The Part of Me That Isn't Broken Inside

by Kazufumi Shiraishi

  When I heard Raita say these words, I remembered my mother saying something along those lines in the old days. When I passed my entrance exams and was about to leave for Tokyo, she handed over a meager amount of money and said, Now, you’ll never, ever understand me.

  I feel like something’s snapped, Raita muttered when I fell silent.

  Snapped? I said automatically.

  Yes, that’s right. When the boss and his wife suddenly decided to close shop and return to Kagoshima, in the beginning, I was, like, resigned to that and simply thought to myself, like, oh, so that’s how it’s going to be. But lately, I’ve been getting this sense that it’s not something so simple, that this thing like a cord that’s been barely keeping me tied to this rotten world until now has finally snapped. My life until now, let’s face it, has just been about living in my bro Kohei’s shoes, right? Although he was my cousin, he was like an older brother to me. Now that two years have gone by since his death, I’ve been thinking what a disgraceful life I’ve been living. As I’ve been saying for some time, there’s nothing I really want to do in this world, right? The boss asked me to inherit the shop, but I’ve never thought about running my own business; I was just working my ass off there because he and the missus had let me stay with them. Like you said some time ago, Naoto-san—this world’s a genuine hell? Well, I really think so too, because no matter where you go, I don’t think you could possibly find any other world that’s made to be so stifling as this one, that before you’re finished you’re made to suffer and suffer, only to be made to suffer again; there’s no end, you’re never excused. When we let Kohei die I became convinced, like you, Naoto-san, that this here is where hell is.

  By that time I was sloshed, and half of Raita’s story had slipped out of the other ear. Raita didn’t seem to mind, though, going on and on as he pleased.

  You know what’d be great? he went on. To die by doing something really rad and flashy; go out with a bang, you know!

  Raita seemed dead set about that, so I decided to give him a piece of my mind.

  Don’t place conditions on dying, I said. Only idiots say I want to die in this or that way.

  You think? I mean, if you’re going to die anyway, wouldn’t it be okay to go out in a really messed up way? Honoka and I talk about stuff like that a lot.

  Raita looked embarrassed now.

  Honoka’s been saying such things too?

  Yes, she has.

  Fools, the both of you. I decided that’s what they surely were and laughed loudly.

  After spending about thirty minutes at the kitchen table, staring into empty space, I changed clothes and went out.

  With lunch on my mind, I was walking down toward Morishita when I saw Tomomi and Takuya near an intersection; they were approaching down the sidewalk on the other side. It was surprising, considering that it was already past two. Perhaps they were returning from the ward official’s place, but what I found puzzling was that

  Tomomi was holding a large bouquet. What’s more, the two were walking side by side toward Morishita Station, which was in the opposite direction from New Seoul. When I hid under the eaves of a watch store and saw them disappear into the subway entrance, I hurried down there myself, having made up my mind to follow them.

  At the platform, I spotted the two standing at the Shinjuku-bound side. Keeping a safe distance, I observed them from behind a column. Takuya’s legs, exposed by his shorts, were so thin they seemed like they’d break any minute. Tomomi was holding the bouquet in her right hand while holding her son’s hand. Her hair was rough as usual.

  I wondered where she was going with such a large bouquet? At the very least, it didn’t seem like the ward official’s place. A train bound for Hashimoto pulled into the platform, and when I made sure that the two of them boarded this train, I jumped onto an adjacent car.

  The two got off at Meidaimae and transferred to the Ino-kashira Line from there. Of course, they remained clueless to the fact that I was shadowing them.

  They ultimately got off at Shimokitazawa Station.

  I finally had an idea about where they were going, and the bouquet, fluttering in and out of sight amid the bustling crowd in the lively street just outside the station, seemed unusually vivid now.

  As expected, they disappeared into a small playhouse located approximately ten minutes away on foot from Shimokitazawa Station.

  The place had only a few seats, but it was a historic theater, equipped with the very latest stage sets. There were several garlands lined up at the entrance, and young couples were streaming through there. Apparently, on that day, the playhouse was featuring the opening performance of a small theatrical company, which had only recently shot to prominence. A flashy billboard, using only primary colors, was on display, pasted with a particularly large photograph of the leading actor. Naturally, the face in the photograph was that of Ilgon Park.

  After Tomomi and her son were out of my sight, I smoked a cigarette in front of the playhouse and went back the way I came. There was a Hiroshima-style okonomiyaki restaurant in front of Shimokitazawa Station I used to go to sometimes back in my college days, so I had one helping of a large okonomiyaki pancake called oban, and had two glasses of oolong tea highball before returning to my apartment.

  Three days later, at night, I arrived at the door to New Seoul, bringing along three special admission tickets to Korakuen Stadium’s Children’s Day shows, which I’d purchased from a ticket agency in Ikebukuro in the afternoon. But, for some reason, I was unable to pull the door open. In the end, I decided to just let go of the handle and walk back home.

  On the way back I pulled out the tickets, which I’d stashed inside my wallet, and tore them to pieces before throwing them into the trash bin of a convenience store found along the way.

  I decided to end my association with Tomomi and Takuya.

  Until then, I’d always thought that I’d lose touch with Eriko first, so it occurred to me, as I walked along, that the order was reversed.

  That night, I had a hard time falling asleep.

  For some reason Takuya’s face kept drifting through my mind, unsettling me terribly. For some reason it was heart-wrenching to imagine what Takuya would think if I stopped turning up suddenly. By getting to know Takuya, I learned that children lived in a completely different world from the world of us adults. However, this small world of theirs was always being crushed to smithereens for our self-seeking convenience.

  Lying there in bed, I was remembering the time when just Takuya and I went up to Okutama last summer for a swim in the river there. It was a hot day, and Takuya was down to his underpants, wearing a small straw hat and crouched down in a babbling brook, playing in the water, never getting tired. Sitting on the riverbank, which was scorched by sunlight, I was, despite feeling dozy, keeping a cautious eye on his really small back.

  Meanwhile, around thirty minutes later, a middle-aged man appeared and began fishing right next to Takuya. Takuya was drawing water into a beach bucket he’d brought from his home, dumping sand into it and emptying the bucket into the river whenever it got heavy; it was a game he was repeating over and over. Every time he did so, he generated a small splashing sound on the shore.

  A little while after the man had lowered his fishing line, a sharp voice reached my ears, which were still fuzzy with sleep. Snapping out of my reverie at once, I took a clearer look at Takuya in a hurry, afraid for a brief moment that Takuya might have become stuck in the river. But that wasn’t the case. Instead, the fisherman was gesturing

  to Takuya while shouting, Move over more, boy!

  Surprised, Takuya looked up at the man and ran back toward me, on the verge of tears. I don’t think I’ve ever felt more rage than I did just then. In fact, I thought I clearly felt the blood in my head boiling.

  Approaching the man, I raised my voice and shouted, Move the hell out yourself, asshole! and grabbed a big stone on the riverbed and hurled it at his fishing line with all the strength I could muster. The man
gave me an indignant look in return, so I seized his lapels suddenly and pushed him away with brute force. He fell back into the rapids, and when I took a further step forward I kicked his jaw with my right foot without much hesitation. Blood gushed out of his nose as he began to pack up his gear and hightail it out of there, looking disoriented and helpless. But my anger didn’t subside. I grabbed yet another sizable stone, and began to run after the guy, just when his back was receding far into the distance. Flinging away his rod and cooler on the way, while yelling out expletives and looking behind over and over again, he managed to escape. Only after I’d mercilessly chased him in this way—and after breaking in two the fishing rod he’d thrown away, knocking the cooler into pieces with the stone, and making sure that he was nowhere in sight—was I finally able to regain control of myself.

  When I returned to the part of the riverbank where I’d been originally, I found Takuya still frightened, so I encouraged him to resume his playing in the water. This time I joined him and the two of us together caught small fish and built a sandcastle as well. Takuya was delighted and, squatting down, played on and on by the riverside. When he’d occasionally turn his face toward me, laugh innocently, and wave, he’d look relieved and return to playing by himself.

  And then, for some reason, watching the way Takuya was at that moment, I felt, for the first time in decades, that old misty-eyed sentiment of feeling wanted.

  I was just beginning to doze off when my cell rang.

  Since Eriko was supposed to be coming home that night, I answered the phone, thinking it was certainly her, but it was Tomomi instead.

  I’m sorry to call so late, she said in a sad voice. Apparently, Takuya had been in bed since three days ago, running a fever. Although she closed the shop today to nurse him, his temperature was fluctuating wildly and he was weakening considerably. Since she got worried about how strange his condition was, she’d ended up calling me, apparently.

  It then occurred to me for the first time that New Seoul’s sign wasn’t lit up tonight. If I’d pulled that door handle even just a little, I’d have realized for sure that the shop was closed.

  This disturbed me quite a bit. I’d carelessly overlooked something I usually wouldn’t have. I’ve always loathed such negligence.

  I’m on my way.

  After hanging up the phone and going out to the street, I climbed into the car parked in the lot behind the apartment. While driving, I thought about the steps to take if Takuya’s condition was serious. I remembered the whereabouts of a general hospital in the vicinity and concluded that calling an ambulance would be more reliable than driving Takuya over to the hospital.

  Then, suddenly, I had another thought.

  If I hadn’t overlooked that sign, I wouldn’t be hurrying over to Tomomi’s place in such a state of panic. I also thought that perhaps I’d bought those three tickets with the intention of tearing them up from the beginning—but I couldn’t give a damn about such things anymore.

  The room smelled of illness. Takuya was lying on a child’s futon with a wet towel placed over his forehead, but was coughing intensely in intermittent bursts. He was half-asleep, and his forehead was terribly hot when I removed the towel and placed my palm over it. Yet he looked pale, his breathing was fast, and the wings of his nose quivered with each breath he took. A part of the sheet was stained, and when I asked Tomomi about it, she answered, He vomited as soon as I called you. But it must have been only water, since he hasn’t eaten since the day before yesterday.

  Tomomi squeezed the towel over a washbowl and placed it over Takuya’s head, covering his eyes. Apparently, he’d started running a fever Sunday night, which was three days ago, and since his temperature rose considerably the day before yesterday, she’d taken him to see a doctor and was told that it was a cold. After administering the medicine she received, the fever finally went down yesterday, during the day, so she was feeling relieved, when it rose again. It’s been repeatedly going up and down, all day long, ever since. When it was evening, the strange, wet

  cough started, and he seemed to be suffocating. Even though he tended to catch cold, she’d never seen him like this, so she’d become unbearably worried at once.

  Takuya’s state was clearly odd. It appeared that he was semiconscious, rather than asleep. I put my arm under the futon and, tucking up the hem of his pajama top, placed my hand on his skinny belly. Even though he’d been avoiding food, his abdomen was noticeably swollen.

  It’s probably pneumonia. A little severe even. The moment I said so, Tomomi crumpled up her face and seemed to be on the verge of bursting into tears.

  He must have caught a nasty virus, I went on, that day at the ward official’s office. The human traffic at places like that is intense.

  At a loss, Tomomi covered her mouth and looked into Takuya’s face by the pillow, and began to call out his name again and again.

  I got up, went into Tomomi’s adjacent room, and called for an ambulance.

  After being wheeled into a hospital in Sumiyoshi on a gurney, Takuya was immediately put into an oxygen tent, where they began to administer an IV treatment after piercing his thin arm with a long needle. Overwhelmed by the gravity of the situation, Tomomi lost it and began biting into her handkerchief while sobbing impatiently.

  It hasn’t led to pleurisy, so there’s nothing much to worry about, said the doctor on night duty in his office while examining X-rays of Takuya’s chest, displayed on the viewing screen. Nonetheless, Tomomi said vehemently, Doctor, please save Takuya! Naturally, the doctor seemed a bit troubled.

  I learned his name from the nametag on his chest and called my office from the lounge of the emergency room. A junior reporter I’d worked with in the past was still there; the weekly magazine’s final proofs were due that day. I had him look up the doctor’s history in the directory of physicians found in the reference library on the fifth floor. When I learned that the doctor was formerly on duty for a lengthy period of time at the medical office of a well-known university, I conveyed the information to Tomomi to comfort her, to allay her fears.

  Takuya was moved to the children’s ward on the third floor, and Tomomi and I spent the night there, seated on steel chairs that we arranged by the tented bed where Takuya slept. An hour after he was administered a transfusion, I could see, even through the tent, that the look on Takuya’s face was mellowing. Hearing his breathing become more regular, Tomomi finally looked a little relieved.

  If anything were to happen to this child, I wouldn’t be able to go on living, Tomomi murmured, so I said reprovingly, Saying such a thing could make it come true, you know. And then added, He’ll probably be hospitalized for two, three days, but everything’s going to be all right. I’ll pay a visit tomorrow with a big bouquet in hand.

  Tomomi reacted to my words by casting a dubious look, and seemed to be on the verge of saying something, but kept quiet.

  When I told her, after a while, that it would be appropriate to tell Park about this matter, Tomomi told me that she could manage on her own from this point on and that she wanted me to go home and get to bed, ahead of her.

  That won’t be necessary, I responded, without taking my eyes off Takuya’s sleeping face.

  12

  TWO DAYS LATER, I visited Takuya’s hospital room and found Park there.

  Takuya was already quite well, sitting cross-legged on the bed, eagerly playing with a toy car that Park had apparently bought for him. On top of a small closet used for storing small personal effects was the large bouquet I’d brought yesterday, arranged in a blue vase.

  After introducing myself to Park I said, Where is Tomomi, if I may ask?

  He answered that she’d returned in the evening to Morishita to open up shop, and that he intended to stay here tonight. When I asked Takuya, Isn’t it great that your father has come? he nodded very happily.

  Would you like to have a smoke in the lobby downstairs? Park offered, polite in speech, gentle in bearing, tall in stature. His face, with thin
eyebrows and strangely large eyes, was angular. The bridge of his nose was smooth like a beveled surface, and his reddish hair, kept long, was parted in the middle of his forehead and left hanging down all the way to his ears. He had a voice that was thick and penetrating, and he had a figure that was so impressive it could leave a lasting impression even from a distance. Seeing Park up close for the first time, I realized that Takuya in fact took after this man, and not Tomomi.

  We descended the stairs together. It was already late, and there didn’t seem to be any other visitors around. The dry sounds of our slippers flip-flopping resounded throughout the stairway. The lights in the outpatient lobby were already turned off, and, with the green light of the emergency sign and the light from the medical office in the back providing the only illumination, the place was dim and silent. There was a large houseplant in a pot placed by a massive television set, and a surprisingly large, black wall clock hung on the wall, displaying in golden letters the name of a drug company and the word Donation on the glass door encasing a swinging pendulum. Next to it was a replica of Hanjiro Sakamoto’s Three Horses in a Pasture, fit in a frame whose gold leaf gilding was starting to fade away here and there.

  We went over to the corner designated by a sign that said smoking corner, and sat down next to each other on one of the green-vinyl-covered settees there.