Kafka on the Shore

  "Convenient world we live in," he says.

  "Thanks," I tell him.

  "If you don't mind, why don't you take a cup of coffee upstairs. No cream or sugar. You make really good coffee."

  I make a fresh cup and take it on a tray to the second floor. As always, the door to Miss Saeki's room is open and she's at her desk, writing. When I put the cup of coffee on her desk, she looks up at me and smiles, then puts the cap back on her fountain pen and rests it on top of the paper.

  "So, are you getting used to things around here?"

  "Bit by bit," I answer.

  "Are you free now?"

  "Yes, I am," I tell her.

  "Why don't you sit down, then." Miss Saeki points to the wooden chair beside her desk. "Let's talk for a while."

  It's starting to thunder again. Still far away, but gradually getting closer. I do what she says and take a seat.

  "How old are you again? Sixteen?"

  "Fifteen. I just turned fifteen," I respond.

  "You ran away from home, didn't you?"

  "Yes, I did."

  "Was there some reason you had to do that?"

  I shake my head. What should I say?

  Miss Saeki picks up the cup and takes a sip while she waits for my answer.

  "I felt like if I stayed there I'd be damaged beyond repair," I say.

  "Damaged?" Miss Saeki says, narrowing her eyes.

  "Yes," I say.

  After a pause she says, "It sounds strange for a boy your age to use a word like damaged, though I must say I'm intrigued. What exactly do you mean by damaged?"

  I search for the right words. First I look for the boy named Crow, but he's nowhere to be found. I'm left to choose them on my own, and that takes time. But Miss Saeki waits there patiently. Lightning flashes outside, and after a time thunder booms far away.

  "I mean I'd change into something I shouldn't."

  Miss Saeki looks at me with great interest. "As long as there's such a thing as time, everybody's damaged in the end, changed into something else. It always happens, sooner or later."

  "But even if that happens, you've got to have a place you can retrace your steps to."

  "A place you can retrace your steps to?"

  "A place that's worth coming back to."

  Miss Saeki stares straight at me.

  I blush, then summon my courage and look up at her. She has on a navy blue dress with short sleeves. She must have a whole closet of dresses in different shades of blue. Her only accessories are a thin silver necklace and a smallish wristwatch with a black leather band. I look for the fifteen-year-old girl in her and find her right away.

  She's hidden, asleep, like a 3-D painting in the forest of her heart. But if you look carefully you can spot her. My chest starts pounding again, like somebody's hammering a long nail into the walls surrounding it.

  "For a fifteen-year-old, you make a lot of sense."

  I have no idea how to respond to that. So I don't say anything.

  "When I was fifteen," Miss Saeki says with a smile, "all I wanted was to go off to some other world, a place beyond anybody's reach. A place beyond the flow of time."

  "But there's no place like that in this world."

  "Exactly. Which is why I'm living here, in this world where things are continually damaged, where the heart is fickle, where time flows past without a break." As if hinting at the flow of time, she's silent for a while. "But you know," she goes on, "when I was fifteen, I thought there had to be a place like that in the world. I was sure that somewhere I'd run across the entrance that would take me to that other world."

  "Were you lonely when you were fifteen?"

  "In a sense, I guess. I wasn't alone, but I was terribly lonely. Because I knew that I would never be happier than I was then. That much I knew for sure. That's why I wanted to go—just as I was—to some place where there was no time."

  "What I want is to grow up faster."

  Miss Saeki pulls back to study my expression. "You must be much stronger and more independent than I am. At your age I was filled with illusions of escaping reality, but you're standing right up to the real world and confronting it head-on. That's a big difference."

  Strong and independent? I'm neither one. I'm just being pushed along by reality, whether I like it or not. But I don't say anything.

  "You know, you remind me of a fifteen-year-old boy I used to know a long time ago."

  "Did he look like me?" I ask.

  "You're taller and more muscular than he was, but there is a resemblance. He didn't enjoy talking with other kids his age—they were on a different wavelength—so he spent most of his time holed up in his room, reading or listening to music. He'd get the same frown lines, too, whenever the topic got difficult. And you love to read as well."

  I nod.

  Miss Saeki glances at her watch. "Thank you for the coffee."

  Taking that as my signal to leave, I stand up and head for the door. Miss Saeki picks up her black fountain pen, slowly twists off the cap, and goes back to her writing.

  There's another flash of lightning outside, bathing the room for an instant in a weird color. The clap of thunder hits a moment later. This time it's closer than before.

  "Kafka," Miss Saeki says.

  I stop at the doorway and turn around.

  "I just remembered that I wrote a book on lightning once."

  I don't say anything. A book on lightning?

  "I went all over Japan interviewing people who'd survived lightning strikes. It took me a few years. Most of the interviews were pretty interesting. A small publisher put it out, but it barely sold. The book didn't come to any conclusion, and nobody wants to read a book that doesn't have one. For me, though, having no conclusion seemed perfectly fine."

  A tiny hammer in my head is pounding on a drawer somewhere, persistently. I'm trying to remember something, something very important—but I don't know what it is.

  By this time Miss Saeki's gone back to her writing and I go back to my room.

  The rainstorm continues to batter us for another hour. The thunder is so incredibly loud that I'm afraid the windows in the library will shatter. Every time a bolt of lightning streaks across the sky, the stained-glass window on the landing flashes an image like some ancient ghost on the white wall across from it. By two o'clock, the storm lets up, and yellowish light begins to spill out between the clouds like a reconciliation has finally been reached. Water continues to drip down in the gentle sunlight.

  When evening rolls around, I start closing up the place for the night. Miss Saeki says good-bye to me and Oshima and heads home. I hear the engine of her Golf and picture her seated at the wheel, turning the key. I tell Oshima I'll finish locking up.

  Whistling some aria, he goes off to wash up in the restroom, then leaves. I listen as the Mazda Miata roars off, the sound fading off in the distance. Now the library's all mine.

  It's much quieter than ever before.

  I go to my room and study the sheet music for "Kafka on the Shore." Like I suspected, most of the chords are simple. The refrain, though, has a couple tricky ones. I go over to the reading room and try playing it on the upright piano. The fingering's really tough, so I practice it over and over, trying to get my hands around it, and somehow wind up getting it to sound right. At first the chords sound all wrong. I'm sure it's a misprint, or that the piano's out of tune. But the longer I listen to how those two chords sound one after the other, the more I'm convinced the whole song hangs on them.

  These two chords are what keep "Kafka on the Shore" from degrading into some silly pop song, give it a special depth and substance. But how in the world did Miss Saeki come up with them?

  I go back to my room, boil water in the electric kettle, and make some tea. I take out the old records we found in the storage room and put them on the turntable one after another. Bob Dylan's Blonde on Blonde, the Beatles' "White Album," Otis Redding's Dock of the Bay, Stan Getz's Getz/Gilberto—all hit albums from the late sixties.
That young boy—with Miss Saeki right beside him—must've done what I was doing, putting the records on the turntable, lowering the needle, listening to the music coming out of these speakers. The music felt like it was taking me and the whole room off to some different time, a world before I was even born. As I enjoy the music, I review the conversation we'd had that afternoon, trying to capture our exact words.

  "When I was fifteen, I thought there had to be a place like that in the world. I was sure that somewhere I'd run across the entrance that would take me to that other world."

  I can hear her voice right beside me. Inside my head something knocks at a door, a heavy, persistent knock.

  An entrance?

  I lift the needle off the Stan Getz album, pull out the single of "Kafka on the Shore," place it on the turntable, and lower the needle. And listen to her sing.

  The drowning girl's fingers

  Search for the entrance stone, and more.

  Lifting the hem of her azure dress,

  She gazes— at Kafka on the shore.

  The girl who comes to this room most likely located that entrance stone. She's in another world, just as she was at fifteen, and at night she comes to visit this room. In her light blue dress, she comes to gaze at Kafka on the shore.

  Suddenly, completely out of nowhere, I remember my father talking about how he'd once been struck by lightning. He didn't tell me himself—I'd read about it in an interview in a magazine. When he was a student in art college, he had a part-time job as a caddy at a golf course. One day he was following his golfer around the course when the sky suddenly changed color and a huge thunderstorm crashed down on them. They took refuge under a tree when it was hit by a bolt of lightning. This huge tree was split right in two. The golfer he was caddying for was killed, but my father, sensing something, leaped away from the tree in time. He got some light burns, his hair was singed, and the shock of the lightning threw him against a rock. He struck his head and lost consciousness, but survived the ordeal with only a small scar on his forehead. That's what I was trying to remember this afternoon, standing there in Miss Saeki's doorway listening to the roar of the thunder. It was after he recovered from his injuries that my father got serious about his career as a sculptor.

  As Miss Saeki went around interviewing people for her book, maybe she met my father. It's entirely possible. There can't be that many people around who've been struck by lightning and lived, can there?

  I breathe very quietly, waiting for the dawn. A cloud parts, and moonlight shines down on the trees in the garden. There are just too many coincidences. Everything seems to be speeding up, rushing toward one destination.

  Chapter 26

  It was already pretty late in the afternoon, and they had to find a place to stay for the night. Hoshino went to the tourist information booth at Takamatsu Station and had them make a reservation at an inn. It was within walking distance of the station, which was nice, but otherwise was typical and somewhat dumpy. Neither Hoshino nor Nakata minded much, though. As long as there were futons to sleep on, they were fine. As before, breakfast was provided but they were on their own for dinner. This particularly suited Nakata, who was likely to drop off to sleep any time.

  Once they were in their room, Nakata had Hoshino lie facedown on the futon, got on top of him again, and pressed down with both thumbs up and down his lower back, carefully checking out the condition of his joints and muscles. This time he was much more gentle, just tracing the spine and checking out how tense the muscles were.

  "Something wrong?" Hoshino asked anxiously.

  "No, everything's fine. Nakata doesn't find anything wrong with you now. Your spine's in good shape."

  "That's a relief," Hoshino said. "I wasn't looking forward to another torture session."

  "I know. Nakata's really sorry. But you did tell me you didn't mind pain, so I went ahead and did it as hard as I could."

  "Yeah, I know that's what I said. But listen, Gramps, there are limits. Sometimes you've gotta use common sense. But I guess I shouldn't be complaining—you did fix my back. But man alive, I never felt anything like that in my life. The pain was unimaginable! It felt like you were ripping me apart. Like I died and came back to life or something."

  "Nakata was dead for three weeks once."

  "No kidding," Hoshino said. Still facedown, he took a gulp of tea and munched on some crunchy snacks he'd picked up at a convenience store. "So you really were dead?"

  "I was."

  "Where were you all that time?"

  "Nakata doesn't remember. It felt like I was somewhere far away, doing something else. But my head was floating and I can't remember anything. Then I came back to this world and found out I was dumb. I couldn't read or write anymore."

  "You must've left your ability to read and write over on the other side."

  "Maybe so."

  The two of them were silent for a time. Hoshino decided it was best to believe whatever the old man told him, no matter how eccentric it sounded. At the same time he felt uneasy, as if pursuing this dead-for-three-weeks idea any further would lead him into some chaotic, out-of-control situation. Better to turn the conversation back to more practical matters. "So, now that we're in Takamatsu, Mr. Nakata, where are you planning to go?"

  "I have no idea," Nakata replied. "I don't know what I'm supposed to do."

  "What about that entrance stone?"

  "That's right! Nakata completely forgot about it. We have to find the stone. But I don't have a clue where to look. My mind's floating and won't clear up. I wasn't too bright to begin with, and this kind of thing only makes it worse."

  "We're in a bit of a fix, then, aren't we?"

  "Yes, I'd say we are."

  "Not that sitting here staring at each other's all that much fun. This won't get us anywhere."

  "You're right."

  "I think we should go around asking people, you know, if that stone's somewhere around here."

  "If you say so, then that's what Nakata wants to do. I'm pretty dumb, so I'm used to asking people questions."

  "My grandpa always said asking a question is embarrassing for a moment, but not asking is embarrassing for a lifetime."

  "I agree. When you die, everything you know disappears."

  "Well, that's not what he meant, exactly," Hoshino said, scratching his head.

  "Anyway, do you have a mental image of the stone? What kind of stone it is, how big it is, its shape or color? What it's used for? If we don't have some details, it's hard to ask. Nobody's going to know what the heck we're talking about if we just say, Is there an entrance stone anywhere around here? They'll think we're nuts. You see what I mean?"

  "Yes, I do. I might be dumb, but I'm not nuts."

  "Okay."

  "The stone Nakata's looking for is very special. It's not so big. It's white, and doesn't have any smell. I don't know what it's used for. It's round, sort of like a rice cake." He held up his hands to indicate something the size of an LP record.

  "Hmm. So if you spotted it, do you think you'd recognize it? You know, like—Hey, here it is."

  "Nakata would know it right away."

  "There must be some kind of story or legend behind it. Maybe it's famous and on display at a shrine or someplace."

  "It could be, I suppose."

  "Or maybe it's just in some house, and people use it as a weight when they make pickles."

  "No, that's not possible."

  "Why not?"

  "Because nobody can move the stone."

  "Nobody except you, you mean."

  "Yes, I think Nakata probably can."

  "After you move it, then what?"

  Nakata did an uncharacteristic thing—he pondered this for a good long time. At least he looked like he was, briskly rubbing his short, salt-and-pepper hair. "I don't really know about that," he finally said. "All I know is it's about time somebody moved it."

  Hoshino did some pondering himself. "And that somebody's you, right? At least for now."

 
"Yes," Nakata replied, "that's correct."

  "Is the stone found only in Takamatsu?"

  "No, it isn't. It doesn't really matter where it is. It just happens to be here right now. It would be much easier if it was in Nakano Ward."

  "But moving that kind of stone must be risky."

  "That's right. Maybe Nakata shouldn't bring this up, but it is very dangerous."

  "Damn," Hoshino said, slowly shaking his head. He put on his Chunichi Dragons cap and pulled his ponytail out the hole in the back. "This is starting to feel like an Indiana Jones movie or something."

  The next morning they went to the tourist information booth in the station to ask if there were any famous stones in Takamatsu or the vicinity.

  "Stones?" the girl behind the counter said, frowning slightly. She'd been trained to introduce all the usual tourist places, but nothing beyond that, and the question clearly had her flustered. "What sort of stones are you looking for?"

  "A round stone about so big," Hoshino said, forming his hands in a circle the size of an LP, just as Nakata had done. "It's called the entrance stone."

  "'Entrance stone'?"

  "Yep. That's the name. It's pretty famous, I imagine."

  "Entrance to what, though?"

  "If I knew that I wouldn't have to go to all this trouble."

  The girl thought about it for a while. Hoshino gazed at her face the whole time.

  Kind of pretty, he judged, though her eyes are a bit too far apart, giving her the look of a cautious bovine. She made a few calls, but it didn't look like she was getting anywhere.

  "I'm sorry," she finally said. "Nobody's heard of a stone by that name."

  "Nobody?"

  She shook her head. "Excuse me for asking, but are you here just to find this stone?"

  "Yeah, I don't know if it's just to see it. Anyway, I'm from Nagoya. The old guy's from Nakano Ward in Tokyo."

  "Yes, Nakata's from Nakano Ward," Nakata chimed in. "I rode in a lot of trucks, and even got treated to eel once. I came this far and haven't spent a cent of my own money."