"Lend you a hand?"
"As I've explained, I don't have any form. I'm a metaphysical, conceptual object. I can take on any form, but I lack substance. And to perform a real act, I need someone with substance to help out."
"And at this particular point that substance happens to be me."
"Exactly," Colonel Sanders replied.
They cautiously continued down the path, and came to a smaller shrine beneath a thick oak tree. The shrine was old and dilapidated, with no offerings or decorations of any kind.
Colonel Sanders shined his flashlight on it. "The stone's inside there. Open the door."
"No way!" Hoshino replied. "You're not supposed to open up shrines whenever you feel like it. You'll be cursed. Your nose will fall off. Or your ears or something."
"Not to worry. I said it's all right, so go ahead and open it. You won't be cursed. Your nose and ears won't fall off. God, you can be really old-fashioned."
"Then why don't you open it? I don't want to get mixed up in that."
"How many times do I have to explain this?! I told you already I don't have substance. I'm an abstract concept. I can't do anything on my own. That's why I went to the trouble of dragging you out here. And letting you do it three times at a discount rate."
"Yeah, man, she was fantastic... but robbing a shrine? No way! My grandfather always told me not to mess with shrines. He was really strict about it."
"Forget about your grandfather. Don't lay all your Gifu Prefecture, country-bumpkin morality on me, okay? We don't have time for that."
Grumbling all the while, Hoshino hesitantly opened the door of the shrine, and Colonel Sanders shined his flashlight inside. Sure enough, there was an old round stone inside. Just like Nakata said, it was about the size of a big rice cake, a smooth white stone.
"This is it?" Hoshino asked.
"That's right," Colonel Sanders said. "Take it out."
"Hold on a minute. That's stealing."
"No matter. Nobody's going to notice if a stone like this is missing. And nobody'll care."
"Yeah, but the stone is owned by God, right? He's gonna be pissed if we take it out."
Colonel Sanders folded his arms and stared straight at Hoshino. "What is God?"
The question threw Hoshino for a moment.
Colonel Sanders pressed him further. "What does God look like, and what does He do?"
"Don't ask me. God's God. He's everywhere, watching what we do, judging whether it's good or bad."
"Sounds like a soccer referee."
"Sort of, I guess."
"So God wears shorts, has a whistle sticking out of His mouth, and keeps an eye on the clock?"
"You know that's not what I mean," Hoshino said.
"Are the Japanese God and the foreign God relatives, or maybe enemies?"
"How should I know?"
"Listen—God only exists in people's minds. Especially in Japan, God's always been kind of a flexible concept. Look at what happened after the war. Douglas MacArthur ordered the divine emperor to quit being God, and he did, making a speech saying he was just an ordinary person. So after 1946 he wasn't God anymore. That's what Japanese gods are like—they can be tweaked and adjusted. Some American chomping on a cheap pipe gives the order and presto change-o—God's no longer God. A very postmodern kind of thing. If you think God's there, He is. If you don't, He isn't. And if that's what God's like, I wouldn't worry about it."
"Okay..."
"Anyway, just get the stone out, would you? I'll take full responsibility. I might not be a god or a Buddha, but I do have a few connections. I'll make sure you aren't cursed."
"You sure?"
"I won't go back on my word."
Hoshino reached out and carefully, like he was inching out a landmine, picked up the stone. "It's pretty heavy."
"This isn't tofu we're dealing with. Stones tend to be heavy."
"But even for a stone it's heavy," Hoshino said. "So what do you want me to do with it?"
"Take it home and put it next to your bed. After that things will take their course."
"You want me to take it back to the inn?"
"You can take a cab if it's too heavy," Colonel Sanders replied.
"Yeah, but is it okay to take it so far away?"
"Listen, every object's in flux. The Earth, time, concepts, love, life, faith, justice, evil—they're all fluid and in transition. They don't stay in one form or in one place forever. The whole universe is like some big FedEx box."
"Hm."
"This stone's temporarily there in the form of a stone. Moving it isn't going to change anything."
"All right, but what's so special about this stone? It doesn't look like much of anything."
"The stone itself is meaningless. The situation calls for something, and at this point in time it just happens to be this stone. Anton Chekhov put it best when he said, 'If a pistol appears in a story, eventually it's got to be fired.' Do you know what he means?"
"Nope."
Colonel Sanders sighed. "I didn't think so, but I had to ask. It's the polite thing to do."
"Much obliged."
"What Chekhov was getting at is this: necessity is an independent concept. It has a different structure from logic, morals, or meaning. Its function lies entirely in the role it plays. What doesn't play a role shouldn't exist. What necessity requires does need to exist. That's what you call dramaturgy. Logic, morals, or meaning don't have anything to do with it. It's all a question of relationality. Chekhov understood dramaturgy very well."
"Whoa—you're way over my head."
"The stone you're carrying there is Chekhov's pistol. It will have to be fired. So in that sense it's important. But there's nothing sacred or holy about it. So don't worry yourself about any curse."
Hoshino frowned. "This stone's a pistol?"
"Only in the metaphorical sense. Don't worry—bullets aren't about to shoot out."
Colonel Sanders took a huge furoshiki cloth from a pocket and handed it to Hoshino.
"Wrap it up in this. Better for people not to see it."
"I told you it was stealing!"
"Are you deaf? It's not stealing. We need it for something important, so we're just borrowing it for a while."
"Okay, okay. I get it. Following the rules of dramaturgy, we're of necessity moving matter."
"Precisely," Colonel said, nodding. "See, you do understand what I'm talking about."
Carrying the stone wrapped in the navy blue cloth, Hoshino followed the path back out of the woods, Colonel Sanders lighting the way for him with his flashlight. The stone was much heavier than it looked and Hoshino had to stop a few times to catch his breath. They quickly cut across the well-lit shrine grounds so no one would see them, then came out on a main street. Colonel Sanders hailed a cab and waited for Hoshino to climb in with the stone.
"So I should put it next to my pillow, huh?" Hoshino asked.
"Right," Colonel Sanders said. "That's all you have to do. Don't try anything else. Just having it there's the main thing."
"I should thank you. For showing me where the stone was."
Colonel Sanders grinned. "No need—just doing my job. Just consummating my function. But hey—how 'bout that girl, Hoshino?"
"She was amazing."
"I'm glad to hear it."
"She was real, right? Not a fox spirit or some abstraction or something messed up like that?"
"No spirit, no abstraction. Just one real, live sex machine. Genuine four-wheel-drive lust. It wasn't easy to find her. So rest assured."
"Whew!" Hoshino sighed.
By the time Hoshino laid the cloth-wrapped stone next to Nakata's pillow it was already past one a. m. He figured putting it next to Nakata's pillow instead of his own lessened the chance of any curse. As he'd imagined, Nakata was still out like the proverbial log. Hoshino untied the cloth so the stone was visible. He changed into his pajamas, crawled into the other futon, and instantly fell asleep. He had one short dream—of a god in
short pants, hairy shins sticking out, racing around a field playing a flute.
At five that morning, Nakata woke up and found the stone beside his pillow.
Chapter 31
Just after one o'clock I take coffee up to the second-floor study. The door, as always, is open. Miss Saeki's standing by the window gazing outside, one hand resting on the windowsill. Lost in thought, unaware that her other hand's fingering the buttons on her blouse. This time there's no pen or writing paper on the desk. I place the coffee cup on the desk. A thin layer of clouds covers the sky, and the birds outside are quiet for a change.
She finally notices me and, pulled back from her thoughts, comes away from the window, sits down at the desk, and takes a sip of coffee. She motions for me to sit in the same chair as yesterday. I sit down and look at her across the desk, sipping her coffee.
Does she remember anything at all about what happened last night? I can't tell. She looks like she knows everything, and at the same time like she doesn't know a thing.
Images of her naked body come to mind, memories of how different parts felt. I'm not even sure that was the body of the woman who's here in front of me. At the time, though, I'm a hundred percent sure.
She has on a light green, silky-looking blouse and a tight beige skirt. There's a thin silver necklace at her throat, very chic. Like some neatly crafted object, her slim fingers on the desk are beautifully intertwined. "So, do you like this area now?" she asks me.
"Do you mean Takamatsu?"
"Yes."
"I don't know. I haven't seen much of it, just a few things along the way. This library, of course, a gym, the station, the hotel... those kinds of places."
"Don't you find it boring?"
I shake my head. "I don't know yet. I haven't had time to get bored, and cities look the same anyway. Why do you ask? Do you think it's a boring town?"
She gave a slight shrug. "When I was young I did. I was dying to get out. To leave here and go someplace else, where something special was waiting, where I could find more interesting people."
"Interesting people?"
Miss Saeki shakes her head slightly. "I was young," she says. "Most young people have that feeling, I suppose. Haven't you?"
"No, I never felt that if I go somewhere else there'll be special things waiting for me. I just wanted to be somewhere else, that's all. Anywhere but there."
"There?"
"Nogata, Nakano Ward. Where I was born and grew up."
At the sound of this name something flashed across her eyes. At least it looked like it.
"As long as you left there, you didn't particularly care where you went?" she asks.
"That's right," I say. "Where I went wasn't the issue. I had to get out of there or else I knew I'd get totally messed up. So I left."
She looks down at her hands resting on the desk, a very detached look in her eyes.
Then, very quietly, she says, "When I left here when I was twenty, I felt the same way. I had to leave or else I wouldn't survive. And I was convinced I'd never see this place again as long as I lived. I never considered coming back, but things happened and here I am. Like I'm starting all over again." She turns around and looks out the window.
The clouds covering the sky are the same tone as before, and there isn't any wind to speak of. The whole thing looks as still as the painted background scenery in a movie.
"Incredible things happen in life," she says.
"You mean I might go back to where I started?"
"I don't know. That's up to you, sometime well in the future. But I think where a person is born and dies is very important. You can't choose where you're born, but where you die you can—to some degree." She says all this in a quiet voice, staring out the window like she's talking to some imaginary person outside. Remembering I'm here, she turns toward me. "I wonder why I'm confessing all these things to you."
"Because I'm not from around here, and our ages are so different."
"I suppose so," she says.
For twenty, maybe thirty seconds, we're lost in our own thoughts. She picks up her cup and takes another sip of coffee.
I decide to come right out and say it. "Miss Saeki, I have something I need to confess, too."
She looks at me and smiles. "We're exchanging secrets, I see."
"Mine isn't a secret. Just a theory."
"A theory?" she repeats. "You're confessing a theory?"
"Yes."
"Sounds interesting."
"It's a sequel to what we're talking about," I say. "What I mean is, did you come back to this town to die?"
Like a silvery moon at dawn, a smile rises to her lips. "Perhaps I did. But it doesn't seem to matter. Whether you come to a place to live or to die, the things you do every day are about the same."
"Are you hoping to die?"
"I wonder...," she says. "I don't know myself."
"My father was hoping to die."
"Your father died?"
"Not long ago," I tell her. "Very recently, in fact."
"Why was your father trying to die?"
I take a deep breath. "For a long time I couldn't figure it out. But now I think I have. After coming here I finally understand."
"Why?"
"My father was in love with you, but couldn't get you back. Or maybe from the very beginning he couldn't really make you his. He knew that, and that's why he wanted to die. And that's also why he wanted his son—your son, too—to murder him. Me, in other words. He wanted me to sleep with you and my older sister, too. That was his prophecy, his curse. He programmed all this inside me."
Miss Saeki returns her coffee cup to the saucer with a hard, neutral sound. She looks straight at me, but she's not really seeing me. She's gazing at some void, some blank space somewhere else. "Do I know your father?"
I shake my head. "As I told you, it's just a theory."
She rests her hands on the desk, one on top of the other. Faint traces of a smile remain. "In your theory, then, I'm your mother."
"That's right," I say. "You lived with my father, had me, and then went away, leaving me behind. In the summer when I'd just turned four."
"So that's your theory."
I nod.
"Which explains why you asked me yesterday whether I have any children?"
Again I nod.
"I told you I couldn't answer that. Couldn't give you a yes or a no."
"I know."
"So your theory remains speculative."
I nod again. "That's right."
"So tell me, how did your father die?"
"He was murdered."
"You didn't murder him, did you?"
"No, I didn't. I have an alibi."
"But you're not entirely sure?"
I shake my head. "I'm not sure at all."
She lifts the coffee cup again and takes a tiny sip, as if it has no taste. "Why did your father put you under that curse?"
"He must've wanted me to take over his will," I say.
"To desire me, you mean."
"That's right," I say.
Miss Saeki stares into the cup in her hand, then looks up again.
"So do you—desire me?"
I give one clear nod.
She closes her eyes. I gaze at her closed eyelids for a long time, and through them I can see the darkness that she's seeing. Odd shapes loom up in it, floating up only to disappear.
Finally she opens her eyes. "You mean in theory you desire me."
"No, apart from the theory. I want you, and that goes way beyond any theory."
"You want to have sex with me?"
I nod.
She narrows her eyes like something's shining in them. "Have you ever had sex with a girl before?"
I nod again. Last night—with you, I think. But I can't say it out loud. She doesn't remember a thing.
Something close to a sigh escapes her lips. "Kafka, I know you realize this, but you're fifteen and I'm over fifty."
"It's not that simple. We're not talki
ng about that sort of time here. I know you when you were fifteen. And I'm in love with you at that age. Very much in love. And through her, I'm in love with you. That young girl's still inside you, asleep inside you. Once you go to sleep, though, she comes to life. I've seen it."
She closes her eyes once more, her eyelids trembling slightly.
"I'm in love with you, and that's what's important. I think you understand that."
Like someone rising to the surface of the sea from deep below, she takes a deep breath. She searches for the words to say, but they lie beyond her grasp. "I'm sorry, Kafka, but would you mind leaving? I'd like to be alone for a while," she says. "And close the door on your way out."
I nod, stand up, and start to go, but something pulls me back. I stop at the door, turn around, and walk across the room to where she is. I reach out and touch her hair.
Through the strands my hand brushes her small ear. I just can't help it.
Miss Saeki looks up, surprised, and after a moment's hesitation lays her hand on mine. "At any rate, you—and your theory—are throwing a stone at a target that's very far away. Do you understand that?"
I nod. "I know. But metaphors can reduce the distance."
"We're not metaphors."
"I know," I say. "But metaphors help eliminate what separates you and me."
A faint smile comes to her as she looks up at me. "That's the oddest pickup line I've ever heard."
"There're a lot of odd things going on—but I feel like I'm slowly getting closer to the truth."
"Actually getting closer to a metaphorical truth? Or metaphorically getting closer to an actual truth? Or maybe they supplement each other?"
"Either way, I don't think I can stand the sadness I feel right now," I tell her.
"I feel the same way."
"So you did come back to this town to die."
She shakes her head. "To be honest about it, I'm not trying to die. I'm just waiting for death to come. Like sitting on a bench at the station, waiting for the train."
"And do you know when the train's going to arrive?"
She takes her hand away from mine and touches her eyelids with the tips of her fingers. "Kafka, I've worn away so much of my own life, worn myself away. At a certain point I should have stopped living, but didn't. I knew life was pointless, but I couldn't give up on it. So I ended up just marking time, wasting my life in pointless pursuits. I wound up hurting myself, and that made me hurt others around me. That's why I'm being punished now, why I'm under a kind of curse. I had something too complete, too perfect, once, and afterward all I could do was despise myself. That's the curse I can never escape. So I'm not afraid of death. And to answer your question—yes, I have a pretty good idea of when the time is coming."