always. Maybe he was really trying to act normal, but even though he’d killed somebody not too long before, he looked like the same old Yuichi. After dinner we went up to his room for a while, and he sprawled out on his bed like usual, and was reading car magazines… He said, “If I didn’t have a car I never could have gone anywhere.” And I went, “Yeah, but what about trains or walking? People can go anywhere they want to.” I laughed when I said this, but Yuichi didn’t reply… Somehow I can’t forget those words now. If I didn’t have a car, I never could have gone last New Year’s anywhere. Or the look on his face.
Everybody knew how crazy Yuichi was about cars. Cars aren’t my thing so I don’t know the details, but somebody told me once that Yuichi’s was tuned to professional specs, and come to think of it, his car was featured once in a specialty magazine, Car something or other. “This is a national magazine!” he said, excited for once, and he must have bought five copies to keep. It was just one of those black-and-white photo spreads at the back of the magazine, but it was a whole page and they showed Yuichi, looking kind of tense, standing next to his precious car.
Yeah, I remember now. This was around the time he fell for that massage-parlor girl. He said he gave her a copy of the magazine.
I really feel sorry for him about that whole thing. I was actually worried Yuichi might commit suicide back then. I’m not trying to justify him or anything. I mean, he was spending every day at a massage parlor, trying to pick up this girl who worked there. But there they were, sharing all their hopes for the future, and Yuichi decided to rent an apartment in the city for the two of them, and right when he did, the girl disappeared.
He didn’t tell me anything at first, but one day out of the blue he said, “Hifumi, I’m going to move soon, so could you help me?”
Yuichi isn’t the talkative type like me. So this was really unexpected. I asked him why he was moving and he said, “I’m going to live with a girl.” I was astonished. I mean, with a girl in that kind of business, besides. I didn’t pry any further, but I had a bad feeling about it. The week after that, I think it was, I helped him move. And right after that, the girl quit the massage parlor and vanished.
About a month later, I helped him move again. Yuichi told me all about the reasons for it without any prompting from me, and I couldn’t believe it. He’d never discussed any of the details with the girl. When they were at the massage parlor, she’d just mentioned the type of life she’d like to live someday. Yuichi’s always been that way. He’s always leaped from point A to point D, imagining the intermediate steps, and never telling anyone what he had in mind. When she happened to tell him, “I’d love to quit this job and live in a small apartment with a guy like you,” the first thing he did was go out and rent an apartment. Unbelievable.
The first three days of the new year were almost past, with none of the traditional soba, osechi ryori, or good-luck first visit to a shrine. Ever since she’d heard that the Hakata college student wasn’t the killer, Satoko hadn’t done any cooking, so Yoshio bought two maku-nouchi bentos for them at the take-out place in front of the station.
He made hot tea for them, and placed the bento in front of Satoko. As she listlessly separated the disposable chopsticks, she murmured, “So bento shops are still open during New Year’s…”
“Yeah, it was actually pretty crowded.”
Satoko looked about to reply, but silently speared a boiled carrot instead.
Yoshio had yet to tell Satoko about seeing Yoshino in the pouring rain at Mitsuse Pass. He knew she’d believe him if he did, and would insist that he drive her there. But when he thought about going and the possibility that they might not see Yoshino again, he couldn’t bring himself to explain what had happened.
He’d driven up to the pass three days in a row after that, hoping to catch another glimpse of his daughter. But that first day was the only time Yoshino appeared and called out to him. After that, no matter how much he waited, he neither saw her nor heard her voice. On the third day he visited, he was surprised to find one of Yoshino’s co-workers there, a girl named Mako Adachi.
Mako said she’d come a number of times to lay flowers there for Yoshino. She took the local bus up to the pass and then walked along the back road to the site.
Yoshio gave Mako a ride back to Kurume station. In the car they hardly spoke, but she did tell him that she was quitting at the end of the year and moving back to her parents’ home in Kumamoto. Yoshio asked her what she planned to do there.
“I don’t know yet,” she said. “I just don’t feel comfortable in the city anymore.” She told him how she once spotted Keigo Masuo in Tenjin after he was released. She didn’t talk with him, of course, but just seeing him made her feel bitter. “That might be the reason I decided to go back home,” she said. Yoshio asked her for Keigo’s address and at first she said she didn’t know it, but after a moment’s hesitation, she told him the name of a well-known building right next to his condo, a place everyone knew.
The call from the police came just as Yoshio and Satoko were finishing their bentos. He was expecting to hear that they’d captured the suspect, but all he learned from the detective-the same one who’d visited him the other day-was that although they’d been sure the suspect had already fled Kyushu, his abandoned car had been found near Arita, in Saga.
Yoshio hung up and told his wife what he’d heard. Strangely enough, he felt nothing at the news. Satoko was silent and placed the lid back on her half-eaten bento.
Yoshio figured that that was the end of it, but Satoko suddenly murmured, “So the police are working even during the New Year’s holidays.” For a moment she sounded like the old Satoko, before Yoshino had died. She wasn’t exactly smiling, but perhaps trying desperately to do so. “The police never give up, do they? They do their best even during New Year’s,” she murmured, her lips drawn back tightly, as if they were numb.
“Yeah, even during New Year’s, so I’m sure they’ll arrest the guy soon,” Yoshio said.
“Arresting him won’t bring back Yoshino,” Satoko said, her expression gloomy again.
“The day after tomorrow I’m going to reopen the shop,” Yoshio said, trying to change the subject.
“I’ll believe that when I see it.” Satoko smiled.
It was the first time she’d smiled since the murder. The smile was halfhearted, but he was proud of her for trying.
“Satoko, there’s something I wanted to tell you…”
He was going to tell her about what took place at Mitsuse Pass, how Yoshino had apologized to him. He wanted to tell her about it, but somehow the words wouldn’t come.
Satoko put the leftovers in the plastic bag they came in, and tied the ends tight, then tied them again. She did it so many times there finally wasn’t enough slack left to tie it anymore. Yoshio took the bag from her and dumped it heavily in the kitchen wastebasket.
Satoko stared at the wastebasket and said, “Honey?… I just don’t get it. Why did that college student leave Yoshino up there at the pass?” She paused. “That’s what I want to know,” she went on. “When she called us and said she was going to Universal Studios, she mentioned his name…” Her gaze was still fixed on the wastebasket.
“Did she say she was going with him?” Yoshio asked.
“I don’t know yet was all she said, but she seemed happy. I hope we can, she said.”
Yoshio didn’t know what to say. Out there was a man who had murdered his daughter. And another who had stepped on her heart. His hatred should be aimed at the one who killed her, but all he could picture was Yoshino being literally kicked out of that car.
The next morning Yoshio drove to Hakata.
Holding her breath, Mitsuyo listened to the voices and footfalls of the young men outside. Yuichi was crouched down beside her, his arm around her shoulder.
The men had just arrived here by car a few minutes before. The moment Yuichi heard the sound of their engine coming up the narrow logging road, he grabbed Mitsuyo’s hand and yanked her into the shack next to the lighthouse.
The lot where the men had parked was a little bit away and they heard the footsteps of three or four people getting closer. “This place gives me the creeps,” they heard one say. “The last time I was here, the road was blocked off.”
The door in the shack where Mitsuyo and Yuichi were hiding was made of frosted glass, and the lines of iron in the reinforced glass were sharply defined in the moonlight.
Before they knew it, the young men’s voices and footsteps were right outside the door. The door suddenly banged as they roughly tried to pull it open.
“Is it open?”
“Nah, it’s locked.”
“Want to use a rock and break the glass?”
Shadows moved beyond the frosted glass. Mitsuyo inched closer to Yuichi and they clasped each other’s numb hands.
“Don’t do it. There’s nothing inside anyway.”
As he said this a large rock clunked down on the ground. Apparently one of them had actually picked up a rock.
Yuichi was crouching next to a large plastic bottle of water. It was almost ready to fall over.
“The road back that way’s really dark, so you better watch out!”
One of the men-who’d apparently started to walk toward the lighthouse-was shouting, and then the shadows outside the door grew distant, kicking pebbles as they went.
Mitsuyo reached out and grabbed the bottle. Yuichi, thinking she was trying to hug him, pulled her closer to him, the bottle now in her hand.
The men were apparently heading toward the cliffs.
“It’d be cool to come here to see the first sunrise of the year,” one of them said.
“But that’s west, isn’t it?”
“I wonder when was the last time they used this lighthouse.”
“It isn’t much fun here if it’s just four guys.”
Mitsuyo and Yuichi held their breath and listened.
Because of the cold, the men stood there only about a minute and then headed back to the shack.
Please, Mitsuyo prayed, please just go away.
Beyond the frosted glass they saw one shadow pass by, then a second, and a third. Right when they were waiting for the last one to pass, a fist pounded on the glass. Mitsuyo nearly cried out, burying her face in Yuichi’s shoulder just in time.
The men stood there for a while, discussing where they should go next. An engine roared to life in the parking lot.
Mitsuyo tapped Yuichi’s shoulder twice and, relieved, she nodded. The sound of the engine faded in the distance.
Yuichi stood up and carefully opened the door and peered out. Mitsuyo stood behind him, and when she looked outside, she saw the car winding its way down the logging road, its high beams lighting up the road ahead.
The winter sky was full of stars, and they could hear the waves crashing against the cliff nearby. The strong wind shook the little shack, bending the plywood boards nailed to the windows. Mitsuyo took a deep breath. She looked and saw the lighthouse, bathed in moonlight.
They’d abandoned their car a few days before in Arita. When Yuichi couldn’t decide what to do, Mitsuyo said, “Let’s go to a lighthouse.” She knew they couldn’t escape, but she couldn’t suppress the desire for one more day, one more hour together.
“There’s one lighthouse they don’t use anymore,” Yuichi murmured, finally bringing himself to get rid of his car.
Without a word, Yuichi took his sleeping bag out of the trunk, a red sleeping bag he apparently used when he went on long drives. They took a train, and then a bus, and finally arrived. Mitsuyo let Yuichi lead her by the hand; she had no idea where they got on the train, or where they were going.
They rode the bus along the seacoast and got off at a small fishing village where the lighthouse was. In front of the bus stop was a small convenience store and a tiny gas station, but other than that there were only twenty or thirty homes, with fishing nets hung out to dry in the gardens.
They walked a little while from the bus stop and passed a shrine, next to which was a steep logging road. At the entrance to the road were signs saying Not a Through Road! and Closed Ahead! The thick weeds growing along the road made it even narrower. The two of them held hands and walked up the road for nearly half an hour, feeling as though they were walking through a prairie.
“We’re almost there,” Yuichi said, many times, his hand on her back to help her along the steep road.
When they reached the road’s end, the sky opened up and there was the lighthouse.
“See, there it is,” Yuichi said, smiling for the first time since they’d abandoned his car.
Beyond the logging road was a parking lot. There wasn’t a single car there, of course, and the asphalt was missing in places, with weeds shooting out through the cracks. Beyond the parking lot was the lighthouse, surrounded by a fence. They slipped through a break in the fence, the shabby lighthouse looming above them, looking ready to topple over. Below it was a similarly grubby lighthouse keeper’s shack, painted white. Yuichi tried the doorknob and the door opened easily.
Inside, the space was empty and dusty, the light shining in illuminating the dust in the air. In one corner of the shack were plywood boards leaning against the wall and a pipe chair, the foam rubber sticking out of the cushion. The floor was littered with sweet-bun wrappers and empty juice cans.
Yuichi laid one of the plywood boards on the floor and tossed his sleeping bag on it. Then he took Mitsuyo by the hand and led her outside, right below the lighthouse. A single bird, a kite, was circling in the winter sky. The sky seemed close enough to touch.
The lighthouse looked out over the sea that lay beneath the cliff. A chain blocked the way and there was no path past this point. She could hear the waves crashing against the cliff. Gazing at the scenery spread out before her, it felt less like a dead end than a starting point. From here one could go anywhere.
“I bet you’re starving,” Yuichi said. Mitsuyo, gazing out at the distant horizon, nodded. The sun was out, but the wind was so cold they soon sought shelter again in the shack. They spread the sleeping bag out on top of the sheet of plywood and ate the lunches they’d bought at the convenience store in front of the bus stop.
“Are you sure nobody’s going to come here?” Mitsuyo asked, and Yuichi, his mouth full of rice, nodded.
“Do you really think we can stay here?” she asked, and then Yuichi stopped chewing.
“We can buy some candles and food at the convenience store down there…” As he spoke, his voice grew softer.
Ever since they’d run away from the Karatsu police station, they hadn’t discussed the most important point of all. They knew they couldn’t escape. But they both felt the same way: that they wanted to be together right up until the moment they were arrested. They just couldn’t say it aloud.
The threatening phone calls she’d received at the year’s end stopped after New Year’s. She knew she couldn’t just crouch in fear in the kitchen, but she was so afraid of the phone ringing, of those men pushing their way into her home, that she found herself trembling even while she was sitting down.
So when the front doorbell rang she was even more startled. They’re here, Fusae thought. But it turned out only to be the local patrolman.
“Grandma, you at home?” he called out.
She nearly collapsed from relief and hurried to the front door.
“Have you heard Yuichi mention a friend by the name of Mitsuyo Magome? A girl who works at a clothing shop in Saga?” The policeman asked this as soon as she opened the door, without even saying hello. The cold wind rushed in. The patrolman rubbed his hands as he spoke and Fusae could only weakly shake her head.
“I see. So you haven’t heard of her. It looks like Yuichi took this girl with him when he ran away.”
“Took the girl with him?”
“Yeah, we don’t know if he forced her to go, or whether she went voluntarily.”
Fusae sat down heavily on the step up from the entrance. Knowing, perhaps, that asking any more questions was pointless, the patrolman patted her on the shoulder. “They found Yuichi’s car in Arita,” he added, and then left.
All Fusae could manage to do was stare at his retreating back.
Yuichi abandoned his car. He gave up on his car…
She could see him, walking far away from his car. Where are you going! she shouted to him, but he kept on walking, disappearing into a dark forest she’d never seen before.
Just then the phone in the kitchen rang. She was about to call after the patrolman, but she knew that he’d come about her grandson, the murderer, and wouldn’t listen to some complaint about threatening phone calls.
If she didn’t answer the phone, those men would definitely pay her a visit. If she did answer the phone, maybe they could find some sort of solution. All she could do was cling to this hope. She walked back to the kitchen and, hands shaking, lifted the receiver.
“Hello? Mom? It’s me, Yoriko. What is going on? They’re saying Yuichi is a murderer! That can’t be true, can it? Tell me what’s going on!
“Hello? Talk to me, Mom!”
Yoriko was hysterical. She didn’t let Fusae get a word in edgewise. “Honey…” was all Fusae was able to say.
“The police came to my workplace! Like they thought I was harboring him or something. And they even went through the company dorm…”
“How are you? Okay?”
As her daughter spoke, Fusae remembered how strong-willed she was, even as a child. When Yoriko entered junior high, she started going out at night. On weekends their tiny fishing village was shaken by the roar of motorcycles as a gang pulled up. Katsuji would grab her by the hair to try to stop her, but Yoriko would kick free and run off. More than once, Yoriko was taken into custody in the city and they had to pick her up at the police station. Once she graduated from high school, she started working at a bar, but this didn’t turn out so badly. Working full-time helped her to grow up, and Fusae remembered how, on one of her rare visits home, she politely poured sake for her father and said, “Dad, you should drop by our bar sometime for a drink,” handing him her business card.
But then she went and married a worthless man who ran out on her. Yuichi had been born by this time, and she gave him up to her parents to raise. Ever since then the only contact they had was a phone call every couple of years, an afterthought on her part. She’d say things like “I’m really sorry about what I did to you, Mom,” or “Next time let’s go on a trip to a spa together,” but in all that time she never once came home.
“Yuichi a murderer? It’s got to be a mistake.”
Fusae had no idea how to respond.
Yoriko sighed deeply. “You’ve been with him all this time… How could you have raised him to become someone like that!” she shouted. “Anyway, I told the police he wasn’t going to come here. The only time I see him is when he comes to pester me for money. He knows how poor I am, but he’ll come and wheedle a thousand yen, two thousand, out of me and leave.”
“You two see each other?” Fusae said, shocked.
Yoriko stopped. “Anyhow, that’s what I told the police,” she said, and without waiting for a reply, she hung up.
Fusae was dumbfounded. She was surprised that Yuichi had been secretly meeting Yoriko, but even more shocked that he was trying to get money from her. It was easier to believe that he murdered someone than to believe he wanted money from his mother.
With the sunlight streaming in the glass window, the air in the shack grew a little warmer. Inside the sleeping bag, Mitsuyo kissed Yuichi on the neck.
Sleeping on the hard plywood board, despite the padding of the sleeping bag, made her back and sides ache, and she’d woken up often during the night. When she did, she could see her breath, and though her ears and nose ached in the cold, the snug sleeping bag let her feel Yuichi’s warmth all the more.
Next to the plywood board were some plastic bags full of the remains of the bento, bread, and drinks they’d consumed over the last few days. Lying here, it felt as if they were on a magic carpet flying through the sky.
Feeling Mitsuyo stirring, Yuichi woke up, murmured “Good morning” into the hair at the back of her neck, and pulled her close.
“I’ll go to the convenience store later on,” Mitsuyo said. The warm air in the sleeping bag spilled out around their shoulders.
“You’ll be okay by yourself?” Yuichi asked, yawning.
“I’ll be fine. I think it’s better if I go alone.”
“I’ll go with you down to the road, and hide in the bushes and wait for you.”
“I told you, I’ll be fine.” In the tight sleeping bag Mitsuyo gave his chest a couple of playful taps.
The previous day they’d gone together to the convenience store. They’d been there several times, and when they were at the checkout stand the woman at the cash register asked, “You’re not from around here, are you?”
Mitsuyo immediately replied, “Uh, yeah. We’re spending New Year’s with some relatives who live in the area.”
“Is that right”? the woman asked. “And where are you from?”
Without thinking, Mitsuyo said, “Saga.”
“Where in Saga?” the woman asked.
“From, uh, from Yobuko.”
The woman seemed about to say something more, so as soon as she got their change Mitsuyo pulled Yuichi by the hand and hurried out of the store.
If that same woman was working the register today, she might very well ask Mitsuyo where their relatives lived. If it came to that, they couldn’t use that store anymore. To find another store, they’d have to walk the road all the way to the next town.
Yuichi got out of the sleeping bag, slipped on his sneakers, and headed to the toilet. The lighthouse hadn’t been in operation for years, but luckily the water was still on. The toilet wasn’t exactly clean, but Mitsuyo felt like giving a prayer of thanks for the running water, as if it had been left by some secret ally.
“The place looks so much cleaner now,” Yuichi murmured admiringly as he stepped into the toilet.
“Well, I spent two hours cleaning up.”
Yuichi looked over at Mitsuyo, still in the sleeping bag, and said, “While you’re at the convenience store, I’ll try to cover over this broken window.” He pointed to the window facing the sea. He’d used some plastic tape he’d bought to temporarily cover the broken glass, but the wind still blew between the cracks.
After Yuichi had used the toilet and was heading outside with a plastic bottle of water, Mitsuyo asked, “Besides food, what else would you like me to buy?”
“Besides food?… Well, how about a deck of cards?”
“A deck of cards?”
As soon as she said this, she realized he’d been joking. Yuichi’s eyes narrowed in the winter morning light. He howled, laughing at her.
Mitsuyo finally got up and folded the sleeping bag, still warm from their bodies, neatly on top of the plywood board. She followed the sound of Yuichi gargling and when she stepped outside, she saw the sea laid out before her, glittering in the sun, seagulls drifting low in the sky.
“It’s so beautiful,” Mitsuyo said, lost for a moment. Yuichi spit out the water near his feet and said, shyly, “You know what? I had a dream last night.”
“What kind of dream?” Mitsuyo took the plastic bottle from him.
“You and I were living together. Remember how we were talking about that before we went to sleep? What kind of house we’d like to live in? In my dream, we were living there.”
“Which one was it? The house? Or the condo?”
“The condo… But in this dream you kicked me out of bed.” Yuichi gave a short laugh. Mitsuyo took a drink of water and said, “But I really did kick you from inside the sleeping bag.”
Yuichi faced the sea and stretched lazily. His fingertips seemed to be almost grazing the sky.
“Later on, maybe we can gather some weeds and lay them on top of the plywood.”
“I wonder if that would make it softer.”
Mitsuyo took another swig of water. It hadn’t been in a refrigerator, but the water was freezing cold.
Everybody blames me, saying Yuichi did what he did because I abandoned him, but it was my mother who really raised him. I’m not blaming her or anything. It’s just that on TV and in magazines they’re treating me like the villain in all this. There was this announcer on TV, who looks like she couldn’t care less about other people’s lives, and she gave a neat summary of everything that happened in my life. Then some big-shot commentator added his take on it. They discussed the murder from all different angles, but the conclusion was always the same: the mother who abandoned her kid is the real culprit.
After I left Yuichi at the ferryboat pier at Shimabara, I thought about killing myself many times. But in the end I couldn’t do it.
When I went to see my parents, they said they’d raise Yuichi, and they even took away my parental rights. It was like they were telling me to get lost.
But I was still his mother. I might have lived apart from Yuichi, but I was always thinking of him. And I never once hid his existence from the men I was seeing.
I didn’t stay in touch because I knew my mom would say something like “If you’re not going to raise him, then don’t call us.” And I also thought it would hurt Yuichi to be reminded of his mother, now that he had gotten used to living with my mom. But I never forgot him. I waited until he entered high school, and then I secretly got in touch. I figured when he was in high school, he’d be old enough to understand the dynamics between men and women.
It was kind of awkward seeing him again, at first. But we’re mother and child, and there should be something we have in common. I can still remember what the noodles tasted like the first time we met. I was surprised to see how much pepper he put on his noodles, and when I asked him about it he said, “Grandma’s food is always kind of bland, so I use tons of pepper, hot mustard, mayonnaise, and ketchup.” Somehow when I heard this, I knew my parents were taking good care of him, and I was relieved.
After that, we met about once every six months. When school was in session we met during his summer or winter breaks, and we’d have a meal together. He was always very quiet, but still he came whenever I asked.
One day I was feeling really depressed. After we ate in Shimabara, Yuichi gave me a ride back to my apartment, and in the car I suddenly burst into tears. I had so many problems. I wasn’t getting along well with the man I was living with, at work I’d been transferred to a section I hated, and I was starting to feel emotionally unstable. Plus I was feeling like an awful woman for having left Yuichi. I knew I was pretty young when I left him, but if I had had my life together a bit more, I might have spared him those sad and painful memories.
I bawled my eyes out then, right in his car.
Please forgive me, I sobbed, for being such an awful mother. I’ve been so awful, yet you still come to see me when I ask you to, and you never act angry. And you call me Mom, despite what I did to you. It’s so hard on me to meet you like this. I’m the only one at fault here, so I wouldn’t blame you if you hate me. I realize this is the cross I have to bear.
I kept on crying and crying. I didn’t even notice we’d pulled up in front of my building. It’s just that…
I finally stopped crying in the car and was about to get out when Yuichi suddenly said, “Mom, can you lend me some money?” For a moment I couldn’t believe my ears. This was a boy who’d always refused to accept any allowance I gave him, even a thousand yen. I was startled, but I opened my wallet right away and handed him five thousand or ten thousand, whatever I had. Through my tears, I asked him what he was going to use it for and he said, “What does it matter?” and shot me this scary look.
After that day, every time I saw him, he asked me to give him some spending money or lend him some cash. At first I gave it to him, to sort of atone for my sins, but I was scraping by on ¥120,000 or ¥130,000 a month. I didn’t have any spare cash. All he wanted when we met was money, and more money, so I didn’t call him as often anymore. But then he began dropping in on me unannounced, telling me it wasn’t payday yet and he was broke. He’d grab whatever I had, one thousand, two thousand yen, and leave.
Of course, part of the blame for why he committed this murder lies with me. But if you ask me, I’ve been punished enough. Think about it. How a parent feels when their child forces them to give them what little money they have. It’s a terrible feeling. You feel totally hopeless. Some days he looked like the devil to me. I almost hate him now.
“Ouch! That hurts!” Mitsuyo screamed. She was sitting on the sleeping bag, her legs spread out in front of her, and Yuichi was giving her a foot massage.
“If this spot here hurts, that means your neck’s weak, Mitsuyo.”
He couldn’t tell if it really hurt her or whether she was laughing, but he found it amusing nonetheless, and continued to press down hard with the base of his thumb.
“Ow! Wait! Wait a second!” She tried as hard as she could to wriggle away, but Yuichi’s large hands wouldn’t let her go.
“I get it. I’ll stop… But let me ask you, does it hurt here, too?”
“Ow!”
“And here?”
“Do I look like I’m not in pain?”
“If it hurts here, that means you’re not getting enough sleep.”
“I know that! How do you expect me to sleep on top of a sheet of plywood?”
“But you were snoring last night.”
“I don’t snore. But I talk in my sleep sometimes.”
As if to persuade her to stay put, Yuichi began gently massaging her calves.
Until a short time before, they’d been enjoying the sun at the base of the lighthouse. Cold wind whipped up from the cliff, but Yuichi had lit a fire in a small metal drum he’d found and they sat beside it, eating some of the bread they’d stocked up on. The dried branches crackling in the flames made them forget the previous night’s cold weather.
“If we bought some rice cakes at the convenience store, do you think we could roast them on that drum?” Mitsuyo asked as she was getting her calves massaged.
“If we had something we could use for a grill, we could,” Yuichi replied.
“How do you usually spend New Year’s?” she asked, as Yuichi put on one of her socks for her.
“New Year’s? I go over to my uncle’s house on New Year’s Eve and drink with the guys from work. Then in the middle of the night we pay our first visit of the year to the shrine. And on the third I go for a drive, I guess.”
“By yourself?”
“Sometimes. Sometimes with Hifumi, a friend of mine. How about you?”
“We always have the big New Year’s sale on the second. I know it’s kind of weird, considering where we are and all, but it’s been ages since I’ve had such a relaxing New Year’s.”
Mitsuyo tugged on the other sock herself. A relaxing New Year’s-she knew it was a silly thing to say, but the words just slipped out.
What was I doing last New Year’s? she thought.
Mitsuyo pulled on her shoes and walked outside, leaving Yuichi sprawled on the sleeping bag. This was the western edge of Kyushu, but even here the sun went down early in the winter. It had been high above her, making the surface of the sea glitter, but now it was a faint red, fading into the horizon.
Mitsuyo walked over to the base of the lighthouse, leaned over the chain handrail, and gazed down at the cliff far below. Waves crashed against the base, eroding the rocks.
Last New Year’s Eve it was past six-thirty when she’d finished work. It was the last day of their end-of-year sale and they’d closed up early, but being on her feet all day left her exhausted.
She spent every New Year’s Eve back at her parents’ house, but last year she rode her bike back to her apartment first. Tamayo had left a few days before on a group trip to Hokkaido, leaving behind a forgotten copy of her itinerary on the table. Thinking she’d spend the hours before she went back to her parents’ home doing a thorough year-end cleaning, Mitsuyo began by washing the windows. She wet a cloth in cold water and leaned out the window, completely absorbed in the task.
The next morning, New Year’s Day, she and her family gathered around to eat the special dishes her mother had prepared. Then they went for a first visit to the local shrine, but when they got back there was nothing else left to do. Her younger brother and his wife and son went home by car, and her mother started watching the New Year’s specials on TV, her father snoring away beside her.
With time on her hands, Mitsuyo rode her bike over to a shopping center that was open all year round. The huge parking lot next to the road was full, and many of the customers inside the shopping center were dressed in their New Year’s best.
She wasn’t shopping for anything in particular, but she stopped first in the bookstore. At the front of the store was a shelf of bestsellers and she picked up one, a love story that had been made into a movie, but just thinking about work the next day made her put it down again. She left the bookstore and went to the CD store. She picked up a copy of Yuji Fukuyama’s song “Sakurazaka,” which she heard a lot on the background music at work, but after toying with the idea of buying it, she put it back.
From the window of the CD store, she could see outside. Her bike was parked there, and somebody had thrown an empty juice can into her basket. For a moment everything looked blurry, and that’s when she realized she was crying. Mitsuyo ran out of the store, looked for a restroom, and dashed inside. She had no idea why she was crying. It wasn’t because somebody had thrown an empty can in the basket of her bike…
There were no books or CDs she wanted. A new year had just begun, but there was no place she wanted to go, no one she wanted to meet.
She went into a stall and couldn’t stand it anymore. Tears gushed out and she realized she was bawling.
Now Mitsuyo gazed at the sea, unconcerned about the freezing wind blowing up from the cliff. The sky, clear during the day, was suddenly covered with thick clouds. If the temperature dropped any more, she thought, tonight might be the first snowfall of the year.
She sensed something behind her. Turning around, she saw Yuichi, hunched up against the cold.
“You’d better go to the convenience store before it gets dark.”
Yuichi came over and stood beside her, leaning out and looking down at the cliff. She saw his prominent Adam’s apple in the faint evening sun shining through the clouds.
“Yuichi, if I hadn’t asked you to run away with me, would you have gone to the police?”
The question came out all of a sudden, but she’d been thinking about it for several days now. Staring at the cliff, Yuichi was quiet. “I don’t know,” he said, but no matter how long she waited, he didn’t elaborate.
“There’s one thing I’d like to make sure of.”
Yuichi tensed up a bit at her words.
“You didn’t make me run away with you. I wanted you to take me with you. If anybody ever asks you, I want you to tell them that.”
Yuichi frowned, uncertain. Mitsuyo felt as if she’d just said goodbye and buried her face in his chest.
“Until I met you,” she said, “I never realized how precious each day could be. When I was working, each day was over before I knew it, and then a week just flew by, and then a whole year… What have I been doing all this time? Why didn’t I meet you before? If I had to choose a whole year in the past, or a day with you-I’d choose a day with you…”
As he stroked her hair, she began to cry. Yuichi’s hand, just out of his pocket, was warm as a blanket.
“I’d choose a day with you, too, Mitsuyo. That’s all I ever need… But I can’t do anything for you. I wanted to take you to all kinds of places, but I can’t take you anywhere.”
Mitsuyo pressed her cheek against his chest.
“I wonder how many more days we can be together,” Yuichi mumbled sadly. And right after that, a single flake of snow landed on the handrail and melted away.
Powdery snow suddenly began to fall onto the pavement and melted. Keigo Masuo was walking down the sidewalk, and when it started snowing, he halted and looked up at the sky.
Before he knew it, the world was covered with powdery snow. The overcast Hakata streets seemed to fade out of focus. A mailbox nearby looked far away, while the high-rise building across the street loomed closer.
Yoshio Ishibashi, following him, kept about ten yards back. Between them, countless powdery snowflakes fluttered down from the sky.
With each step, Yoshio had to suppress the desire to rush forward. Keigo had no idea he was being followed, and continued walking, one hand thrust in his jeans pockets, his shoulders hunched against the cold.
Two days earlier, Yoshio had surprised himself and run out of his home in Kurume.
This college student who had kicked Yoshino out of his car on top of Mitsuse Pass lived on the top floor of a luxurious building. Yoshio had ridden the elevator to the eighth floor. As he rode up, he felt the weight of the wrench concealed in his pocket. The door to Keigo’s condo had a bell but Yoshio knocked. He knocked at the thick front door over and over. “Come out, you! Come out!” he yelled.
But no matter how much he knocked, the door remained shut, and he suddenly realized his nose was pressed again it and he was sobbing.
“Come out… Nobody’s going to make fun of my Yoshino and get away with it…”
There was no sound from the other side of the door.
Fighting back his tears, Yoshio stepped away. He got in the elevator, and as he did, the whole scene rushed back at him: Yoshino being kicked out of the car at Mitsuse Pass. He slammed his fist against the elevator door.
He hadn’t come here to grill the boy about why he’d abandoned Yoshino. Asking that wouldn’t bring her back. No, he’d come as a father, a man who couldn’t let anyone break his daughter’s heart. All he wanted was to protect her feelings.
Yoshio went out to his car, parked in front of the condo, and called his wife on his cell phone.
“I won’t be back tonight, but don’t worry,” he said in a rush of words. “I’ll be back as soon as I finish up what I need to do here.”
After a pause, Satoko asked, “Where are you?”
“Hakata,” Yoshio answered.
After more silence she said, “Okay. Be sure to come home as soon as you’re done.”
It was snowing harder than before. Keigo almost skipped along and, ignoring the red light, crossed at the intersection.
Yoshio tightened his grip on the wrench in his pocket. As he stepped into the crosswalk, he nearly collided with a taxi making a left turn, and the driver blasted his horn. Yoshio came close to falling, but pushed hard against the bumper of the cab and managed to keep his balance.
The taxi driver rolled down his window. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” he shouted angrily. Two high school girls, wrapped in mufflers and waiting for the light to change, stared. Keigo, already on the other side of the street, glanced back for a moment at the commotion.
Yoshio ignored the driver and took off after Keigo. The driver went on blaring his horn.
When he got to the other side of the street, Keigo was far away. Yoshio sped along in the snow. The wrench banged against his ribs as he ran, the snowflakes melting on his face forming lines of water down from his eyes, like tears.
Just then, Keigo noticed the approaching footsteps and turned around. Yoshio rushed toward him and Keigo edged backward. “What the…?” he said.
Yoshio stood right in front of Keigo, his ragged breath white in the air. Yoshio was struck by how tall the young man was, or rather, how short he himself was. But he stood his ground, glaring up at Keigo, who was glaring down at him.
“Are you Keigo Masuo?” Yoshio asked, more loudly than he needed to.
“Who are you, old man?”
Keigo took a step back. Yoshio stuck his hand in his pocket and felt the heavy wrench.
“Yoshino died because of you.”
“What?”
“My precious daughter died because of you.”
Yoshio glared up at him, unblinking. A flash of fear crossed Keigo’s eyes.
“Why the hell did you do that?”
“Do what?”
“Why did you-abandon Yoshino at the pass!”
At Yoshio’s angry shout, a cat appeared from behind a light pole, bristled, and scampered off.
“What are you talking about?”
Keigo tried to run off but Yoshio grabbed his arm. Keigo attempted to twist away.
“I didn’t kill her! I didn’t do anything!” Keigo broke free from his grasp, but as he did, his elbow struck Yoshio hard in the face. Everything turned blank and Yoshio fell to his knees. Still, he managed to grab Keigo by the legs to keep him from escaping.
“Let me go! What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
Keigo roughly tried to shake free. His knees scraped the ground and a dry pain shot through him. Keigo tried to walk, dragging Yoshio behind him.
“Let me go!” he yelled.
At that instant all the strength drained out of Yoshio’s arms. Keigo slipped free and almost instinctively kicked him in the shoulder. Yoshio flew out horizontally and hit his head on the guardrail of the street with a dull thud.
“I didn’t do anything!” Keigo said again. He looked furious and he bolted down the street. In the increasingly white world that surrounded him, Yoshio lay there watching his retreating figure.
“Wait… You have to apologize to Yoshino…” He’d meant to shout this, but all that came out was white breath. Keigo had disappeared into the swirling snow. A single cold flake of snow landed on Yoshio’s eyelashes and melted.
“Yoshino… Daddy’s not going to give up.”
As his consciousness grew dim, he could see Yoshino as a young child, toddling along… Where is this place? Some ferryboat dock? There’s the sea over there. And Yoshino’s running across a huge parking lot. She’s holding a snack, some chikuwa from one of the stands, and she’s running toward the sea.
“Are you all right?”
Just as he was starting to lose consciousness, he heard a voice. A young man put his arms around Yoshio and helped him to his feet.
“Can you stand?”
“That guy… you have to… chase him…”
As he made this desperate plea, the young man looked in the direction that Keigo had vanished in.
“Why… why do you need to chase Keigo?” the young man asked uneasily.
Nearby a black crow was pecking at a bag of garbage. As it tried to tug the bag along the ground, the garbage became covered in snow.
The pitch-black crow shook its head as it tore open the convenience-store bag. A crumpled wrapping for a bento flew out of the hole in the bag. A light layer of snow covered the asphalt, dotted with the crow’s footprints. As it spread its wings, they brushed against the glass of the phone booth.
With the freezing receiver held to her ear, Mitsuyo lightly tapped the glass with her foot, hoping to drive the crow away. Startled, the bird leaped back a step, the plastic bag in its beak.
“Hello? Hello? Who’s calling?” Tamayo asked cautiously.
“Sorry I haven’t gotten in touch.”
“Mi-Mitsuyo? Where are you? Why haven’t you called me? Are you by yourself? Are you okay?”
Mitsuyo couldn’t get in an answer to this flurry of questions. “Calm down, okay?” she managed to say.
“What do you mean, calm down? Do you have any idea how panicked I’ve been? They said you’ve been taken away by a murderer. Please-tell me you’re all right! Is that guy with you?”
“No, I’m alone right now.”
“Good. But you have to run away. Right this instant! Where are you? I’ll call the police!”
“Take it easy, all right?”
Tamayo sounded as if she really was going to call the police at any minute. That made sense, Mitsuyo thought. Ever since the night that Yuichi half dragged her away in his car, after she’d told Tamayo not to worry, they had exchanged a few e-mails, but she never answered Tamayo’s questions about what was going on. They’d kept this up until her cell-phone battery died.
“Are you really alone?” Tamayo asked again. “If you really are, then I want you to say Call the police right away.”
“What’re you talking about?”
“If that murderer isn’t with you, say it.”
Tamayo was serious, so Mitsuyo gave in and repeated the line. “The guy I’m with,” she added. “He really isn’t an evil person, you know.”
From the other end of the line, she heard a disgusted sigh.
According to Tamayo, detectives had been staking out their parents’ house. The police were convinced that Yuichi had forced Mitsuyo to go with him, and after the New Year’s TV programs ended and regular programming started up again, the talk shows began showing scenes of Mitsuyo and Tamayo’s apartment building, though they blurred out the name, and they didn’t give the sisters’ names or show their photos. The investigation was progressing better than they’d expected.
As she listened to Tamayo, Mitsuyo thought of Yuichi, back on the logging road. I’m fine going to the convenience store myself, she’d told him, asking him to stay back in the shack, but Yuichi was worried about her going alone and he had accompanied her down the hill, where he was hiding now in the bushes. The snow must be piling up in those bushes, too, she thought.
“But he really didn’t force you to go with him, did he?” Tamayo asked.
“No, he didn’t,” Mitsuyo answered firmly.
“So what are you planning to do? How can you stay with a person like that?”
Mitsuyo had no idea how to respond. Tamayo broke the silence and said, tearfully, “My God, of all people in the world, why did you have to choose a murderer?”
“Tamayo?”
The crow outside had flown off somewhere, its footprints filling with newly fallen snow.
“I did something terrible, didn’t I…” Mitsuyo said.
On the other end of the line Mitsuyo could hear her sister gulp. “If you know that,” Tamayo said, “then you’d better-”
“But this is the first time in my life I’ve felt this way. I want to be with him, even if it’s just one more day.”
“You want to be with him? That’s a little self-centered, don’t you think?”
“Huh?” Mitsuyo clutched the receiver tighter.
“I hope you’re not telling me you want to run away with this guy. No matter how much you love him, you can’t tie him down with the way you feel. It’ll be painful, but if you really love him you have to take him in to the police. The more you two run away, the more guilty he’ll be.”
Before she realized it, Mitsuyo pressed the hook with her numb finger. All she heard now was an inorganic whoosh of the dial tone. Tamayo hadn’t told her anything she didn’t already know. She hadn’t expected her sister to understand, but the conversation had only reinforced what she expected-that no one else was on their side.
It had stopped snowing when she left the phone booth.
Leaving footprints behind in the light dusting of snow, she headed for the convenience store across the street. She’d already bought their food, but she’d seen a ¥480 pair of gloves and she wanted to go back and buy them for Yuichi.
You can’t tie him down with the way you feel.
Tamayo’s words, and her own footprints, followed her.
The parking lot of the convenience store was empty except for one lone car, its engine running. The exhaust from the tailpipes was as white as cotton. Normally she would have noticed it right away, but perhaps because she’d been unsettled by Tamayo’s words, or perhaps because the car blended into the snow, she didn’t see right away that it was a patrol car. The moment she did, her legs went weak, and she couldn’t move.
The heat inside the store clouded the windows, and she couldn’t see inside. Still, she could barely make out a figure at the register that looked like a policeman.
He’s coming out. The policeman’s coming out.
She tried as hard as she could to walk away, but her legs wouldn’t move. As the automatic doors slid open, she finally was able to walk. There was still some distance between her and the policeman. She was just about to glance back when someone tapped her on the shoulder.
“Excuse me,” a man’s voice said, close by.
She turned and found herself face to face with a young patrolman. His hat was lightly covered with snow. His nose was red in the cold, his breath forming a cloud that almost hid his face.
“Is something wrong?” the patrolman asked.
He smiled at her. He seemed to have been watching Mitsuyo from behind and saw how she had stood there, stock-still, on the road.
“No…”
She turned her face away and strode off. At that instant the patrolman’s eyebrows, stiff in the cold, twitched.
“Hold on a minute. You’re Miss Magome, aren’t you?”
Mitsuyo, about to break into a run, felt these words behind her. A truck drove past. The ruts in the snowy road led straight to where Yuichi was waiting for her on the logging road.
Yuichi… Mitsuyo called out silently.
The ruts in the snowy road led to a narrow alley. The sunlight and shade cut the road neatly in two, with only the snow on the sunny half dazzling in the light.
Fusae bent over and walked straight ahead, so as to stay within the space between the ruts. Once out of the alley there was the pier, and past that the bus stop. She’d checked the bus schedule. Now if the bus would only come on time.
“Do you have a comment for us?”
“How do you feel now? Any feelings for the victim’s family?”
“Yuichi really hasn’t gotten in touch with you?”
“Do you know the girl he ran away with?”
Fusae stared at her feet, avoiding the cameras and reporters surrounding her. The spot in the snow where she was about to step next had been trampled down, leaving behind a dark footprint.
There’d been only a scattering of reporters up till now, but this morning they suddenly multiplied. Last night she’d talked to Norio on the phone, and he’d said they’d finally released Yuichi’s photo. Right after talking with him, the phone rang again. She was sure it was Norio, but it was yet another threatening call from the health-food people. “Listen, old woman, you haven’t transferred the money to us yet!” the voice on the other end growled.
Fusae hung up immediately, but the phone rang every fifteen minutes until after midnight. Fusae put the futon over her head to block out the sound. More than anything, she felt frustrated at her own fear spilling over into tears.
That morning when she turned on the TV, the first thing she saw was a talk show reporting on the murder. They didn’t show Yuichi’s photo, but rather a graphic of Mitsuse Pass straddling the Saga and Fukuoka prefecture border, and the highway in both directions. Symbols indicated the murdered girl’s apartment in Hakata, the apartment on the outskirts of Saga City where Yuichi’s girl lived, and Yuichi’s home here in Nagasaki. One more symbol showed where Yuichi’s car had been abandoned, in Arita, and where a witness had seen them in a hotel.
The report said it wasn’t clear yet whether Yuichi had forced the girl to go with him, or whether she’d gone along voluntarily. According to the employee of the hotel who had spotted them, “the girl seemed to be pulling him by the hand,” to which an ill-tempered commentator added disgustedly: “If they’re running away together, the guy’s an idiot, and so is she. What I mean is this is the kind of girl who latches on to guys like that. It’s disgusting.”
Surrounded by reporters and cameras, Fusae finally made it to the bus stop. The microphones thrust at her occasionally brushed against her ears.
Even at the bus stop, the barrage of questions didn’t let up. Fusae didn’t say a word, which led one irritated reporter to shout, “Does your silence mean that you admit it’s true?” trying to force her into making a comment.
Luckily, there was no one else at the bus stop, but along the way, there were local housewives watching Fusae and the reporters, looks of pity on their faces. The bus finally arrived and Fusae, mumbling an apology, stepped forward. The reporters made room for her, though some clucked their tongues in disapproval. She grabbed the handrail and was climbing in when several reporters tried to get on as well. Five or six passengers were already aboard, all of them staring in amazement at the crowd at what was normally a deserted bus stop in a little fishing village.
Fusae hunched over and sat down in the seat behind the driver. The reporters were all scrambling, vying to get aboard. Fusae sat there, staring at her shoes, their tips covered in mud and snow.
“Just a second here. Who do you think you are?” the bus driver growled, his voice booming over his microphone. “You can’t do interviews in the bus. You have to get permission!” The reporters all froze.
“It’s dangerous. You’d better all get out!” the driver shouted. He looked around to shove the reporters back.
“Yelling at an old lady isn’t going to help anything,” the driver added, to everyone. Fusae recognized his face in the rearview mirror. This was usually an unfriendly driver, a bit erratic in his driving, the one driver along this route she always hoped to avoid.
“Watch out now, I’m shutting the door!” The driver forced the door closed and the bus slowly pulled away.
Fusae looked back down at her shoes. It wasn’t until they reached the next bus stop that she realized she’d been crying, thankful to the driver for his kindness.
The bus left the road along the sea and headed into the city. Fusae felt as if everyone was staring at her and couldn’t bring herself to look up, but as new passengers boarded at each stop, the atmosphere inside the bus gradually changed. As they reached Katsuji’s hospital, Fusae pressed the button next to the window. “We’ll be stopping at the next stop,” said the driver curtly.
The bus slowed down. Fusae waited until it came to a complete stop before she grabbed hold of the railing and stood up. She wanted to thank the driver but didn’t have the courage, and headed toward the exit at the back.
The door hissed open. No one else was getting off. She glanced toward the driver and was stepping down when he suddenly said, “It’s not your fault. You hang in there now, y’hear?”
A stir ran through the bus for a moment after the driver’s words echoed through the sound system. Fusae didn’t know how to react. The passengers turned to look at her, standing on the steps, and she fled. She turned around, but the door closed and the bus just drove away.
It had all happened so quickly. Left behind, alone at the stop, Fusae could only stare blankly at the receding bus.
You hang in there now, y’hear?
The words echoed again in her mind, and she hastily bowed in the direction of the bus.
It’s not your fault.
She repeated the driver’s words to herself. Behind her was the hospital and going inside meant taking care of her ill-tempered husband, then back home to the crowd of reporters outside, and a night spent trembling in fear at more threatening phone calls.
“You hang in there now, y’hear?” she murmured again.
Running away won’t help anything, she thought. And no help’s on the way, no matter how much I wait. It’s no different from when they threw those rationed potatoes and I had to scramble around to pick them up. I need to be strong. I’m not going to let them make fun of me anymore. Be strong. Nobody’s going to make fun of me anymore. No way. No way am I going to let that happen.
When Yoshio awoke, he was on a makeshift bed in a hospital. He must have lost consciousness, but his mind was clear now. All he felt was pain.
Yoshio looked around him. His bed was in a hallway, not a room. He tried to sit up, but a man’s arm shot out from the bench beside him and rested on his chest. “You better lie down for a while,” the man said, but Yoshio pushed back and sat up. A nurse was scurrying away down the long hallway.
“You have a mild concussion… They’re going to put you in a ward soon,” the young man beside him said uneasily, glancing back and forth between Yoshio and the retreating nurse. This was the young man who’d helped him up after he’d hit his head, Yoshio recalled, and he was about to thank him, when another memory came and he was silent for a moment.
“You’re a friend of Keigo Masuo, aren’t you?” he said as he lowered himself from the makeshift bed. The young man’s face stiffened and he asked, more hesitantly, “What sort of… relationship do you have with Keigo?”
Yoshio looked straight at him. The young man was tall and lanky, his eyes somehow lifeless. Trying to avoid Yoshio’s wordless stare, the young man said, bowing his head, “My name’s Koki Tsuruta. I know Keigo from school.”
“If you’re his classmate, you must know where he is now, right?” Yoshio asked. He knew the boy wouldn’t answer him. He got up and set off toward the elevators.
“Wait up!” Koki’s voice followed him from behind. “Are you… that girl’s…”
Yoshio halted and turned to face Koki. He realized his jacket was lighter than before and he reached in his pocket. The wrench was gone.
“Is this what you’re looking for?” Koki pulled the wrench out of his yellow backpack.
“You saw what happened, didn’t you? The guy kicked me, too, and made me lose consciousness. I can’t just go back to Kurume like this. I couldn’t stand it. But I don’t expect you understand how I feel.”
Yoshio reached out and grabbed for the wrench from Koki. Koki hesitated for a moment. “All right,” he said. “But don’t try anything stupid, okay?” And he meekly handed over the wrench.
As I was taking Yoshino Ishibashi’s father over to the café where Keigo always hung out, I called Keigo on his cell phone. When he answered, he sounded really worked up. “Koki, is that you?” he said. “Where are you? Get over here, okay?” He went on: “Something crazy just happened to me. Guess who I ran into? The father of that girl who died on Mitsuse Pass! Y’all killed mah daughter! the guy said and tried to grab me. God, it was wild! I gave him a good kick.” Keigo’s voice was loud, and I could picture his entourage around him, egging him on.
After we left the hospital, Yoshino’s father walked beside me. I hung up the phone and said, “He’s in the usual place,” and he said “Is that right?” and nodded.
At the time, I didn’t understand why I was taking him to meet Keigo. I can’t express it well, but when I saw Mr. Ishibashi in the snow, clinging to Keigo’s legs, it was like I was smelling the scent of a human being for the first time in my life. I’d never noticed the scent of humans before, but for some reason Mr. Ishibashi’s scent came through clearly. Compared to Keigo, he looked so small, so small it made me sad.
I spend most of my time holed up in my room, watching movies, so I’ve seen tons of people crying, being sad, angry, and full of hatred. But this was the first time I realized that people’s emotions have a distinct odor. I wish I could explain it better, but when I saw Mr. Ishibashi clinging to Keigo’s legs, it was like, I don’t know, like I could really feel this whole crime for the first time…
The feeling of Keigo’s foot as it kicked Yoshino out of his car, the cold of the ground as she touched it. The sky Yoshino saw as the criminal strangled her, the feeling of her throat under his hands as he wrung her neck. I could suddenly feel it all, as clear as day.
A person disappearing from this world isn’t like the top stone of a pyramid disappearing. It’s more like one of the foundation stones at the base. You know what I mean?
Truthfully, I don’t think Mr. Ishibashi could ever hurt Keigo. Not then, when they confronted each other, or later on in their lives. Keigo will always come out on top. Still, I wanted Mr. Ishibashi to stand up to him and say something. I didn’t want him to silently lose out.
As she walked from the bus stop in front of the hospital, Fusae took her worn purse from the bag hanging heavily on her wrist. Inside was a sheaf of supermarket receipts, four-thousand-yen bills, a large five-hundred-yen coin all by itself, and a handful of other coins.
The only snow left along the seaside road was underneath the trees lining it. On the road itself the snow had melted and the cars splashed muddy water.
Fusae put her purse back in her bag. The bus driver’s words were helping her along, but something else had burst within her. She had finally shaken free of the fear that had controlled her these past few weeks. She left the seaside road and headed toward the back road that led to Dutch Slope.
She was trying to recall the time when Katsuji’s second cousin Goro visited with his family, from Okayama, on a vacation to Nagasaki. They weren’t all that close to them, but Katsuji was enthusiastic about it and showed them all over town, then took them to a Chinese place for dinner. Yuichi must have been in elementary school back then, so it would have to be twenty years ago.
Goro’s wife was a frumpy, strong-willed woman who was constantly complaining about how high the entrance fees were to places they visited, how expensive the coffee was. They had a daughter, Kyoko, who’d just gone into junior high, and she and Yuichi played together during the trip.
Fusae recalled showing them Dutch Slope. She was tired of the complaints and so she walked ahead and caught up with Yuichi and Kyoko. As she did, she overheard Kyoko say, “Yuichi, you’re lucky your grandmother’s so pretty.” Yuichi didn’t seem interested and went on kicking pebbles as he walked, but Kyoko continued. “I wish my mom was like your grandmother and wore a pretty scarf when she went on a trip.”
Fusae was embarrassed, and kept her distance. The scarf she was wearing was cheap, and these words of praise were coming from a girl in junior high, but Fusae couldn’t hide the pride she felt.
Afterward, on visits to open-house days at Yuichi’s classroom and parent-teacher-conference days, Fusae was never without a scarf around her neck. Nobody ever told her how nice she looked again, but without the scarf she might not have had the courage to be among the young mothers.
As she walked down the cobblestoned backstreet toward the shopping district, Fusae wondered how long it had been since she’d bought a new scarf. Not just a scarf-she hadn’t bought any new clothes in ages. What was the last thing she had bought? Was it that imitation-leather coat she got at Daiei? Or the light blue sweater from the local clothing shop?
She’d walked down this street for years, but now she noticed a clothing store she’d never seen before. The place was small, the entrance nearly blocked by a wagon piled high with sweaters that were obviously catering to a middle-aged female clientele.
Fusae stopped and gazed inside the shop. Perhaps because it was still light out, the inside of the store looked dark, with a couple of old mannequins set up as though they’d like nothing better than to flee. Large price tags were attached to the clothes on the mannequins, the printed price crossed out in red, the reduced price written over it. But that, too, was crossed out, without a new price written on the tag.
Fusae walked over to the wagon outside and picked up the nearest sweater, a purple one. She held it up and saw that it was too small for her. The woman at the register stood up, and after a moment’s hesitation, Fusae returned the sweater to the wagon and went inside the dark store.
Fusae merely nodded to the clerk when she greeted her, and as she fingered the white jacket one of the mannequins was wearing, the woman came over and said, “That material feels very nice. It’s so soft.”
The original price on the tag said twelve thousand yen, but that was crossed out, and the reduced price of nine thousand was crossed out as well. She turned her eyes and saw colored scarves hanging next to the register. Noticing where Fusae was looking, the clerk said, “Those are on sale, too.”
Fusae walked further back into the store and picked up a bright orange scarf. There was a mirror to one side reflecting her in her dark gray coat. Fusae slowly wrapped the scarf around her neck. Perhaps a bit too bright for her, she thought, but the color went surprisingly well with the coat.
“How much is this?” she asked.
“The color looks really good as an accent,” the clerk said while she straightened the scarves. “Let me see,” she added, checking the price tag. “This one would be three thousand eight hundred.”
Fusae had no makeup on, and the scarf was all it took to make her face look much brighter. She had only four thousand yen with her, but she unwound the scarf from her neck and handed it to the clerk. “Here you go. I’ll take it,” she said.
“Here you go.”
The policeman in the driver’s seat held out his hand, which held a handkerchief. The handkerchief, pure white cotton, looked strange in his rough fingers. He must be married. The handkerchief was nicely ironed and had a faint scent.
Mitsuyo was seated in the backseat of the patrol car. Beside her was the plastic bag full of food she’d bought at the convenience store. The heaters clouded the windows and she couldn’t see outside. She took the handkerchief and wiped away her tears.
When the patrolman had her sit in the backseat, Mitsuyo cried. He wasn’t sure what to do, so he asked about her health, about where Yuichi was, and then contacted his precinct via radio. But Mitsuyo was so shaken she could barely hear her own voice, let alone his.
She held the handkerchief against her face, and the patrolman hung up the radio and said, “Miss Magome, we’re going to go to the station first. A policewoman will be there and we’ll talk more.” He started the engine.
The patrol car pulled out of the convenience-store parking lot. Mitsuyo could just make out the clerk and the customers in the store watching them. She realized that she was trembling and pulled the bag of groceries onto her lap and hugged it tightly.
Would Yuichi realize what was going on? Would he run away?
The car was heading toward the intersection where the logging road went up to the lighthouse. Turn left here and they could see the thicket where Yuichi was hiding. Mitsuyo couldn’t bring herself to look in that direction, and held on more tightly to the shopping bag. She squeezed it too hard, and a sweet bun popped out and fell to the wet floor near her feet.
Yuichi… Yuichi…
Until the car completely passed the intersection, Mitsuyo repeated his name to herself over and over.
She wanted to force the door open and leap out, but the car was racing along too quickly. It had happened too suddenly, with no time to say goodbye. She held the handkerchief to her face all the way to the police station. The policeman helped her out of the car, and they went into the small, deserted local station. The inside smelled of kerosene from the heater, and curried rice.
“Just-just sit here for a while.”
The patrolman guided her to a bench next to the window. Cold wind blew in the open front door, scattering papers on the desk. The phone on the desk was ringing. The policeman hesitated, but decided to close the front door first. As soon as he shut it, the phone stopped ringing.
Mitsuyo sat down on the cold, hard bench and grasped the plastic shopping bag to her again. The handkerchief in her hand was damp with sweat and tears.
The patrolman was about to say something to her, but he seemed flustered and stopped. He took off his cap, laid it on the desk, and lifted the receiver of the phone.
“Yes. We just arrived… No, she isn’t hurt. She is a little upset, yes… No, I haven’t asked her yet.”
Mitsuyo listened to the patrolman’s replies, and thought again of Yuichi, hiding in the thicket. With the light covering of snow, he must be freezing. The frozen leaves and branches must be stabbing his numb hands and cheeks.
On the wall opposite the bench was a local map taped to the wall. The station was marked in red. She saw the village where the convenience store was, and the lighthouse where they’d hid.
“Excuse me. I need to use the restroom,” Mitsuyo said, standing up. The patrolman put his hand over the receiver and after a moment’s hesitation, opened the door to the back room. Mitsuyo nodded her thanks to him, then gestured to ask whether it was all right to close the door. The patrolman, phone to his ear, nodded, and she shut the door.
The back room was six mats in size and a futon was spread out on the tatami for the policemen to use for naps.
“I’m sure the man is still around here… No, there’s no place where they could hide out for long…”
Mitsuyo heard the patrolman’s voice through the door. Next to a door that said Restroom was a window. On impulse, she opened the window. She stood on top of a metal folding chair and scrambled out.
She didn’t look back. She climbed over the low wall behind the station, ran through the garden of a nearby house, and emerged onto an alley. Beyond the narrow alley was a hill, and on top of the hill was the lighthouse. Mitsuyo felt Yuichi was calling to her, and she knew that even if she had to crawl up the steep slope on her hands and knees, she would make it back to the lighthouse.
As he walked next to Koki, Yoshio wondered whether he could be trusted. He’d been nice enough to take him to the hospital, but after that he’d announced that he was a friend of Keigo’s. The whole thing made Yoshio uneasy.
“Do you know Yoshino, too?” he asked.
Koki’s pale cheeks, which looked as if they seldom saw the sun, reddened. “Ah, no I don’t. I never actually…” he said evasively.
Koki silently headed toward the shopping district. He wasn’t taking a taxi, Yoshio noticed, and he walked right past the subway, so the shop that jerk is in must be right around here.
“You go to the same college as that guy?” he asked.
“Uh… yeah.”
“You don’t like him much?”
“No, we’re good friends.”
Yoshio barked a short laugh at this. If you’re such good friends, then why are you taking a man you don’t know to see him, a man who’s carrying a wrench?
“I left home planning to kill him. Do you have any idea how I feel?”
It felt weird, talking about this with a good friend of the man who’d kicked his daughter in the back and abandoned her.
“You have parents?” he asked.
“Yes,” Koki replied briefly.
“You get along okay?”
“Not really.” The reply left no doubt how he felt.
“You have somebody you really care about?”
At this, Koki halted and looked puzzled.
“Somebody who, when you think about their happiness, you feel happy, too?”
Koki shook his head. “I don’t think he has anyone like that either,” he muttered.
“There’re too many people in the world like you,” Yoshio said. “Too many people who don’t have anyone they care about. Who think if they don’t love anyone else then they’re free to do whatever they want. They think they have nothing to lose, and that makes them stronger. If you have nothing to lose, there’s nothing you really want, either. You’re full of confidence, and look down on people who lose things, who want things, who are happy, or sad sometimes. But that’s not the way things are. And it’s just not right.”
Koki stood there, stock-still, the whole time. Yoshio nudged him and said, “Come on, which way is it? Are you taking me, or what?”
Koki came to a halt outside a glass-enclosed restaurant fronting the main street. White words in a foreign language danced across the glass. Inside, young girls were poking around in large bowls of salad.
Yoshio left Koki standing outside and walked in. He was met by a rush of sound-music playing, the clatter of dishes in the kitchen, customers laughing.
He didn’t spot Keigo at any of the tables, or at the counter that wrapped around the kitchen area. Yoshio ignored the waitress who came over to seat him, and strode into the restaurant. Two young men were seated on cushioned seats, facing toward Yoshio. They were gazing up at Keigo, seated with his back to the entrance, who was doing all the talking. The two friends were laughing uproariously.
Yoshio walked straight toward them. Keigo didn’t notice him coming and went on talking, gesturing all the while as he spoke. “So get this. The old fart grabs me and says, ‘It’s y’all’s fault, hear me? That mah daughter’s dead!’ The guy was so serious you couldn’t believe it. So desperate. God! I’d laugh my ass off if I ever saw that old fart’s face again. You know the type-like the old men that Macchan imitates sometimes?”
The two friends were laughing, right in front of Keigo. But Yoshio couldn’t figure out what was so amusing. A father trying that hard for the sake of his murdered daughter-what’s so funny about that?
The two friends finally noticed Yoshio and glanced at him. Following their gaze, Keigo turned around, and gulped.
I just don’t get it, Yoshio thought. This guy who can laugh at other people’s sorrow. I don’t get it. And I don’t understand how these friends of his can laugh along. And I don’t get these people who send letters abusing and slandering Yoshino. And these talk-show commentators who’ve labeled Yoshino a slut. I just don’t understand them.
Yoshino. He silently called her name. Daddy doesn’t get it at all.
Keigo was standing up in front of him. He was speechless, his face pale. The wrench Yoshio was gripping in his pocket seemed suddenly light.
“Is it so funny?” he asked. He really wanted to know. Keigo took a step backward.
“Go ahead, try living that way,” Yoshio said, the words pouring out. “If you can live like that, laughing at everybody else, go ahead.” Yoshio was so sad he couldn’t stand it.
Keigo and his friends stood staring blankly. Yoshio took the wrench out of his pocket and tossed it at Keigo’s feet. And without another word, he left.
Yoshio arrived back in Kurume after four p.m. that day. He’d been gone two days, and when he thought about Satoko, who had probably spent the whole time crying, he considered how worried she must have been. It pained him deeply.
He parked in the lot a little way from their house, and trudged heavily toward home. After Yoshino was gone, he felt drained of energy. He’d stood in front of Keigo, who’d ridiculed him, but had left without doing a thing. Was this the right choice, or had he made a mistake? He had no idea.
He emerged from the alley where the parking lot was and could see in the distance the sign Ishibashi Barbershop. For a moment he couldn’t believe it. After Yoshino had been killed, he hadn’t once switched on the light on the barber pole outside the shop, but now he could swear it was on and revolving.
Dubious, Yoshio stepped up his pace, and as he approached his shop he could see that indeed the barber pole was revolving. He started running. Out of breath by the time he reached the shop, he yanked open the front door. There weren’t any customers inside, just Satoko, dressed in her white barber’s coat, folding freshly laundered towels.
“You… you opened the shop?” Yoshio asked.
Surprised by his sudden appearance, Satoko, eyes wide, said, “Oh! You startled me.” She went on, smiling, “If I don’t open it, who will? Mr. Sonobe came in a while ago for a cut.”
“And you cut it?”
These past few years, Satoko had grown to hate touching customers’ hair, and had avoided working in the shop. But here she was now, decked out in her barber’s coat, right in front of him.
“You must have been worried,” Yoshio said.
Satoko went back to folding the towels and silently shook her head.
“Well, I’m back,” Yoshio said.
The setting sun shone through the glass door, and the name Ishibashi Barbershop formed a shadow at their feet.
Fusae declined to have the scarf wrapped and tied it around her neck. The clerk had shown her a special way to tie it. Fusae paid and left the shop. Just a scarf, but buying it made her feel light and happy.
She cut across a park and came out behind the bus terminal. At night the area was lined with small stands selling food and drinks, but it was still early and there were only a few stands there, all locked up with tin sheets and chains. Down the road was a large pay-by-the-hour parking lot, and beyond that the bustling shopping district.
She’d seen this parking lot before, back then, from the window of that room where she was surrounded by those men. She’d been so frightened she couldn’t lift her head, but the leader of the group, who occasionally spoke to her kindly, brought her a cup of hot tea, and she managed a quick glance out the window.
Fusae continued down the street, and was at the fence around the parking lot when, taking a deep breath, she slowly turned around and glanced up at the building behind her. It was the kind of old multiuse building you find anywhere, with a narrow staircase up to the second floor. She could make out the bottom half of the blue door of the elevator.
A young family, the father holding his little daughter on his shoulders, was walking nearby, perhaps on their way to have a meal in Chinatown. The little girl had on a kind of Santa Claus hat that she evidently found uncomfortable and was trying to yank off, while her mother walking beside her adjusted it.
Fusae clutched the bag in her hand more tightly, took another deep breath, and set off again. She thought she was walking along pretty steadily, but she began to feel something trembling beneath her, as if she were walking on a board floating in the water.
She went into the gloomy building. As she stepped onto the first step of the stairs, its tiles starting to come off, she suddenly felt like fleeing and grabbed on to the handrail.
Yuichi, honey-where are you?
She walked up another step.
Remember that no matter what happens, Grandma’s always on your side.
You need to do what’s right, too. You’re scared, aren’t you? But you can’t run away. You have to do the right thing. Grandma’s not going to let them beat me, either.
Fusae touched the elevator button. The heavy bag made her arm tremble. The door opened. It was a tiny elevator that couldn’t hold more than three at a time. She went inside and pushed the button for the third floor. She kept on pushing it until the door closed.
The elevator door opened again and she stepped out into a dim hallway. A single door was at the end.
Yuichi, you can’t run away. I know you’re scared, but you can’t run. Running away’s not going to change anything. That’s not going to help anybody.
Fusae found herself muttering this aloud as she walked down the corridor. She stood in front of the door and could hear men laughing inside. Her body felt tense. The sound of a TV mixed in with the laughter. She heard a girl on a roller coaster: a thundering sound, the girl’s shrieks, and every time she shrieked, a roar of laughter from the men watching, right behind this door.
Fusae gritted her back teeth and turned the cold doorknob. The door was unlocked and opened easily, cigarette smoke wafting out.
She saw the backs of three men, sprawled out on a sofa in front of the TV. The one who looked the youngest noticed Fusae standing there. “Yeah?” he said, as if he couldn’t be bothered. Fusae took a step forward. The man who’d spoken to her stood up, and the other two stared at her.
“Whaddaya want, old woman?”
The man who’d stood up approached her. The other two had gone back to watching TV.
“I never intended to… sign a year’s contract,” Fusae managed.
“Huh? What’s that?” the young man said as if he hadn’t heard her.
“I never intended to make a year’s contract!” she shouted. “And I want you to cancel it.” Things started to swim before her eyes, and she felt about to faint. At the shout, the two on the sofa turned around again.
“I want you to cancel it!” she shouted, the spit flying. “I don’t have that kind of money, so you have to cancel it!”
The bag in her hands swung around as she spoke and struck a shelf. The three men burst out laughing, but Fusae didn’t hear them.
“I’ve struggled all my life. And I’m not about to let people like you make a fool out of me!”
Her breathing ragged now, Fusae strode out of the office. She bumped against the walls on both sides as she walked down the corridor. If they want to come, let ’em, she thought. They want to laugh at me, let ’em. But beyond the door to the office there was no laughter, no footsteps about to chase after her. The gloomy hallway was so silent it was creepy.
The setting sun was just grazing the horizon. Yuichi was standing on the far edge of the cliff following a pair of seabirds with his eyes as they flew off into the sun.
Without waiting for sunset, he walked back to the caretaker’s shack at the lighthouse. It wasn’t warm inside, but he could feel how chilled he’d become standing on the cliff.
On the plywood board was the sleeping bag that Mitsuyo had folded up, the orange-juice pack she’d drunk, the box of chocolates she’d eaten, the pebbles she’d lined up. Yuichi sat down on the folded sleeping bag. He could feel the cold concrete below the plywood board.
While he was hiding in the thicket, snow that had accumulated on the leaves had fallen onto his neck. He’d shrugged his shoulders at the cold and the melted snow ran down his back. Mitsuyo was just buying a few things at the convenience store and should have been back a long time ago. Worried, he’d emerged from the bushes. Just before Yuichi came out on the main road, he spotted a policeman walking from the bus stop in his direction. Yuichi quickly hid behind a light pole. The policeman posted a notice of some kind on a bulletin board across the street, and started walking back toward the bus stop.
Yuichi waited, checking out the situation. He was just about to step out onto the main road when a patrol car, siren blasting, roared by. He hurriedly hid again behind the light pole.
He waited another five, then ten minutes, but no Mitsuyo. Maybe she’d noticed the patrol cars, too, and had taken the path, the one past the shrine, back to the lighthouse. Thrusting aside weeds as he went, Yuichi made his way up the hill. But no matter how long he waited at the lighthouse, Mitsuyo didn’t return.
Yuichi flicked at the pebbles of different sizes and colors she’d lined up in a neat row on the plywood board. Did they mean anything? Yuichi scooped them up. As he squeezed them, they clicked against each other in his palm.
Mitsuyo… He called her name as he fingered the pebbles. No other words came. A sudden commotion was coming from the base of the hill. Usually he and Mitsuyo couldn’t hear anything from down there, but now something ominous was filtering up the slope.
Pebbles still in his hand, he ran outside. The sun had set now, and the border between the sea and the mountain had vanished. Red lights of a patrol car were visible among the faint lights of the town below. Not just one, but many, coming from all directions, red lights converging on the town. Sirens, like waves, rang out from down below.
In all the commotion, the mountain seemed all the more silent. Yuichi turned away and gazed at the towering lighthouse. It soared upward, as if propping up the night sky.
He remembered when he was a child, when his mother abandoned him and he’d stared across to the lighthouse on the other shore.
“I’ll be right back,” his mother had told him, and disappeared. Yuichi had believed her. He waited and waited but she never returned. It must be because I did something bad, he’d thought. And he’d tried his hardest to think what that could be. But no matter how hard he thought about it, he couldn’t figure out why she’d be so mad at him.
The last ferryboat was just leaving then. Yuichi, tired from waiting, was walking along the pier when a little girl ran up to him from the parking lot. She must have just learned to walk, for she didn’t seem to know how to put the brakes on her running feet. Yuichi reached out and held her to stop her from running. The little girl’s look of relief was something he could clearly picture, even now. As the girl’s father ran over and lifted her up, the girl reached out to Yuichi and offered him the stick of chikuwa in her hand. Yuichi declined, but the girl’s father said, “We just bought it, so please go ahead,” and he handed it to Yuichi. Yuichi thanked him and took it.
When he thought about it later, he realized that from the time his mother left him, until the next morning when one of the ferry workers discovered him there, all he ate was that stick of chikuwa.
Yuichi tossed the pebbles in his hand at the lighthouse above him. Mitsuyo… he thought again. The pebbles flew in all directions, only the largest one actually striking the base of the lighthouse.
Mitsuyo might be in one of those patrol cars. She might have been arrested. If they grabbed her, I have to go rescue her. Go right away and tell them, “I wanted her to come with me. I threatened her and made her come with me.” No. Mitsuyo will be back. No way the cops got her. She bought a lot of things at the convenience store and will come back, a smile on her face, saying, “Sorry I’m late!” She said she’d be right back. She smiled when she said that, when she left.
Yuichi picked up a stone from the ground and flung it hard against the lighthouse.
Without Mitsuyo, all he felt was pain. Mitsuyo is off somewhere right now, alone, he thought. The last thing I want is for her to feel this kind of pain. It’s enough that I feel it.
The bark of the tree broke off under her grip and stabbed beneath her fingernails. Mitsuyo gritted her teeth, not giving in to the pain, grabbed a thin branch, and stepped up on top of a boulder.
The woods were pitch-black and wherever she stepped were fallen dead trees. Dead trees she could handle, but not the moss-covered rocks. She slipped on them over and over, tumbling to the damp ground.
After she climbed out the window of the police station, her only thought was to get to the top of the hill, to the lighthouse. On the way, as she was running through the garden of someone’s house, an old woman sitting on the porch had called out to her, but she clambered over the wall without looking back and ran into the dark woods.
The snow piled up on tree branches and leaves and she could barely make out her surroundings. She’d lost all feeling in her fingers. She looked up and saw the sky beyond the branches ahead of her. If she could make it that far, she would be at the lighthouse, where Yuichi was waiting. The bushes she grabbed on to had thorns; the thin branches bent back and snapped into her face.
Still she climbed on, clambering over the rocks. The sorrow that had swept over her in the back of the patrol car was pursuing her, and would catch her if she stopped for even a moment. She no longer had the willpower to consider what she was doing, or what she had done. All she wanted was to see Yuichi one more time. It hurt not to have him by her side, right this instant. He was there at the lighthouse, waiting for her, and she couldn’t stand to make him feel any lonelier.
She had no idea where this strength was coming from. Or where she found the power to love someone so much.
“Yuichi!”
With each freezing branch whipping across her face, she bit her lip and called out to him.
Yuichi’s at the lighthouse, waiting for me. I know he’s waiting for me. Have I ever had a place like this before, ever? And I can make it there… If I can only make it, I’ll be with the one who loves me. In all my thirty years, have I ever had a place like this? But I’ve found it now. And that’s where I’m heading.
Mitsuyo grabbed at the cold branches with her numb hands and climbed up the wet rocks.
On this day the temperature in the northern part of Kyushu fell below zero degrees centigrade. At five p.m. the decision was made to temporarily lower the speed limit on the entire Kyushu Expressway. Chains were required for cars driving through the mountains and fog started to envelop the cities. The evening news announced that a snowstorm was coming that night and reporters feared that traffic would grind to a halt. It was after five-thirty when Mitsuse Pass was closed to traffic. This announcement scrolled across the TV screen during the entertainment-news report and soon disappeared.
Just around that time, an old woman showed up at a police station in a small harbor town. She explained that twenty minutes before, a young woman had crossed through her garden and gone up into the hills behind. The patrolman, terribly pale looking, took down her report and hurriedly spread a map before him. Today, for some reason, this sleepy harbor town was crawling with police.
Up the hill behind the old woman’s house was a lighthouse that was no longer being used. The assembled policemen’s fingers rested on top of the map.
“I asked where she was going but she went into the hills without even looking around once.”
The policemen didn’t hear this last explanation from the old woman, for they were already out the door.
Around the same time, Yuichi had decided to come down off the mountain and was packing up the sleeping bag inside the caretaker’s shack. He knew he’d be arrested if he came down to the town, and wouldn’t have a chance to ever use the sleeping bag, but still he shouldered it. With the candles out, the shack was dark, though he could see his cold white breath.
Once he came out of the shack, the disturbance in the town below was louder. The police cars that had been scattered about the town had now formed a line of red lights headed up from the foot of the hills to the lighthouse.
Yuichi went limp. He could barely stand.
And then it happened. Branches in the dark thicket shook, and he heard Mitsuyo, feebly calling out his name. “Mitsuyo!” he yelled out.
“Yuichi!” she called back. Branches shook and snow slipped from the leaves. Yuichi leaped over the fence and raced into the dark thicket. Mitsuyo’s hair was full of dead leaves and twigs, her fingertips were bloody, her eyes wet with tears.
“I couldn’t leave you, Yuichi.”
Yuichi blew on her frozen, numb hands.
“I… I escaped. I couldn’t stand to say goodbye…”
Yuichi stroked her chilled body. Mitsuyo’s cheeks were so frozen even his own cold hands felt warm.
He put his arms around her and was leading her back into the shack when Mitsuyo saw the line of patrol cars heading up the logging road and stopped short. The red lights were getting closer to the lighthouse. Sirens echoed through the hills. Yuichi gave Mitsuyo a little shove.
Inside the shack, Yuichi took the sleeping bag from his bag and spread it out. He tried to get Mitsuyo to sit down, for she was clearly exhausted, but she clung to his neck. The sirens were nearer.
“I’m so sorry. I couldn’t help you. I’m so sorry,” Mitsuyo sobbed aloud as she clung to him. “I knew you were going to get arrested, and yet I begged you… to run away with me… If only I hadn’t been so selfish…”
Yuichi held her close as she sobbed.
“I couldn’t help you at all,” she cried, “but you stayed with me… I’m such a terrible woman, yet you’re still holding me… Don’t say anything, just hold me… It’s so hard-so hard when you’re kind to me like this. I hate myself-I never did anything for you. I’m terrible… terrible. I told you to go to the police then… And then I stopped you. God, I’m so awful.”
Yuichi listened. As her cries became louder, so did the sirens. The line of patrol cars was drawing nearer the lighthouse.
Yuichi finally had to peel Mitsuyo away from him. For a moment she stood there, trying to bury her face in his chest, but Yuichi refused to let her. He refused and stood staring right into her wet eyes.
A red light shone through the window of the caretaker’s shack, dyeing Mitsuyo’s wet face red. When she noticed the light, Mitsuyo tried again to cling to Yuichi. Footsteps drew nearer.
“I’m not… the kind of guy you think I am,” Yuichi said, and roughly pushed Mitsuyo away, and she fell to the plywood board.
Mitsuyo’s short cry echoed in the room. The policemen’s flashlights shone in from the far window, the beams crisscrossing each other. And right then, Yuichi straddled Mitsuyo and laid his cold hands on her neck.
Mitsuyo, wide-eyed, tried to shout. Yuichi closed his eyes and squeezed her neck hard. Behind him, the door slammed open and flashlights shone on the two of them.
Let me see, now, when was that? It was when I still looked forward to the homemade lunches he made for me, so it must have been not long after we met… We were eating the lunches in one of the private rooms and talking about something, I don’t remember what. Oh-yes I do. It was about our mothers.
I’d totally forgotten about that, but after he was arrested they had all those talk shows about him on TV. And that jogged my memory. His mother was on one of those shows and she nearly tore the head off the interviewer, she was so angry. “I’ve been punished enough!” she shouted. And when I saw that, I suddenly remembered what we talked about back then.
I was raised by my mom, just her and me, and it might sound strange considering what I do for a living, but the last thing I wanted to do was worry my mother. And when I told him that, he got all serious and said, “Don’t tell anybody else, but every time I see my mom I’m always pestering her for money.”
A pretty ordinary story, I thought, and gave some noncommittal response. But he looked so serious and probably felt bad, like he wanted to apologize or something. Really, though, it sounded like it was going to be a boring story.
Then he said something unexpected. “It hurts to pester her for money I don’t really need.”
So I went, “Then you shouldn’t do it.” I laughed but he thought for a while and then he said, “Yeah, but both of us have to be victims.”
At first I didn’t get it and was going to ask him what he meant, but right then our time was up and the phone rang.
That was it. He brought me lunches many times after that but never mentioned his mother again.
In the news they’ve been running stories about him and the confessions, I guess you’d call them, of that girl who was with him to the end, the one he nearly killed. Playing these stories up big, right? Every time I see these, it still gets me. His face when he said that. Yeah, but both of us have to be victims.
It makes me kind of want to meet that woman, the one from Saga he took with him. Something about the way he looked back then, I just can’t shake it.
I know meeting her isn’t going to change anything. Maybe if I send him a letter or something… On second thought, I shouldn’t get involved…
Maybe it’s like he said in his confession, that at the pass, and at the lighthouse, he was carried away by this sudden urge to kill. Maybe he really is that kind of person…
I finally opened my little diner, but had to close it last month. I guess luck wasn’t on my side. I got sick soon after we opened… So now I’m back at my old job. I used all my savings to open that shop, and after I closed it, I needed money to live on… It makes me kind of scared when I consider my age, but I couldn’t think of anything else to do.
It’s like I told you. I don’t have anything more to add, or anything I want to correct.
I get a kick from driving women into a corner. When I see women like that, scared and suffering, it turns me on. I never noticed it before, but I think I always had those feelings inside me. My first confession was what the reporters picked up on and ran with. But I did say those things. And I am that kind of man.
I didn’t chase after Yoshino Ishibashi because I was planning to kill her. We’d made a date, but then she told me she didn’t have time for me. And then she got into another guy’s car right in front of me. One word of apology from her, that’s all I wanted… So I followed her, and when I got to the pass she’d been kicked out of the other car… I tried to help her, but she refused, said she was going to the police, and before I knew what was happening I’d strangled her.
Maybe it was like that detective told me, that maybe when I was strangling her I realized for the first time I get sexually aroused by women who are suffering. And that’s why I didn’t turn myself in, but went looking for another girl. Mitsuyo Magome just happened to get in touch with me right then, so I made a date to meet up with her.
When they arrested her, Miss Magome apparently said she went with me of her own free will, but I think it’s because I intimidated her and psychologically backed her into a corner. I told her how I murdered Miss Ishibashi, and I think she understood what an evil person I am, that she couldn’t escape, and that made her submit to me.
In fact, Miss Magome did exactly what I told her, and since I didn’t have any money it worked out well to have her along.
She stood by me, apparently testifying that “I was never intimidated or treated roughly,” but I think that’s also like the detective said, that even after she was freed she couldn’t shake off her terror. You could turn that around and say it confirms what I said: that I used fear to control her.
The whole time we were together, she was jumpy. Everywhere we went-when I told her about how I killed Yoshino, when I forced her to go to a love hotel with me, when she sat in the passenger seat of my car, when we arrived at the lighthouse. She was nervous and scared, and that got me excited.
The detective told me how my grandfather died the morning after I was arrested. He did his best to raise me, and I feel awful about putting him through all this in his final hours.
I feel sorry for my grandma, too, for what I did. I heard how she went to visit both families-the Ishibashis and the Magomes-to apologize. And how they refused to see her…
My grandma’s a timid person who can’t do anything on her own, and it hurts to think about that… My grandparents are totally innocent in all this. Totally…
I wrote a letter to Yoshino’s parents, but didn’t get a reply. Not that I should expect one. Or I guess I should say I know I don’t have the right to send them a letter. I can apologize all I want, but it’ll never be enough, I know that. Doesn’t matter the reasons behind what I did, the fact remains that I did something that can never be undone. I think I should die in order to apologize to them. That’s the only thing a person like me can do. But until that day, all I can do is put my hands together in prayer to beg their forgiveness, and keep on apologizing.
I did bad things to Miss Magome, too, I know that, and if the police had shown up a few minutes later, she might have ended up like Yoshino. I’m absolutely sure of this. From the first moment I met her, I may have been imagining that scene, and those feelings.
I’ve said this over and over, but I never liked Miss Magome. She was a source of funds for me when I was on the run, so I pretended to like her. And as I did, I think I started to deceive myself into thinking I really did feel that way about her.
Now when I rethink it, I realize it didn’t have to be Miss Magome. It didn’t necessarily have to be her…
If I hadn’t met her, though…
If I never had met her, I don’t know…
That night, when Yoshino shouted, “I’m going to report this to the police!” I could have insisted that she was lying, but I didn’t think anybody would believe me. Like no one in the entire world would trust what I say. That terrified me, and I ended up doing what I did. But somehow I couldn’t admit deep down to myself what I’d done… Which is how I wound up taking the coward’s way out and running away…
But it’s different now. There are people now who believe what I say. I understand that. So I can admit it now, that I’m a murderer. I’m the man who killed Yoshino and dragged Miss Magome along with me… I can just come right out and say it.
Can I say one more thing?
I heard that Miss Magome was able to go back to her job. Is that true?
I guess I won’t be able to see her again, right?
I know it sounds stupid coming from me, but I want to tell her to forget all about this, as quickly as she can… And tell her to find her own kind of happiness… Could you tell her that for me? I won’t see her ever again, but it would be enough for me if you told her that.
I know she must hate me and doesn’t want to hear anything I say, but if you’d just-just tell her that, that would be enough…
I’m living in our apartment with my younger sister again. Everybody at work has been very helpful, and I’ve been able to go back to work this month.
Things are back to normal. My life’s the same as it was before I met that man.
Right after the news broke, reporters were trying to force their way into my parents’ house, and I didn’t know what to do. But now I get up every morning at eight, pedal my bike to work, come back to the apartment in the evening, and make dinner with my sister…
On the last holiday I did something I haven’t done in a long while-I bought a CD of a singer I like at the shopping center in the neighborhood. I think I’m getting calmer these days.
I’ve heard all kinds of things from the detectives about what that guy said, ever since he was arrested. Of course I didn’t believe it at first. About him saying he liked to make women suffer and that he took me along just to get money out of me.
I couldn’t believe any of it, no matter how much I heard. But finally I understood that I was the one who was really flipping out here. That like an idiot, I’d been so taken in by him, and maybe he really was using me.
After that guy’s testimony was in all the TV stations and magazines, people stopped throwing rocks at the windows of my parents’ house, and though people still come to my workplace sometimes out of curiosity, wanting to take a look at me, I don’t get any dirty looks anymore from people on the street.
Because I’m not the woman who ran off with him, but a victim who was forced to…
My sister and other people have asked if I want to move, but I’m the woman who couldn’t go anywhere, even when I was running away with that guy. There’s no other place I can go.
I’ve been reading articles about the incident in magazines. But I never can believe it’s me they’re talking about.
I’m not trying to escape reality. But even when I try hard to remember what happened, it always feels like some other woman who did all those things. Not me.
I think while all that was going on, I forgot what kind of woman I am. I’m a woman who can’t do a thing, but I was convinced I could… I ignored the fact that up till then I couldn’t do a single thing in my life…
Not too long ago, I went up to Mitsuse Pass for the first time, to lay flowers at the spot where Yoshino Ishibashi passed away. For a long time I didn’t have the courage to go, but I thought it’s my duty to go there…
My sister said, “You’re a victim here, so you don’t need to force yourself to go,” but that time when we were in the squid restaurant in Yobuko, when he told what had happened, I forgave him. I was just thinking of myself, and I forgave him for violently taking Yoshino’s life, no matter why he did it.
I think that for the rest of my life it’s my duty to apologize to Yoshino.
The place where she died is a lonely curve in the road, a gloomy place even in the middle of the day. The flowers there were all dried up, but there was a bright orange scarf someone had wrapped around the guardrail like a landmark. I plan to go every month, on the day of the month when she died, to apologize. Not that that will make her forgive me or anything…
I’ve never met that man’s grandmother. I heard she visited my parents’ house a number of times, but I was never sure how I should receive her. All I really want to tell her is that none of this is her fault…
No, I’m trying not to follow the trial. At first I thought he was lying to protect me. I wasn’t threatened by him, or the victim of mind control or anything… I tried to argue that we were really in love with each other, but people kept on saying no man could be in love with a woman he just met on an online dating site. And if he really loved me, would he try to strangle me?
But those days when we were on the run… when we were in that shack at the lighthouse, scared, when it was snowing and we were freezing-I still miss those times. I know it’s stupid, but it hurts when I think of those days together.
I guess I was the one who was off in my own little world, convinced I was in love.
I mean, he’s the guy who murdered Yoshino. The one who tried to kill me.
Isn’t it like everybody says? That he’s the villain in all this? And I just decided on my own to fall for someone like that.
Right?