by Ryu Murakami
‘True.’
‘Anybody with a brain knows that attaining success in this country doesn’t amount to squat. I think the wine thing is a good idea, something practical you can really focus on and get engrossed in. Lots of guys my age have already decided what they want to do – software engineer, that’s a big one, graphic design . . . Well, mostly computer-related stuff, I guess. But if you’re going to specialise in something it’s best to get started early, right?’
‘And you?’
‘I’ve decided to hold off a while longer. I like biology, and chemistry, but I haven’t had any biochemistry or molecular biology or anything like that yet, so. . .’
Shige put the knife back in the cabinet and returned the key to its hiding-place beneath a bottle of armagnac.
‘Don’t even think about ever using that in a fight,’ Aoyama said. Shige rolled his eyes. ‘Even against intruders or whatever. Sometimes having a weapon can put you in greater danger.’
‘I know that. But when Gangsta starts barking and I’m all alone in the house . . . You know, there’ve been a lot of burglaries around here lately.’
Aoyama looked at the clock. It was nearly one a.m., and he felt a little guilty about having left Shige alone while he was out enjoying himself. He finished off his Evian and said, ‘I’ll try not to stay out so late from now on.’
‘How did it go, by the way?’ Shige said, heading back upstairs.
‘What?’
‘Your date.’
‘Oh. It was good. She had a pretty unfortunate childhood, and I heard a lot of the details tonight. Grew up in an abusive family, with no one to turn to. But the thing is, she managed to overcome it all through ballet. Most beautiful women are pampered all their lives, but she had to learn to be strong and rely on herself.’
Shige stopped halfway up the stairs and looked down at him.
‘What?’ Aoyama said.
Shige shrugged.
‘I don’t know anything about ballet,’ he said, ‘but from what I hear it’s not that easy to overcome being abused as a child.’
Aoyama marvelled for the thousandth time at how mature his son was becoming. He smiled and said goodnight, telling himself that Shige would understand when he met her.
‘Good night, Pops,’ Shige said from the top of the stairs. His voice was as gentle and assured as that of a grown man.
Autumn was turning to winter. The FM programme Tomorrow’s Heroine was dying a quiet death. Yoshikawa said that, when it finally expired, all they had to do was announce that because of script considerations all further auditions were being postponed. There wouldn’t be any problem whatsoever, he said – dozens of film projects got cancelled each year.
‘Besides, we’re not film producers, so it’s not as if our reputations are on the line. Give it two weeks and nobody’ll even remember the whole thing anyway.’ Yoshikawa was in better spirits these days. He’d moved his mother into a nursing home on the outskirts of Tokyo. ‘But you’ve got a bit of a challenge ahead,’ he said. ‘Obviously you’ll have to tell the lovely Yamasaki-san that the film is officially kaput. You haven’t slept with her yet, have you? I don’t care how sweet she is, to sleep with her before confessing the truth would be asking for trouble.’
Aoyama still hadn’t even held hands with her.
They’d had four or five more dates over the past couple of months. And though they’d yet to go beyond dinner and drinks, he could tell she enjoyed being with him. Her voice was always vibrant and animated when he called, and she showed up for their dates in flawless fashion and make-up. He, for his part, grew more besotted with her each time they met. He took her to the best restaurants he knew of and introduced her to a series of serious wines. They’d spend hours over each meal, engaging in a regular feast of reason and flow of soul. She never tired of talking about ballet, and he often waxed poetic on his reminiscences of Germany, and yet the conversation always seemed sparkling and new.
But as the final episode of Tomorrow’s Heroine neared, Aoyama began to feel the pressure. When should he break the news that the film project had fallen through? That wasn’t the only thing he needed to discuss with her, either. She still didn’t know much about his own personal life. Somehow he had yet to find the right opportunity to reveal that he’d lost his wife seven years before and lived with his fifteen-year-old son. And she seemed to take great care not to ask about such matters.
It was late October, a week before the final instalment of the radio show, on an evening when the first blasts of wintry wind were strafing Tokyo, that Aoyama decided it was time.
He’d asked her to meet him at the bar in one of the high-rise hotels in West Shinjuku. He wanted to tell her about the film project before they went to dinner, and in order to collect his thoughts he arrived almost twenty minutes early. The bar here specialised in champagne – even serving it by the glass – and had become a bit of a hot spot after being written up in a few trendy magazines. This early in the evening, however, it was still half-empty. The waiter greeted Aoyama by name and offered a table, but he chose to sit at the bar. He preferred not to be facing Yamasaki Asami when he told her the news.
She glided in wearing a black minidress and boots, and, as always, the head of every man in the place turned as she passed.
‘I haven’t been to Shinjuku in ages.’ She smiled and eased on to the stool beside him.
‘I know this unique little restaurant not far from here,’ he said, ‘in East Nakano. It’s run by a former geisha, and she serves authentic Edo kuruwa cuisine. I thought it might be a nice change.’
‘Everywhere we go, the food’s so irresistible.’ She patted her very narrow waist. ‘I’m afraid I’ve been gaining weight.’
Aoyama grinned and ordered Dom Pérignon rosé for both of them. After a casual toast and a swallow, he braced himself and dived in.
‘I’m afraid I have some unfortunate news tonight,’ he said. She was lowering her glass to the counter but froze halfway there, her features visibly stiffening.
‘What is it?’ she whispered.
The plan was to explain the situation roughly along the semi-truthful lines Yoshikawa had suggested. Aoyama looked down at his glass of champagne and concentrated on suppressing an incipient tremor in his voice.
‘It’s about the film you auditioned for.’
She expelled her breath with a sound very much like phew, drained half the champagne from her glass and beamed at him. He was puzzled but somewhat relieved, in a tentative sort of way.
‘Why are you smiling?’ he said.
‘I’m not smiling. Go ahead.’
‘You were smiling.’
‘Was I?’
‘Yes. You definitely smiled. This isn’t good news, and it’ll be even harder for me to say if you’re grinning at me.’
‘But it’s about the film.’
‘That’s right.’
‘Somebody else got the part?’ she said. She may not have been smiling now, but she certainly wasn’t frowning.
‘Not exactly. The thing is, we had this scriptwriter preparing the screenplay, a fairly famous guy, and . . . Well, without going into too much detail, the backers rejected what he came up with, and he got angry, and the week before last he pulled out.’
‘Oh. So you have to find someone else to write it?’
‘It’s not that easy. The distributor agreed to the project on the condition that this particular writer be involved. There was a little nastiness between the backers and the distribution company as a result, and . . . Well, I’m no expert on the movie business, but I know there’s no way a film can get made without backing and distribution. Next week they’ll announce that production has been temporarily suspended, but I’m afraid the truth is that this project will probably never see the light of day.’
Aoyama glanced at her. She was beaming again. And what she said took him completely by surprise.
‘You must be awfully disappointed. But I . . . this is selfish of me, I know, but I’m kind
of glad.’
‘Glad?’
‘I’m sorry. It’s terrible of me to say that, after—’
‘Why are you glad?’
‘Don’t you remember what I wrote in that essay? I was 100 per cent certain I wouldn’t be chosen for the part. But I knew that if someone else got it, you and she would be spending a lot of time together, and I didn’t really relish the thought of that. So, from a strictly selfish point of view . . . Besides, I was afraid the “bad news” might be something else – that you couldn’t see me any more, for example, or that we wouldn’t be able to meet as often.’
She held her glass up to his again. The delicate rims rang like tiny, perfect bells, and Aoyama felt the tension drain from his shoulders.
8
The restaurant, on a back alley in the drinking-and-dining district of East Nakano, would have been all but invisible to the unsuspecting eye: there was no neon, not even a signboard, announcing its existence. He and Ryoko had come here often, and the exterior hadn’t changed at all since those days. But foreign streetwalkers and young male hookers with heavy make-up now milled about in the alley, hounding any drunks who stumbled by. They didn’t even glance at Aoyama, however, as he passed with Yamasaki Asami on his arm. He noticed her studying a few of them on the walk from the main street, where the taxi had dropped them, but there was no indication of anything like scorn or fear in her expression: she looked at these people as she might look at anyone. As he led her down the alley, carving a path through the prostitutes, he was aware of a certain sense of superiority – not in relation to them, personally, but to their fate. These were unfortunate men and women who were forced to sell their bodies and their pride. He, on the other hand, was with a beautiful young lady, and he was in love. He felt truly blessed.
At the top of the handwritten menu, in brushed ink calligraphy, were the words edo kuruwa ryori. It was a small place – seven seats at a counter and two tables. Seated together at one of the tables were the only other customers: three white-haired gentlemen who might have been presidents or directors of banks or trading companies. They were talking about things like golf and the stock market and health issues, and sipping in a refined way at their cups of cold saké. Kai, the owner, was dressed as always in a kimono. She brought steaming hand-towels and a pair of cocktails in faceted Satsuma glasses.
‘Hello, stranger,’ she said to Aoyama.
Yamasaki Asami tasted her cocktail and gasped.
‘That’s delicious!’ she said.
Her voice reverberated in the small room, and all three of the white-haired gentlemen slowly turned in their elegant tailored suits to look at her. Each was old enough to have seen more than his share of beautiful women, but they must have been struck by something in that uncommon voice of hers. That soft but penetrating voice that caressed your ears and climbed through your brain like a vine.
‘I’m glad you like it,’ said Kai with a welcoming smile. ‘Speciality of the house – iced saké and citron.’
Kai had been a geisha in Shimbashi. At least ten years older than Aoyama, she’d retired in her mid-thirties to marry a doctor but soon divorced and opened this restaurant. She’d developed an incredible network of patrons over the course of her career, including VIPs in every field from finance to mass media. (He’d once asked who her most memorable customer was, only to be mildly astonished by the answer: Khrushchev.) Aoyama hadn’t known her in her geisha days, of course, but he’d been coming here for nearly twenty years. Kai had always liked Ryoko, and Aoyama had never hesitated to talk to her about his private life. He’d been eager for her to meet Yamasaki Asami.
After the introduction, Kai rejoined the gentlemen at their table. Her assistant, a woman on the verge of middle age who was slightly lame in one leg, brought out an appetiser of jellied blowfish. Though it was November, the room was well heated, and she shuffled over the tatami barefoot, as did Kai. There was something strangely alluring, Aoyama thought as he watched her limp back to the kitchen, about a woman in bare feet and full, traditional kimono.
‘What is kuruwa ryori, exactly?’ Yamasaki Asami asked him as she reached for a slice of blowfish with her chopsticks.
‘The most common theory,’ he said, ‘is that it originated with dishes served in the pleasure quarters back in the Edo era, but some say it’s actually from the inns on the old Tokaido Road. In any case, it’s the epitome of Edo chic, and in my opinion it’s much more inviting and likeable than kaiseki, for example.’
Sitting with the white-haired old gentlemen, Kai wasn’t talking much but keeping their cups full and listening closely to what they had to say. When they directed a question to her (‘You don’t play any golf, do you, Kai?’), she kept her replies brief and genial (‘I can’t stand all that walking!’). Lending an ear was as much an art for a woman in her position as it was for bartenders and hostesses. And Kai was a past master.
‘I don’t even know very much about kaiseki,’ Yamasaki Asami said.
She seemed somewhat more restrained than she’d been at the French or Italian restaurants they’d gone to. She was probably a bit intimidated by the insular atmosphere of the place, Aoyama thought, remembering that Ryoko too had felt that way at first.
‘It would be abnormal to know much about kaiseki at your age.’
‘But they say it’s delicious.’
‘I’ve never really found it all that tasty.’
The assistant brought out yellowtail sashimi, lacquered bowls filled with clams in a broth, and warmed ginjoshu saké from Ishikawa prefecture. Yamasaki Asami’s nearly translucent cheeks took on a faint blush as she sipped from her cup.
‘Kaiseki,’ Aoyama said, glancing at the elderly gentlemen and lowering his voice mischievously, ‘is essentially a cuisine designed for senior citizens.’
She laughed – that laugh like medicine for the ears – and said ‘How so?’ as she daubed wasabi on a slice of yellowtail.
Aoyama gazed down at her hand manipulating the chopsticks. Her slender fingers, the light pink polish of her fingernails, the blue veins faintly visible on the back of her hand. The skin so smooth it might have been a man-made membrane.
‘The common denominator of all kaiseki dishes,’ he said, ‘is the soft texture. None of them make any demands on your teeth. There’s no meat to speak of, and even shrimps, for example, are mashed into dumplings. It’s all very refined, I suppose, but . . . I don’t know, you might say that kaiseki is basically about dishes that are easy to chew.’
He’d thought he was somewhat accustomed to being with her now, but sitting side by side like this, brushing shoulders, was making him tense. His throat was dry, and he had to suppress the impulse to drink too quickly. When one is tense, especially around a desirable member of the opposite sex, one tends either to clam up or to talk too much. Aoyama was of the latter persuasion.
‘People always talk about the health benefits of Japanese food,’ he said, ‘but I’m fascinated by other aspects of the Japanese dining experience. Like the whole system of serving food at a counter like this, with the customers all facing the same direction, instead of each other. It’s strange when you think about it. At a sushi bar, for example, everyone’s facing the itamae-san, and you discuss the things you’re eating – what type of squid this is, and where they’re caught, and how this is the season for them but they’ll only be at their best for another couple of weeks, and so on. Discussing the food with the chef even as you eat it – that’s a peculiar system.’
‘I suppose it is, isn’t it? I don’t go to sushi restaurants very often – they’re so expensive – and I could probably count the number of times I’ve sat at the counter, but I know what you mean. There’s something about that atmosphere.’
‘At its worst, it’s almost an atmosphere of collusion.’
‘Collusion?’
‘Everyone at the counter becomes a member of the group. In some sushi bars, all the customers are regulars and they all know each other. As an outsider, you need courage to walk
into a place like that and take a seat. It’s a tight-knit little community, and harmony is of the utmost importance. Nobody’s confronting anyone else individually. The conversation all proceeds through the chef, who’s like a moderator or a master of ceremonies. You couldn’t spend some quiet time with a lover, for example, in a place like that, because you’d be isolating yourselves from the others and spoiling the atmosphere for everyone.’
‘I guess that’s true.’
‘And I’ll tell you something else: sushi and kaiseki are two foods I never crave when I’m really run-down or stressed.’
‘No?’
‘When you’re overseas, for example, and you’re physically tired and your nerves are frazzled, the last thing you want are cold slices of sushi, or all the subtle little tastes of kaiseki. At least that’s my experience, but I think it’s a fairly common one. Different people crave different things, of course, but when I’m feeling exhausted I prefer spicy food like Korean or Sichuan Chinese. Spices stimulate the appetite.’
‘I love spicy food. Indian food, for example.’
‘Indian food’s great, isn’t it? Most spicy cuisines originated in hot climates – Cambodia, Thailand, Vietnam, they’re all tropical places – but in Korea the climate is relatively cold. I’ve wondered about that before, why it is that so much Korean food is spicy. Korea has an incredibly rich culture, but history has been cruel to the people. The Koreans have suffered enormously, in very basic and concrete ways – being invaded and occupied by foreigners, having relatives murdered before their eyes, that sort of thing. It’s hard for most of us even to imagine what they’ve been through. But no matter how bad your situation is, you need to eat. And spicy food is a powerful ally when your reserves of courage and energy are low, because it stimulates your appetite. Sushi and kaiseki don’t have that sort of power. The portions are cold and fresh and bite-size and soft and go down easily, but they aren’t foods that lend you strength when you don’t have the strength to take sustenance. My theory is that sushi and kaiseki are dishes that evolved in peaceful, prosperous times, when eating well was the normal state of affairs. In this country we have the illusion that there’s always this warm, loving community we belong to, but the other side of that is a sort of exclusiveness and xenophobia, and our food reflects this. Japanese cuisine isn’t inclusive at all – in fact it’s extremely inhospitable to outsiders, to people who don’t fit into the community.’
