He removed from the breast pocket of his heavy-looking, multi-pocketed shirt a packet of cigarettes and pulled one out for himself. To offer me one as well, he shook the box and let the tip of one more poke out. I pulled it out as he held out his lighter, but I declined with a wave of my hand and lighted up with my own cigarette lighter.
For his first puff, Park inhaled sharply and exhaled slowly, as if he were taking a deep breath of fresh air. I’ve heard a lot about you from Tomomi. She tells me that you’ve been helping her out in many ways, and I’m grateful for that.
I told him that I found his formal tone somewhat surprising, and that I didn’t really do all that much, and that I didn’t think I was in any position to receive any gratitude from him.
But, he said, even this time, had you not been around, Tomomi would’ve been at a loss.
No, it’s all merely having neighborly relations with her, and nothing more.
Park looked my way and gave me a strange smile that bordered on a frown.
The two of us smoked in silence for a while, but since I had nothing particular to say to the guy, I just waited for him to speak, believing that he wouldn’t have invited me down here unless he had something on his mind. Park methodically extinguished his cigarette, stubbing it out on the rim of a one-legged ashtray before lighting up his second one.
Takuya is a frail child, you see, Park began. When he was born, I was traveling around Shikoku on a promotional tour of the provinces, and I only got to see him for the first time a month later. Apparently, the jaundice he had at the time of delivery was severe; it spoiled his complexion.
Listening to his low, sonorous voice, I thought, possibly because of his profession, there was something theatrical about the way he talked.
Perhaps you may have already heard, he went on, "but Tomomi was my senior in the acting troupe, and age-wise, she’s also a year older. Although I know I’ve always been a heavy burden to her, I still had the nerve to make her abandon the theater so that she could deliver Takuya.
Back in those days, I was a zero. A zero human being, no matter what he does, stays a zero in people’s eyes, so I thought I could get away with whatever the hell I wanted. So when a child was born to me—a zero human being—it felt incredible, frankly.
I couldn’t quite understand what Park was trying to tell me, but every word, which he seemed to articulate with the intention of engraving it in my mind, was driving me up the wall, so I told him that it wasn’t as if he was the one who gave birth to Takuya. Park laughed out loud before resuming his talk.
The only time Tomomi said anything selfish in her life was when she insisted on giving birth to Takuya. Even her parents in Sendai were dead set against that at the time, and I was at a loss. There’s also the issue of my nationality, and I hadn’t had my name entered in the family register to begin with. Tomomi was quite frantic by then. It was terrible. At a time when the pregnancy wasn’t that conspicuous yet, she named the baby Takuya, a boy’s name, and loudly declared that she and Takuya, just the two of them, would live together alone. She appeared like a beast in my eyes, behaving in such a way. Nonetheless, at the end of the day, she’s actually very ordinary. And it seems to me that you don’t understand this part of her very well. What’s more, with the age gap between you and her even wider than in my case, you probably see her as more of an adult than I do.
I was starting to get fed up with him, having suddenly realized that he was in the middle of saying something profoundly important. In effect, he wanted to meddle, fancying himself a nice guy. But I couldn’t stand the jerk. Sure, he might have taken a benign interest in me, but I’m simply repelled by anyone who tries to so simplistically, so shamelessly, spew out dime-store tales of what they’ve seen or experienced in their lives, even if those stories aren’t that pushy or in-your-face.
I’m sure such things happen often, I said. Just because someone’s ordinary doesn’t mean that person’s weak, and there are tons of women out there who carry themselves perfectly well even after being dumped by a man.
But when Takuya falls sick in this way …
He may be ill, but he’s not seriously ill, right? Contrary to what you might think, a father is a good-for-nothing, and if he’s not around from the beginning, kids aren’t going to have a problem with that: they’re just going to go on living, indifferent to his absence, never thinking there’s anything unnatural about not having a father around, and women can lead surprisingly fulfilling lives with just one child in their lives. At the least, children serve as a sufficient excuse, after all, for living. That’s the impression I get even when I see Tomomi-san. If you’re worried sick about the two of them, well, I feel you’re just wasting your time.
Park was listening to me with a blank look on his face, but he suddenly said, My God, you’re interesting! He then said that Tomomi was right when she remarked that I was terribly awkward at keeping an appropriate social distance between people. Apparently, you don’t understand human relations. I suppose it’s because you haven’t come across that many hardships, Park said, conclusively.
I was about to burst into spontaneous laughter at how old-fashioned he just sounded.
You’re the type that wants to get along with anyone and everyone, aren’t you? I said to Park.
Yeah, whatever, he said, pausing for a moment. At any rate, what I wanted to talk to you about isn’t me, but you. I just wished to know your feelings for Tomomi. She’s concerned about you. The last time we met she said she was unsure about the way you thought of her, but she felt certain that you love Takuya. She seemed amazed, though, by how you could be that way.
I didn’t quite understand what Park meant to say.
Why are you interested in all this stuff? I said. To this day, I’ve never wondered whether I’m in love with somebody, you know, not even once. You can’t figure out something like that, no matter how much you mull it over—it’s just something that gets validated by your actions, more or less.
Park laughed again. Look, if you aren’t comfortable saying, ‘I love you,’ that’s okay. There’s nothing wrong with that. What I’m really trying to ask now has nothing to do with what you think; I just want to know whether you’ve imagined Tomomi’s feelings for you.
Why, it would be rude of me if I did. Her feelings are her feelings, I answered.
Park nodded with perfect understanding, as if I’d just confirmed his suspicions about me. He said emphatically, Now, that’s what’s generally seen as a sign of not being in love. Frankly, I think the concept of acceptance is alien to you. All you do is think about yourself, but you still poke your nose into Tomomi and Takuya’s affairs. In the end, all you do is enjoy the kinds of exchanges with them that can never hurt you, or put you in a vulnerable position.
Although I was more or less unfazed, I detected a touch of rage in his words, which felt like a ball of shit brushing past the outer layer of my heart. The one who couldn’t think about anybody but himself wasn’t me, but Park. In
my dealings with people, I’ve always been wary of pushing any uncertain or shallow emotions, while also being cautious about never accepting any impositions of such emotions from anyone—emotions that invited delusional and careless thinking. But what I’ve been upholding above all, to maintain this principled attitude, at whatever times, in whatever situations, are the inviolable rules of never prioritizing my interest, and of never bargaining.
When I said, I think you can never genuinely love anyone, as long as you keep hoping, self-indulgently, for your own feelings to be understood, Park said, glaring into my eyes, So then why would you have sex with someone you just got to know by chance? Why would you occasionally give money to her? Why would you take care of her in so many ways? Don’t you think that by acting like that you’re only playing with her feelings?
Of course not! Even if I did something for Tomomi-san, it shouldn’t matter at all. In the first place, there’s no such thing as a coincidence in this world, and no one can really play with anothe
r person’s feelings.
Don’t you know that Tomomi occupies a weak position in society, that she’s actually starved for kindness? Don’t you think you’re taking advantage of this weakness of hers?
It was starting to get unbearable, listening to the discordant, off-key remarks of this guy who wasn’t much older than me.
Look, talking like that amounts to insulting Tomomi-san, all right? I’m sure she’d lose her temper if she heard you.
Park sighed pretentiously and stood up, and after clenching the cigarette that had burned down to the filter between his forefinger and middle finger, he went over to the vending machine by the dispensary and pulled out two cans of coffee and returned, the cans suspended in his left hand.
Park turned gentle, smiling with friendly eyes. Deep down, I found the sunny actor’s mask unforgivable. As he stood there, he pulled the tab off of one coffee can, and then the next, and then held out one can before sitting next to me again.
At any rate—it was the second time he’d said that—I heard from Tomomi today that you found out that she’d gone to see my performance after standing you up. Apparently, she’s very uneasy about it. Look, Tomomi likes you, but she’s got a child, and she’s older than you, so I believe she’s completely at sea about her future, you know: she just doesn’t know what to do.
Gazing at his impressive profile, I was thinking that the only way this character could ever think about anything was to mix things up in his head. His extraordinariness, in short, was only skin-deep. He was simply incapable of distinguishing between himself and Tomomi, or even between himself and me. It was clear to me that Park, in the end, was nothing more than a misguided, muddled Joe Blow you found loitering around here and there everyday, supremely self-confident in his self-knowledge, when, in fact, his self-knowledge didn’t amount to knowing anything about even a single strand of hair on his head.
For sure, I said, pausing as he did earlier, and then began breaking down my rationale, mainly for myself.
For sure, when I came to know that Tomomi had deceived me to go see your play, I did think about saying goodbye. But it wasn’t because I hated her for betraying me. It was just that I’d decided on my own to end it, just like that. You can keep looking for a reason to explain such a decision, but you won’t find it anywhere. I’ve always tried to suppress any anger in me, no matter how I’m offended, trying not to take things too seriously. This is because I believe others, just like myself, can’t clearly account for their own actions. A person’s emotions are like the fleeting glimmerings of a fireworks display, and each and every action arising from those emotions hasn’t a shred of consistency in it to begin with. So if that’s the case, who could blame anyone for their deeds, and for what reasons? If I’m in any way different from others, it’s only because I don’t get upset over the results of my decisions. Unlike you, I don’t get all bothered and behave miserably. I never engage in such stupidity. You’re the type of guy who’s always repenting or reflecting; in a restaurant, the moment your dish arrives at the table, you start regretting, falling into a panic-stricken state, thinking to yourself I should’ve never ordered this crap. To me, the decision to end my relationship with Tomomi and the decision to eat curry and rice in my company’s cafeteria at lunchtime are the same things. They’re simply decisions for which I’m entirely responsible. The only problem here is you can’t understand that. Even though in the end I didn’t break off my relationship with Tomomi and Takuya, it’s not in any way because I forgave her; rather, it’s merely the result of the fact that there were no grounds, in the first place, for my decision to part from them. You see, people tend to do such things over and over again.
Park had been listening to my long-winded talk in silence, but he didn’t really seem to have understood anything.
Listen, dude, it’s all fine and dandy for you to get so fancy-pants and la-di-da about the relationship, but Tomomi can’t afford to be like that. In fact, that lady isn’t like you at all. What you’re doing is involving an innocent woman and her child in the drama of your big fat worthless ego. Your babbling is irritating, by the way, and there seems to be a serious hole in your heart, and I don’t want you to do anything silly like have Tomomi around just to fill that hole.
He looked down, and began to speak in a slightly quivering voice. "We broke up five years ago, but she never visited me, not even once, of her own accord. Only I’d visit her with many toys, like some kind of Santa Claus, after finding some kind of a pretext like an anniversary or a memorial day. She used to often tell me that, come summertime or Christmas, Takuya would always remember me.
"Then, out of the blue, that Sunday, for the first time really, she came to visit me, of her own accord, holding a big bouquet. After the show ended, I took the both of them out to dinner. She let me know of the tough time she was having in finding a nursery school for Takuya. Apparently, the social worker at the child welfare office kept making snide remarks, finding fault with Takuya’s nationality, his fatherless household, and with Tomomi’s bar business. Apparently, in the end, the meeting just blew up into a big fight, with Tomomi kicking her seat. And because of that, she had no choice but to make a round of visits to the bigwigs of the ward assembly to seek their help.
"I personally haven’t given Takuya’s nationality any thought, but she said that she was now unbearably sad for him, imagining such harassment could happen again many times in the future as well.
"Do you know why she came to see me that day? She came to ask me to give up being a father, which was when she suddenly confided in me about the presence of another man in her life, about you. It’s rather negligent of me, I know, but these last five years, I had no idea at all that there was another man in her life.
At any rate, you must have already figured out by now what’s going on in her head, right? You can’t go on pretending like you don’t anymore.
As I’ve been trying to say for some time now, I said, such talk is meaningless. Granted, she might have become a bit fainthearted, and so is likely thinking about getting married to me, but it’s a passing phase.
In reaction to these words of mine, Park crushed the can he was holding and immediately spoke in a despairing voice, brimming with melodramatic tones, hammy enough for the stage. What the hell are you saying!? he boomed. Something’s seriously wrong with you. Such talk isn’t meaningless! Such talk is rife with meaning! It’s terribly significant! Look, just answer this question—can you categorically say that you’re going to marry Tomomi and become Takuya’s new father? Can you swear you will? Can you tell me if you’re absolutely ready for something like that? Well, can you?
I took my first sip of the sweet coffee, and said, Ready? I don’t know about that, but I don’t have a problem with becoming Takuya’s father.
But I don’t think she’s seriously wishing for such an outcome, I continued.
Then, with some emphasis for the first time, I added, I believe you’re a conscientious person, but isn’t there a part of you that’s underestimating women and children? Anyway, I couldn’t care less.
After parting from Park, I paid a visit to New Seoul. The store was crowded and Tomomi was moving about busily behind the counter. I told her that I’d talked with Park in the hospital, and that although I knew she’d gone to see Park that day, I really didn’t mind at all.
On the evening before the visit, Tomomi said, I was reading the paper, and as soon as I spotted a small article introducing Park’s performance, somehow I got this urge to show Takuya what his real father’s like when he’s at work, you see. It came to me suddenly, this urge.
And then Tomomi said, under her breath, I’m sorry.
I told her that such an urge was common and could arise in anyone, and then I left the shop after saying, Once Takuya is discharged, let’s celebrate somewhere nearby. I’ll make reservations.
After stepping outside, I realized I didn’t even take a single sip of the whiskey and water she’d served me. It occurred to me that it was t
he first time that I hadn’t drank in that bar. I went on to kill about two hours in a pachinko parlor near the station, and after roaming about the shopping area in Takabashi, I returned to Tomomi’s place. She was just in the middle of closing up shop.
While helping her clear up, I said, "You said ‘real father’ a while ago, didn’t you? Well, how do you feel about a
fake one?"
I didn’t quite understand why I asked such a question, but Tomomi didn’t answer anyway. Instead, she turned toward me and wore a smirk on her face and said, Hey, how about going to a hotel from now on?
We took a cab ride to Kinshicho, drank a lot of sake at a yakitori joint, and then entered into a hotel district, arms around each other’s shoulders. It had been a while since I last slept with Tomomi in a place other than the second floor of New Seoul.
Standing in the reception, in front of a panel displaying available rooms, the two of us chose the most expensive room listed there; it was called Paradise, and it certainly lived up to its name.
We bathed in a glass bathtub, washing each other’s bodies, and messed around on a round bed that revolved while moving up and down. Our figures were reflected in the mirror on the ceiling.
I straddled Tomomi’s face and swatted her cheeks with my hardened thing—which went splish-splash. And while looking down at her creased, pained expression and listening to her gasp and moan, I became terribly excited, somehow, strongly desiring to finish inside her for the first time since I’d begun sleeping with her.
When I asked, while thrusting my hips, Can I come? Tomomi screamed, Yes, yes, faster, faster. When I said, You’ll get pregnant, she said, Yes, yes, let me get pregnant, let me get pregnant, please let me get pregnant, and ad infinitum.
When I pulled out my dick in a wild frenzy, I discharged an unusually large volume onto Tomomi’s stomach.
After we finished, Tomomi’s face was radiant. She even looked two or three years younger. I then felt, while comparing the sight of my semen scattered across her lower abdomen with the sight of that glowing, rejuvenated face of hers, a chill coursing through the depths of my heart.
The Part of Me That Isn't Broken Inside Page 14
