The Biter

  Then his fingertips brushed against something small.

  He grabbed it and brought it in front of him. It was a metal hexagonal nut with a diameter of about two centimeters. After he brushed away the dust with his fingers, it gave off a dim glow in the darkness. Had it not rusted because it was stainless steel?

  After gazing at it vacantly for a bit, he leisurely put it in his mouth. He rolled the hard, cold, metallic-tasting lump around on top of his tongue.

  …Sweet?

  There was no reason it should be. But he definitely picked up on a faint sweetness inside his mouth. A somehow nostalgic sweetness, yet one that made him feel guilty.

  Roll, roll. Roll, roll. He absorbed himself in licking it, putting it lightly between his teeth on occasion.

  That’s right… This was the sweetness of hard candy. The flavor of a big, round black sugar candy.

  Hidden in the closet, he had licked intently at the piece of black sugar candy that someone had given him. He had to hurry and finish licking it before he was discovered. But it would be such a waste to just bite it.

  Experiencing happiness and anxiety, satisfaction and guilt all at the same time, he rolled and rolled the hard candy around his mouth.

  Suddenly, the closet door was ripped open.

  What are you eating?!

  A shrill, hysterical voice. That woman’s voice.

  She dragged him out of his hiding spot and forced open his mouth. She pulled the black sugar candy, wet with saliva, out of his mouth with fingers that reeked of makeup.

  This! This is what you’re eating?! It’s just a clump of sugar! Eating sugar will melt your teeth!

  Eating sugar will melt your teeth. The phrase he’d heard long ago repeated like a curse. Curling up like an infant without realizing it, Takaesu plunged into a pool of memories.

  Hikaru Takaesu’s mother was a famous food educator and critic. She was the author of many published books about nutritional education, and she had frequent exposure in all types of media.

  On television, she seemed just like the ideal mother: pretty and kind. But Hikaru had almost no memories of being praised by his mother. Do this. Don’t do that. Do this. Don’t do that. Those were all the words he got from his mother.

  Hikaru had probably been five years old when his parents divorced.

  He remembered his father as being kind. He was a salaryman at a trading company, and the only thing he could have called a hobby was playing pachinko on his days off. He would let Hikaru eat the chocolate and snack foods he won, telling him to keep it a secret from his mother.

  Even on the day he moved out, Hikaru’s father gave him a ton of candy. Hikaru tucked it away with care in a secret box hidden at the back of the closet in his room.

  Hikaru, his mother, and the maid were then the only ones living in that big house in Motoazabu. It was around that time that Hikaru’s mother started to get hysterical when she reprimanded him.

  At the same time that he started elementary school, he was forced to go to cram school to prepare for middle school entrance exams. Before long, swimming school and English conversation school were added to the list. He had absolutely no time for play, and when he said he wanted a gaming system for his seventh birthday, his enraged mother pinched his ear so hard he thought it would tear off. He was a good student but an outsider in class; he didn’t have a single friend.

  His mother was crazy about more than just education. She forced the maid to create menus based on her own nutritional theories and strictly forbade eating anything else.

  His mother’s pet theory was that the foundation of child rearing was to get calcium to kids before anything else for healthy teeth and healthy bones; their dining table was jam-packed with small fish and seaweed. Sweet things were completely banned, and he had to be sure to brush his teeth within ten minutes of eating. She even made him take a toothbrush set when he went to school. When she had discovered him secretly sucking on the candy, she had punished him harder than when he had wanted the gaming system.

  And why did his mother make him take such good care of his teeth? That was so she could put Hikaru’s picture in her books and magazine articles.

  Look how properly she was raising her child. Look how wonderful her theories were. She used Hikaru as material to show off like that. Funnily enough, young Hikaru with his shining snow-white teeth became popular with housewives, and he was even brought in to do a toothpaste commercial when he was eight years old.

  Soon, his mother had gone so far as to supplement her claims with the theory that chewing strength nurtures the brain, and even more reforms were made to their diet. For rice, they ate brown rice or rice with grains mixed in. They had small fish that could be eaten with the bones still in them. Their vegetables were all hard stalks. Even snacks were limited to salted beans, dried kelp, and dried sardines. Every time he ate something, his mother would tell him to chew it a hundred times.

  Chew it up well, Hii. Chew. Chew. Chew more. If you spit it out, you’ll get a pinch. There now, chew. Chew. Chew. Chew. Hii…you have to work hard and eat enough for her, too. So chew more, chew. Chew, chew, chew, chew.

  Even when he went into the higher grades of elementary school, Hikaru’s grades put him at the top of the class, and as usual, he didn’t have a single cavity.

  Hikaru became aware of a certain habit around the end of summer break in the sixth grade: grinding his teeth. Without noticing, he had gotten into the habit of rubbing his teeth together hard whether he was in class, studying at home, or going to and from school.

  Even when he tried to stop, he just couldn’t do it. His jaw just tensed up on its own, especially when he was thinking of his mother, and his teeth made a grinding sound.

  It was no big deal, or so he thought. But Hikaru didn’t know. He didn’t know that excessive tooth grinding was a full-fledged disease: attrition.

  A disease in which the enamel is abnormally worn away due to continual grinding of the teeth.

  He wore down his permanent teeth, which had just grown in then, enough to expose the dentin. Hikaru became unable to properly brush his teeth because it was too painful. He skipped brushing his teeth at school and fooled his mom by only pretending to brush at home.

  Then bacteria set in immediately in his weakened teeth. Cavities sprung up all over the place simultaneously and progressed with incredible strength.

  But he couldn’t even discuss it with his mother, let alone go to the dentist. His body went cold with fear just imagining…how harsh the reprimands and punishments would be if she knew he had several cavities.

  He had them stop the photo shoots for magazines and books for a while, saying that he wanted to focus on studying for his middle school entrance exams. But the truth was, studying was already out of the question because of the pain. Even when he sat down at his desk he was only desperately enduring the excruciating pain, and the days passed by with him unable to get enough sleep. Along with his teeth, all the words and formulas jammed into his head were dissolved by the Streptococcus mutans bacteria and disappeared altogether.

  The state of his second-semester finals was wretched. There was no way he could show his mother the answer sheets that had been given back to him. Hikaru hid them in a secret box in the closet.

  The excuse that the grading was running late didn’t hold up for even three days.

  His suspicious mother did a thorough search of Hikaru’s room right in front of him, discovering an ancient-looking rice cracker tin at the back of the closet. Raging at Hikaru, who was wailing for her not to open it, his mother pulled off the lid and found the bundle of answer sheets marked with grades that were far below average.

  His mother’s face went pale and her hands trembled. Then her gaze turned to the bottom of the box. There were the lovingly stored packages of chocolate, gum, and black sugar candy Hikaru’s dad had given him before moving out.

  His mother’s features changed. Her eyes quickly narrowed, her canine teeth were bared, and her hair even seeme
d to stand on end. There was the face of a demon. Pulling Hikaru down to the floor, his mother opened his mouth aggressively.

  The moment she saw Hikaru’s teeth, decayed with attrition and cavities, a scream burst from his mother’s throat that was difficult to believe came from a human being. That deep, rumbling, lingering voice sounded like the roar of a beast.

  His mother ran from the room and returned immediately. Hikaru’s mouth was frozen open from fear. His mother clamped down on his front tooth with the pair of pliers she held in her right hand and screamed, Eating sugar will melt your teeth! I told yooooou!!

  Takaesu leaped up, a muffled sound slipping out of him.

  For a moment, he didn’t know where he was. After hurriedly looking around in the total darkness in all directions, he remembered the circumstances that had led him to sneak into the abandoned building.

  Letting out a long, thin breath, he pulled the blue sheeting covering his body up to his mouth.

  It had been quite a few years since he dreamed of that woman. He wiped away the greasy sweat that was flowing down his forehead like a waterfall with the sleeve of his training wear. Sticking a finger into his mouth, he checked to make sure his teeth were where they should be.

  Everything was fine. That woman couldn’t do anything anymore.

  That was because, six years ago on the day he had graduated from college, he had taught her a lesson. Taught her how much she was hated by her own son.

  Taking over all of his mother’s name recognition and status, Takaesu made his debut as a gourmet food critic, keeping the fact that the majority of his teeth were fake a secret.

  There was lingering damage in his alveolar ridge because a layperson had roughly pulled out his teeth while he was still growing, so rather than get implants, he had no choice but to use partial dentures. He had always been afraid it would be discovered someday that he was a food critic with dentures who couldn’t chew hard things, but that life ended three months ago. The day that eye given to him by the heavens had settled in his flesh, he put aside his dentures for the new real teeth that were growing in.

  …That’s right. He couldn’t bite his mother anymore, but there was still a person he should bite: the dentist who treated a child that had obviously been abused and accepted a pile of money to keep it quiet.

  When he got back to Tokyo, he would pay a visit to that dentist, who was now the only person who knew that Takaesu had dentures.

  He would have her examine the teeth that had grown in and fully enjoy the shock on her face before he captured her. He would tie her up on the exam table, pull her teeth out one by one, and chew them up with a crunch as if they were ramune candy. There was no need for him to pay an extra fee to have maintenance done on his mouth in an exam room during the middle of the night anymore.

  But before that, there was the boy with the shell.

  During his brief slumber, the healing of the burns had progressed quite a bit. He didn’t feel much hunger, either. Just as if nutrients had seeped out of the stainless steel nut in his mouth.

  Roll, roll.

  After rolling the nut around inside his mouth a bit—

  Grind, grind. Crunch, crunch.

  Takaesu bit through the lump of metal and swallowed it.

  7

  The weekend passed by anticlimactically without a thing happening.

  Whether Minoru was doing his run early on Saturday morning, going to and from school, or going shopping with Norie on Sunday, the Biter didn’t show himself and Yumiko and DD didn’t make contact with him again. In just two days, the events at Akigase Park had rapidly lost their sense of reality.

  On Monday morning when he and Norie left the house together, it was starting to feel like everything had been a dream. The presence of the orb settled deep in his chest—the black Third Eye—was the only thing that didn’t disappear, but now even that seemed like a part of everyday life.

  At an intersection along the way he said good-bye to Norie, who worked at the Saitama prefectural office near Urawa Station, then sped up on his bike a bit. Even when he pulled his face out from under his scarf a little and inhaled the cold air through his nose, he couldn’t pick up on that unique beastly smell at all.

  But there was still just one thing—no, there were just two things that he couldn’t say weren’t bothering him, like little thorns in his side.

  The first was what DD had called out to him three days ago when Minoru had started to leave the park.

  Watch out for the smell of the Ruby Eye, kid.

  Even without being told, he went on checking for the smell in the air in that way. But he couldn’t get past the feeling that Yumiko and DD had said something important within the conversation about the smell of the Ruby Eye. He just couldn’t remember it. Maybe it was a result of Minoru’s conscious effort to keep the memories of those events at a distance.

  And the second thing was Tomomi Minowa, who they’d taken away to the hospital.

  He hadn’t seen her at school on Saturday. She shouldn’t have any major injuries, so if she was still being treated, was it for a mental issue? That wasn’t unreasonable, either; she had seen the terrifying face of the shark man up close. It would be good if she could somehow recover and come to school today, though.

  He stopped his bike at the signal to cross the Shin-Omiya bypass and let out a sigh.

  At least the incident itself was over. Knowing that he owed the terrible burns he had taken to that mysterious organization, the Biter had no reason to hang around this area for days. He had probably fled somewhere far away a long time ago and was being followed by Yumiko and all them.

  The signal turned green, and as he pumped the pedals of his bike hard, he whispered those words deep inside himself for the umpteenth time.

  It’s over, all of it.

  When morning classes ended and the bell chimed for lunch break, the classroom was immediately filled with clamor and the smells of boxed lunches.

  Minoru cut across it all smoothly and went out into the hall. Usually he would go straight and head for the cafeteria, but today he came to a halt and looked down the hallway on the right. Minoru’s class, sophomore Class One, was on the eastern end of the school building on the third floor. At the far-off western end was Class Eight—Tomomi Minowa’s class.

  Minoru had no idea what had happened to her after DD and Yumiko had taken her off to the hospital. If he knew her phone number, he could have at least worried about whether to send her a text, but they had never exchanged phone numbers or anything.

  He should be able to find out if she had come to school if he went directly to her classroom, but no excuse materialized for why he would be peeking into Class Eight at the end of the hall as he passed by. It also seemed like there would be trouble if the track team guys saw him or something.

  Disappointed with himself for thinking these things even for a moment, Minoru started walking not down the stairs, but toward the hall. Even if they saw him, he could be finished with all this if they called him out again. Next time, though, he’d have to be sure not to activate the shell the moment he got hit.

  With his shoulders drawn in, Minoru went against the tide of students headed for the cafeteria all the way to the other end of the hall. He furtively peeked into Class Eight through the classroom door that had been left open.

  He ran his gaze over the room quickly, but Tomomi Minowa wasn’t there after all. Was she absent from school today, too, or had she already gone to the cafeteria or the locker room?

  As he was turning these thoughts over in his mind near the door, he heard a low voice from behind him.

  “Hey.”

  Reflexively sucking in a breath, he wheeled around. Standing there was the shark man—no, it was one of the three guys who had summoned him to the back of the dojo. The sophomore from the track team who had seen Minoru and Tomomi talking. If he remembered correctly, they had called the guy Ogucchi.

  The only impression Minoru had of the guy from five days earlier was him
chuckling in front of the upperclassmen, but now his eyes were sharply narrowed beneath his short hair and his mouth was twisted with displeasure.

  “What business do you have in our class, Utsugi?” he asked in a deep voice.

  The question made Minoru want to murmur, “Nothing,” and slip away, but he stood his ground, slowly letting out the air in his lungs. “Could we talk over there?” he suggested, looking toward the corner of the hallway.

  Although the track team member’s brow furrowed, creating vertical wrinkles between his eyes, he nodded. They moved in front of a window at the western end of the hallway and faced each other again.

  Come to think of it, I only know this guy’s nickname, Minoru thought.

  “Sorry, I don’t know your name,” he said as he made eye contact with the guy, who was about the same height as him.

  “…Oguchi,” he murmured.

  Giving the guy a slight nod, Minoru got right to the point with no preamble.

  “I was wondering if Minowa is at school today.”

  “…What’s it to you?” Oguchi said, his voice going lower still.

  Taking in Oguchi’s piercing gaze, Minoru had a belated realization. This guy liked Tomomi Minowa. That’s why he was wary of Minoru talking to Tomomi.

  Then how about me? he wondered momentarily.

  Since moving to this town, he had never felt interested in a particular girl or wanted to become close with one. He had gone on avoiding closing the distance between him and other people, not just girls. That was because he was always afraid that he would end up with bitter memories, painful memories, memories he would want to forget.

  Oguchi had surely been overtaken by dark emotions the moment he saw Minoru talking to Tomomi. That’s why he had told the upperclassmen and encouraged them to call Minoru out. But there was no doubt that he had regretted his actions afterward. After all, when he had seen Minoru laid out on the ground after being hit, Oguchi’s face had been completely contorted.