The Nakano Thrift Shop

by Hiromi Kawakami

  I turned towards the mirror again, put some foundation on my finger, and dotted it on both cheeks, the tip of my nose, and my forehead. Surprisingly quickly, I had got used to commuting on the overcrowded trains, to maintaining my distance from the permanent female employees, even to finding the best way to use Excel, but I just couldn’t seem to get used to putting on ‘proper’ make-up every morning.

  When I was at the Nakano shop, I barely even knew that something like foundation existed. I would dash some toner on my face and, if the mood struck me, maybe put on a little tinted lip gloss. Back then, that was the extent of it.

  Almost three years had passed since the Nakano shop closed.

  I’d been at this job for six months already. It was with a health food company located in Shiba.

  My contract had been extended twice already, but it probably wouldn’t be again. It had been a comfortable place to work, but there wasn’t much I could do about it.

  I lightly rolled my shoulders up and down while I haphazardly slapped on some blush. My shoulders were very stiff, most likely from staring at a computer screen for so many hours a day. Maybe this Saturday, I ought to check out the new massage parlor that has just opened by the train station, I thought to myself as I continued to roll my shoulders.

  A while ago, I’d been out drinking with Masayo, whom I hadn’t seen in a long time.

  ‘Look at you, Hitomi, a real office lady!’ Masayo said as she poured herself some warmed saké.

  ‘I’m not an official employee, I’m just a temp,’ I said.

  ‘What’s the difference?’ she asked.

  When I explained, Masayo nodded as she listened. But I have no doubt she forgot it all immediately.

  According to Masayo, lately she’d been ‘as busy as a bee.’ It seems that one of her doll creations had won a prize that was fairly well known in that world.

  ‘The prize money wasn’t much, fifty thousand yen,’ Masayo explained. ‘But it adds prestige,’ she said, raising her eyebrows halfway.

  As a result of this new prestige, Masayo had been invited to lecture at the local cultural center and, all told, she was to give three talks at various community centers.

  ‘That’s why I’m as busy as a bee! I don’t love it,’ Masayo said, taking a drag on her Seven Stars. She really didn’t seem happy about it at all.

  ‘But it’s a good thing to earn money,’ I said.

  Masayo laughed. ‘Hitomi, you sound like an old lady!’

  ‘I am an old lady!’

  ‘Oh, come off it! You’re barely thirty!’

  And then, even though we were already in our cups, we clinked a toast.

  ‘Cheers to Hitomi, for becoming an old lady!’ Masayo said, emptying her little saké cup.

  ‘Stop it, please!’ There was about a third left in my glass of shochu mixed with warm water, and I finished it in one gulp. I could feel the soft and faintly warm flesh of the pickled plum garnish as it slid down my throat.

  I thought back to the last time I’d seen Masayo.

  ‘You moved, didn’t you?’ When Masayo had first called me on the phone, I had recognized her voice immediately.

  This had been right after I had moved from my previous apartment. Masayo said she had received my notice. I had sent handwritten change of address cards to ten or so people, including Masayo. After deliberating about whether to send them to Mr. Nakano and Takeo, I decided not to.

  ‘I spent what little savings I had,’ I told her.

  On the other end of the line, Masayo sighed suggestively. This whole time, I had thought that her voice sounded a little too beguiling.

  ‘That’s nice.’

  ‘Do you think so?’

  ‘I do. It’s a good thing.’

  It had been a perfectly ordinary exchange, but something about Masayo’s voice had sounded different from usual. We made small talk and chatted about the weather, and just when I had decided it was time to get off the phone, Masayo had said, ‘The wake is today, and the funeral service is tomorrow.’

  What? I asked in reply.

  ‘For Maruyama.’

  For Maruyama? I repeated, like a parrot.

  ‘His heart. I hadn’t heard from him for three days so I went to see him. In this kind of weather, he was still in perfect condition.’

  Since Maruyama’s ex-wife Keiko has made the arrangements, I don’t really want to go but . . . it’s more of a social obligation. Haruo is going with me to the funeral service, but tonight, he has something that he absolutely must do for a client, so, Hitomi, would you consider going with me?

  Her voice was smooth as silk. It was exactly the same tone Masayo had used when an unfamiliar customer came into the Nakano shop and she would talk them into buying some old random item.

  ‘I’ll go,’ I replied softly.

  ‘Ah!’ Masayo sighed again, suggestively.

  ‘The landlord at the building where he lived is making a terrific fuss, can you believe it? He really had the worst luck with that landlord!’ This was the only time that Masayo sounded like herself.

  But then she murmured strangely, almost innocently, ‘Maruyama, he’s really dead!’ I had never heard her sound so bewildered.

  ‘Anyway, congratulations on your move,’ Masayo said, which was an odd way to end the call.

  Maruyama, he’s really dead! Like a broken record, Masayo’s curiously charming and dispirited voice resonated in my mind.

  Later, Masayo was already there when I got to the ticket gate at the station where we had arranged to meet. She had on a brown coat with her brown ankle boots, and the same scarf dyed from trees and grasses that had been wrapped around her neck when the shop closed, but that night she wore it over her head.

  ‘Is it all right to wear that to a wake?’ I asked before I could stop myself.

  Masayo nodded glumly, and the scarf shook lightly when she moved her head.

  ‘If you wear excessively proper mourning clothes to the wake, it looks as though you were expecting the death, so this is perfectly appropriate,’ Masayo said, and then she scrutinized my outfit. I was dressed head to toe in black mourning clothes—black stockings, even my coat was dark.

  ‘I shouldn’t have worn proper mourning clothes?’ I asked nervously.

  ‘You shouldn’t have,’ Masayo responded without hesitation, giving a nod.

  The wake took place in a small funeral home which was a fifteen-minute walk from the station. There were three wakes going on at the same time—the Midorikawa family, the Maruyama family, and the Akimoto family—and there was the steady hum of people talking as they came and went.

  ‘I’m glad it’s not empty,’ Masayo said, hurrying into the line.

  Next to the altar, a middle-aged couple with two girls sat alongside a white-haired woman who seemed to be Mr. Maruyama’s ex-wife Keiko, all of them expressionless. Both of the girls were wearing uniforms from a local private elementary school.

  Without making eye contact with Keiko, Masayo performed the ritual of condolences and quickly turned her back towards the altar. Following Masayo, I made an offering of incense and, as I did so, I looked up to see that there was a color photo of Mr. Maruyama smiling radiantly. The photograph was from when he was quite young. There was not a single line on his forehead or around his mouth, and the contours of his face were slender and firm.

  ‘Shall we have a drink before we go home?’ I suggested once we had left the hall. Without replying, Masayo walked steadily along.

  ‘I’m fine,’ she finally said after a while. This was after we had been walking for about five minutes, so at first I wasn’t sure what she was talking about, but I soon realized it must have been in response to my proposal when we had left the hall.

  ‘He’s gone, isn’t he?’ I said, and Masayo nodded again, silently.

  We didn’t stop for a drink. Neithe
r of us spoke as we walked the rest of the way to the station. Just as I was about to buy a ticket and head towards the gate, Masayo said behind me, ‘The one I love most in this world.’ She didn’t murmur, nor did she raise her voice—she spoke as if it were just a continuation of our conversation.

  ‘What?’ I asked as I looked over my shoulder.

  Her face still glum, Masayo repeated herself, ‘The one I love most in this world.’

  I turned around to look at her directly, but Masayo didn’t say anything more. It was the end of the workday, and several people coming through the ticket gate had bumped into us.

  ‘I missed the chance to say that to Maruyama,’ Masayo said quietly during a momentary lull in the surging crowd, and she turned her back on the station and started walking.

  The odd color of the scarf dyed from trees and grasses that covered Masayo’s head looked even stranger as it caught the light from the street lamps. Her back perfectly straight, Masayo receded into the distance.

  Since that night of the wake I hadn’t been in touch with Masayo, until the night I called my mother.

  ‘I passed the second-level exam!’ I said, and my mother whispered my name ever so softly. Then she remained silent at the other end.

  ‘It’s not really that big a deal,’ I went on, but she still didn’t reply; she may have been crying.

  This is why . . . I thought to myself as I stifled a sigh.

  ‘Were you really that worried about me?’ I asked, my voice deliberately cheerful.

  ‘I’m so happy for you, Hitomi,’ my mother said, without answering my question. Her voice sounded gentle, the embodiment of maternal affection. Actually, she doesn’t just sound tender; my mother is tenderness itself.

  We had been out of touch for a long time when I’d called her suddenly last year to tell her I was going to bookkeeping school, and to ask her to support me financially. Back then, my mother’s voice had sounded anxious. Nevertheless, the money had soon been transferred into my account. I was somewhat dispirited to see that she had sent 150,000 yen more than I had asked for. It wasn’t that I was embarrassed about her concern for me; it was more—how can I say?—it felt like a wake-up call, bringing me back to the reality of life. Of course I was grateful, but along with my gratitude I felt an odd sense of futility; it made me squirm in my seat. Since the Nakano shop had closed, whenever anything happened, the sensations resonated physically within me. Like they did now.

  ‘Next, I plan to take the first-level exam,’ I said in an even brighter voice. Finally, my mother sounded excited. Good for you, Hitomi! I always knew you would work hard and continue your studies.

  I could vividly imagine the faces of my father and younger brother. Hitomi will never finish bookkeeping school, she’ll get sick of it and give up, I could hear them say. But my mother didn’t mention any of this.

  I miss Masayo, I had thought to myself. I called her up right after I got off the phone with my mother.

  It’s been such a long time! Would you like to go out for a drink? I said without any preamble, despite the fact that we hadn’t spoken since that night of Mr. Maruyama’s wake two years ago.

  I’d love to, Masayo replied, completely unfazed.

  And so, there we were, having a drink together.

  Masayo had got a little tipsy.

  ‘Is Mr. Nakano doing well?’ I ventured. It was all I could manage to ask, afraid that she might reply, without batting an eye, that he was not doing well.

  ‘He’s fine!’ Masayo replied crisply.

  ‘Is he still doing the online auctions?’ I asked.

  ‘He went off on his own from Tokizo and made his own website,’ she said.

  Saké, two more! Masayo called out. They don’t need to be warmed, cold is fine. Just bring them right out, she said in a rapid barrage. The server gave a perfunctory answer; it wasn’t clear whether he had got her order or not.

  ‘What’s with that guy? He reminds me of our dear Takeo,’ Masayo said, fluttering the menu in front of her face like a fan.

  ‘That brings back memories, hearing you call him “our dear Takeo”,’ I said.

  Masayo peered into my face. ‘Tell me, Hitomi—were you and Takeo . . . like that?’

  ‘Meaning what, like that?’ I said, imitating the way that Takeo used to speak.

  ‘Ah, now that brings back memories!’ Masayo said, and then she herself imitated Takeo. ‘Meaning, you know, like that!’ She didn’t really sound like him, though.

  ‘So, you know, Haruo told me he made such a healthy profit from the online auctions, he was able to get a small business loan.’

  The cold saké arrived more quickly than expected, and Masayo poured it generously into a beer glass. The thick leftover foam from the beer floated wispily on the surface of the saké.

  He’s got a loan because of a healthy profit—isn’t that a bit of an oversimplification? I asked.

  Masayo fluttered her hand in front of her as she laughed, Oh, my, Hitomi—you really did pass second-level bookkeeping!

  With his loan and his profits, she said, Mr. Nakano had decided to lease a shopfront in Nishiogi and open a Western antique shop.

  ‘That’s amazing, isn’t it?’ I cried out softly.

  Masayo gave a wry smile. ‘I have my doubts, but with Haruo, you never know!’

  We clinked another toast. Then we ordered a couple of plates of food, and we drank cup after cup of saké, and the night quickly grew late.

  Closing time, we were told, and we left the bar. I was quite drunk myself now.

  ‘You mean you haven’t seen our dear Takeo at all?’ Masayo asked in a loud voice.

  You don’t have to shout, I can hear you, I yelled back.

  ‘You haven’t seen him?’ Masayo repeated. Her expression seemed half-smiling, half-angry, and wrapped around her neck was the very same scarf dyed from trees and grasses.

  I haven’t seen him, I answered flatly.

  Really? Masayo said, disappointment in her voice. I wonder what our dear Takeo is up to? Have things worked out for him? I hope he hasn’t died on the side of a road or anything, she said, knitting her brows together.

  Heaven forbid, I hastened to say.

  Masayo burst into wide-mouthed laughter. See, Hitomi—that’s just what an old lady would say!

  Well, I am an old lady—I told you so!

  Yes, but, a real old lady doesn’t call herself an old lady.

  Hey, Masayo, have you put on a little weight?

  I have, indeed! I get fat when I get busy—what can I do?

  You must just be eating cake from Posy.

  Say now, at Posy, since the son took over and became in charge, everything seems to have changed. All the cakes now have ridiculously long and pretentious names!

  The moment I heard her say that the son had taken over at Posy, for some reason I felt the strength drain out of me. I tried to recall what Takeo’s face looked like, but I couldn’t quite picture it. I just kept seeing, in alarming detail, the severed tip of his right little finger.

  The last train . . . I said, and I broke into a run.

  Goodbye! Masayo said, drawing out the syllables. I got out of breath almost immediately but I kept running anyway.

  The one I love most in this world. I had no one to say those words to. I hadn’t even felt the desire to say them to someone, ever, I thought as I ran. There was still time before the last train, but I kept running all the way to the station, without stopping to catch my breath.

  The next month, at the end of the accounting period, my contract term ended. The other women gave me a bouquet of flowers. It was the first time that had ever happened to me, and it practically brought tears to my eyes.

  ‘What kind of company will you work for next?’ a woman named Miss Sasaki asked. She was slightly younger than I was.

  ‘It seems th
ey have something to do with computers.’

  ‘It seems so, does it? Miss Suganuma, you always do things your own way, don’t you?’ Miss Sasaki laughed.

  My own way. Clutching the bouquet as I walked home, I repeated these words in my head. I had spent time with these young women for eight months. Some of them were a little mean, some of them were quite kind, some of them were slightly particular, and some of them were a bit odd. Did that mean that I was the one among them who did things ‘my own way’?

  It was as if everyone doled themselves out in such small portions. Never completely open, not all at once.

  I reminisced about the people from the Nakano shop, brief scenes with each of them.

  The whole bouquet did not fit into the vase I had, so I filled an empty mayonnaise jar with water and put the extra flowers in there. I would be starting at the next company at the beginning of next week. I would definitely try to go to the massage parlor tomorrow, I thought. I opened a drawer to retrieve the envelope that contained documents from my new office, and a scrap of paper fluttered to the ground.

  It was one of the sketches that Takeo had done of me, the ‘clothed’ version.

  So this is where it was, I murmured as I picked it up. I had on a T-shirt and jeans, and I was stretched out with an earnest expression on my face. It was skillfully done. Looking back now, I saw that Takeo was even better at drawing than I had thought.

  Could Takeo have died on the side of a road?

  That would serve him right! I thought at the idea of such a thing. But my smugness was soon dampened by the realization of how troublesome it was, just to feel that way—how troublesome it was, really, just to be alive. I wanted nothing to do with love! I wanted the stiffness in my shoulders to go away. I could probably put a bit of money into savings this month. These thoughts drifted by one by one, like tiny bubbles.