The Gun

  If that woman were dead, I thought, not that it mattered, but maybe that kid would be able to have a decent life. His father probably wasn’t around, so he would end up with a relative, or in an orphanage, but in any case, I figured, wouldn’t it be a hell of a lot better than to go on being beaten by that half-crazed woman? Just like it had worked out for me, that kid might be able to have a better life. He wouldn’t have to pluck the claws off crawfish anymore, and he could take regular baths. They might even be able to fix his squint, and he would no longer be forced to imagine sexual scenes inappropriate for a child. With these thoughts passing through my mind, as if to justify myself, I forced a smile to cross my lips.

  15

  Keisuke brought Nakanishi over to my apartment. But they soon left, chatting for only a few minutes. I talked to them as usual, they seemed normal too, but after giving the excuse that they had to get to their part-time jobs, they had left right away. I thought something seemed weird, but since I wanted to be alone, it was just as well. I had the feeling that Keisuke was trying to talk to me about something, but it might have just been in my head. He was smiling the entire time, and as he left he said we should go out drinking soon.

  I took out the gun and polished it carefully. There were rare occasions when when I looked at the gun and it frightened me. During one of those moments, I was completely startled to get a call from Yuko Yoshikawa. “Would you come meet me at the coffee shop in front of the station?” she asked me. I ended up just going straight there. My eyes darted restlessly at my surroundings, I felt like I was searching for something as I walked along, and halfway there, I felt nauseous for some reason. I figured it must have been from smoking too many cigarettes. Yuko was inside the coffee shop, drinking a black tea. She took one look at my face and said, “What’s the matter?” I responded, “Nothing, really,” thinking I must have looked drawn and haggard. She was silent for a moment, still staring at me.

  A young couple sat at the table next to us; the girl was doing all the talking. Last night she had been at a Denny’s until really late, hanging out with friends, she saw a guy she was friends with in junior high, it really brought back memories. The guy DJ’ed at a club in Ikebukuro every Saturday night, and tonight was Saturday, so they should go together, she kept nagging the guy sitting in front of her. The guy replied noncommittally, eyeing the passing waitress in her short skirt with her dyed brown hair, on her way to take my order. I asked for a coffee and lit a cigarette, looking at Yuko across from me. The guy next to me, angry with the girl, said, “It’s just a bullshit act!” The girl was like, “That’s not true!” She went on and on, he had been in New York, he came back to Japan after the terrorist attacks.

  “Hey, listen—I want you to be honest with me,” Yuko said, looking me straight in the eyes. “Right, I mean, well. You were just kidding around, weren’t you? With me, I mean. Because I couldn’t believe it, that you would do something like that. Seriously, because I half-thought you were messing with me, you know—I want you to tell me, if you were. So. Care to explain? I’m the kind of person who likes for things to be clear.”

  As she said this Yuko’s eyes were still fixed on mine. She went on.

  “You know, that was really awful, what you did. Honestly, I mean—are you listening to me? Don’t you have anything to say? That you hate me now, or you changed your mind—whatever you have to say, just tell me.”

  For whatever reason, I felt an uncontrollable urge to tell her what I was about to do. It seemed absurd, but if I had had the gun with me, I think I might have laid it on the table right then. But if I were to tell her, I didn’t think she would understand, and anyway, it wasn’t the kind of thing that I could even explain to myself very well. And if I did tell her, she would probably decide that I was crazy, and try to stop me, and when she couldn’t, then I bet she would report it to the police. And that would create a serious problem for me. I wasn’t exactly sure what kind of problem, but I knew it would be bad. And maybe I really was crazy. Just then, inexplicably, I felt as though I wanted to burst into tears, and though I hadn’t cried in many years, overcome with that emotion, I actually choked up. Obviously, I was not about to cry in a place like this. What I did, instead, was say to Yuko simply, “It’s no big deal.” But even I wasn’t sure what wasn’t such a big deal.

  “Look, Nishikawa,” Yuko said. It took me a moment to realize that was my name. “There’s something strange about you. Something really strange. I have no idea what you’re thinking. I mean, there was something about you from the start—I was worried—but you’re being especially weird now. Look, what’s the matter? Did something happen? Come on, say something.”

  “You don’t know what I’m thinking?” I said.

  “I have no idea.”

  “So what difference does that make?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, who really cares if you don’t know what I’m thinking? What does that matter? What does anything really matter? I have no idea, I’m telling you, no fucking idea—if I die, if you die, if my father dies, if that guy dies, or doesn’t die—what does it matter? None of it is a big deal. None of it, at all. What matters doesn’t exist. But you know what? That’s all right now. Anyway, if I . . . No, if I were to—it doesn’t matter—if I were to . . .”

  I stopped there, suddenly embarrassed. I wasn’t sure what I was self-conscious about, but I felt as though I couldn’t stand to be there any longer. Or rather, that’s how I wanted to feel—I wasn’t sure why, but I knew that I wanted to leave, so I just stood up. I put a thousand-yen note by the coffee shop’s register, thanked the waitress, and I left.

  While I was walking, my cell phone rang—it was Yuko. At that moment, it occurred to me to toss my phone somewhere, so I threw it in the direction of an open sewer. The phone made a little clank, rolling in a slide across the asphalt and falling into the gap. I went to have a cigarette, but then I remembered I had left them in the coffee shop. In an attempt to calm my frayed nerves, I let out a little yell.

  16

  The next two days passed by swiftly. During that time, I was unable to complete any sort of mental preparedness or readiness. I spent most of those two days watching television. The strange thing was, that whole time, I didn’t even look at the gun once. Since I had found the gun, not a single day had passed when I didn’t look at it. For that to go on for two days in a row was really . . . I don’t know, quite exceptional. The doorbell rang a few times, but I completely ignored it.

  On Tuesday, I slept until evening, and when I opened my eyes, I took a deep breath. I remembered how, in a scene from a television show or movie I had seen—I wasn’t sure which one—a guy who was going to shoot someone that day, when he opened his eyes, he had taken a deep breath. I did that twice, and then I brushed my teeth more thoroughly than usual. For no particular reason, I brushed my teeth for about thirty minutes. I turned on the television, I put on some music, and before long seven o’clock had rolled around. It was dark outside my window, and the news had come on. I realized, at that point, that it was already past seven. I opened my bag, shoved the bare gun into my pocket, and put on the reversible black jacket. “Just kill her and get it over with,” I repeated several times.

  It was cold outside, uncomfortably so. On my way, I became aware that the gun was stuck in the pocket of my jeans, and I moved it to my jacket. I made the transfer nonchalantly, as I continued to walk along. It wasn’t until afterward that I noticed there was no one else on the street around me. But I felt like it didn’t really matter—I might have even walked along with the gun in my hand. Still, I left it in my pocket.

  My hands were chilled from the cold. I put them both in the pockets of my jacket to warm them up. I wish I had some gloves, I thought to myself, and then I remembered the leather gloves I had originally bought for this day. I also realized I had forgotten the flashlight. Fed up with myself, I considered going back to get them, but I didn’t have
the courage. I don’t know why, but going back home would have taken a lot of courage. I kept going, headed for the construction site I had decided upon. The site was very close. This surprised me, and I was caught by a sudden feeling of desolation, seized with an urge to speak to someone. Looking at that big white sheeting, I realized that I was terrified of the building itself. I tried my best not to look at it as each step brought me closer and closer.

  I made it to the parking lot, and then I tried to sneak into the area that was clad in that white. But the sheeting was tied up to the steel columns with cord, and I couldn’t find a place where I might be able to get inside. Those thin plastic cords, tight and secure, seemed like they were rebuffing me. But of course, that was just an illusion. I scanned my surroundings, making sure there was no one around, and then I held the flame of my lighter to the cord. Something about the orange of the flame that appeared within the darkness was nostalgic to me. What flitted through my mind was the light from candles atop a birthday cake—maybe that’s what I remembered. The cord warped, seemed to squirm, and then melted into shreds. I did that three times, then I raised the material at the gap it created and went inside. The structure of the restaurant was still there, but it was kind of creepy without any lights on. The restaurant seemed large and imposing, and I felt terribly small within it. I sat down on the few steps before the front door, and lit a cigarette. It would soon be eight o’clock.

  Through the small gaps in between the scaffolding and the sheeting material, I could see what was on the other side, and I looked for the best position. After moving around from place to place, I decided that the best spot was right in the middle, facing the crosswalk. From here I could see straight ahead, even make out the face of whoever was walking in the pedestrian crossing that stretched out directly in front of me. The woman often passed through the crosswalk around this time. Or rather, almost anyone who walked along this street used this crosswalk. I could use the time while she was crossing the street to make sure who it was. And once she made her way across, just when she reached this side, she wouldn’t be more than two meters away from me. I waited for her to arrive, peering through the gap. I readied the gun with bated breath.

  But, just then, I realized something important. The woman did not necessarily always take this street, at this time. Whereas she came through here quite often, it was not a certainty that she would today. I was astonished that now was the first time I had thought of this. Most of all, I was extremely annoyed with myself. If I was just going to kill the woman, I might as well do it without hiding in a place like this. I asked myself, once again, what was I doing here? It had seemed like there was a plausible reason to fire the gun here, but at that moment, I could no longer recall what it was. I felt ridiculous, and suddenly thought about going back to my apartment. There, I figured, I could wait for her to return home, then ring her bell, and shoot her when she came to the door. That seemed like a sure way to kill her, and more importantly, I thought, it would be easy. I decided that’s what I would do, if she did not show up. It was just past eight o’clock.

  I found myself staring at the ground. For some reason, I couldn’t stop looking at the grass that was growing there. As I wondered why, I realized that there was no significance to the fact that I was staring at the grass. I wanted to warm myself up. It’s bitterly cold here, I thought. A scene from a television show I had watched the day before drifted through my mind, of a guy getting beaten up, and then, the image of the top of the utility pole I had seen at some point popped into my head. There was nothing special about this grass. Staring at it, I said out loud, “This grass is nothing special.” Then I thought about how bitterly cold it was here, and that I wanted to get warm. I told myself that I was about to kill someone, but it felt as though someone I didn’t know were committing this deed, far off in the distance. Rather than consciously thinking the words kill someone, it was as if they were ready and waiting, already arranged in my mind and repeating in an unstable cycle. My gaze remained fixed on the grass. I had no particular interest in staring at the grass but, how should I say, it would have taken a lot of courage to look away. “Kill someone, kill someone,” I repeated out loud, like a kind of incantation. The gun felt heavy, hanging loosely from my right hand. I had relaxed somewhat, but the gun continued to assert its heft. I had the impression that the echo carrying the words kill someone was, I don’t know, lulling me into idleness.

  It was then, the moment when my gaze returned to look out from the sheeting, that I saw the figure of a woman from a distance. She was walking on the opposite side of the street, then she stopped, exactly at the pedestrian crossing where I was waiting. The crosswalk sign was red, and I knew that when it turned green, she would step into the crosswalk. Which meant that she would approach the spot where I was hiding. At that moment, I felt an unexpected spasm, as if my body had shrunk in on itself. That tremor struck a sharp pain at my core, a condensed pain that seemed in a split second to be focused from my whole body to my heart. I could scarcely breathe, as if I had forgotten how to, and I collapsed on the spot. I noticed I was trying to inhale even though my throat was closed and, for the first time I realized that, in order to breathe, I needed to open my throat. Consciously I did so and inhaled. I felt like an idiot. Trembling, I couldn’t be sure but my awareness was in shambles, I didn’t think I could concentrate. Trying to gather my wits, I used what was left of my consciousness to remind myself what I was about to do, and I decided, first and foremost, to aim the gun. Being careful not to let the tip of the gun stick out, I leveled the gun at that slight gap. By then I felt that I had regained my alertness. But I heard something, and the irksome noise reverberated within me. It was accompanied by a pain, and it took a little while for me to realize that it was the sound of my own heart. Because it was too loud to be my heart—the sound was strange and mechanical. The moment I thought, I hope the light never changes, it turned green. With a sort of gloomy look, the woman slowly stepped into the crosswalk, gradually coming closer. She was bundled up in a baggy red track suit, and with her right hand she pushed back her brown hair. In just a few more seconds, this woman will be dead, I thought. Then I focused my attention on the gun, and I cocked the hammer. The metallic clink echoed keenly in my head, like something cold and sharp. In an attempt to steady my trembling right hand, I grasped my right wrist firmly with my left hand. But then my left hand began to quiver in the same way—it was a problem. My heart thudded dully; I had the sensation that scraps of metal were mixed in with my blood, and the relentless sound sped up, constricting my breathing. Both my hands were covered with beads of moisture, and the trembling had not subsided. Don’t think about anything, I told myself, over and over. Just go ahead and pull the trigger, then whatever happens next, I repeated, after you pull the trigger, you can think about it. The woman was about to reach the end of the crosswalk, where the distance between us was less than three meters. It was striking distance—that fact shot through my mind with an almost electric current. The impact was intense, a sort of fervid liquid spreading throughout my brain and seeming to saturate it, making a splattering sound. Just then, a black hole opened up in my mind. That blackness encroached upon the fragments of my mind that were left, like paint flung on a canvas. I felt as though I could see the traces it would leave with my own eyes. Yet, in the midst of all this, I remained focused—Pull the trigger, pull it. Just as the woman reached the end of the crosswalk, suddenly she stopped in her tracks, let out a sigh, and turned back to cross the street again. Seeing this, I could not fully grasp what had happened. I should have shot her, I thought, but I had the feeling that I had gone off somewhere else, and once again something within me convulsed. The woman, seeing the signal change back to red, stopped in the middle of the crosswalk and turned around once again, then stood with her back directly in front of me. She was not even two meters away. I realized that she was once again waiting for the light, and I felt myself slipping into something like disappointment, somewhere betw
een the short distance I was from her and the length of time it took me to fire the gun. At that moment, I felt like I was right there. Only inches away from the reality of killing someone, and whatever would come after that. What I felt then was a densely concentrated fear, one that might shake my very being. What lay beyond was overwhelmingly larger than myself, like a deep, dark space that went on and on without any visible boundaries. Within it was a crushing sense of isolation. If I became a murderer, I knew the memory of killing someone would stay with me for the rest of my life. The people who up to now had been kind to me and whom I had spurned—whether I liked it or not, I doubted that their enticements would reach me in that place. But the gun demanded that I fire it soon. The gun was everything to me. I was meaningless without it—I felt a savage love toward it. And yet the gun was cold to me. It drove me mad to think that the gun did not care, not even if I were consumed by that darkness. I’m not the one using the gun, I thought. The gun is using me—I was nothing more than a part of the system that activated the gun. I was saddened to realize that I had been manipulated by the gun the entire time. I had been manipulated by something man-made all along; despite never having attached much importance to my own life, I had sacrificed it to the gun. Just then, I looked at the scene that surrounded the woman. The dirty crosswalk signal, the asphalt, these buildings, these people—I didn’t know who they were or where they came from. But I felt an intense desire for the tiny shred of my own life, for the worthless time I had experienced so far. This feeling grew maddeningly strong, beyond the control of my own will, and I was overcome. And yet, not to pull the trigger felt cowardly somehow. There was no basis for it, but that was how I felt. What would happen after I killed her, I wondered. It was possible that, even if I did it, I could go on with my life as if nothing happened. In the history of the world, hundreds of millions of people must have been killed, directly or indirectly. Poverty killed people, just as the atomic bomb did, that was for sure, no matter what anyone said. But still, I could not pull the trigger. My consciousness faded, my vision dimmed, and the next thing I knew, I had tossed the gun aside. It didn’t feel as though I had done that myself, but there the gun was, lying on the ground some distance away from me. For a while I just sat there, in a daze. Then the thought occurred to me that I could no longer be with the gun. The idea crept into my mind uncannily, without any resistance. But then a grief, unlike anything I had ever felt before, seemed to well up. For a long time, I wept out loud. My sobbing was a strange mixture of relief and sadness. My tears wouldn’t stop, and I sat there crying without pause. Then, as I gazed at the gun lying away from me, for some reason I thought of my father, who would soon die.