NISHIGUCHI PARK IN Ikebukuro was busy. I walked past a group of homeless men drinking and looked around. Hidden at the bottom of my bag was the bottle containing the poison I’d given to Yajima. Maybe that was why I had so little energy. A mixture of powders, with potassium cyanide as the main ingredient. My body grew heavier, but my vision cleared. Among the crowd in the park, however, I couldn’t tell who the caller was. I took out my cell phone and dialed his number.
Far away, a man sitting on a chain that formed part of the fence started hunting in his pocket. A black daypack was slung over his shoulder. He was wearing acid-washed designer jeans, a loose gray knit cap, a sleeveless white down jacket and a long-sleeved T-shirt of the same color, covered in English writing. I ended the call and walked towards him. He was still young, with narrow eyes and a thin nose, an oddly clean-cut face. He was staring at his phone, which had stopped ringing abruptly. I stood beside him, conscious of the drugs in my bag.
He turned slowly to face me. His neatly trimmed eyebrows suddenly drew together as though I’d taken him by surprise.
“What do you want?” he demanded.
The rain had just stopped, and the ground was still unpleasantly damp.
“What do you mean? You told me to come here.”
He glared at me for a second.
“What?”
“You called me here, didn’t you?” I repeated. “What the hell is this?”
“You? But the voice is the same. How come?”
I looked at him blankly. “What are you talking about?”
“Aren’t you Kuki, Fumihiro Kuki?”
I thought for a moment, trying to make sense of the situation.
Looking up at me, he went on. “Who the hell are you? Why are you checking up on Kaori Kuki?”
I realized that he was genuinely puzzled. He knew about Fumihiro, the person I used to be, but maybe he didn’t know about my plastic surgery or that I’d bought Shintani’s persona. I hesitated, thinking furiously. I couldn’t understand how he knew about Fumihiro, how he knew about Kaori, how he knew my number. I’d have to worm it out of him.
“You summoned me here. What’s your game? And how did you get my number? That’s what I’d like to know.”
He continued to stare at me.
“I don’t get you,” I went on. “I don’t know what you’re up to, but we’re getting out of here.”
“I’ll decide where we go,” he said, standing up at last.
WE WALKED PAST a police box, turned left at a convenience store and went into a different park. It was dirty, full of homeless people’s light blue tarpaulin shelters. I thought we were heading to a coffee shop or something, but he sat on a bench, took a bottle of mineral water from his backpack and started to drink. It was a brand I hadn’t seen before. I perched on the same bench, leaving a space between us. When I lit a cigarette he frowned rudely, then turned his gaze to my bag.
“I’m warning you,” he said. “Don’t do anything stupid.”
“Stupid?”
“Why are you carrying that so carefully?”
He was still looking at my pack.
“Why, are you chicken?”
“Just so you know, even though you can only see one of me, I’m not the only one watching you.”
I stared straight at him. There was no way I was going to look around, let him call the play. I thought back to what I’d seen on the way here. Apart from the homeless guys, there had been a number of people, male and female, laughing in a friendly fashion in front of the convenience store on the other side of the fence. There were also two cars parked on the street directly behind me.
“Would you like to see what I’ve got in here?” I taunted.
A dusty, gritty wind started to blow. He began to speak, then fell silent and looked away.
“Okay,” I said, “there’s lots of things I want to ask you, but first, tell me what you’re after. You must have had some reason for phoning me. What was it?”
He stayed quiet, head bowed.
“I asked you what it was. If you’re not going to answer, I’m leaving.”
“Before I tell you,” he said after a long pause, “who are you?”
I noticed for the first time that his skin was abnormally pale. He had a white wristband on his left arm and two hoop earrings. I chose my words carefully.
“You called me here, and you’re asking me who I am? The first thing you said on the phone, you called me Fumihiro Kuki. Then you said that if I didn’t come you’d hurt Kaori. In other words, you tried to threaten this Fumihiro by bringing up the name of this Kaori woman. And then someone different turns up. Am I close? So what are you after? Money? You’ve worked out that I’ve been checking up on Kaori. If you tell me what you know, I’m happy to pay you, if that’s what you want. Who is Fumihiro? Kaori’s brother?”
He didn’t move, just kept looking at the ground. His expression didn’t change, but he seemed to be thinking.
“What do you want? Money?”
“Yeah,” he spat. “Money.”
“What’s your name?”
“That’s not important.”
“Okay then, we’re done talking. I don’t talk to people I don’t know. You can’t use Kaori to intimidate me. If you need money, try someone else.”
I stood up.
“I told you I wasn’t the only one watching you,” he said.
“So they’re going to attack me? In a public place like this? You’re dumber than I thought.”
“My name is Ito.”
I looked at him, shocked. My heart started to beat faster.
“And your first name?”
“Last name’s enough.”
An idea struck me.
“Okay … are you from a family of cancers?”
He looked me full in the face.
“I get it,” I continued. “So that’s how it is. And maybe you’re JL, is that right? In that case …”
“How do you know that? What is this?”
He leapt to his feet, mouth open. I sat down again and tried to gather my thoughts. This place was starting to get to me. I lit a cigarette to calm my nerves.
“If you are,” I went on, “then I see how you know about Kaori and Fumihiro. I lied before. I know Fumihiro Kuki too. I’m a … Let’s just say I know him.”
“You know him? Where is he?”
“He’s dead.”
“Dead?”
“Suicide. There was this woman he was obsessed with. I was intrigued, so I thought I’d check her out.”
He sank onto the bench again.
“So he’s dead?”
“Yeah.”
“Idiot,” he shouted.
I was taken aback by his sudden outburst, but I kept a poker face.
“That’s so lame. If he was going to die he could at least have blown up his house first. Loser.”
His face had turned slightly red. I watched him, continuing to pick my words carefully.
“So I know some stuff about the Kuki family. That’s if Fumihiro was telling the truth. I know the story of the cancer line too, that branch of the clan. This one guy was a soldier, and when he got married he took his wife’s surname, Ito. He was killed when that cult took over the nuclear power plant, but according to Fumihiro he might already have had a son. It’s a common name, but seeing how you know so much about the Kukis, it all fits.”
“And what makes you think I’m in JL?”
“When I heard the line ‘Happiness is a fortress’ in the statement claiming responsibility for the attacks, I remembered hearing Fumihiro say it. It’s not exactly a popular expression. I did some research on it later and found that even though it’s peculiar, JL sometimes use it in their communiqués. That’s when I thought that maybe someone connected to the Kukis is in JL. And if I’m right, it’s not hard to guess that they’re from that separate cancer line. When I thought about what you were probably after, it was easy to put two and two together. The press is always trying to work out who fu
nds JL. In other words, you knew Fumihiro was rich and you were using Kaori to try and blackmail him. And with a bit of luck you thought you could get him to join you. Am I right? Fumihiro was a cancer too. He can’t have had much of a life. What’s more, for the pranks you’re pulling, you’ve got to the stage where you need funds. You need a backer. Isn’t that how it is?”
The rain started again fitfully. We sat side by side on the bench, a bit apart, looking straight ahead. Two homeless guys were arguing over the water fountain. In their hands they were both holding battered teakettles.
“If I tell you what I know, will you really give me money?”
“That depends what you say. Tell me about Kaori as well.”
He took a deep breath and turned to face me.
“You’re nuts. I still don’t exactly get why you were checking up on Kaori, but it’s, I don’t know, creepy. Going to the trouble of hiring a PI to investigate her, even looking into the family background. But just for that reason maybe there’s still a chance. Perhaps we can talk about that. Just a bit, though.”
“Still a chance?”
“We’ll discuss it later.”
The homeless men were still quarreling. Ito took a swig from his bottle.
“Like you say, I’m what the Kukis call a cancer. From that side of the family. You know that much already, so there’s no point hiding it. Like you said, my father was a leader of the Rahmla cult, that bunch of morons who committed suicide. But that’s not important.”
The rain grew heavier.
“So it’s true that I’m in JL. For various reasons, we need money just now. Really urgently. I’ve had my eye on the Kukis, the main line of the family who we’ve hated for years. Ever since I was little I’ve often gone to peek at their mansion. Not out of envy. Out of hatred.”
He fiddled with his wristband.
“There were two kids there, about the same age. They looked happy. Fumihiro and the one you’ve been watching, Kaori. They seemed close. Sometimes one of the housemaids who knew my circumstances, what’s her name, she would slip me a bit of money or some sweets. I asked her. She told me that Kaori was adopted and that Fumihiro was Shozo Kuki’s son, not his grandson. That rang a bell. The old man was following the custom of the cancers. That got me interested. From time to time I’d go to spy on Fumihiro, but then my situation changed and I couldn’t leave the house for a while. The next time I saw him he was in high school. It was amazing. He was like a different person.”
I got a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach, but was careful not to let it show.
“He’d shrunk, and he looked like an invalid. Really ugly. Did you notice that too? He was the spitting image of the old man. Something bad has happened to him, I thought. Actually, maybe I should have talked to him then. Both of us being cancers, maybe we’d have found we had something in common.”
He was still looking at the ground, unmoving.
“I joined JL. We were strapped for cash, and by chance I saw Kaori on the street. A weird coincidence, it was almost scary. I figured I might be able to get some money out of her, because I thought she still had ties to the Kukis. But someone was tailing her. A private eye. I knew him. He used to work for Shozo Kuki. A long time ago he was asking questions about me, I don’t know why. That got me thinking. Since Shozo had disappeared and was probably dead, maybe this time it had been Fumihiro who hired him. Another detective, a woman, was secretly filming Kaori in a bar. Not doing anything special, just her daily routine. I thought there must be romance in there somewhere. Apparently Fumihiro had gone missing, but I thought he might be stalking her on the sly. And I thought that could work out well for us. If I could team up with him, money wouldn’t be a problem anymore. Since I figured his life was probably pretty twisted, I thought we might get on. One of our gang is light-fingered, so I got him to tail the woman detective, and he saw her calling someone who was probably her client. The easiest person to tail is someone who’s tailing someone else. She was saying something about photos and recordings of Kaori. He stole her cell phone for a few minutes and looked at her call history for the time she made that call. I was willing to bet that number would be Fumihiro’s.”
He sighed and started playing with his water bottle.
“But I was too hasty. I made up my mind too quickly, even though my hunches are usually right. But it’s okay, this interesting guy turned up. I’ve decided to let you join us. You’re crazy, aren’t you? I can smell it.”
“Join you? No way.”
He laughed.
“But you seem really interested.”
His cell phone rang and he looked at the screen. It seemed to be an email, and he frowned slightly. Though I was nervous about my surroundings, I couldn’t show it by looking around. I could see two men who hadn’t been there before, in front of the office block on the other side of the fence, but they soon disappeared behind the building.
“And we’re not exactly peace-loving. We don’t care what we do to Kaori. Don’t worry, I’m not trying to threaten you. You look like a prickly bastard, and I guess threats wouldn’t work anyway. If money isn’t an issue for you, just a donation from time to time would be fine. You can afford to hire Shozo Kuki’s private eye, and looking at your clothes, you’d probably hardly even notice it. If you helped us we’d show you some good stuff.”
“What are you up to, exactly?”
He stood up, still holding his phone, and stowed the water bottle in his pack.
“We’re attacking all accepted values. Authority, class differences, shared perceptions. We don’t care what happens to the social structure—revolutions are for suckers. Our target is people’s collective consciousness. It’s like throwing a cream pie in their face.”
By now it was raining quite heavily.
“Come see me again, and I’ll give you some specific examples. You’re not the type to tell the cops. You’re not a loser. You hate people, don’t you? And you don’t give a damn about society. I can see it in your face. I’ve got a gift for spotting kindred spirits. But I’ll tell you one thing. If we move right away from ethics and morality and common sense, a completely different world will emerge. Sort of as a bonus. Okay, see you.”
And he walked off, getting soaked by the rain. Maybe it was just a coincidence, but while I wasn’t looking the people outside the convenience store had gone, and so had the cars behind me. Ito was already a long way off and I didn’t have the energy to follow him. The homeless guys’ battle over the drinking fountain was growing louder. The bottle of cyanide in my bag suddenly felt heavy again.
I WENT INTO a run-down bar with blue lighting and asked for whiskey. Parking myself on a stool with uneven legs, I rested my elbows on the counter. I’m not sure why but I got drunk quickly. Faint jazz was playing on the sound system. I couldn’t make out a melody.
I wondered what Shintani thought of his own life when he was alive, before I took his identity, turning the question over idly in my head. Had he really killed Sae Suzuki? If he had, I’d end up being hunted by the police for something I hadn’t done. I had a vision of Aida’s slit-like eyes and remembered that he was involved in the Yajima investigation too. As my PI had said, if the police found out that I really did have a connection to Yajima, I’d be in trouble. If Aida worked out that I was Fumihiro and that I was keeping an eye on Kaori, he’d immediately draw a line from me to Yajima, with Kaori right in the middle. So together with Sae’s death, Aida might end up hounding me either way, if stopped being Shintani or if I stayed as I was.
I had murdered my father, who had fully intended to make me experience hell, and taken another person’s face and identity. You could say that everything had become weirdly distorted because I’d broken the rules so many times. I hadn’t expected to meet someone from the cancer line like that. Ito had said that he’d sometimes come to spy on the estate. He’d seen me when Kaori and I were living in peace, and also when, as he put it, “Something bad had happened to me.” I thought about what kind of life
he must have led. Before my father had died at my hands he had talked about “an even greater evil.” Certainly I was surprised that Ito was a member of JL, but given his background, perhaps it wasn’t so odd after all. For one thing, his father was a leader of Rahmla. And he’d asked me to team up. I wasn’t sure what to do about him. Plus I was watching over Kaori, and I didn’t know what I was going to do there either. I had no idea why I was doing all this stuff when I was trying not to exist. Nor did I understand why I’d ended up crying in my sleep for murdering Yajima, as that woman had told me.
The plastic surgeon claimed that fate was driven by the combination of people’s character, heredity and environment, and those of the people around them. I didn’t know where those threads would lead, or how much they knew, but I thought that over time they must lead somewhere. What would happen in the future? What would I do? What would happen to me? I was raised by my father to be a cancer, so Kaori and I should have been doomed from the start. We’d dodged that, but I’d paid a price for it. However, in the perverted life caused by my violations of society’s rules, I’d committed more violations, so presumably in the future I’d grow even more perverted. Did I break the rules deliberately? Was that my tendency?
As my vision blurred with drunkenness, I phoned the woman I’d picked up in the d’Alfaro. After six rings she answered in a quiet voice. The background was raucous, and I figured she was in a bar somewhere.
“Um, it’s me. I mean, we met the other day …”
“Ah.”
The noise died away.
“Look, I was wondering if we could meet now? Of course I’ll pay you.”
“That’s okay … hey.”
She must have moved somewhere because there was no sound at all.