Record of a Night too Brief

by Hiromi Kawakami

  “Ten Indian rosewood with agate spacer beads.”

  “Seven single strands of clear crystal.”

  “Twelve strands of sandalwood.”

  I would give the memos to Nishiko, who would transfer the information to the ledger. It was the way they had done it in the old days.

  “Do you think we might use a computer, Miss Sanada?” Mr Kosuga would sometimes say. “We don’t need one—our turnover is too small,” Nishiko would reply, and Mr Kosuga would immediately agree and the subject would be dropped. But he would pick it up again shortly. “Wouldn’t using a computer make things easier, Miss Sanada?” The subject never went any further.

  At midday, Mr Kosuga returned to the shop with a box again. Something was moving around inside it, frantically, again. Nishiko went to put the box in the storeroom. Half the inventory had been accounted for, and she decided we could do the rest tomorrow.

  I set off to buy some cakes to have with our tea. Mr Kosuga came out after me.

  “Miss Sanada, let’s go to a cafe. Don’t bother buying anything today.”

  As I sat opposite Mr Kosuga in a cafe by the station, I remembered how we had sat like this together before, that time in the motorway service area, on the way back from the temple in Kōfu.

  “Is that snake still living with you?” he enquired, as I had expected he would.

  “Mmm… sort of.”

  The snake had settled in comfortably in my place. Maybe I felt grateful now for the way my dinner would be cooked and ready to eat when I got back in the evenings. I had never minded returning at night to a dark apartment, but once you try living with someone, I could see, you do get thoroughly used to it.

  Mr Kosuga put talk of my snake aside. “There’s something I’d like to tell you.”

  And this is what he said:

  “We have had, as a matter of fact, a snake living with us now for, well, it must be more than twenty years. She seems to have come along with Nishiko—she claims to be her aunt. At first I did everything I could to get rid of her, she was a nuisance, she gave me an unpleasant feeling. But I couldn’t, in the end. Somehow, every time I tried, some twist of fate, something, would always happen—a relative would suddenly be on the verge of death, things between Nishiko and me would get out of joint, one of us would get an injury. A Shinto priest even came and conducted a purification ceremony, but he said there was no sign of an evil spirit haunting us. So even after we had an exorcism, the snake was still hanging around. After a while, her presence came to seem almost natural, and I managed not to let her bother me. But, recently, she seems close to death, and she can no longer take human form—or if she does, it’s only for brief periods. She just lies there, insisting that we cater to her every need. She won’t eat anything but freshly killed birds and frogs. Today I went out and bought some birds to feed her. I don’t understand Nishiko. ‘Just throw her out,’ I tell her. But she shakes her head obstinately, and carries on feeding her, happily. This isn’t the woman I thought I married. It’s scary.”

  Mr Kosuga rubbed his forehead three times.

  “I mean it. It’s scary,” he said.

  What exactly was he referring to? It did sound a little scary, it was true, but whether it was the snake or something in Nishiko that scared him, probably even Mr Kosuga would have found it hard to say. Those words of my snake flashed in my mind. “You’re always playing the innocent, aren’t you, Hiwako, dear.”

  At the cafe, Mr Kosuga asked for fluffy pancakes, and I ordered a slice of pear charlotte. We stayed for about an hour, and then returned to the Kanakana-Dō.

  The woman tapped me on the shoulder. When I glanced around, she leant forward and rubbed her face against mine. Her cheek was very cold. I felt a sense of completeness—like when you hug a pet, or when you’re snug under a covering. The woman wrapped her arms tightly around me. Her arms, too, were quite cold, and I noticed the flesh on her fingertips seemed to have become a little reptilian. But it didn’t put me off that she was reverting to her snake form. If anything, it put me at ease. If there had been nothing snakelike about her and she had coiled herself around me in her human form, I would have had much more difficulty. She and I were exactly the same height. We formed a perfect pair, our arms tightly wrapped around each other’s body.

  As we coiled, she said:

  “Hiwako, dear, it’s so cosy and comfortable in the snake world…”

  I nodded, and she continued:

  “Hiwako, dear, wouldn’t you like to come over?”

  Shaking my head, I gently extracted myself from her embrace.

  The snake world didn’t hold much appeal for me. Perhaps sensing this, the snake stopped coiling round me, backing off, and sitting in front of me, hugging her knees with her arms.

  “Have you ever been betrayed, Hiwako, dear?” she asked, looking up at me seductively.

  To be betrayed, you probably first have to be deeply involved. Had I been deeply involved with anything in my life?

  I could recall a number of times when I’d been close to people, men, women, sometimes emotionally, sometimes physically, and also a certain period of time when I’d had some sort of conflict with someone, though I couldn’t really remember whom, in a place where I had gone in to work every day. But I hadn’t ever been deeply involved. Maybe there were times that might have counted as involvement and I was unconsciously trying to forget them. But if I could forget them, they probably didn’t mean that much.

  “I don’t remember.”

  At this, the woman opened her mouth wide and laughed.

  I waited for her to ask something else, but she didn’t. Instead, she slithered up to the ceiling. Staring down at me, she called out, “Hiwako, dear! Hiwako, dear!” and reverted to her snake form.

  And she kept on calling out: “Hiwako, dear! Hiwako, dear!” That voice of hers would not stop. It reverberated unceasingly in my ears, merging with a swishing sound. The sound of a snake’s scales rubbing up against each other. “Hiwako, dear! Hiwako, dear!” Shu-ru-ru-RUUU, shu-ru-ru-RUU.

  A strange, unearthly sound. Like the sound of a strong wind blowing at night.

  Arriving at the shop one morning, I found Nishiko sitting idly gazing into space.

  The pavement in front of the shop had been sprinkled with water, the saucers with salt heaped even higher than usual, and the interior thoroughly dusted and cleaned.

  Mr Kosuga was nowhere to be seen.

  “Good morning,” I said.

  “Oh, it’s you, Miss Sanada.” Nishiko’s voice was like that of a person who has been adrift at sea and only just made it back to dry land. Something was at her feet. There was a slight sense of a presence.

  “I opened up the shop early today,” she continued, in the same listless voice.

  “What time was that?”

  “Oh, I suppose four or so.”

  Suppressing my surprise, I took a step back, and a bamboo basket beside her on the floor came into view. The presence was inside it.

  “Somehow I couldn’t sleep. These days it takes ages to get light in the mornings. I got bored lying there in the dark.”

  So she had come in at four o’clock, opened the shutter, turned on the lights, and then busied herself quietly in the shop? And when she’d got tired of that, she’d just sat there completely motionless, staring out into the darkness?

  “Has Mr Kosuga gone out?”

  “You tell me. He hasn’t come into the shop yet. He’s probably still sleeping. Recently, he’s been sleeping like a log. All he ever does is sleep. I sometimes wonder whether he’ll ever wake up.”

  Her tone was oddly cold. Whatever was inside the basket stirred.

  “Er…” I hesitated.

  Nishiko looked up. Her eyes were two shining spots. Narrow slits at first, they gradually widened, protruding, swelling. They were brimming with tears.

  “That basket. What’s in it?”

  Nishiko’s eyes were getting bigger and bigger. Now they seemed almost to be bursting, half out of
their sockets, the pupils surrounded by white. But in the next instant, all returned to normal.

  “That?” she said. “Oh, just a basket.”

  Once more her eyes started to protrude. Her eyeballs seemed to have taken on a life of their own, and were expanding with speed.

  “There’s a snake in there, isn’t there?”

  “Want to look?” The moment she said the word “look” her eyeballs went back to normal.

  The atmosphere in the shop was definitely peculiar today. Where on earth was Mr Kosuga? Was he really simply lazing lethargically about… or sleeping like a log?

  Nishiko lifted the lid of the basket. Inside was a large blue-black snake, limp as if dead.

  I gasped. With that, the snake raised its head and stared at me with shining eyes that resembled Nishiko’s.

  Nishiko had a slight smile on her face. And then she said this to me:

  “That’s right, it’s a snake. I heard you have one in your place too, Miss Sanada. That’s rather unfriendly of you, not to have told me. So, you’re a snake person too. I’m sort of relieved to know it. It makes me like you better. You know, I might seem like a mild-mannered woman, but the truth is that, when it comes to people, I have extreme likes and dislikes. I bet that surprises you, doesn’t it, Miss Sanada? To you I was simply someone who puts salt in the saucers every day, who threads together the prayer beads, and who many years ago eloped—someone who is basically irrelevant to you. You don’t like me particularly, nor dislike me. You just wanted to continue with your happy, humdrum life. But you know, when I take a liking to someone, I take a strong liking. Look at my husband: I was once madly in love with him. But he no longer loves me. He thought he liked me, perhaps loved me, changed his mind, changed his mind again, then changed his mind three more times, and now finally he finds he dislikes me. But even amid his feelings of dislike, he has a few patches of attraction. That’s what makes him so unwell. That’s why all he does is sleep.”

  As Nishiko talked on in a low voice, the snake glided its way over the edge of the basket, got into her lap, then draped itself over her shoulders.

  “What’s your snake like, Miss Sanada? I want to know all about it. My own snake, you know—well, she’s about to take leave of this world. How will I endure life without her? How can something die, when I love it so much? At one time I wanted to become a snake. I wish now I had taken the chance. My snake did ask me to go over. I’m sure your snake asks you to go over too. Snakes will keep asking you, again and again. But I refused each time. I guess I thought it would be unnatural. Not that I know well what natural is. So my snake must have resigned herself. Eventually, she gave up asking. I’ve lost track of how long ago that was. If I were asked now, of course I’d say yes. I’m sure it’s lovely in the snake world. All warm, with nothing to make you feel different. The kind of place you can relax into, and sleep on and on. Why haven’t you gone over, Miss Sanada? It must be so cosy and comfortable…”

  Cosy and comfortable. Nishiko’s voice reminded me of that of the woman in my apartment. Her voice was utterly different in quality, but they seemed to come from the same source. After a while, I lost track of whether I was in the shop or in my apartment. Of course, in reality I knew where I was and that it was Nishiko, talking away in her tremulous voice, Nishiko, telling me her thoughts. But I longed to swallow what she was saying, swallow it whole. Maybe if I did that, I would be able to go straight over. Over to the snake world, where I could pretend I knew nothing, and just sleep on and on…

  A chill ran up my spine as I realized what I was thinking.

  Nishiko’s eyes were no longer distended. They were back to the shape they were normally. The snake was coiling about her body, droopingly, almost lifelessly. Soon Nishiko stopped talking, and the Kanakana-Dō returned to the way it always was. The snake’s scales were jagged and rough.

  Speaking of snakes, there’s something I’ve often thought about.

  It has to do with being intimate, skin-to-skin, with another person. The first time I bring my body close to another person’s, I cannot close my eyes. The person’s arms wrap around my body, my hands entwine with theirs, and together we are on the verge of feeling that we’re losing our human form. Only, I will be unable to let go of mine. I remain locked within my human body, unable, despite all efforts, to get to that point. If I could close my eyes, I would be able to sink into the other person, merge my form with theirs. But my eyes will not close.

  All I can do is watch, eyes open, while the other person moves, or resists me, or submits to what I desire.

  If, after the first time, we bring our bodies together a number of times, little by little my eyes will droop, the taut outer layer of my skin will start to loosen, and very slowly, it begins to happen. I reach the point when, without having to try, without even having to think about trying, I am almost there.

  And then, just when I am on the cusp, I see the other person change into a snake, for an instant. The change doesn’t happen to me. It happens to the other person—whoever it is that I am skin-to-skin with. It can be a red snake, a blue snake, a grey snake—a snake of any colour.

  This is how it always is. Some people I have stopped getting close to at too early a stage for them to turn into snakes. But anybody I have been with for any length of time has turned into a snake once. Why do they make the change, while I don’t? Perhaps I do turn into a snake, in fact, while they are having their snake moment. But I remember so vividly the horror I feel when I see the person I am with make their change. Surely, I would never feel like that if I had become a snake myself.

  The woman in my apartment takes the form of a snake every night. And with her, I feel no horror. Was she referring to this when she teased me for “playing the innocent”? Was this what she meant when she urged me, making that shu-ru-ru-RUU sound, to stop putting on my act and come over and join her in the snake world?

  Mr Kosuga was starting to look thin and pale.

  One day I glanced at him from behind, opening the doors of the Buddhist family altar. It was as if I was viewing him through a ripple of hot air. I could almost see the rosewood of the door through him.

  “Mr Kosuga!” I exclaimed.

  “What?” he said, turning round. He looked a bit like a featureless ghost: the colour had quite drained out of his eyes, nose, and lips.

  “Is something the matter?” I asked.

  Mr Kosuga looked puzzled. And then he asked me in his turn: “Miss Sanada, isn’t your colour strangely dark today?”

  Moving away from the altar, he came over to me and gave my lower jaw a few strokes with the palm of his hand. He might as well have been petting an animal.

  “You’ve changed, Miss Sanada,” he said, stroking my jaw a bit more. “There’s a prickliness in the air all around you.”

  On the day Nishiko had been sitting there with her snake, she remained in the shop till evening. Mr Kosuga hadn’t made an appearance at all. Not one customer came into the shop, and Nishiko and her snake continued to sit, not making a single movement. I spent the day doing odd tasks, finishing up what was left to take of the inventory, noting the accounts, as Nishiko had instructed me, in an old ledger. No sign of life came from Nishiko or the snake. As the hours passed, they came to seem more and more like some sort of statue.

  When closing time came, Nishiko rose, unsteadily, and took an envelope that she’d apparently prepared beforehand out of the bosom of her kimono. “Your bonus,” she said, and handed it to me.

  I took the envelope, bowed my thanks, and asked whether I should close up the shop. Nishiko nodded absently, as if she didn’t care one way or the other. Conscious of their two presences, I locked up, turned off the lights, except for the one in the area where they sat, and prepared to leave. Sitting there in a pool of light, Nishiko and the snake were once again like a statue. This might be the last time I ever see her, I thought as I left.

  And she did stop coming into the shop after that.

  “How is Nishiko doing these da
ys?” I asked Mr Kosuga.

  “Well, a lot better than she was. She still can’t walk properly, though. The doctor says she should try to get up, move about. But she says she doesn’t want to.”

  The day after Nishiko and her snake had sat like a statue, Mr Kosuga informed me that Nishiko had suffered an injury. She had been going upstairs with the snake draped around her, when she lost her footing and tumbled down the stairs.

  “The snake was crushed to death underneath her,” he told me, in a flat tone of voice. “She’s now in the garden. I asked Nishiko where she wanted her buried, and she told me somewhere close by.”

  He rolled his head helplessly a few times, and with a small grunt hoisted a box of prayer beads onto his shoulder. Single-stranded oval bodhi seeds, bound for a nearby temple—they were the last beads Nishiko had threaded. I remembered how with her usual total absorption she had strung them together, her legs tucked under her, on a raised section of the floor.

  “I’m wondering whether Nishiko is now going to die,” Mr Kosuga said.

  Shocked, I looked at him. He was even paler than before, and seemed quite lacking in energy.

  “You can’t mean that.”

  “It’d be a terrible loss if she did,” Mr Kosuga said, rubbing his forehead in his usual manner.

  The smell of incense was suddenly strong, and the air seemed to throb with energy. It was as if several invisible creatures, foxes perhaps, had just dashed through the shop. Mr Kosuga rubbed his forehead again.

  “It’d be a terrible loss. I really don’t want her to die,” he muttered, though to whom I wasn’t sure, then adjusted the position of the box, and walked out the door.

  That day, left to my own devices, I made tea, ordered myself a deluxe bowl of tempura on rice for lunch, and when I was not attending to customers, I wrote entries in the ledger. From time to time, I thought about my snake.