by Susan Barker
I tap on her door. ‘Mariko, are you in?’
The door is ajar. I kick it so it swings open. The room is empty, everything stowed away, all the surfaces pristine. It is as though I have opened a door into a room in a meticulously ordered guest-house. A breeze seeps through the mosquito screens. I step back over the threshold, closing the door behind me.
Without Mariko to distract me I light a cigarette and pace the kitchen, buzzing with nervous energy. I hope Yuji can lay his hands on the money soon. I know I am selfish to be so excited when things are so unpleasant for him, but I can’t help it. Besides, we’ll be out of here before anything bad happens.
I am not without misgivings, though. Months of roach-infested hostels and the fatigue and confusion of travelling can take their toll on a couple. We could end up like those sun-burnt, travel-worn couples you see bickering their way through Japan. But travelling exposes you to new cultures, opens you up. Yuji will be freer away from the underworld machismo of his job. He doesn’t say it a lot, but I know he loves me. I think Japanese men hide their emotions, the way Japanese women hide their giggles behind their hands. I don’t need him to be demonstrative. His willingness to spend months on end travelling through Asia with me is confirmation enough.
I sprint into work late and charge into the changing room. After getting ready in record time I dash out to the lounge, hoping Mama-san is still in her office. Fortunately there aren’t many clients yet – just two at the bar with Stephanie and Annoushka, and two with Katya. Shadows flock beneath a broken light in the lounge. On the jukebox Sting dirges on about being an Englishman in New York. If he feels alienated in America he should try it over here for a while.
Katya rises to greet me as I go over. She’s wearing the long, red Chinese dress she bought on our jaunt last week to Kobe, her hair twisted into a topknot, oriental flicks of kohl tapering the corners of her eyes. She takes my hands and pecks me on both cheeks.
‘This is Mary,’ Katya announces. ‘Mary is from England.’
‘Good evening,’ I say to the salarymen.
They stand and bow. One is venerable and grey, the other an office junior with the last vestiges of pubescent acne inflaming his forehead. I recognize the venerable grey one. Stephanie calls him ‘the Octopus’. Apparently, to those who can tolerate his shallow breathing and frisky, wandering hands, he’ll dispense 10,000-yen notes like a cash machine gone haywire.
‘And these two handsome gentlemen,’ Katya says, ‘are Murakami-san and Taro.’
More bows all round. Katya sits next to the Octopus, so full of adoring smiles and honeyed devotion she almost has me convinced. I sit down next to the office junior.
‘England, huh? Cool,’ Taro says. He is whippet-skinny, bony wrists shooting past his shirtsleeves, like a schoolboy ambushed by an overnight growth spurt.
‘Rains a lot,’ I reply. ‘Where are you from?’ I put my elbows on the table, leaning forward like I can’t wait to hear.
‘Hiroshima,’ Taro says. ‘I came to Osaka to work for Daiwa Trading. You may recognize my esteemed superior, Deputy Senior Managerial Supervisor Murakami.’ Taro gestures towards the Octopus. ‘He is a regular client at this hostess bar.’
Katya is shelling pistachios and popping them in the mouth of the esteemed superior, smiling through his repellent attempts to suck her fingertips. He murmurs something, and Katya throws her head back in laughter, neck tendons flaring.
‘I like pistachios too,’ Taro says, hopefully.
I smile in a too-dense-to-take-a-hint kind of way.
‘So what’s it like working for Murakami-san?’
‘He’s the best. He’s expanded the Graduate Trainee Programme to include private tutorials in Woman and Alcohol. I am learning from a master.’
‘Lucky you.’
‘He is way cooler than the other people at the company. Murakami-san really knows how to unwind after a hard day at the office. My office head is, like, this boring robot: “Please do the corrections I have made in red ink. No more cigarette breaks until I say so . . .”’
‘Cigarette, Taro?’ Murakami-san asks, proffering a pack of Winston Extra Strength to his charge.
Taro takes one and sticks it in his mouth. I light it for him and watch as he sucks smoke into his mouth and holds it there a second, before blowing it out. He tells me about his new hobby, golf, which he is learning under the supervision of Murakami-san. Then Taro asks me to teach him some English swear words. I oblige, helping him with his pronunciation.
Half an evening passes in this way. Taro puts away about three glasses of lychee Chu-hi; hardly enough to intoxicate a hamster, yet his cheeks fire like a kiln, and he succumbs to the inexplicable urge to whip off his tie and wrap it round his forehead, Rambo-style. I laugh politely.
Murakami-san claps eyes on the spectacle and booms: ‘Bravo, Taro! The office clown strikes again!’
Katya and I titter girlishly. Our eyes briefly meet and unite in contempt. Murakami-san drags his pouchy eyes away from the thigh-high slit in Katya’s dress long enough to tell her that he is ready for another Singapore Sling. Katya asks me to accompany her to the bar.
I measure out the Cointreau, cherry brandy and gin and tip it into the cocktail mixer. Katya adds pineapple juice from the carton. It’s a lively night, with seven hostesses dispersed among the suits. All the girls have glittery hair and cleavage (I saw a can of that spray-on stuff in the changing room earlier) and Annoushka and Sandrine have white orchids tucked behind their ears. They look so pretty. As a client talks to her, Annoushka smiles, shredding a cardboard drinks mat under the table with her nails.
‘You’re quiet tonight,’ Katya says. ‘Has the ankle-biter been getting on your nerves?’
‘I feel like a bloody babysitter,’ I say. ‘I wish I could just pack him off to bed or something. How’s the Octopus?’
‘I’ve had nicer things stuck to the sole of my shoe, but the little extras make up for it . . .’
Above the bar is Supermodel TV. A model struts down the runway in a top hat, trailing a magnificent fantail of ostrich feathers.
Katya smiles to herself. ‘He asked me to ask you something.’
‘What?’
Katya screws the lid on the cocktail mixer and gives it a couple of brisk, conger-eel shakes. ‘He asked me to ask you if you’d sleep with that boy he brought. He says he’s still a virgin, and Murakami-san got the impression you were hitting it off.’
‘What!’ I choke.
Katya is serious. ‘He’s offering three hundred thousand yen and will pay for the love hotel. The only thing is the boy mustn’t know it’s a set-up. He has got to think it’s because you like him.’
Three hundred thousand yen. That is a month’s salary for most people. I look over and see Taro and Murakami-san in a conspiratorial huddle. Murakami-san is talking. Taro is grinning from ear to ear.
‘Katya! Are you serious? I’m not a prostitute . . .’
Katya drops the act. She creases up with laughter. ‘Don’t take it personally. Murakami-san propositions everyone.’
‘Right.’
‘Three hundred thousand yen, though – that would cover a lot of your travelling expenses!’
‘Yeah.’
‘And I lose out on the commission I’d make off you.’
I’ve had enough of Katya’s joking around. I thump a silver tray onto the bar top, with slightly more force than I intended.
‘Come on, Mary. Where’s your sense of humour tonight?’ she teases.
‘I am sick,’ I say, ‘of men who assume the hostess bar is a front for a brothel.’ This venom arises from nowhere, surprising me, surprising Katya. I look away from her.
‘I heard Yamagawa-san was here the other night,’ Katya says lightly, changing the subject.
‘Yeah. He made me sing ‘Material Girl’ in the karaoke booth. Four times.’
Katya laughs, just like Yuji did when I told him. I suppose it is quite funny in retrospect. ‘You should have said no . . . Or made him pick a bett
er song.’
Katya pours Murakami-san’s cocktail into a glass.
‘He had this boy with him who’d been in a car accident. His face was covered in bandages.’
‘Jesus. Poor guy,’ Katya says. ‘One thing about people who work for Yamagawa-san, they are definitely more accident-prone than most.’
She pours some more pistachios into a dish. I pick up a clean ashtray and add three thousand yen to the Daiwa Trading tab. Katya’s grim remark has depressed me. She lifts the silver tray and balances it on the palm of her hand. As she walks out of the bar she turns and says with a rueful smile: ‘About the Octopus . . . I didn’t mean to offend you. I thought you’d think it was funny.’
‘I know,’ I say. ‘I’m a bit tired tonight. Forget it.’
‘Let’s go for a drink after work,’ she says, ‘and we’ll talk properly.’
I smile at her and think, I’m really going to miss you when I’m gone.
Murakami-san must have given Taro a pep talk in my absence, because I get back to find the boy remodelled on Don Juan. Murakami-san must also have warned him just how severe an impediment the Rambo look is to wooing the opposite sex, because he has removed the headband and opened a couple of shirt buttons, to air his skinny chest.
‘Can you drive?’ Taro asks.
I shake my head. ‘Nah, I’m too lazy to learn. I’ll probably be stuck with public transport for the rest of my life.’
‘I’m taking lessons,’ Taro says casually. ‘My instructor says I’m the fastest learner he’s come across in a long time. I should have my licence in a couple of weeks. I’ll take you for a spin if you like. Nara is especially beautiful this time of year.’
‘Thanks, Taro. That should be fun,’ I say.
I reach for a cigarette. I wonder what season it is in China right now. Will Yuji need to bring his leather jacket?
‘Allow me.’ Taro lights my cigarette, suave as hell. I grimace my thanks, trying to inhale and smile at the same time. He takes a swallow of his lychee alcopop, emitting a silent belch before asking: ‘Mary, do you have a boyfriend?’
‘Yes,’ I reply, lightning fast.
Taro weathers the news with a strained, skull-like grin.
The malicious pleasure I feel is quickly succeeded by guilt. ‘But it’s nothing serious . . . you know, just a bit of fun.’
Taro’s smile assumes a natural laxity. ‘Oh! Right. I like having fun too . . . Maybe we could have fun together some time?’
‘OK,’ I say. ‘Why not?’
No way in Hell! . . . but where’s the harm in lying? It’s not like I’m going to be around for much longer.
Taro is going on about Universal Studios Japan when the dizziness begins. I grip the table and wait for it to pass, but my skull tightens, as if clamped by an invisible vice. A blizzard of monochrome dots blights my vision. Taro’s boyish squeak is suddenly as barbaric as nails driven down a blackboard. I want to tell him to shut up, but wait for a pause in his boring, second-by-second account of the Terminator II ride before excusing myself.
I lurch through the lounge, my vision like a detuned television; full of flickering human shapes, light and shade. I stumble my way from memory, ramming shoulders with a client by the bar, who apologizes in a deep baritone. I don’t stop to see who he is. I need to get to where I am going before I pass out.
Beneath my feet the floor surface changes from carpet to tile. The air smells of charred pizza crusts and Korean pickles. I inch by the deep-fryer, oily convection currents settling on my skin. I pass the silent, human-shaped snowstorm of Watanabe, edging forwards until my hand, held out before me, meets the cool metal surface of my destination. I grope for the handle, wrench open the door and enter the frigid air of the walk-in fridge. The door swings shut behind me. Upsetting a stack of pizza bases, I sink to my knees in relief.
I kneel with my forehead pressed against the cool, gritty fridge floor. Marooned in the darkness, I knead my temples and the vice loosens its grip.
Sound-proof, light-proof, salaryman-proof; I could stay in here all night. I try to diagnose my dizzy spell. It can’t be alcohol. After months in this boozy occupation, it takes seven whiskies even to put colour in my cheeks. The cold clears my head. Goosebumps have reared up all over, and my back teeth have begun a demure, staccato rat-a-tat-tat. Blood refrigerates in my veins, chilling me to the marrow.
A wrenching sound and a chink of bright kitchen light cuts across my floor-level field of vision. Despite the angry ‘leave me alone’ vibes I send out, the chink widens into a sizeable gap and a shadow enters. The silence indicates the shadow belongs to Watanabe. He closes the door and crouches beside me. He touches my shoulder and my head snaps up in surprise; Watanabe isn’t the type to make physical contact. I sit up, shins against the cold fridge floor.
‘Here, drink,’ he whispers.
A glass is pressed into my hand. I take a sip of water, then another. I’m not remotely thirsty but the act of drinking eases me back into human functioning.
‘Thank you,’ I mouth into the darkness. ‘My head hurts.’
‘You will get used to it,’ Watanabe intones gravely.
I laugh weakly. ‘I want it to go away.’
There is a silence as Watanabe turns my words over. Then: ‘That’s what I thought,’ he says, ‘when it first happened to me.’
I laugh again and wonder, not for the first time, if Watanabe is altogether there.
We sit in quietude for a moment before the seal of the walk-in fridge breaks again. The door swings wide open. We blink at the silhouette of Mama-san, her little chihuahua tucked into her arm.
‘Back to work, Watanabe,’ she says.
Watanabe gets up and ducks past Mama-san, lowering the visor of his baseball cap like a protective shield.
‘What is wrong with you, Mary?’ Mama-san asks impatiently. ‘Why are you sitting in the fridge? Are you drunk?’
I rise on wobbly legs. ‘No. I just had a dizzy spell. I thought I would feel better if I sat in here for a while. Sorry.’
Mama-san does not verbalize her displeasure. She drinks in my frowzy satin dress and messy hair with a face most people reserve for sucking lemons. ‘Where is Mariko tonight? Is she sick?’
‘I don’t know. I haven’t seen her,’ I say.
Mama-san shoots the vegetable rack a withering look. ‘If you are sick, Mary, go home. If you can work, then work. I do not pay you to sit in my fridge all night.’
Watanabe listens, stooped at the sink.
Stephanie bounds into the kitchen, her auburn ringlets jouncing. ‘Watanabe-san! Prawn tempura and a plate of nachos,’ she says in her American-accented Japanese. ‘Salsa dip.’
She clips up the order slip and sneaks an inquisitive look our way. It must look as though Mama-san is about to shut me away. Mr Bojangles slithers an inch down the front of Mama-san’s red dress. She hoists him back up with the crook of her arm.
‘I am better now,’ I say. ‘I can go back to work.’
‘Good. Then, get back to table nine.’
Mama-san turns back to the lounge, her face still cast in a vinegary grimace. I wonder how she will feel when she discovers her only son has skipped the country without telling her. That he has chosen to elope with me is bound to add salt to the wound. I feel sorry for her, I really do. But if she was a nicer person he wouldn’t keep it from her.
I sigh, daunted by the prospect of two more hours babysitting Taro. Watanabe stands motionless at the sink. ‘I can’t wait to get out of here,’ I say.
The tap alone gushes its reply, but I am certain Watanabe wishes the same thing.
11
WATANABE
The glass department store stretches eight storeys high. Escalators zigzag through the centre of the building, up to the roof-top garden. Golden lifts voyage up and down like tiny beads of air in a crystalline plant stem. Outside this glorified greenhouse two foreign girls embrace, one blond, the other brunette. Tiny fibres from the brunette’s mohair tank-top float
up and tickle the blonde’s nostrils. Static crackles across the breadth of air between them.
Mary and Katya cocoon themselves in the mellifluous tones of feminine interaction, pealing every so often with xylophonic laughter. Mary impregnates the air with oxytocin, a hormone conducive to trust and uterine contraction. The 2 parts per 17 million diffusion of this chemosensory signal causes Katya, whose biology serves purely Machiavellian ends, to wrinkle her nose.
I stand opposite the department store, beneath a giant azure-blue screen, upon which a famous actress chirrups the virtues of Maybelline Ultralash mascara. The signal at the pedestrian crossing beeps and a battalion moves towards me: necktie-asphyxiated salarymen; women clutching the hands of their preschool offspring; drop-out youths roving from games arcade to pool hall. It is human cartography in motion; muscles manoeuvring ivory skeletons, bloody Medusan tentacles shooting into hyperspace. Each individual moves within a ghostly vortex of memory and emotion; psychic treasure-troves I dip in and out of at whim. In a flash of neutrinos they touch down on my side of the street, and continue towards their destinations, bodily microprocessors whirring, like tiny, electric cicada.
Greeting ritual consummated, Mary and Katya enter the building. I cross the road to join them. Some 2,758 whorling fingerprints besmirch the handle of the door they went through. I recognize Mary’s thumbprint atop the smudgy miscellany. Touching my hand to this blazing vestige, I push open the door.
Shop automatons in red uniform and pill-box hats are posted throughout the ground floor. Each has a pearly smile and a compulsive bow. Blitzed by vibrant stimuli, Mary and Katya experience the kind of endorphin rush usually induced by extreme sports and recreational drugs. They descend upon a stall of silk scarves. To the horror of a nearby automaton, Katya wraps one round her head.
‘I could wear this to work and earn extra money reading tea leaves,’ she says.
Mary laughs and a nearby office lady glances over. Unlike me, the office lady cannot translate foreign sound waves into the universal metalanguage underlying all speech. They head towards a hatstand 7.2 metres away. I slip behind a pyramid of diamanté tiaras. It is easy to evade detection in a department store. Caught in the dazzle and glare of such a place, visuospatial senses are stunted and inattentive to peripheral activity.
