“From the mansion. I saw you when you went over the wall.”
“Why were you in front of my house?”
“The reason wasn’t important. I was nearby because of work so I thought I’d gawk at the famous Katsuragi residence.”
“I thought no one was in the street.”
“I was a little ways away. If I looked at the house from up close, I’d get caught by the security camera, wouldn’t I?”
“Well, after that, you followed me? Why? For what?”
“I feel like I’m getting interrogated by a detective.” I grinned wryly and sipped my coffee. “I told you earlier. Mr. Katsuragi is a very important man to us. It’d be natural for us to go investigate if we saw someone climb over the wall and leave his estate, wouldn’t it?”
“Why didn’t you talk to me immediately?”
“Is that what you wanted?”
When I asked, she sunk into silence. I took another sip of my coffee.
“I thought maybe there was some sort of reason, so I thought I’d watch you for a bit. But I didn’t think I’d end up following you all the way here.”
“Strange taste.”
“If I weren’t like that for my work, I wouldn’t be any good. Now I get to ask some questions. First, introduce yourself.”
“I already did.”
“All I’ve heard is that you’re the EVP’s daughter. I’d like to know your name. I need something to call you, don’t I?”
She watched the street through the glass window, but eventually muttered, “Juri.”
“What?”
“Juri. As in the first characters from ‘arbor’ and ‘science.’”
“Ah, so it’s Miss Juri. Juri Katsuragi. Indeed, just hearing your name, I know you’re no pleb.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’m praising you. Anyway, I’m wondering what circumstances in the world would make Miss Juri Katsuragi climb over her own house’s wall?”
She sighed at my question. Her slender shoulders rose and fell. “Does that mean I have to tell you?”
“If you don’t want to, you don’t have to, but…” I reached my hand towards the pocket my cellphone was in.
“Fine. You’re saying you’re going to tell my parents, right?”
“It’s what you call adult responsibility. Take your pick.”
“Let me think a little.” Juri rested her chin in her hands on the counter. She was surprisingly fair for girls nowadays. You could call her skin porcelain; its surface didn’t even have a trace of unevenness. It wasn’t just from being young. That took work.
As I gazed at her beautiful profile, she faced me abruptly. I pulled back in a flash.
“Could I get a refill on the coffee?” she asked.
“Sure thing.”
As I cleared the empty cup, I took the opportunity to drink mine as well and bought two more cups of coffee. When I got back to the seats, Juri was smoking Caster Super Milds.
“I can’t praise you for smoking while you’re still young.”
“Agreed. But if I were older, would you praise me?”
“I don’t smoke.”
“Because of your health?”
“More than that, I think it’s a waste of time. If it takes about three minutes to smoke one cigarette, then people who smoke a whole pack a day waste one hour out of twenty-four just smoking. They might say they’re actually working while they smoke, but that’s bull. Another reason: in order to smoke, you have to sacrifice a hand. There’s hardly any line of work that benefits from you using one hand instead of both.”
Juri faced me and blew smoke into my face. “Is it any fun thinking that way?”
“It’s not because it’s fun, it’s just that I don’t like wasteful things. Anyway, have you come to a decision?”
Juri put out her cigarette in the ashtray with some care and brought her second cup of coffee to her mouth.
“To put it simply, I was running away from home.”
“Running away?”
“That’s right. I came to hate being in that house, so I ran away. That’s why I can’t get caught by my parents. That’s why I had to climb over the wall.”
“I don’t buy it.”
“Why not?”
“That’s not something you do in such light gear.” Her luggage was just one small handbag.
“You can believe it or not, but don’t get in my way.” She took a second cigarette out of the pack.
I sighed and looked around. I didn’t want anyone to think I was trying to woo a young woman, but I had a mountain of stuff I wanted to get out of her.
“I got it,” I conceded. “I’ll accept that you were running away. But I can’t let you escape from my sight just yet. I’d like to hear the reason why you’re running. If I think it’s not unreasonable for you to run away, I’ll turn a blind eye tonight.”
Juri blew smoke at me. “Why do I need your permission to run away?”
“Because that’s the situation. I suppose you’ll just have to resign yourself to the fact that you were unlucky enough to be witnessed. So tell me.” I motioned with my right palm, leading her on.
Still holding the cigarette between her fingers, she bit the thumb nail on her other hand. Her nails and teeth were also well-maintained, beautiful.
After taking that thumb from her mouth, she side-eyed me.
“It was Mr. Sakuma, right?”
“I’m glad you remembered,” I answered smugly.
“What I’m about to tell you—can you promise me you won’t tell anyone?”
“I want to say I’ll promise, but it’ll depend on what you say.”
“Hmph.” She looked over at me again and stared fixedly. “You’re pretty honest. I thought you’d say you’d promise.”
“It’d be meaningless to make that promise.” It was easy to say I’d promise, but she wasn’t the type of girl to talk if I did.
“I guess there’s no guarantee you’d honor your promise anyway.”
“That’s the way it is. But I can say this. My attitude depends on if I benefit from it. And if I’m not going to, I don’t particularly want to be known as a gossipy guy. Especially not by a favored client’s daughter.”
The corner of Juri’s lips twisted. I couldn’t tell whether she thought I was being unpleasant.
She took several pulls from her cigarette in rapid succession. I decided to watch as she blew gray smoke incessantly.
“You know, I—” Juri started, “I’m not really a Katsuragi.”
“Ah.” I gazed at her profile. This had caught me flat-footed. “Is that right?”
“It might not be accurate to say ‘not really.’ Officially…yeah, I should say officially I’m not his daughter.”
“Either way, it’s still a surprising confession. If it’s true.”
“If you’re not going to believe me, you can forget about it. Because I won’t tell you any more.”
“Hey, hey,” I pleaded with a soothing gesture. “Don’t think it’s unreasonable for me to be surprised. I won’t interrupt you again, so let me hear the rest.”
Juri gave a light snort. Her expression betrayed disdain for a mere gossip-lover. Given the circumstances, I resigned myself to taking that look.
“Did you know Papa married a second time?”
“I’ve heard about that. But wasn’t this almost twenty years ago?”
“Exactly twenty. He divorced his last wife with mutual consent. With his current wife, he has one daughter.”
“It seems unlikely that that daughter is you.”
She wouldn’t call her own mother “his current wife.” But she had also said “last wife.” That suggested she wasn’t the child of the last wife, either.
“I’m actually the child of his last lover.”
She said it so plainly that I couldn’t reply. I blinked with my mouth half-open.
“It might not be right to say that she was his last lover. She might have been his lover before last, or maybe even
the one before. Anyway, that guy doesn’t stop.” She smiled with just her lips. Apparently by “that guy” she meant her father.
“Are you saying she’s a lover from Mr. Katsuragi’s earlier marriage?”
“Well, yeah. The divorce seemed to have something to do with it, too. Apparently, his last wife was a high-class lady from a good family, so even though she was dealing with the mighty Katsuragis, she must not have been able to stand it.”
Listening to Juri’s story, I couldn’t help but chuckle. It was a fine joke that Katsutoshi Katsuragi had fumbled his private life.
“Then, why are you, the daughter of a lover, living with the Katsuragis?”
“It’s simple. Because my mom died. Apparently it was leukemia. They say she was really beautiful, and also that beauties die young,” Juri said without any note of sorrow.
“You don’t remember your mom?”
“I feel like I remember her faintly, but…” She shook her head. “I don’t really know. Maybe I don’t remember. Maybe I’ve seen pictures and are mistaking them for memories.”
A coolheaded analysis. “When did the Katsuragis take you in?”
“When I was eight. But my mom died when I was three. During that time, my grandmother took care of me.”
At eight, her personality would have finished developing. I imagined how Juri must have felt being taken away, and felt some sympathy for her. “I wonder why Mr. Katsuragi didn’t try to take you in until you were eight.”
“Who knows. Maybe because of his new wife. His legit daughter had been born by then.”
“In that case, I wonder why he decided to take you in.”
“Because my grandmother fell ill. Someone had to raise me, huh? Papa did recognize me as his own, and he must’ve thought that taking me into his home as his daughter at that point was better than someone else doing it and raising hell.”
Juri put out her cigarette in the ashtray.
“You’ve been at that house since then?”
“In a way.”
“In a way?”
“Think about it. If you suddenly had someone else’s kid come in, even if it’s an eight year old, your new wife and real daughter wouldn’t feel good about it. Even Papa knew that, so they sent me to a boarding school. Up north in Sendai, too.”
“From elementary school?”
“From elementary school to high school. The only times I’d go home were during long vacations. But then, I didn’t feel like going home one bit. I wanted to stay in the dormitories forever. But according to the school rules, unless there were special circumstances, you had to go home. I hated summer vacation and even winter vacation and spring vacation. I thought if we just didn’t have those things I’d be all set. Normal kids get excited when vacation gets closer and lament that it’s over, but I was completely the opposite. How I awaited the end of August.”
Juri was looking at the street through the glass. It was an expression that housed both loneliness and emptiness. She might have gone through her childhood with that face.
“Are you a college student?”
“Yeah. Sophomore.”
I thought of asking her at which school, but didn’t. It was irrelevant, and there were other things I wanted to ask her about more. “So that’s how you came back to Tokyo.”
“I really wanted to stay in Sendai. It didn’t even have to be Sendai, I wanted to attend a college outside of Tokyo. But when they told me to come back, I had no choice. Because they’ve been taking care of me.”
“Mr. Katsuragi told you to come?”
“Yeah. Well, I know what Papa was thinking, basically.”
“What do you mean?”
“To put it simply, he started worrying about the future. He wants to hurry and marry me off to someone. To do that, he needs to keep me close, right?”
“I see.” It was strange enough, but I understood. “So, unable to bear your current life, you ran away. Climbing over that wall.”
“You get it now?”
“I grasp the circumstances. But did you really hate it that much? You didn’t get along with everyone at home?”
“I can’t say I didn’t.” She tried to take out another cigarette, but it seemed her previous one had been the last. She crushed the empty box in her hand. “This isn’t ‘Cinderella,’ and it’s not like I was bullied. But I’ve experienced plenty of invisible malice. In the end, I wasn’t really family. No matter how many years passed, I couldn’t blend in. For their part, they never accepted me. If I weren’t there, they’d be a perfect family. When I’m there, it’s like I’m an actress in a soap opera. Everything I say and do is fake, and it’s so suffocating.” She looked at me. “Do you see?”
“Somehow,” I answered. “What about you? Are your feelings about the Katsuragis all negative? Regarding your new mother, for instance?”
“That’s a mean question.” She took a long breath. “You think I could come to like them? People who kept ignoring me? Smiling all the while. With smiling masks.”
Well put, I admired. “What about the daughter? Um, I guess I should say your half-sister.”
“Oh, her.” Juri closed her mouth and inclined her head. Her face said she was choosing her words. Still wearing that expression she answered, “I hate her.”
3
When I checked into the Kayabacho Polar Hotel, it was past midnight. It was a business hotel that acquaintances of mine patronized when they came to Tokyo, so if I showed my face at the front desk, they’d be accommodating. Tonight I had Juri wait behind the stairs and went through the procedures.
“Well, I don’t have any intention of being complicit with you running away from home, but you trusted me and told me a lot of stuff, so I’ll treat you.”
After getting into the room, I put the key on top of the tiny desk. The room only had a small single bed, a TV, the desk, and a refrigerator.
“For the time being, I’ve rented it out for two nights. Checkout is the day after tomorrow at noon.” Saying so, I glanced at the clock. “It’s already past midnight, so I should say tomorrow,” I corrected myself.
“Why for two nights?”
“Just in case. Sleep well for tonight, and then if you feel like going home, go whenever you like. But when you do, give me a ring.”
“What you mean is, if I’m not going home, I should stay put.”
“It’s late, so for now just sleep well. Let’s talk again tomorrow.” I started heading to the door, but stopped and turned around. “Um, you have money, right?”
She looked away at that. Her eyelashes fluttered.
“You tried to stay in a hotel without any?”
“I have a card.”
“Hah, a family card.” I pulled out two ten-thousand-yen bills from my wallet. “Anyway, I’ll leave this. In case of an emergency.”
“I don’t need it.”
“Then you can just leave it here.” I put the ten-thousand-yen bills on top of the TV and put the remote on it as a paperweight. “See you tomorrow. I’ll pray you’ll come to your senses. Let me tell you, as soon as a family card is reported you won’t be able to use it. Without money, just what are you thinking of doing?”
Not waiting for Juri’s reply, I did head to the door this time. When I turned the knob, she spoke to me from behind.
“I should have helped myself.”
At her one liner, I turned around again. “What was that?”
“I ought to have grabbed some money. If not cash, then something valuable. A diamond or whatever. Then I wouldn’t have had to worry for a while.”
“Goes to show how impulsive you were. Tomorrow you’ll change your mind. Anyway, for now, I’m not contacting Mr. Katsuragi.”
“I won’t ever go back home.”
“Well, take your time thinking it over.”
“I have a little bit of a claim to that household’s fortune, don’t I?”
I was taken aback for a moment by her off-kilter question. I shrugged. “Probably. But you’d need to
keep being their daughter.”
“You mean if I leave, then I wouldn’t?”
“Who knows. But thinking about that now is meaningless. You wouldn’t inherit anything until Mr. Katsuragi passes away. That’s decades in the future.”
“I heard there’s a way to before anyone dies.”
“You mean an advance? It’s not impossible, but that would be for Mr. Katsuragi to decide. I don’t know about you demanding one. Either way, you’d have to go home first.”
She’d realized she was penniless and was remembering only now the enormity of what she was losing. That she’d worry about her fortune as a runaway had to be Katsutoshi Katsuragi’s blood in her.
I turned the doorknob. “Well, goodnight.”
“Wait a second.”
I turned around with the door still slightly ajar. “What now?”
“Could I ask you for a favor?” She pulled her chin in and looked up at me. It was a face she hadn’t shown until now.
“Depends on what it is.”
“It’s nothing difficult. First, call home and just tell them I’m with you.”
“That’s all you want?”
“After that, I want you to go get money. Tell them that I’m not going home and that I need enough money to live off of.”
I shut the door. If anyone heard this, it could spell trouble. Then, studying Juri’s face to make sure she wasn’t kidding, I spread my arms and said, “Are you serious? Or are you pulling my leg?”
“If I called, they’d just tell me to come home.”
“It’d be the same if I called. They’d tell me to hurry up and bring their daughter home if I had the time to be making a stupid call. I told you earlier, but Mr. Katsuragi is an important client of ours. Even setting you up here is an act of betrayal.”
“You could just say that I don’t want to go home.”
“Like that would convince him. In the worst case, I’d end up being accused of kidnapping you.”
“Then how about you say it’s a kidnapping?”
“Huh?”
“Without introducing yourself, just say: If you want your daughter back, prepare ten million yen in cash.”
I squatted and peered at her face from below. “Are you sane?”
“I’m not going home, okay, and I need money. I’m ready to do anything.”