Autumn Winds

Standing still, As I think of things, The stories of all things

—Ikuta Choukou

Say, what kind of story should I write? I live in a flood of stories. I should’ve become an actor. I can even picture the expression I wear in my sleep.

Even if I die, there will be someone to apply the adorning makeup on my lifeless face, someone to grieve for me. That would probably be K.

K is two years older than me, making her thirty-two as of now.

Let us talk about K, shall we?

K isn’t related to me, not by blood, although she had been over at my place a lot when we were little, so she is like family to me. And the K now, like me, wishes to have never been born. Within ten years of one’s birth, one could have seen all the most beautiful things in this world. No matter when one dies then, there would be no regrets. However, K is living. She lives for her children. And besides that, she lives for me.

“K, don’t you hate me?”

“Yes,” K nods solemnly. “I sometimes wish you’d die.”

Many of my relatives are deceased. My eldest sister died when she was twenty-six. My father died at fifty-three. My youngest brother died at sixteen. My third brother died at twenty-seven. This year, my second-eldest sister died at thirty-four. My nephew died at twenty-five, and my cousin at twenty-one, both of whom were close to me, and whom as of this year, had passed away.

If there is any reason that you must die, please tell me; and though I probably can’t do anything, we can talk about it together. Even if it’s only a sentence a day. Even if it’s only for one month, or for two. Come travel with me. And if you still cannot find a way to live, even then, no, you must not die alone. When that time comes, all of us, we’ll all die together. Those that are left behind are too pitiful. You, do you know, how deep the love of the abandoned goes?

And so, K is living.

In late autumn this year, wearing a plaid flat cap, I visited K. I whistled three times, and K, gently opening the wooden door at the back, came out.

“How much?”

“It’s not about money.”

K inspected my face.

“You wanted to die?”

“I guess.”

K lightly bit her lower lip.

“It’s like around this time every year, you just can’t go on. I wonder if it’s the weather. You didn’t wear a coat? Oh, my, no shoes either.”

“It’s fashion.”

“Who told you that?”

I sighed and said, “Nobody.”

K also sighed a little.

“Whoever says that can’t possibly be a good man.”

I smiled.

“I want to go travel with K.”

K gave a rigid nod.

I knew it. Hey, see, I knew it. K brought me with her. She wouldn’t let such a kid die.

At midnight that day, the two of us boarded the train. As the train began to move, both K and I felt somewhat relieved at last.

“How’s the book coming along?”

“I’m not writing it.”

The train enveloped in total darkness went, clickety-clack, clickety-clack, clickety-clack.

“Cigarette?”

One by one, K took out three kinds of foreign cigarettes from her handbag.

I wrote about something like this once. The protagonist, who sought his death, smoked a fragrant, expensive foreign cigarette as he was about to end his life, and for the faint joy he got from it, he chose not to die; so the story went like that. K knew about it.

My face turned red. Even so, pretending to be composed, I took the time to try each of the three kinds of cigarettes, one by one, with no favoritism.

In Yokohama, K bought some sandwiches.

“You don’t want one?”

K, being deliberately unmannered, devoured her sandwich for me to see.

I, too, loosened up and took one. It tasted salty.

“I feel as though if I say even a single word, it would bring everyone pain, an unnecessary kind of pain; so I’d rather stay silent and smile, maybe that’d be better, but I’m a writer, and writers don’t get to go about their lives without saying anything; it’s truly troublesome. I can’t even admire a flower properly. I cannot simply admire its faint fragrance. I’d suddenly pluck it with my hand, place it in my palm, rip off its petals, then knead it all into a mess, tearing up, then put it between my lips and chew on it and spit it out, trample it under my feet, then find that I’d failed to contain myself. I want to kill myself. I might not even be human. I honestly do think that these days. Maybe I’m, I don’t know, Satan. The Killing Stone. Poison mushroom. No, don’t say I’m Yoshida Goten. I’m a man, after all.”

“Is that so?” K looks at me, her expression stern.

“K, you hate me. You hate how perfect I am. Ahh, I see. K believes in my strength. You’ve bought into my brilliance. And so, my efforts, the efforts of a fool, are the concern of none. It’s like an onion, you peel and peel it, in the end, there’s not a single thing. Surely there must be something, that’s what I believed, so I got another onion and peeled and peeled and peeled it, and then there’s nothing; it would quite sadden a monkey, you know? To randomly love everybody who’s right around the corner is to love nobody at all.”

K tugs at my sleeve. My voice was comparably loud amidst the passengers.

I laughed and said, “My fate lies here, too.”

Yugawara. We got off the train.

“The ‘nothing’ you said, that was a lie,” said K as she put on the inn’s wool coat. “Look, the pattern on this coat, these blue stripes, aren’t they pretty?”

“Yeah.” I was tired. “Just then, were you talking about the onions?”

“Sure.” Having changed, K sat down next to me. “You don’t believe in the present. What about this moment, then, this very moment right now?”

K’s carefree smile is like that of a young girl as she looks at me.

“Moments are the wrongdoing of nobody. They’re the responsibility of nobody. That I know.” I sit steadily on my mattress like a bureaucrat with my arms folded. “However, they are not enough to make up the joy of life for me. Only the purity in the moment of death can be believed. But a moment of worldly joy—”

“The responsibility of what comes after, you’re scared of that, no?”

K mildly teased.

“I can’t put an end to it, I can’t. Fireworks fade in a moment, but the human body doesn’t die, remaining hideously forever. If at the moment of seeing such beautiful light, our bodies would burn and burn until there’s nothing left, that would be redeeming, except it’s not the case.”

“You’re a stubborn one.”

“Ahh, seriously, words are despicable. Whatever questions you have about moments, just go ask the ephemeralists. They’ll guide you by hand. Everyone’s boastful of their own methods. It’s to add some flavor to life. To live in memories, or in devotion to the present moment, or—in hope of the future, whatever it is, maybe that’s the way human idiocy and wisdom differ.”

“Are you an idiot, then?”

“Come on, K. I’m not idiotic or wise. We’re even worse than those.”

“Tell me!”

“Bourgeois.”

And bourgeois in dejection at that. They live in the memories of their wrongdoings. Both of us, with our enthusiasm very much gone, took our towels and headed for the public bath downstairs.

We didn’t speak of the past, nor of tomorrow. Just like that, with only the present moment, the present moment filled with compassion, K and I set off on our journey. We didn’t speak of the matters at home. We didn’t speak of the pains of our bodies. We didn’t speak of the dread of tomorrow. We didn’t speak of our incomprehension of human beings. We didn’t speak of the shame of the bygone days. Thus, in this moment, at least for this one moment, we could have peace, while contemplating, as we both bathed.

“K, you see that scar over here on my stomach? That’s an appendectomy scar.”

K, like a mother, gently chuckled.

“K’s legs are quite long, but look at mine, aren’t they pretty long too? I can’t even wear non-tailored trousers. I’m an inconvenient man in every way.”

K looked out the dark window.

“Say, I wonder if there’s such a thing as good misfortunes.”

“Good misfortunes,” I also mumbled dazedly.

“Is that rain?” K suddenly hears.

“It’s the stream. See, it flows right beneath us. In the morning, there’d be red leaves everywhere outside the bathhouse windows. To think there’s such a tall mountain standing right under your nose—you’d be amazed.”

“Do you sometimes come here?”

“Not really. Just once.”

“To die?”

“That’s right.”

“Have you gone sightseeing here?”

“I haven’t.”

“What about tonight?” K deliberately asks.

I laugh. “So that’s the ‘good misfortune’ K was talking about, is it? So that’s what it’s about. But I’m still—”

“What?”

I said firmly, “I thought you wanted to die with me.”

“Ah,” this time, K laughed. “There are bad fortunes, too.”

On the long stairway of the bathhouse, step after step, as I slowly went up one by one—good misfortunes, bad fortunes, good misfortunes, bad fortunes, good misfortunes, bad fortunes…

We called a geisha.

“If the two of us stay together, there’s the danger of a double suicide, so please do not sleep tonight and look after us. Should Death come, chase it away for us,” K said earnestly.

“I understand. If it really comes to that, let’s commit a triple suicide instead,” answers the geisha.

We began playing a game in which a twisted string of paper is lit, and before the flame goes out, one must name an object of the chosen category and pass it on. Entirely useless things. Go.

“Getas chipped on one side.”

“Horses that can’t walk.”

“Broken shamisens.”

“Cameras that don’t take pictures.”

“Light bulbs that don’t work.”

“Planes that can’t fly.”

“And there’s…”

“Hurry up, hurry up.”

“Facts.”

“Eh?”

“Facts.”

“How foolish. Well, then, endurance.”

“Getting difficult, isn’t it? Labor, for me.”

“Aspirations.”

“Decadence.”

“The weather two days ago.”

“Me,” said K.

“Me.”

“Well then, me too—me.” The fire went out. The geisha lost.

“Indeed, it’s quite difficult.” The geisha could finally relax.

“K, you’ve got to be joking. Facts, aspirations, even yourself; entirely useless? You must be joking. For men like me, as long as we’re alive, we’d want to somehow live a decent life. K is honestly an idiot.”

“You’re welcome to go home.” K became serious, too. “Do you just want everyone to see your stuck-up self and your stuck-up suffering?”

The geisha’s beauty was no longer beautiful.

“I’m going back. I’m going back to Tokyo. Give me the money. I’m going back.” I stood up, taking off my coat.

K, seeing my face, cried. Even when her smile just then still lingered, she cried.

I didn’t want to go back. Nobody was stopping me. Fine, die, go die. I changed into a kimono and put on my socks.

Getting out of the inn. Running away.

I stopped atop of the bridge, watching the white stream flowing through the valley beneath. I thought, I’m such an idiot. Idiot, idiot, I thought.

“Sorry.” K was quietly standing behind me.

“Even in terms of sympathy, enough is enough.” I teared up.

After returning to the inn, two beds had already been laid out. I took a dose of Veronal and soon pretended to have fallen asleep. Not long after, K softly stood up and took a dose of the same medicine.

We remained drowsily asleep until late noon the next day. K woke up first and opened the window in the corridor. It was raining.

I woke up too; without speaking to K, I went down to the bathhouse by myself.

Last night was last night. Last night was last night—I tried desperately to persuade myself, swimming around in the spacious bathtub.

I got out of the bathtub and opened the window, watching the winding white stream flow by.

A hand is suddenly placed on my back. K stood there, naked.

“A wagtail.” K pointed at a hopping bird on a rock on the opposite side of the stream. “And to think that wagtails were compared to walking sticks, those nonsensical poets. They’re so much tougher and so much braver; see, they aren’t troubled by humans at all.”

I also thought so.

K slid into the bathtub.

“Such show-offs these red leaves are.”

“Last night—” I stuttered.

“You slept well?” asked K insouciantly, her eyes as clear as the water of a lake.

I dived into the hot bathtub with a splash. “As long as K’s alive, I won’t die, alright?”

“What about bourgeois, is that a bad thing?”

“I think it’s bad. Loneliness, anguish, gratitude; those are all their interests. They’re self absorbed. They live solely for pride.”

“Only concerning themselves over the standpoints of others”—K got out of the bathtub with a swash, quickly drying her body with a towel—“maybe that’s because it’s where their own body exists.”

“The rich go to Heaven—” just as I spoke those jokingly words, the towel whipped me with a crack. “The happiness of ordinary people seems so hard to find.”

K drank black tea in the salon.

Perhaps due to the rain, the salon was bustling with liveliness.

“I hope this trip ends without troubles.” I sat alongside K next to a window, through which the mountain could be seen. “I want to give K a gift.”

“Crucifix,” murmured K, her slim neck appearing frail.

“Ah, milk, thanks,” I told the waitress. “K, are you still mad at me? Last night, the things I said about going back and whatnot, that was just for show. I’m—maybe possessed by the stage or something. If I go one day without such an act of deceit, I’d get anxious. I wouldn’t be able to live. Even now that I’m sitting right here, I’m keeping up this act to the death.”

“Even when you’re in love?”

“There were nights when I fell out of love because I was concerned about the hole in my sock.”

“Say, my face, how is it?” K sincerely neared her face to me.

“How is what?” I frowned.

“Is it pretty?” she asked like a stranger. “Do I look young?”

I felt like punching her.

“K, are you just that lonely? K, remember who you are. K is a kind wife, a caring mother; I’m a scoundrel, the worst of all.”

“Only you—” just as she spoke, the waitress came with the milk. “Ah, thanks.”

“Misery is one’s freedom,” I said, sipping the hot milk. “Joy, too, is one’s freedom.”

“But I’m not free. I’m not either way.”

I let out a long sigh.

“K, there are about five or six men at the back. Which one do you like?”

Four people that looked like servants were playing Mahjong. Two middle-aged men read newspapers while drinking whiskey soda.

“The one in the middle,” mumbles K slowly, gazing at the flowing mist caressing the faces of the mountains.

“Chrysanthemums are quite difficult, aren’t they?” K had quite a respectable position in a certain school of ikebana.

“Ah, familiar, so familiar. His profile is just like Akisuke’s. A Hamlet.” That brother of mine died at twenty-seven. He did quite a lot of sculpting.

“Well, I didn’t know that many other men anyway,” said K, embarrassed.

Newspaper extras.

The waitress went and gave everybody a copy—eighty-ninth day since the conflict began. Shanghai was surrounded. The enemy force fell apart and fully retreated.

K glanced at the extra.

“You are?”

“Group C in the Division.”

“And I’m an A,” K laughed loud enough to startle me. “I wasn’t looking at the mountains. There, see, I’m looking at the shapes of the raindrops before our eyes. Every one of them has its uniqueness. There are ones that fall proudly with a splatter, ones that impatiently fall in thin drizzles, ones that fall pretentiously with a loud plop, ones that dully, softly fall, drifting in the wind—”

K and I were both exhausted. That day, by the time we’d left Yugawara and reached Atami, the streets were wrapped in the evening mist, with every house’s lights dimly flickering, creating quite an unsettling sensation.

Having arrived at the inn, we decided to go for a stroll before dinner, so we borrowed two umbrellas from the inn and went to see the sea. The waves in the rain proceeded lazily and broke into cold splashes. They carried an uncompassionate, careless feeling.

By the time we went back and saw the streets, there were but loosely scattered lights.

“When I was little,” K stopped and spoke. “I used to poke little holes in postcards with a needle and look through them at a lamp, and all the western-style buildings and forests and battleships in the postcards were gilded in beautiful illumination—do you still remember?”

“That kind of scenery,” I said, deliberately feigning ignorance. “I’ve seen them on projectors. Everything’s kind of hazy.”

We paced slowly along the coastline. “It’s cold. If only I’d taken a hot bath before coming out; that’d be nice.”

“There’s nothing else we really want now, is there?”

“Indeed, we’d gotten everything from our fathers.”

“And when you felt like you wanted to die—” K knelt down to brush the mud off her feet. “That, I understand.”

“Us,” we were like naive twelve, thirteen year olds. “Why can’t we live independently? Even if it means becoming a fisherman, that’s fine with me.”

“Nobody would allow us to do that. Everyone’s so caring that it gets a little too much to bear.”

“Exactly, K. Say, me, I just want to do some mundane things, but then everyone would laugh at me—” My eyes landed on a fisherman. “I wish to be a fisherman for life and live like a fool.”

“You can’t. You wouldn’t be able to comprehend the feelings of a fish.”

The two of us laughed.

“You should know already, no? I am Satan. The people I fall in love with always turn out ruined in the end.”

“I don’t think so. Nobody actually hates you. Always pretending to be the villain.”

“So you’re saying I’m naive?”

“Precisely; just like this stone monument of Omiya.” On the side of the road stands the stone monument of the Golden Yaksha.

“Let’s talk about the simplest thing there is, then. K, I’m serious about this. All right? I—”

“No! I know what you’re going to say.”

“Really?”

“I know everything. I also know I’m my father’s mistress’ daughter.”

“K. We—”

“Ah, watch out.” K stood in front of me.

The bus’ wheels snatched K’s crackling umbrella, then K herself; and just like the diving of a swimmer, a straight, white line drags out below the wheels that rolled like the waves.

“Stop the bus! Stop the bus!”

I felt as though I was hit in the head with a bat, utterly enraged. I stepped forcefully towards the side of the vehicle that had finally stopped. K was lying beneath the bus with the beauty of a rain-beaten bellflower. She was an unfortunate woman.

“Don’t touch her!”

I held the unconscious K in my arms, sobbing aloud.

I carried K on my back to a nearby hospital. K whispered through her tears, “it hurts, it hurts”.

K stayed for two days in the hospital; her family members came in a rush for her, and brought her home in their car. I took the train home, alone.

K’s injury didn’t seem to be too severe. She got better day by day.

Three days ago, I went to Shimbashi to get some things done, and took a walk around Ginza on my return. Behind the display window of a certain shop, I saw a silver crucifix, but instead of buying it, I purchased a bronze ring from the shelf. That night, in my pocket I only had a bit of money that I’d just gotten from the magazine company. On the bronze ring is a daffodil made from yellow stone. I sent it to K.

In return, K sent me a photograph of her eldest daughter, who is three years old. I got the photograph this morning.