The Part of Me That Isn't Broken Inside

by Kazufumi Shiraishi

  13

  WHILE HAVING BREAKFAST IN the coffee shop of our usual hotel, I talked to Teruko Onishi about the commotion over Takuya’s hospitalization.

  Oh my! Tomomi-san must have been very worried then, the missus said, frowning with a really pitiful look.

  Any story concerning Tomomi always drew her attention. Though her circumstances had nothing in common with Tomomi’s, the missus appeared to feel particularly sorry for her. While I’m not really sure why, I’d once taken her to New Seoul to introduce her to Tomomi. Perhaps that one-time encounter had left a strong impression on her. Of course, she seemed to figure out that night, at a single glance, that my relationship with Tomomi was physical, and to the missus, this fact had apparently served as a springboard for diving headlong into the kind of X-rated relationship we began to have.

  Bedeviled by sexual dissatisfaction, Teruko was hungry for some no-strings-attached sex; she had to have it, by hook or crook. In that sense Tomomi’s presence was the best insurance against the collapse of her marriage.

  It was on a summer evening, about half a year before I got to know Eriko, when I first asked Teruko Onishi out on a date.

  I told her to come out to Nihonbashi from Takanawa, where she lived, so that I could take her to a small izakaya pub. I used to work part-time during my college days, for around two years, at a large wholesaler specializing in medical supplies in Takaramachi, and the izakaya was where one of my senior colleagues used to take me. The proprietor used to be a professional cyclist, and, perhaps because he tired of making money, he used to let penniless customers like us enjoy delicious liquor and fresh fish at amazingly low prices.

  The missus, who wasn’t much of a drinker, got drunk soon. Her face all red, she seemed to be in pain, so we left the place early and took a very long stroll. Exiting out of Kayabacho, we passed through the shopping district of Monzen-Nakacho and walked further toward Kiba.

  As we walked, Mrs. Onishi began to sober up from the fresh air, and she became amused by the lively early-evening ambiance of the downtown area on a balmy summer’s day. Turning left at the intersection in front of Kiba Station, I led the missus by the hand into Kiba Park. The sun had gone down, and a cool wind was blowing from the sea. A large bridge resting in the center was lit up, appearing serene in the evening’s twilight.

  Oh dear! I never knew there was such a vast park here, the missus said, impressed.

  That’s the Museum of Contemporary Art, I said, pointing to a gorgeous building on the left, presently crouching under a deep black, overhanging gloom.

  Is that right? The missus nodded, pushing back, with both her hands, her long hair streaming in the wind.

  Crossing the large bridge, we headed for the park’s plaza. When we reached the area with a grove of trees, there was no other soul in sight; with even the streetlights sparse, a thick darkness was enveloping the periphery. We sat down together on a bench beside some trees and bushes.

  Perhaps someone was blowing on a trumpet in the grove, rather incompetently, as we occasionally heard the grating, high-pitched sound of a brass instrument.

  I proceeded at once to put my hand into the missus’s skirt, having become hopelessly filled with desire, as soon as I felt the soft flesh of her upper arm when we were seated in the bar at the small counter. As I kissed her while rubbing my fingers against her panties, moving them up and down, right and left, her wetness reached the pad of my middle finger in no time, filling my heart with gratitude.

  When I pulled out my hand I stood up hastily—afraid she might dry up soon—and then, as I assumed a crouching posture, I took her hands and, in the spirit of pulling open a drawer, drew her into the bushes nearby. The missus got on top of me, and I felt the cold summer grass, along with the night dew, on my back, penetrating through my shirt. There was a large stone at my back, around the area of my belt, bugging me, so, with the missus still over my chest, I shifted my left arm to my back, grabbed the stone, flicked it to the side, and immediately repositioned my body.

  But the moment I slid my hand under her blouse to play with her breasts, the missus began to resist suddenly. Even when I pressed my lips to hers, she kept her teeth clenched, and when I tried to pry them open with my sharply stiffened tongue, it was no use.

  In the end we just got up and returned to the bench.

  I talked for a while—"Hey, did you know that the novelist, Mr. Yoshimura, lives with his wife in an apartment

  that’s just a stone’s throw away from this park? He likes sushi, and oh yes, his favorite sushi bar’s also nearby. The food there’s delicious. You like sushi? If you’re up to it, we can drop by. What do you say?"—I was talking a lot but the missus, appearing tired and sluggish, was taking no heed. So I reluctantly ended up inviting her to Tomomi’s store.

  Can’t hear the trumpet anymore, the missus muttered, standing up.

  On the way to Morishita, inside the taxi, I briefly explained about Tomomi and Takuya, and at the shop each of us drank two, three glasses of whiskey and water. Tomomi and the missus also exchanged a few words, all harmless pleasantries.

  While walking up to the crossing after stepping out from the bar, the missus was completely drunk and kept saying over and over again, That mama-san’s so like me! Each time she said so, I shouted into her ear, Not at all!

  The next day, when I showed my face at New Seoul, Tomomi said she found the missus to be a beautiful person, so I talked to her about the lady—There’s a small concert hall in Takaido, and just the other day, a well-known concertmaster of a large orchestra held a private recital there. He has a women’s-only fan club, made up mainly of his students, and most of these members are wives of the owners of blue-chip companies or the wives of doctors and lawyers or their daughters. I was there at the event with a photographer to cover it for my magazine, and that was when I came to have a nodding acquaintance with the woman from last night. She’s the daughter of a director of a certain maker of musical instruments, and is apparently married to an international trader twenty years older than her. The husband’s always off in Europe for half a year, so she spends all that time alone with just her maid in a huge mansion in Takanawa. I know it sounds like the setting to some cheap melodrama, but such ladies of leisure actually exist. Last night, completely by accident, I ran into her alone at this bar in Ginza, and, while drinking, she made me listen to her life story. I ended up bringing her here just for fun. I hope you didn’t mind, Tomomi.

  Mrs. Onishi devoured her breakfast, finishing everything on her plate, which was unusual for her. But what’s more, she went on to order papaya for dessert. I ordered the same and continued to talk about Takuya.

  The boy had left the hospital five days ago on a Thursday, which was a week after he’d been hospitalized. That evening, I took the mother and child to a large Korean restaurant in Tsukishima, treating them to some Korean barbecue in a private room. Takuya was very well, eating a lot of meat, to Tomomi’s delight.

  We left the restaurant around nine, and after placing Takuya on the saddle of the bicycle Tomomi had walked over with, I straddled the rear deck and pedaled with my outstretched legs. Grasping the handles and stiffening up, Takuya was in high spirits as we fooled around, accelerating to overtake his walking mother, only to cross her path.

  When I pumped the pedals with all my strength to race the cars flowing through Kiyosumi Avenue, Takuya hollered with such gusto that it seemed as if his sharp cry, so peculiar to children, echoed across the clear, star-sprinkled night sky. After nearly fifteen minutes of goofing around, we finally began to walk alongside Tomomi. I got down on the sidewalk and walked while pushing the bicycle with Takuya still riding on it. Turning left at Tsukuda, we entered River City, which was lined with high-rise condominiums. Takuya was gaping up at the blocks of apartments shining like huge Christmas trees with the lights lit up in each of their rooms. The night breeze, streaming through the valleys of buildings from Tokyo Bay, pushed against our backs. The flowers of every cherry tree, planted on t
he shoulders of the road, had fallen, but thick growths of bright green foliage were rustling in the wind.

  Although April was already over, the night air of this neighborhood still retained a chill. Concerned about Takuya, who was just starting to recover from his illness, I turned the bike around and we all returned to the main street.

  We stopped in the middle of Aioi Bridge, which straddled the Harumi Canal, and looked up at the sky together.

  There, in the center of a cloudless sky, was floating a big round moon in all its splendid glory, its patterns clearly visible.

  When Tomomi pointed and said, See that, Takuya? It’s the great big moon, Takuya said with admiration, Wow, you’re right! It’s the moon! Even when we began to move again, he just sat there quietly on his saddle, staring at the moon all the time, eyes squinted, as if rays of moonlight were dazzling him.

  Isn’t it beautiful, Takuya? I asked, and he murmured in a small, enchanted voice, his face still turned to the sky, I want to go to the moon on this bicycle.

  Tomomi turned to me and smiled. I lowered my eyes calmly. The moment stood still just then, and it was captured with precision, somewhere far away in the evening sky, like a photograph, I thought.

  I had a rare glimpse that night, I said to Mrs. Onishi, into a child’s mind. It felt as surprising as encountering a ghost in the city, but I was convinced, for the first time, that it was the one true thing you could ever find in this world. The missus was listening while laughing, and then said, Remember E.T.? What you said reminds me of a scene in that movie, and I tell you I just cried uncontrollably. I complained, Don’t lump my story together with that fairy tale! What I said just now isn’t some kind of a figure of speech or a product of my imagination, or some kind of a parable to teach moral lessons.

  Whenever you speak about Tomomi-san, you wear this cold look, as if you didn’t give a damn about her, but when it comes to little Takuya you always look earnest, she said, adding, You told Tomomi-san and her former husband that you only love Takuya-chan, right? Well, I think that’s right on the mark.

  Takuya’s a child, and there’s no way I could ever compare him with Tomomi, an adult, I argued, but the missus showed her usual pale and nasty smile and said, Such a manner of thinking speaks volumes for the deep affection you have for Takuya-chan, you know. But if you can get all teary-eyed about a child who’s not even your own, you really should consider giving more thought to your mother in the hospital.

  Here we go again, I thought, inwardly tut-tutting her triumphant air. While the missus also liked to hear stories about my mother, lately she’d been all too eager to lecture me.

  My mother’s an entirely different matter.

  Is that so? She’s someone who gave birth to you, isn’t she? No other son would feel fine not paying a visit to his ailing mother in the hospital for over two years now. Why, poor thing, her health must have considerably declined. Listen, if you don’t return to see her soon, it might be too late, and you’ll be scarred for the rest of your life.

  There’s no need for that. Why can’t you understand that, Teruko-san?

  Let me ask you this then, what do you intend to do about Tomomi-san and Takuya-chan? You’ll probably end up getting together with Tomomi-san and becoming a father to Takuya-chan. Even though it doesn’t sound like the sort of thing you’d do, I still feel that’s what’s going to happen in the end.

  I fell silent. The missus scooped up several spoonfuls of papaya, and after conveying them to her mouth, she suddenly lifted her face and leaned forward and whispered, If you want a child I can give birth to one for you, you know.

  Stop joking! I demanded. But for some reason the missus wouldn’t stop. Oh, so you prefer another person’s child, do you? You don’t want your own, do you?

  Her harassment was exceptionally shocking. After all, she was the type of person who usually said things like,

  I’m someone who totally lacks concentration and conviction. Whatever I do, I’ve never been able to keep it up for long, and whatever I think about, I’ve never been able to get it organized in my head. I get tired just like that, you see. Even hating people, or, for that matter, loving people, there are times when you have to try so hard, you know? Make an all-out effort. It would be wonderful if there were a step-by-step program you could follow from beginning to end, like piano lessons, but the reality is that, when it comes to matters concerning you personally, there’s a one-off finality to them, right—like you only get one shot at them, without any chance of a redo, and you need to make up your mind about them, once and for all, right? I lack the concentration to do something like that. Seriously! And that’s why I think I got married to my husband, even though I didn’t particularly like him.

  Of course not! I responded. Having my own child is absolutely out of the question, no matter what happens!

  The missus raised her voice, and said, in a single breath, as if she’d been waiting a long time to say it, Even if I bear your child, you have my word that I’ll never trouble you. I could make the little one my husband’s child, or if you want I could even get a divorce and raise the child on my own. I mean it!

  There’s something wrong with you today, Teruko-san, I said, feeling an eerie, oppressive sensation around my chest at the sight of her eagerness.

  The missus then cooled down and sighed, and in an offhand tone explained, as if to vindicate herself, that her husband has a new mistress, but that this time she might really separate. And then, after falling impressively

  silent, she began speaking again heatedly.

  "Yesterday, before I came here, I met an old friend from my college days for the first time in a long while. She had her first baby this year in January, you see, but the delivery was a difficult one. Apparently, there’s a postpartum complication that could develop, and, as odd as it sounds, to this day if she suddenly runs she leaks pee. It seems she’s stuck with this condition for life. I was really surprised, you know, because the person I knew back in the old days would have hung herself over something like that, but she was calm, saying all was fine and dandy because the baby was all right, and that it can’t be helped if her condition was the price she had to pay.

  As for me, I don’t feel like bearing my husband’s child anymore. But I’m thirty-two this year, right? So I feel like, if only for the baby’s sake, I should give birth now.

  You’re talking like there’s a baby inside your stomach already.

  I’m not as maternal as that friend of mine, but even with a woman like me, there comes a time when you naturally feel that way. Funny, isn’t it? But yesterday, I seriously realized that.

  In a novel I read some time ago, I began, there was this scene where a woman, after being reproached by her husband for having an affair, assumed a defiant attitude and said, ‘No matter how many men I sleep with, the only child I’ll ever give birth to will be yours. That’s a firm decision I’ve made. For a woman, staying true to such a thing is of the utmost importance.’ I was pretty impressed, but in the end I realized it was just another lie.

  Even though I’d managed to change the topic, the oppressive sensation around my chest remained.

  Yeah, I suppose you’re right, Teruko Onishi said plainly.

  When I received money from the missus, I was asked about my mother’s condition as usual, so I answered, She’s using many alkyl-based anticancer drugs, but she’s terribly depressed because of their side effects—her skin’s festering in many places. My younger sister phoned to tell me so.

  The missus urged me again to go see my mother soon.

  She’s certainly in the terminal stage, I said, and I wouldn’t be surprised if something happened to her any time now.

  I’m amazed you can stay so calm, she said. You’re odd.

  I send enough money every month. Half of it is your money, though, Teruko-san.

  Shrugging her shoulders, the missus said that, unlike her, I might be overthinking things a little, that I might be making them more complicated in my head than wa
s necessary.

  While looking at her face, I thought what she said sounded like what Eriko would say. In fact, she’d said something similar last week, when I’d met her for the first time in a long time.

  If I remember correctly, after emphasizing that women tend to try harder than men to arrive at a deeper understanding of their partner, she solemnly said, "For instance, I’ve been observing you all this time, and there’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you. It’s something I’ve written about in my diary a little bit, after traveling to Kyoto with you. Anyway, then, as usual, you didn’t seem to be having fun, right?

  See, the thing about you, Eriko continued, "is that you’re always trying to find radically unique answers regarding various things about this world—answers that are all your own. You hesitate to engage in everyman’s joy, in everyman’s contentment, or even in everyman’s sorrow. Instead you’re always complaining that there should be a brand new kind of happiness out there waiting just for you, or a sorrow that only you can suffer. For example, after we make love like we did a while ago, there’s this mild inertia we experience like we’re experiencing now, right? Well, I had an urge to snap out of this inertia, and so I thought about falling asleep by your side tonight, holding you tight in my arms. But when I look at you, all I sense is that you’ve been driven to despair by this inertia, this listlessness. I like you, you know. In the beginning, I think I was simply mad about you, and that was that. But now, it’s a little different. I think I’m gradually turning into a coward, just doing everything I can not to dislike you.

  I realize there are things we’ll never see eye to eye about. But to me, there’s comfort and solace in the willingness to gloss over that fact, to forget about those things we can’t understand in each other. In fact, that’s the way I feel right now too. Don’t you think that the inertia can, with a little thoughtfulness, give us peace of mind and room to grow? But what do you do? Just like a child who doesn’t know the rules, just like a first boyfriend, you keep crazily attempting to comprehend, to make sense of things—until you lose interest. I’m not saying your thirst for knowledge is wrong. In fact, that’s what’s great about you. But I sometimes get worried that you’ll never gain those insights you crave if you keep using that simple method of yours.