I Called Him Necktie

by Milena Michiko Flašar

  Midday. In the park, bentos were being unpacked. Sitting scattered in little groups, eating, drinking, chatting. I thought of Kyōko and wondered whether, out of habit, she had really gotten up at six o’clock even today. Or whether she had stayed in bed, had asked him not to go. Whether she knew about me. And whether she would come here to tell me the news if something had happened to him. The woman up there, that could be her. I had the impression she was looking for someone. I am here, I almost called out, but then I saw, she was already happily arm in arm. All at once I was ashamed I had ascribed such importance to myself. I turned up my collar. Who was I, to think that Kyōko must be looking for me? Who was I to think she must feel some obligation towards me? I watched her as she disappeared behind one of the trees. As they walked the salaryman beside her very gently laid his hand on her neck.

  96

  And there it was again. The feeling of being a nobody, or less than nobody, a nothing. It was a subconscious feeling. It shackled me and said: Run! I tried, struggled to and fro, moved not a millimeter. I shook with the effort it had taken to get this far. After Yukiko’s death it was this shaking, a constant tremor just beneath my skin, which reminded me inwardly and outwardly that despite all the striving, despite all the battles I fought to be normal, I was somehow different – because of this.

  I hid it as best I could. So that no one should notice I was hiding it. And if it couldn’t be hidden, then I was the one who laughed the loudest, pointed it out and said: How funny! Usually I kept my hands in my pockets. Whenever my name was called they began to shake. Had I been caught? Had they found out? I, who pretended to have seen nothing, was particularly anxious not to be seen. And who is more invisible than he who conforms? With my hands in my pockets I pretended to be someone, a person with a guileless expression. That was the pressure I was referring to. Not the tests, not the grades. The pressure consisted of having to act out my lack of expression. The struggle for credibility. The first space I retreated into was not my room in my parents’ house, but my smooth forehead. If the talk turned to Yukiko, the teachers mentioned her story, now and again, for the lesson it held, I buried my hands deeper still, walked, whistling casually, to the toilet, where I locked myself in and waited long minutes until the shaking had worn off. Taguchi, someone knocked on the door, what are you doing in there? I: You know what. Oh, ok, a snigger of recognition. Boy, you take a long time. I came out with a blank grin.

  At home I avoided eating at the table with my parents, the trembling fork and trembling spoon beneath their gaze. So they probably didn’t notice, since I adopted certain strategies to force the shaking back down under my skin and to hold it hidden there until, alone once more, a relief, I let it reappear on the surface. I ate in my room more and more often. Neither Father nor Mother asked the reasons. You know how it is, they said, it’s a difficult age. Had they asked, I could have given them no better answer. Their understanding of my difficult age was the best excuse I could produce: Please excuse me, but I don’t feel like sitting with you. Please excuse me but I don’t care to explain why. Shaky stare. Of all people it was me whom I least wanted to observe.

  97

  But I saw myself.

  I stood to the side and saw myself.

  Wobbly camera.

  I saw the impossible, the attempt to outwit myself. It was normal to have looked away, I told myself. The most normal thing in the world to have ignored Yukiko’s strangled Please help me! To have walked on at the moment when her gaze met mine, held it, and suddenly realized: He won’t help me. No help is to be expected from him. This disappointment, as I left her, for I had walked on, stopped two street corners further on with a cough, heard a gentle clap, as if something very delicate had been squashed, torn, crushed by something very coarse. And who wouldn’t have done the same? Then run away even faster? Who wouldn’t have done the same? That’s how I persuaded myself and realized how I believed myself, definitely wanted to believe myself, how the belief calmed me, the calm was a delusion. Forget Yukiko. You have already forgotten her once. I watched how I gave myself the appearance of having forgotten her. She was the black dot on a white surface. If you overlook it for long enough, it stops existing. Reality is variable, merely a marker for a changing quantity. You bend it to shape. Not a crime. It’s only a crime if you take the unbent reality as more real than reality, and defend it as such against your better judgment.

  If only I had cried, just once. I watched myself not crying. Jaw firm. Swallow. Break something. Quick. The mirror there, broken. And again. Smash your fist into it. A reassuring pain, masking the real one. The one that is not there. Which you force yourself not to feel. Sweep up the fragments. And away with them. To know, to know better, that not crying is crying. And yet you do not cry. Firm up the jaw. Swallow.

  There were others like me. Easy to recognize them. Difficult to recognize myself in them. I recognized them by their wayward gait. Red blotches on the neck when you spoke to them. Exaggerated cheerfulness. A tense representation of normality, by which they demonstrated their difference. I found them repulsive. All of them. I found they were dilettantes in their transparency, who threatened me and my struggle for credibility. One mistake on their part and it would require even greater effort to protect my false face. What connected us was also what divided us from one another. Each of us in our shell. At the slightest vibration we drew in our heads.

  98

  On my seventeenth birthday Father suggested driving together to the sea. Today we are driving to the sea, he said. Just you and me, father and son. That was his way of suggesting something. In the car we listened to old hits. Sake and women, went one, there is nothing more beautiful. Father sang along, while I stared silently out of the window. It felt to me as if we weren’t moving. It was the houses, the rice fields, the clouds that were moving, not us. The pale moon. A strip of blue beneath it. It came nearer. The sea.

  Father took the lead, his shirt billowing like a sail. I trudged behind him along the beach. The roar of the waves. A seagull fought against the wind. Two rocks. Let’s rest here. It’s a long time since we sat together like this. The first time, I replied. Embarrassed throat clearing. As always happened. It feels good to be together like this. We should do it more often. Together like this. He took off his shoes, his socks, stuck his feet into the sand. We do it too rarely. He laughed. I recognized him by his thin voice. I would have liked to pull his sleeve. To say to him: You don’t have to do that. Hide from me. Your sadness. You don’t have to laugh it away. He cleared his throat again, buried his toes deeper. You know, being grown up is not so bad after all. I mean. You have a goal and you are doing your best to get there. Keep your eye on it and aim for it step by step. If you stumble, pick yourself up again. In the end you’ll have reached it. The goal. You’ll look back and see how far you’ve come. Footprints in the sand. And you will be happy. All your doubts about the path you’ve taken will melt away. Do you understand? Yes, I nodded. Did you ever have doubts then? My question slipped out. Who? Me? He paused, his feet buried up to the ankles. No, what makes you think that? I’m just saying in general. What I want to say is. You must not allow yourself to be distracted. A gentle tap on the shoulder. It’s good talking together like this. Father knocked the sand off his feet, pulled on his socks, his shoes. We walked on. Broken shells, clattering stones. A boat on the horizon. Turned around, came home.

  99

  Strange. But the realization that Father was hiding something too, this realization comforted me, that he too, overwhelmed with shaking, had forced it under his skin. At least for a while. It was simply like that, as he said: You must have a goal. You must do your best. You must achieve it. To be happy at some point. Only a little jump was needed. Over to the safe side, over to those who don’t think too much, about how much it hurts to have betrayed others as well as oneself. I wanted to get there, made a run for it, was still running. Would have jumped, had not Kumamoto, the relay runner, passed me the baton of sincerity at the last moment. Admi
t it. Was that what he shouted? Finally admit it, you suffer from the same illness. My Yes was the door closing behind me. Father’s despair. It came too late. When he stormed into the room bellowing and raised his hand against me, I had long been untouchable. He saw it, I am sure of it. In reality he was the one who shied away from me. He deliberately missed.

  Pale evening sky.

  The park began to empty. The lights went on. One more minute. Perhaps he would come now. Just then when I stood up. Happy! Stay here! A straining leash. Warm dog’s nose on my neck. Happy! Stop that! Happy! Come here! Happy! Be good! The Shiba did not obey. Again and again he jumped at me and licked my face. Rough tongue. He wagged his tail. I pushed him aside and stood up. Happy! Come! I heard him barking for a long time after I left our bench.

  100

  A week passed this way. Nine o’clock, I was there. I would see him appear and then have to accept: It wasn’t him. I mistook a high school student, a career woman who smoked, a dancing shadow, for him. I invented stomach pains, the unexpected visit of an old friend, a trip to the mountains, a sudden whim. When I ran out of reasons the rainy season began.

  MILES TO GO.

  The umbrella I’d left behind stood in the corner. It proved nothing. No voice called out to me. I actually began to doubt whether we had met. Whether I hadn’t, was it possible, invented him, like I’d invented the many reasons for his absence. The tie was the only reliable assurance. I touched it and knew, he exists. A tingling on my scalp. My hair was growing again. In the café, on the other hand, time stood still. The same music. To want a love that can’t be true. Sometimes I wished I could lie flat on the floor and soak it through and through with my tears. No, you don’t invent something like that, something like that is true. I sank down and ordered a cola. Coming right up. With eyes closed I tried to remember his face. But the contours had lost their definition. As with Yukiko and Kumamoto, it was a particular expression I retained. A sad charm. With him it was a sad weariness. When I opened my eyes I noticed that the people surrounding me were mired in this weariness, and we all appeared to be waiting for someone who would set us free. A cold hell we persevered in. Now and again a sentence recurred: You must do something.

  It took six more weeks, countless utterances spoken to him, the one who never came, until I found an answer.

  101

  His business card. I had memorized it. With the address in my head I decided to seek him out at his home, and I didn’t think any further than that point, where I would press the bell, ding dong, and wait for some sound behind the door. The first real decision since I nodded to him. I made it early yesterday. I woke up. In front of me the crack in the wall. If only one were crazy enough to do everything differently. To break out just once. Kyōko. I felt she was connected to me as well. I quickly got dressed. With each movement my decision grew firmer. I would wait for a sound and then. Not contemplate how it would work out. It would work out. I slipped out. The tie in my jacket pocket. I touched it at each corner I passed. It propelled me onward. Into the crowds. Bought a ticket. I had not forgotten how. Crossed the turnstile. Into the subway. His world, day after day, his hand holding the strap. I stood a bit sideways, with bent shoulders, rowed against the current. While everyone went into the city, I went out. I saw the things he must have seen. The billboards. The posters. The garbage cans. Full to bursting. My gaze glanced around, not only mine now, as it observed and was observed. I got onto the train. Father’s shoes everywhere. I repeated the address to myself. Seven weeks have passed. A period of mourning*. Why does that occur to me now? And got out. There is the platform where he had stood, the platform on which he asked himself whether anyone would miss him if he were not there. Nobody there. I slowed my steps. What would I say if the door were to open? Was my hope of seeing him behind it any different from my parents’ hope, right at the beginning, when they thought I would come out and tell them: Everything’s all right? I got on the bus. It drove off. Beside me, on the seat, a book left behind. Proof. Of what? The driver called to me: You must get out here. Hot air engulfed me. I had arrived. A short walk. Then.

  102

  Tsik-tsik-tsik. The cry of the cicadas. I captured one and released it again. I was walking through a commuter town, a slumbering community. White shirts on the clothes lines, each house like the next. Parched gardens like handkerchiefs. Potted palms. Women and babies. The children were at school, the men at work. Over there! The gnarled root. Cracked asphalt everywhere. The garden gate. I looked up. A window was open. Fluttering curtain. I rang. Now the door would open. Kyōko’s flower pots. The glove. I rang again. From the house next door came gentle piano music, interrupted by the clatter of silverware. Soon it would be midday. I sat down on the curb. Felt: So this is what it’s like. When the door stays closed. So this is what it’s like. When you stand outside and wait in vain for a human sound. The sun burned down. I blinked.

  Hello? A bright female voice. She was coming up the street.

  Still blinking, I tried to make out her shape. She was coming towards me. I jumped up. Ohara-san?

  Yes, that’s me. And you are? Taguchi Hiro? A friend of my husband’s? Please forgive me. He never.

  I pulled out the tie.

  Or perhaps he did? She pushed open the garden gate, invited me in. She took the tie with a greedy gesture. Two steps at a time. As I took off my shoes in the entrance, I saw his, painfully neat. The briefcase beside them. A sports jacket hung on the hook. It smelled of cigarettes, bittersweet.

  103

  I followed Kyōko through the hall and into the living room. No rattle on the floor. It was silent. While she put the water on in the kitchen for tea, I sat on the couch, a cushion at my back, and looked around. At home. In front of me was the television. To the left, the sideboard. The snow globes and musical clocks. The ballerina revolved around herself on the side table. The naked lady hung on the wall, her body a knot, and the sailor, a girl beneath his gaze, rising smoke. Pink artificial flowers. A swan with a curved neck. Crystal figurines. A full ashtray. I had a hole in my sock, I curled up my toes. Soft carpet. Books. Stacked in piles. The shelves were full. They could have used a new one.

  Some yokan* with your tea? Kyōko poured us two tiny bowls. If I had known you were coming. But. She smiled. I didn’t know. Taguchi Hiro, you said. I don’t believe he told me about you. Or did he and I have forgotten? I often wonder, since he. Her smile collapsed. I often wonder whether I really knew him. Such a sudden death. Afterwards you wonder all sorts of things. And as I collapsed with her smile: Yes, he’s dead. A heart attack. On the way home. On the train. On a Friday. Seven weeks ago. Yesterday his ashes were buried. If I’d known. I would have told you. All the same. You must have. I mean. The tie. He was wearing it on the day he died. Can it be? You were the last to? She didn’t hide her face from me. Not when I began to tell her. Not after I’d told the whole story. I saw how she cried, then laughed, remembered, then returned, how she turned pale, then red, and finally was simply there. How she never let go of the tie the entire time, held it tight. How she caressed it. With her fingers. She made it part of herself. Wanted to melt into it. Melted.

  104

  Which is worse, asked Kyōko after a while. The fact that he concealed his situation from me or the fact that I helped him conceal it? You heard right. I did, knowing full well he had lost his job and couldn’t tell me because of the shame of it, I helped him stay with this shame. I wanted to give him time. To wait with him, until. He needed that: Someone to wait with him. Someone who was patient. Sometimes I took a long step towards him. I talked of breaking out. Of leaning back. Of doing nothing. Or sometimes. About his firm. About his managers. About his colleagues. All this to smooth the way, to illuminate it for him, to help him understand: You don’t have to. To slave away. But he distanced himself. A game, at first it was a game, then I lost control. Ghastly. When you lose control. One moment it’s within your power to initiate movement toward a turning point, and then nothing happens. You have become p
art of the audience. The other person is on stage, a solo performance, the spotlight on his face, all alone. While you, in the back row, in the dark, incapable of intervening, watch as the performance emerges. The curtain falls. I wasn’t allowed to join in, at any point. Even though I did it for his sake, I must have known that a game like that has no happy ending.

  At the beginning of course I had no idea. He left the house punctually at half past seven, came home in the evening, tired, went to sleep in front of the television. Not unusual. I covered him up. And as I was covering him I heard him whispering my name in a dream. Kyōko. Suddenly he was awake. I say: Suddenly. Like a dead man on a bier rising up with a jolt, his arms full of life flung around me, holding me in his embrace, almost crushing me, his breath close to my ear: Forgive me. Please. Forgive me. I gasped for breath. Then he let me go. His arms limp again, he sank back, fell asleep once more, deeper than before, his mouth half open. What a fool I am, I thought, and called up the firm the following day. When I put down the receiver I became aware of the significance of our decisions: He wanted to stay with the promise of his daily routine, I wanted to stay with him for the sake of our daily routine. In this tiny moment, as I put the receiver back on the cradle, I became aware of the beauty of it, that harmonious beauty, in our attempt to remain true to the decisions we had taken.

  105

  In a way he worked hard right to the end. If you understand. He didn’t particularly like his work. What he liked about it was only the routine and the satisfaction he got from keeping it up. The seamlessness of it. Even when nothing else functioned. To maintain this seamlessness, despite the reality, was the hardest work he had ever done.