(2005) In the Miso Soup

by Ryu Murakami

  I had a vision of Frank, his scrap of human flesh at the ready, calling Yokoyama-san from his hotel room before dawn and saying: Kenji was a wonderful fellow, please tell me his bank account number. That was exactly the sort of bizarre behavior he was made for. As opposed to, say, giving himself a Mohawk, painting his body, and running naked through the streets.

  “How do you know it was Frank?” Jun asked me. We were sitting at a table in the little “Café Corner” of the cake shop. After talking to Yokoyama-san I’d been standing there on the sidewalk stunned till she grabbed my arm and dragged me inside, saying I was pale as a ghost, let’s get some hot coffee. We both had cappuccinos, which were supposed to be special in this place, but I couldn’t taste mine. It was as if I had some sort of film covering my tongue and gums and throat. My heart was pounding and my mind was confused. I told her what Yokoyama-san had said.

  “Of course, there’s no proof it was Frank,” I added unconvincingly.

  “You think he stuck that thing on your door, too, don’t you?”

  Sort of, I said. I hadn’t told her what I thought the “thing” was. Jun was too important to me. I didn’t want to share with her something as insane and intense and evil as what I was imagining. I wanted to handle it on my own, if possible. Spilling my guts to her about this would do nothing to brighten her life, that was for sure. But I should have known there was no way to hide anything from a sixteen-year-old girl. Sixteen-year-old girls are probably the most sensitive and perceptive group of people in this entire country.

  “That thing was funny,” Jun said in an oddly childlike tone of voice. Like a nursery school kid seeing a corpse on the steps and telling her teacher: There’s a man sleeping outside!

  “It looked like papyrus, didn’t it?” she said.

  “Ah. ‘The fruit that tastes like first love,’ as they say in the ads?”

  “Kenji.”

  “What?”

  “Normally I like your little puns, but now’s not the time.”

  I hadn’t meant it as a joke. I’d honestly mistaken “papyrus” for “papaya.” I’m not proud to admit it, but that’s how out of it I was.

  “Did it have blood on it or something, that thing? It was all dark and nasty-looking. Was that blood?”

  “I think so,” I confessed, throwing in the sponge. I didn’t have the energy left to lie. “I think it was a piece of someone’s skin.”

  “What? Why would he do that?”

  “As a warning. Warning me not to talk to the police or whatever.”

  My mobile rang in my jacket pocket. Dark forebodings always come true. It was Frank.

  “Hi, Kenji!” in this super-cheerful voice. “How you feeling?”

  He seemed to be at a pay phone, and it sounded like the words were coming not out of his mouth but straight through his skull from his brain. On our table was a little clipboard with a sign: Please refrain from using your mobile phone in the Café Corner. Jun pointed at it and gestured that I should go outside, but a cute young waitress who’d been rearranging cakes in the window said it was all right, since there weren’t any other customers right now. Jun thanked her. This little cake shop was a favorite of Jun’s, and apparently she and the waitress had struck up an acquaintance. It was unnerving to hear Frank talk as I watched Jun and the waitress interacting. His voice had the power to transform an everyday little scene like this into something else entirely. I felt like I was being sucked through the gap between what Frank’s voice symbolized and what Jun and the waitress symbolized, down into the belly of some monster.

  “I’m fine,” I told him, struggling to keep my voice calm. Don’t let on, I told myself. Act like you know nothing. Let him think you’re just some dimwitted nightlife guide.

  “Good! So I’ll see you tonight?”

  “Nine o’clock?” I said.

  “More fun—I can’t wait! Last night was fantastic!”

  “I’m glad you enjoyed it.”

  “Oh, and by the way, I changed hotels.”

  My pulse was racing again, and my throat was bone dry.

  “Oh? Which hotel?”

  “One of those highrise places by the new government buildings. The Hilton.”

  “And your room number?”

  “I wanted to switch to a nicer hotel since I’m only going to be here two more nights, but it was hard to find a room, what with New Year’s and all. They tell me that in Japan New Year’s Day is like our Christmas.”

  He didn’t give me a room number. I doubted he was staying at the Hilton. What he was really telling me was that I couldn’t find him even if I tried.

  “How’s your girlfriend?”

  I wondered if he was watching us right now, and scanned the street outside the window.

  “Oh, she’s fine. I’m surprised you remember I’ve got one.”

  “I was afraid she might be mad because I kept you out later than planned last night. She wasn’t, was she? Girls—you know how selfish they can be.”

  Was he watching us right now? Did he know I was with Jun?

  “She wasn’t mad. Actually I’m with her now. Everything is fine.”

  “You’re on a date? Oh, heck, I’m sorry to bother you!”

  “No, it’s all right, I’m glad you called. You didn’t look well when I left you last night. I was worried.”

  “I’m okay now, and I’m really sorry for all the trouble I caused you. Today it feels like my brain is regenerating like crazy. I can tell a whole lot of new brain cells are being produced, and I can’t wait till tonight, tonight I want to have sex for sure!”

  “Frank, could you tell me your room number at the Hilton? In case there’s an emergency and I need to get in touch with you?”

  “What do you mean, emergency? Like what?”

  “I don’t know, nothing major, but if there’s a mix-up on where to meet or if something happens and I’m going to be late, wouldn’t it be better if I had your—”

  “Oh. Right. Well, actually I haven’t checked in yet. I made a reservation and left my luggage there, but the room’s not ready.”

  “Will you call me again when you know the number, then?”

  “Of course. Oh but wait, I’ll probably be out all day and might not have a chance to call. And if I’m out you wouldn’t be able to get me anyway.”

  “Do you mind if I ask the front desk?”

  “Um, I’m afraid that’s no good, I’m staying under a different name—I mean, not Frank. You know how it is. I plan to have some fun the next couple of nights—naughty fun, if you know what I mean—so I didn’t want to use my real name. But as for where to meet tonight, how about out in front of the batting center?”

  “I’m sorry, what did you just say?”

  “Out in front of the batting center we went to last night. The batting cages were on the second floor, right? Not there but at street level, remember the game center? Right around there. I liked that place.”

  “Frank, I’ve never arranged to meet anybody in a spot like that before. I prefer to go to the client’s hotel. Why don’t we meet in the lobby of the Hilton?”

  “Well, I was there earlier, and it’s not really my kind of place. I don’t feel at ease there. What can I say? It’s so crowded and noisy and kind of snobbish, don’t you think? I don’t like it there so much. I’m a country boy originally, you know, and I just can’t relax in a place like that.”

  So why did he change hotels? A minute ago he’d told me he wanted to move to a nicer place because he only had two nights left.

  “Frank, I’m coming down with a bit of a cold. I don’t want to be outside any more than I have to. Can’t we meet somewhere inside a building? Besides—” I was going to add that a lot of dangerous characters hang out in that area, but he interrupted me.

  “All right, of course, you’re right, it’s stupid to meet outside, what the hell was I thinking? I’m sorry, Kenji, but, you know, I really had fun yesterday. I had a little episode at the end there, but I’ll never forget how nice yo
u were to me. That batting center will always be one of my best memories, I just want you to know that. But never mind, let’s meet somewhere else, but not the lobby of the Hilton.”

  “How about your hotel from last night, the Shinjuku Prince? It’s near Kabuki-cho. Or would you rather check out some other—”

  “No problem,” Frank said. “I love that place.”

  “All right. I’ll see you at nine o’clock in the same cafeteria off the lobby.”

  I was about to hang up when Frank said something that stopped me again.

  “Kenji, why don’t you bring your girlfriend?”

  “What?” I said a little too loudly and looked up at Jun’s face. She was still stirring her cappuccino—hadn’t even taken a sip yet—and watching me with a worried look.

  “Maybe I misunderstood you just now, Frank. Did you say why don’t I bring my girlfriend?”

  “Yeah, that’s what I said. I was thinking the three of us could hang out together. Is it a bad idea?”

  Asking your nightlife guide to bring his girlfriend with him—it’s just plain unthinkable. Did he imagine I’d already told Jun too much? Maybe he wanted to murder her outside the batting center.

  “It’s out of the question, Frank.”

  “Well, suit yourself,” he said and hung up abruptly.

  I took a sip of my cappuccino before giving Jun a recap of the conversation. I had to be careful to reconstruct it accurately. What Frank had said, particularly the part about changing hotels, was full of contradictions, so I knew I’d have to put everything in the right order or it wouldn’t make any sense at all. I wanted to explain it to her properly. She was the only one besides me who knew how freaky he was.

  When I was done, she said: “How suspicious can you get! Why don’t you go to the police?”

  “And tell them what?”

  Jun sighed. The cappuccino was cold, and all the froth was gone, leaving it a light brown color like muddy water.

  “That’s true. You can hardly say you know who murdered the schoolgirl and the homeless man but don’t have any proof. . . . And obviously you can’t just tell them you know this gaijin named Frank who’s a liar and a weirdo, but . . . How about telephoning them instead of going in person?”

  “I don’t know where the bastard is, and I’m sure his name isn’t Frank, either—it’s all lies. The cops couldn’t find him if they wanted to. Now that I think about it he may not even have stayed in that hotel last night. I never actually escorted him to his room, or even saw him get his key at the front desk, and I never called him there.”

  “I wonder why he wanted to meet me?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Kenji, just don’t show up tonight.”

  “I thought about that, but . . . He hasn’t paid me yet, and—”

  “Who cares about the money?”

  “Yeah. The truth is it’s not the money, it’s that I’m sure he knows where I live and there’s no telling what he’ll do. I’m afraid of him, Jun, that’s the honest truth, okay? I’m scared shitless of Frank. I think maybe he wanted me to bring you so he could, you know, find out how much I’d told you about him.”

  I wasn’t about to say “kill you.”

  A woman and her little boy and girl came into the shop. The woman was in her thirties, I’d say, the kids in elementary school. They were having a good time deciding which kind of cake they wanted. The kids were well behaved but gleeful, full of life. The mother was wearing a tasteful suit under a tasteful coat, and her interaction with the waitress was natural and courteous. When Jun turned to look their way, her eyes met the little girl’s, and the little girl beamed at her. There was a time, not so long ago, when I would have looked on this sort of scene with cynicism, if not loathing. I’m not so innocent. I know what malevolence is about, which is why I thought I was able to judge that Frank was a dangerous man. Malevolence is born of negative feelings like loneliness and sadness and anger. It comes from an emptiness inside you that feels as if it’s been carved out with a knife, an emptiness you’re left with when something very important has been taken away from you. I can’t say I sensed a particularly cruel or sadistic tendency in Frank, or even that he fit my image of a murderer. But what I did sense was an emptiness like a black hole inside him, and there was no predicting what might emerge from a place like that. I’m sure we’ve all experienced really malevolent feelings once or twice in our lives, the desire to kill somebody, say. But there’s always a braking mechanism somewhere along the line that stops us. The malevolence is turned back, and it sinks down to the bottom of the emptiness it emerged from and lies there, forgotten, only to leak out in other ways—a passion for work, for example. Frank wasn’t like that. I didn’t know if he was a murderer, but I knew he had a bottomless void inside him. And that void was what made him lie. I’ve been there. Compared to where Frank was at, it may have been like a Hello Kitty version, but I’ve been there.

  “Call me every half-hour,” Jun said, and I nodded. “And whatever you do, don’t let him get you alone.”

  Frank was standing in the shadow of a pillar in the lobby of the Shinjuku Prince. I was passing by on my way to the cafeteria when he popped out from behind the pillar.

  “Hey, Kenji,” he said.

  It literally took my breath away. “Frank,” I gasped. “I thought we were going to meet in the cafeteria.”

  It was kind of crowded, he said and winked. The world’s weirdest wink: his eye rolled back in his head as he closed it, so that for a second all you could see was white. And the cafeteria, clearly visible from where we stood, was almost empty. Frank saw me looking that way and said it was really crowded a few minutes ago. He was dressed differently tonight—black sweater and corduroy jacket with jeans and sneakers. Even his hairstyle was different. The short, slicked-down bangs he’d had the night before were now standing straight up. And instead of the old leather shoulder bag, he was carrying a cloth rucksack. It was like he’d had a makeover or something.

  “I found a good bar,” he said, “a shot bar. You don’t see many of those in this country. Let’s go there first.”

  The bar, on Kuyakusho Avenue, is a pretty well known place. Not because it serves delicious cocktails or the interior is anything special or the food is particularly good, but simply because it’s one of the few no-frills drinking places in Kabuki-cho. It’s popular with foreigners, and I’ve taken clients there several times. It has no chairs, just a long bar and a few elbow-high tables along the big plate-glass window. To get there from the hotel we’d walked along a street lined with clubs and crowded with touts, but Frank wasn’t interested in their lingerie pubs or peep shows.

  “I just wanted to start off by wetting the old whistle,” he said when our beers came and we clinked glasses. We could have drunk beer in the hotel cafeteria. Did Frank have some reason for not wanting to go in there? I remembered reading in a hard-boiled detective novel that if you drink in the same place two nights in a row, the bartender and waiters will remember your face.

  I looked around for someone I knew. Jun had told me not to be alone with Frank, and I thought it might be a good idea to let someone who knew me see us together. Frank peered steadily at my face while he drank his beer, as if trying to read my mind. I didn’t see anyone I knew. A wide range of types stood shoulder to shoulder at the bar. Affluent college kids, white-collar workers bold enough to wear suits that weren’t gray or navy blue, office girls who were old hands at partying, and trendy dudes who looked like they belonged in Roppongi but had decided to drink in Kabuki-cho for a change. Later on, hostesses and girls from the sex clubs would stop in for a drink.

  “You seem a bit funny somehow tonight,” Frank said. He was gulping his beer at a much faster pace than he had the night before.

  “I’m kind of tired,” I told him. “And like I said on the phone, I think I’m catching a cold.”

  I guess anyone who knew me could have seen I was a bit funny somehow. Even I thought I was. This is how people start
the slide down into madness, I thought. Suspicious minds breed demons, they say, and now I knew what they meant. Frank kept peering at me, and I searched for something to say. I was trying to decide how much I should let him suspect I suspected. It seemed best to hint that I thought he was a dubious character, but not to the extent that I’d ever imagine he might be a murderer. If he knew I imagined any such thing, I was pretty sure he’d kill me. And if, on the other hand, he decided I was completely naïve and oblivious, he might be tempted to whack me just for the hell of it.

  “So, what do you want to do tonight?” I asked him.

  “Don’t you have any good ideas, Kenji?”

  In as lighthearted a tone as I could muster, I tested him with one of the cracks I’d been considering.

  “Let’s see. . . . Why don’t we go to the batting center and hit balls till about five o’clock in the morning?”

  “Five? In the morning?” he said with a smile, and when I nodded yes, yes, he laughed out loud in a very American way, raising his beer mug with one hand and slapping my shoulder with the other. An American holding a beer aloft and roaring with laughter looks as natural as a Japanese does dangling a camera and bowing. Some of the customers around us smiled. Japanese always have a favorable impression of people from overseas who seem to be having a good time. The foreigner’s enjoying himself, so maybe old Nippon isn’t so bad after all, in fact maybe this is a world-class bar, and we drink in places like this all the time, so maybe we’re happier than we realized, is how the reasoning goes. This spot had some excellent jazz on the sound system—a rarity for Kabuki-cho—and the lighting was fashionably dim, so that not even the people standing right next to us could see Frank’s face very clearly. Even as he slapped my shoulder and laughed, Frank’s eyes were as cold as dark marbles. I had to force myself to return the gaze of those chilling eyes and try to look perky and cheerful. It was agony of a sort I’d never experienced before. I didn’t know how long my nerves would hold up.