The Night Is Short, Walk on Girl

by Tomihiko Morimi

  But there was a serious problem—namely, that she didn’t pay any attention to me. No reaction to my unrivaled charms or even my existence. And we were running into each other all the time…

  I’d said the line “I just happened to be passing by” so many times, my throat was raw, but she just kept replying with an innocent smile, “Oh, funny seeing you here!”

  A half a year of this charade had already gone by since we’d met.

  After expressing my deep affection for the clock tower, I left through the main gate, crossed Higashi Ichijo Street, and strolled onto Yoshida-South Campus. The dusty field in one part of it was lined with booths. In the northwest corner, a stage was set up, and a girl who appeared to be in an indie band was singing, “Piss off, Benzaiten, ya punk!” Next to the stage was a tent functioning as the headquarters of the group managing the event, the School Festival Office.

  When I peeked inside, staffers were milling around in the narrow spaces between tightly packed desks and administrative implements. In the back, one man wearing an armband was kicking back with a cup of tea, delegating. Behind him hung a huge map of the university grounds. It was as if he was proclaiming that he had the school festival in the palm of his hand.

  “You’ve really moved up in the world, Director.”

  When I spoke to him, he turned to look. “Oh, it’s you,” he said.

  We were both in the same department and had known each other since first year. He was a colorful fellow who exercised his talents doing odd jobs for the School Festival Office and participated in an easy-listening music club. His hobbies included everything from rakugo, traditional one-man comedy, to cross-dressing. He was most famous for using his peerless beauty (truly a waste on a man) for cross-dressing; he was notorious for popping in at the Drag Café on a whim and tempting many men down a futile path of love. Most people would think such a gorgeous man would be utterly corrupt, leading a debauched life on campus featuring affair after affair, but he was actually quite a man’s man. Which is why we got along. In our first and second years, he’d neglect his studies as the school festival neared and throw himself into his office work, getting all grimy and spoiling his handsomeness. His efforts were recognized, and in this, our third year, though he self-deprecatingly called himself the “general manager of odd jobs,” he’d acquired the title of director of the School Festival Office.

  He invited me into the tent and served me tea.

  “It’s rare to see you here. Let me guess, Operation HEM?”

  He was well aware I normally lived my life with no connection to the hubbub of festivals. When I nodded, he smiled.

  “So have you made any progress with her?”

  “I’m steadily filling in the moat.”

  “Isn’t it full by now? How long do you plan to keep that up? Are you going to plant an apple tree, build a cottage, and live on it?”

  “I need to be so cautious that I not only look before I leap, but make a detailed map of the terrain.”

  “Mm, no. You like living your carefree life atop the moat. Because you’re scared if you storm the inner citadel, you’ll get pushed back.”

  “Don’t cut right to the heart of things.”

  “I dunno, man. It seems like a waste of time. All you guys need to do is enjoy each other’s company.”

  “I have my ways. I’m not taking instructions from anybody.”

  “Why do you think of it like that…? You really are an idiot. I mean, that’s what I like about you.”

  I decided to change the subject.

  “Have there been any interesting issues?”

  “Oh man, so many. It’s quieted down a bit at the moment, though.”

  The director told me about the different things that’d happened since the start of the festival. A guy who got drunk, shut himself up in the bathroom, and wouldn’t come out; a religious group operating behind the scenes; a guy who was selling bizarre foods without permission against health codes. There was a band of thieves stealing signboards and lumber. Mysterious Daruma dolls were showing up here and there. It was a rash of incidents appropriate for a festival of fools.

  “The Speedy Kotatsu is also giving us trouble.”

  “A speedy kotatsu table?! How can a table be speedy?”

  “These strange people gather under the kotatsu and loiter on campus. We call it the Speedy Kotatsu because it appears out of nowhere and vanishes without a trace.”

  He pointed at the map behind him. Kotatsu-shaped stickers marked where it had appeared. They were all over campus, so apparently, the thing was worthy of the title.

  “If they’re just hanging out, couldn’t you leave them be?”

  “They invite people to sit with them and serve them hot pot. I can’t have them doing that without permission. If people got food poisoning, it would be a whole ordeal, right?”

  “What are all these other stickers?”

  “Those are related to the Crackpot of Monte Cristo case.”

  He explained that his two biggest problems were the Speedy Kotatsu and the Crackpot of Monte Cristo.

  The Crackpot of Monte Cristo.

  That was the catch-all title of a drama being performed in fragments around campus—a guerilla theater production, so to speak.

  When it opened on the first day of the festival, everyone thought it was just some inscrutable street performance. A single staging didn’t even last five minutes. But as the number of fragmentary performances increased, rumors snowballed, more pieces of information were connected together, and the big picture came into focus.

  In some corner of the school festival, the Crackpot of Monte Cristo and Princess Daruma had a fateful encounter. It was love at first sight, but they were suddenly ripped apart. The Crackpot of Monte Cristo’s eccentricity caused frequent misunderstandings with his friends. As a result, he’d gotten on the bad side of many different clubs. They finally trapped him, but he’d gone missing. With her love for the Crackpot of Monte Cristo in her heart, Princess Daruma was on a journey to avenge him by dealing out peculiar punishments to his enemies, such as stuffing marshmallows in their ears or pouring pudding down their shirts.

  The guerilla theater production The Crackpot of Monte Cristo had Princess Daruma as its protagonist and used real club names in a mix of fact and fiction. It was gathering a lot of buzz in part because it caused incident after incident, including fights between clubs who mistook the play’s events as reality and crowds of spectators falling like dominoes in narrow hallways. At some point, people started calling the mastermind behind the production the Crackpot of Monte Cristo, too.

  “Apparently, the ringleader is hiding out somewhere writing in real time. Judging by the fact that things that happened in the morning are in the play by afternoon, it must be true.”

  “It’s quite an elaborate scheme they’re pulling off.”

  “The School Festival Office considers him a terrorist.”

  “So how far has the story got?”

  “This morning it was revealed that the Crackpot of Monte Cristo is alive and confined somewhere on campus. So people are talking again. There are even students betting meal tickets on whether he and Princess Daruma will reunite. The odds are currently eight-to-two for a happy ending.”

  “If he’s eccentric enough to be called the Crackpot of Monte Cristo, there can’t possibly be a happy ending.”

  “I mean, they came up with a pretty fun event. I’m chasing them down because I have to, but I actually hope they get away with it.” The director smiled in a manner you could call dashing. “Not that I can go easy on them.”

  At that point in our conversation, an office member raced in, out of breath. “They’re performing The Crackpot of Monte Cristo out on the field!” he shouted, throwing headquarters into an uproar.

  The director dumped his tea out and grimaced dramatically. It was obvious he was enjoying this. “Do they think so little of this office?”

  And so they clamorously left the tent.

  See
ms kinda fun, I was thinking, and when I walked out after them, the fleeing theater troupe and the office members were performing a pastoral arrest drama. The Crackpot of Monte Cristo group wore red armbands to show off the fact that they were performers.

  As I sipped some sweet red-bean soup I bought from a stand calling it “Man Juice” and enjoyed the spectacle, a woman who was running away raced toward—and then smack into—me. The piping hot soup splattered, and she shrieked, “Ow, hot, hot, hot!” as if she were doing martial arts or something. Then the office members pounced on her. She was the only one they caught.

  The actress, her long hair disheveled, was forced to sit in the middle of the field and the dust cloud that had been kicked up. Next to her, a Daruma the size of an apple was on the ground. The office director put a foot on that Daruma, haughtily puffed out his chest, and scowled down at her. According to him, she was playing the lead role, Princess Daruma.

  “Huh? If you caught the lead, aren’t they done for?”

  “We’ve caught the lead three times now, but another understudy always appears. It’s like a lizard’s tail.”

  “We have infinite understudies!” she boasted. “As long as the Crackpot of Monte Cristo keeps writing the script, the play will go on! I’ll never tell you where he is.”

  “Damn it all to hell. And we can’t torture her.”

  But I ignored the angry director. I was distracted.

  Why? Because I was fixated on a figure about to leave the field. At that moment, the tumult of the idiot festival receded, and the whole world converged on that single figure in my field of vision and pulsated. That petite frame, that glossy black hair trimmed short, that whimsical catlike gait… I’m the global authority on the view of her posterior, so how could I be mistaken? It wasn’t possible. Walking leisurely toward the exit was a girl whose moat, which seemed shallow but was actually quite deep, I had been filling in this half year, the silhouette I’d been following—her.

  Strangely, she was carrying a huge stuffed carp on her back. Seemingly oblivious to the curious stares, she walked resolutely forward, heading for the multipurpose building.

  “Well, see ya later. Keep up the good work.” I waved to the director and rushed after the girl.

  Why on earth is she carrying that thing around? I wondered.

  I’ll answer that question.

  I was carrying what was very obviously a red koi plushie. I won it at a shooting-gallery game called “I’ll Snipe Your Heart!” when I landed a shot in the bull’s-eye.

  I was always a lucky child. The reason such a naughty little girl like me survived through childhood without cracking my head open must be that I had double the luck of other people. It was I who, driven to self-destruction, mounted my tricycle as a young child and flew down a hill at speeds toddlers should never move at, causing my mother to faint. My sister calls these lucky breaks, saving my foolish bottom time after time, “God’s plot conveniences.”

  Hooray for God’s plot conveniences! Namu-namu!

  To get a huge koi fish the moment I set foot in the school festival for the first time—you’d think there’d be a limit on beginner’s luck. I wonder what kind of fascinating things await me here! It was quite natural that my excitement should rise past any ceiling. The shooting-gallery people offered to exchange the prize for something smaller, but I politely declined. After all, red koi fish are good luck, so if this one was so huge, it must have been even better luck. Yes, indeed. We had to have met for a reason; I couldn’t withdraw just because it was almost as big as I was.

  “Could I have some rope? I think I’ll carry it on my back.”

  It seemed for a moment as if my spirit might get overwhelmed by the koi on my back, but I took a deep breath, held my chest out to puff up a size bigger like a blowfish, and set off walking with confidence.

  When I left the field and entered the academic center, the lecture halls I usually frequented to study welcomed me with a completely different look. Appearing before me one after the other like a splendid scroll were the many booths that talented students formed with crystallized sweat and tears of their youth, tapped into their knowledge, and mustered their style to build. It was truly a theater and performance on young adulthood. It was my first time at the school festival, so I was entranced.

  Eventually, I found the Ethyl Alcohol Research Society. I love drinking, so I quivered with excitement, shaking the red koi on my back. Day drinking at school… The joy of immorality probably makes it taste even better. I’ll go in! That’s what I’ll do! And when I went inside, there was a little handmade bar stocked with a wide variety of brands—what a wonderful world of alcohol.

  I’d seen the woman sitting there, chatting with some student guys over drinks, before. It was Ms. Hanuki, the lady I met one night in the Kiyamachi area. “Hello, Ms. Hanuki. Funny seeing you here.”

  “Wow! Long time no see! Well, well, have a drink!” She took a hard look at me. “Why do you have a red koi on your back?”

  “Auspiciously enough, I won it at a shooting gallery.”

  “Well then! To that big red koi and your luck! Cheers!”

  Then I had a rum cocktail.

  “You’re not a student, Ms. Hanuki, so what brings you here?”

  “Higuchi told me to come take a look.”

  “Is Mr. Higuchi here, too? That’s wonderful.”

  “Want to see him? He’s on the landing of that staircase over there.”

  Mr. Higuchi is a man who wears a grubby old yukata garment and who claims his occupation is tengu. If you lined up the people I’ve met since starting university in order of how inscrutable they are down Higashi Oji Street north to south, Mr. Higuchi would be at the northernmost end. Was he at the festival because he was really a university student disguised as a tengu? Mr. Higuchi, who in the world are you? I wondered as I followed Ms. Hanuki. She led me down the hallway past the lecture hall and went down some stairs.

  On a landing where tons of posters were stuck to the walls was a kotatsu set up, and Mr. Higuchi plus two guys I didn’t know were picking at a hot pot. To leisurely eat hot pot in the middle of such an emotionally charged festival where the sweat and tears of youth were flying! Only someone who insisted on going their own way could pull that off, and I was impressed.

  “Oh! We meet again.” Mr. Higuchi smiled broadly.

  “Funny seeing you here.”

  “Okay, come eat your fill of this soy-milk hot pot with us.”

  As Ms. Hanuki and I sat down, I said, “It’s getting to be the right time of year for kotatsu, huh? Ahhh, so warm and cozy.”

  “Right? This one’s called the Speedy Kotatsu.”

  “How can a kotatsu be speedy?”

  “It moves around. Because the office makes such a fuss… Ohhh, right. Sorry, I should have introduced you sooner. This is Chief-in-Chief Underpants,” he mentioned, pointing to the man next to him. Perhaps taking a cue from Mr. Higuchi, “Chief-in-Chief Underpants” was also wearing an old yukata. He had a face with a bony brow that seemed to contain an indomitable fighting spirit, as well as an admirable physique; he sat up straight with confidence. In different times, he might have been a feudal lord. When he saw me, his big eyes stared, and he bowed without saying a word.

  “A year ago, as a result of certain circumstances, he made a vow, you see. He offered a solemn prayer at Yoshida Shrine. He swore he wouldn’t change his underwear until his wish came true. With real determination, not even the devil would get in the fool’s way, and he’d be able to accomplish anything he desired. He’s already set a historic record, beating out all the other clubs’ Chief Underpants and chosen to be the honorable Chief-in-Chief Underpants.”

  “Chief-in-Chief Underpants… Isn’t that more of a dishonor?” Ms. Hanuki asked.

  But Mr. Higuchi shook his head. “Do you not understand hopes and dreams?”

  “Who’d want to comprehend such unsanitary dreams?”

  “So you haven’t changed your underwear in all that time…?
” I asked nervously, and Chief-in-Chief Underpants nodded gravely. Ohhh, God, please watch over this man who dares to never change his underwear! Protect him from all manner of diseases that affect the lower body!

  He noticed me inching my way out from under the table and held up a hand to stop me. “Oh, don’t worry,” he said. “I’m not under the kotatsu.”

  When I looked over, sure enough, he was sitting with perfect posture outside of the kotatsu blanket. I greatly admired him for keeping his chin up and pushing forward down his chosen path while not neglecting consideration for those around him. What a gentleman.

  “That’s just what a decent guy Chief-in-Chief Underpants is.”

  “Can a human being survive without changing their underwear like that?”

  “I got sick immediately.” He smiled affably. “But I’m still kicking.”

  The soy-milk hot pot was delicious, and it was fun to spend time with Mr. Higuchi, Ms. Hanuki, and Chief-in-Chief Underpants, but I was on a mission to use what little of the afternoon was left to see every corner of the festival. I bit back my tears and bid my farewell to the Speedy Kotatsu.

  With a wave, Mr. Higuchi said, “We appear out of nowhere and vanish without a trace, so with luck, we’ll meet again. I really am envious of that koi fish, though. That’s a great prize you won.”

  After leaving the Speedy Kotatsu, I went around to see the presentations in the various classrooms.

  If I were to list the memorable ones, I would certainly have to include the indie film by the film club Ablutions. It was a masterpiece called The Nose-Hair Man, which depicted, with a documentary flair, the fall of a man who loses his job and his sweetheart because his nose hairs grow three feet in a day. I watched with sweaty palms, wondering what I’d do if my nose hair ended up like that, and by the end, I couldn’t put down my handkerchief. Whoever made it is a genius. But the only person crying in the darkened lecture hall was me. Why was everyone laughing? Nose hairs that grow three feet long are no laughing matter.