The Daydreamer Detective Braves the Winter

by S. J. Pajonas

  “Oh, Mei,” he breathed, dropping his lips to my shoulder and lightly stroking the fingertips of his right hand down the landscape of my back.

  I inhaled sharply, picturing his face as his fingers took everything in. From the tops of my shoulders to my shoulder blades, the skin was puckered like gravel, pale and knotted, swirling towards a swath of slick, three centimeter wide skin. The skin graft eventually healed but it left a line of scarred tissue in a diagonal from my right shoulder blade, across my spine and ending in my left ribs. From there down, the skin was like a rough day at sea, waves cresting in an endless ocean to my waist.

  “Who did this to you?” His voice cracked and I flinched as a warm tear fell on my skin.

  “I never saw who pushed me, and the whole night was a blur. I sometimes say I fell in because I don’t want to believe anyone would have done that to me.” I closed my eyes and remembered the campfire. It had been going for hours so the coals were blazing hot. Kids were running everywhere. I twirled around, laughing and shouting, someone pushed me, and I fell in. “I was sedated for so long after, I doubt I’ll ever know. No one ever admitted it.”

  He sniffed up and pulled away from me, settling his hands on my shoulders and turning me around.

  He placed his entire palm and fingers of his right hand on my lower back. “It doesn’t hurt?”

  “No,” I said, shaking my head and trying to look over my shoulder at him. “Most of the skin healed a long time ago. But the area of the skin graft is permanently numb. I’ve gotten used to it.”

  “This here?” I assumed his fingers were on the graft area. It wasn’t hard to miss because the skin looked so different, stretched and alien.

  “I don’t feel your fingers.” My brain had always tried to fill in the sensory data that belonged to that skin, heat from the baths, the scratch of my bra strap, or the touch of a lover, but my mind could only do so much.

  He sighed and hugged me from behind, pressing his chest to my back. “Have you ever considered getting tattoos to cover them up? I bet there are some tattoo artists in Kyoto that would do a beautiful job.”

  I blinked and perked up. “I have! I used to spend hours looking at photos online. But I’ve never been able to afford it.”

  He nodded against my head. “This changes nothing. You’re all I think about. I’m a man obsessed, imagining days, months, and years into the future with you. I’m not scared off by this.”

  I fell into a canyon of relief, and it swallowed me whole.

  “You’re becoming everything to me. I thought I lost you the night of the barn fire. We pulled up outside and you were on the ground, motionless, your clothes smoking.”

  I turned around and ran my fingers through his hair, my thumbs over his cheeks and across his bottom lip.

  “I get irrationally upset when I imagine you gone, and I don’t want that to ever happen.” He squeezed my waist between his hands and blew out a long breath.

  Leaning in, I closed the distance between us, touched my lips to his, and slipped my fingers into the waist of his jeans.

  He had passed the test.

  Chapter Sixteen

  The kitchen was quiet when I slipped out of bed in the morning. Yasahiro was still asleep, so this was the perfect time for me to get some work done before he was up. I paused at the refrigerator door, closed my eyes, and remembered everything that happened last night. It had felt good to be held by somebody again, to experience that intimate skin on skin connection, and sleep next to a man I was falling in love with. I couldn’t have asked for a better outcome especially since I was so frightened to bare myself to him.

  I grabbed a bottle of cold water from the fridge and sat down at the kitchen table with my laptop. It was Friday, and I doubted anyone would write me back over the weekend, so this was my last opportunity to apply for more jobs before Monday.

  Tucking my knees up under my chin, I reached around my legs and sifted through my inbox. Great, nothing but rejections. I leaned over, grabbed my purse, and pulled out my notebook that was nearing its last few blank pages. Making my way down through a list of employers, I struck a line through the rejections and circled places I would try next. My life would be so much easier if I could find a job here in town. But despite Yasahiro’s new restaurant and the Midori Sankaku, job growth was slow in this part of the country. Considering how many jobs had been eliminated in Tokyo, job growth was slow for the entire country, not just this area. I had legitimate fears about being able to hold my head above water through the rest of the winter without significant income.

  Sorting through the open tabs on my browser, I navigated the local news for all of the Saitama region. Looked like snow was coming this week! And there were plenty of year-end festivals going on. I scrolled down the page and found a news item about Fujita Takahara’s father passing away in hospital. Oh no. He had said his father was close to death. Though I didn’t like him at all, I felt bad for him. Takahara’s father had been a wealthy man, made his fortune in banking of some sort. Though I was pretty good with small businesses, the stock market and big banking was something I never got into, so I skimmed through that portion of the obituary. Takahara’s mother was deceased too, and that left him the sole heir. Well, I guessed I shouldn’t feel too bad for him. He was coming out of the deal pretty well off.

  I sighed and rubbed my face. It was too bad Yasahiro had this fancy coffee machine that I didn’t know how to work because I really needed some caffeine.

  I spent twenty minutes searching several job websites and submitting my resume for anything remotely like what I used to do. This was a recipe for disaster, though. Hadn’t I already learned my lesson with my last job? I was only good at project managing, and I didn’t have enough experience in straight-up business to apply for business management jobs. I could’ve applied my skills towards being a tour guide or running an office, but that was about it.

  Turning to the next page of my notebook, I found the list I made about Etsuko’s murder suspects and why I thought she was killed. Not surprisingly, the page was mostly blank except for Hisashi’s name at the top. I slipped my pen from the elastic holding it to my notebook and chewed on the eraser. What was it Murata had said about Etsuko? She was always lonely and complained about how empty her apartment felt. I jotted that down on the page and add a question mark. If she was lonely, why didn’t she advertise for a roommate? That’s what most people do. Unless they have something to hide from other people. Then there was the observation that Etsuko traveled often on her small budget. How had a waitress with rent and bills to pay afford to leave the country? Goro had said she paid her bills on time. She must’ve had supplemental income.

  The bedroom door opened and Yasahiro emerged, half asleep and his hair everywhere. I smiled at his shirtless form and baggy pajama pants. Wow. I had sex with that guy last night. My smile broadened.

  “Why didn’t you make coffee?” he asked, rubbing his head and yawning.

  “I don’t know where the coffee is, and I don’t know how to use your machine. I figured I should wait until you got up. That way you could teach me.” I rose from my chair and joined him at the monster machine.

  He hummed and wrapped his arms around me. “I don’t have to teach you anything.” He kissed my neck, and I laughed and squeezed him.

  “I guess I’m lucky that way.” I raised my eyebrows at him and he laughed. “But the coffee machine I’m truly terrified of.”

  “Okay.” He opened the cabinet above the machine and pulled out a bag of beans. “I buy these already ground.” He grabbed a measuring spoon from the drawer, showed me where the grounds went, where the water went, and what buttons to press. Coffee began to appear magically not long afterward.

  We sat across from each other at the kitchen table and sipped quietly, and it was companionable and easy, the kind of relationship I’d been looking for for years. I liked when I could just sit in silence with somebody else. Silence did not always have to be filled with conversation.


  “What do you have planned for today?” he asked, sitting back in his chair.

  “I have to leave in an hour to go help Shigimo-san get to the doctor and pick up his prescriptions. Then I’m free for the rest of the day. But I thought I might come by the restaurant for lunch and then go visit Goro at the police station. I’m hoping he’ll let me talk to Hisashi-san.” I swiped on my phone, sitting next to my computer, and scrolled through the messages from Kumi. “Kumi-chan is taking the day off from the bathhouse, so I’ll call her too.”

  “Okay. Any ideas about Etsuko?” He folded his legs crisscross and sat forward to place his coffee cup on the table. “I’ve been thinking a lot about her especially after the funeral. I hope the police can catch whoever killed her because I don’t believe Hisa-kun did it.”

  “Me neither. Murata-san had some ideas that I thought were interesting. She said Etsuko traveled a lot and often complained about being lonely. That she tried online dating for a while.”

  Yasahiro raised his eyebrows at me, no doubt as dubious about online dating as I was.

  “Yeah. I know, but I heard online dating is getting more popular here.”

  “I was going to try it when I was living in France, but I regularly met so many people, it didn’t matter.”

  “Murata-san said Etsuko and Hisashi broke up for a while a few years ago, and she dated other men at the time. Perhaps she never stopped once she got back together with him, though. So this brings me to my idea. I was going to open accounts on all the local dating websites and see if I can find Etsuko. If I can figure out which sites she was using, Goro can do a search of her computer or email. Maybe she met somebody and something happened? I was thinking that if she had a guy on the side who wanted her to himself, wanted her to dump Hisashi, then that would be motive to kill her if she refused.”

  “It’s worth a shot.” He shrugged his shoulders and sipped.

  “And I’m telling you this now, so you don’t think I’m cheating if you ever see me on a dating website.” I laughed at the absurdity of it.

  “I’ll keep it in mind,” he said, winking at me. “Why don’t you get started on it now?”

  I opened my browser and Googled for Japan online dating websites. Scrolling through the results, I found a blog post on the top five Japan dating websites, clicked on the link, and opened each of the recommended sites. I didn’t have to make it much further than the homepage before I found what I should have been looking for in the first place.

  “Oh my God,” I gasped and covered my mouth with my hands.

  “What?” Yasahiro circled around the table and peered at my laptop.

  I pointed to an advertisement on the page, an advertisement with the logo of two sleeping foxes and text above them that read, “Lonely? Is your bed cold and empty? We have just the man for you.”

  “Ne Kitsune. Etsuko mentioned this more than once according to Murata-san, and she even said it to a man who left her apartment.”

  Yasahiro sat down next to me. “An escort service?”

  I clicked on the link and scrolled through the Ne Kitsune website. “It’s like an escort service. No sex — just some guy who comes and sleeps in your bed with you at night.” I immediately understood the appeal of this. What if you just wanted to sleep with someone without sex? Gone in the morning. No problems or relationship issues. It wasn’t what I wanted out of life, but I got it. I could sympathize.

  Yasahiro shook his head. “I’ve been away from Japan for too long to think this is a good idea.”

  “Well, not if there’s something else going on here.” I bit my lip and scanned through the rest of the page. They didn’t have any real photos of the guys who were on offer, just manga-like drawings and descriptions. That was a fantastic way to protect their identity, but it didn’t help me.

  “You’ll definitely need to go see Goro-san now.” Yasahiro stood up and wrapped his arms around my shoulders. “I’m so glad I met you.”

  “Me too.” I laid my hand on his arm and sank into his warmth for a brief moment.

  “I’ll make us breakfast. Why don’t you shower now while I’m cooking? Then I’ll get ready and take you over to Shigimo-san’s place before I head to the restaurant.”

  I had a sudden flash of showering with him, and I sucked in a breath and closed my eyes against the assault on my heart. I’d save that for another day. Instead, I used the time in the shower to hash out this new development.

  Ne Kitsune, I have you now.

  Chapter Seventeen

  It’d been awhile since I was last at the police station. I burst through the doors, armed with purpose and a fresh idea on what to try next. The police station was so small that only a few staff members kept it occupied at all times. I didn’t recognize the young man at the front desk, but past him in the open desk area, Goro stuffed a large rice ball in his face and stared at a computer monitor.

  “I’m here to see him,” I said, pointing to Goro, and he waved to me.

  “Sign in please.” The young man twirled a clipboard around to me. I wrote my name in, dug through my purse to find my hanko name stamp, stamped the paper, and twirled it back to him.

  The door to the right of the desk buzzed, and I let myself in right past Goro’s partner, Kayo Mitsuwara. She smiled as she looked up from a pile of papers in her arms.

  “Hey, Mei-san. How are you?” Kayo’s hair was matted down but pulled into a bun at the base of her neck. I betted she’d been out all morning with a hat on.

  “I’m good. You?” I bowed and continued with the pleasantries, though small talk like this killed my momentum.

  “Good. It’s freezing out there. Goro-san told me your pipes froze at home. When the weather gets better, I’d be happy to come out to the house and help you thaw them out.”

  I blinked and tried not to cringe. This was as likely a story as any as to why we weren’t living at home.

  “Sure. Thank you for offering.” I bowed again. “It’s been a cold winter.”

  “Are you really living at Suga-san’s apartment now?” She leaned forward, her eyes as wide as her smile. “I’ve heard it’s gorgeous.”

  “Yep.” I rocked on my heels and tried to ignore her eager look. She could’ve easily been drooling.

  “I can’t believe you guys are dating,” she lamented, shaking her head. This time, the rage boiled up from my toes, through my belly, to my chest, and I had to swallow several times to keep it down.

  “No. We’re not dating. We’re just sleeping together,” I deadpanned, but she missed my sarcasm. Sarcasm was a foreign language in Japan, and I only knew it from watching Western TV shows. She blushed and shied away from me, and I immediately felt guilty. “Sorry. Yes, we’re dating. No one seems to believe it. I’m beginning to not believe it.”

  “Forgive me,” she said, bowing.

  “Kayo-san!” Goro growled from the other room. “Why are you holding up Mei-san?”

  She beat a hasty retreat for one of the conference rooms. I tried not to sigh, but I was a horrible person for saying that to her. I should apologize next time I saw her.

  I rounded the corner and sat in the chair next to Goro’s desk. He popped the last of his rice ball into his mouth and chewed. “What were you and Kayo-san talking about?”

  “Nothing. Did you get my email?”

  “Yeah. What’s this Ne Kitsune business? Are you looking to cheat on Yasahiro-san already?” He snapped his fingers, his face lighting up. “Wait. You haven’t really been dating and you’re checking out escort services? What? You want me to vet these people or something?”

  I picked his clipboard up from the table and whacked him over the head with it. Two other people in the room snickered.

  “Eh! What’s the matter? What did I do?”

  I tossed the clipboard onto the desk.

  “I’ve had it with you, with everyone.” I stood up and all the activity in the room paused. “I am dating Yasahiro Suga,” I bellowed out. “We’re living together, and it’s the real t
hing. If you don’t believe me, you can ask him yourself.”

  I looked around at everyone staring at me, frozen, and the back of my neck began to sweat. I should have been more discreet but I’d had it. A phone rang and everyone unglued, returning to their tasks. I sat down in a lump.

  “Sorry,” he said, obviously not sorry, before he laughed and rolled his eyes. “Wait till I tell Yasa-kun about this.”

  I reached forward and grabbed his shirt. “You tell Yasa-kun I did this, and I swear I will prank you till the day you die.”

  He swallowed, his face paling. I loved a good challenge and he knew this. I would make his life miserable if he breathed a word of this to Yasahiro. “Okay, Mei-chan.”

  “Now…” I let go of his shirt and smoothed out my own. “Ne Kitsune is an escort service. No sex. They hire out men to come and sleep with women at night if they’re lonely. Murata-san said she heard Etsuko-san mention them more than once. Don’t you remember this? It should be in your notes.”

  “Really?” He opened up his browser and navigated to the website. “So I should be looking into them.” He scrolled until he found the contact information and wrote down the address in his notebook. “They’re located in Kokubunji, west of Tokyo. It’ll be a drive, but I should go visit in person. They won’t talk to me over the phone.”

  A wave of relief crashed over me. I was glad he could drop the joking around quickly enough to get to work. I pulled out my phone and went to my email. “Just to start the process, I opened an account with them and they’re doing a background check on me now.”

  “What?” He pulled away from looking at the email. “I’m not sure that’s safe. What if one of these guys is the killer?”

  “I plan to meet him in a public place the first time, and I’ll let you know how it goes after that.”

  He glanced between me and the computer. “Does Yasa-kun know about this?”

  A little lie. “Yeah. He looked at the website with me.” He didn’t know I was going to meet anyone yet. I thought I’d have him tag along somehow, have him watch from a distant location, but I wanted to wait until the details were figured out. “Anyway, they said they’d reply to me tonight, but I’ll set something up soon. Maybe Monday night.”