Koji Suzuki - Loop

"Do you know Komatsuzaki?"

"No." Kaoru had never heard this name.

"He joined the Loop project after me."

"Oh?"

"He's dead, too."

Kaoru swallowed hard. Death's shadow was creeping ever closer to his father.

Hideyuki proceeded to list three more names, summing up with a simple "They're all dead."

"Doesn't it make you wonder what's going on?" he continued. "All those names I mentioned belonged to people I worked with on the artificial life project, or who were at least connected with it in some way."

"And all of them died from MHC?"

"How many people in Japan have been infected with this virus?"

"About a million, maybe?" That included people like Reiko and Kaoru's mother who had been infected but hadn't yet gotten sick.

"That's a whole lot, but it's still no more than one percent of the population. Whereas, me, I don't know anybody who's not infected."

Hideyuki cast a sharp glance at Kaoru; at first he seemed to be searching Kaoru's soul, but then his expression relaxed into one of prayer.

"You're okay, right?"

Hideyuki brought a hand out from under his sheet and touched Kaoru's knee through his jeans. No doubt he wanted to hold his son's hand, but was afraid of skin-on-skin contact. With his wife already infected, all it would take to rob Hideyuki of the will to fight the cancer would be knowing that Kaoru had contracted the virus too.

Kaoru averted his eyes from his father's weakening gaze.

"Were there any problems with the test results?"

Kaoru felt like his father could look right through him, but he forced himself to speak through his fear. "I told you there's nothing to worry about." True, two months ago his test results had been negative, but there was no telling what next month's test would reveal.

Kaoru turned away, pretending to be reacting to the sound of footsteps in the corridor. He flashed back to the scene in Ryoji's room yesterday afternoon; the mental images brought with them stirrings of the blood and of the flesh, resurrecting the sensory fluctuations that had rocked his body.

The evening before last, he'd been forced to limit his contact with Reiko to kissing. They'd been in a hallway, and they'd only been vouchsafed a few minutes. Considering they were in a hospital, it was about as much as they had any right to hope for.

The next afternoon-yesterday-he'd gone back to Ryoji's sickroom to retrieve the pathology textbook he'd left there, and he arrived just after Ryoji had been taken off to Radiology for some tests. Kaoru hadn't known it was time for his tests; Reiko hadn't told him. But to all appearances it looked as if he'd timed his visit to coincide with the boy's absence.

He knocked softly, and immediately Reiko opened the door, but just a crack. Her face was wet and she was holding a towel-she must have been washing her face when he knocked. There was a sink next to the door, and the ten-watt fluorescent bulb above it was lit. She'd been taking off her makeup there, rather than in the bathroom.

Patting her face with the towel, she spoke in a quiet, controlled voice.

"You forgot something yesterday."

"Sorry, I should have called first." Kaoru lowered his voice in response. There was no sign of Ryoji.

"Come in."

She took his hand and guided him into the room, then shut the door. They stood in front of the sink, in front of the mirror, facing each other. She finished wiping her face. She was letting Kaoru see her features unadorned by cosmetics.

There were crows' feet around her eyes, appropriate to her age, but they only made her look more attractive to him.

A partition stood between them and Ryoji's empty bed; Kaoru nodded toward it, as if to ask why he wasn't in it.

"The nurse just took him away."

"Tests?"

"Yes."

"What kind?" "

"A scintigram," she said in a shaky tone that suggested she was unfamiliar with the word.

A scintigram, a precursor to chemotherapy, took two hours at a minimum, since it involved injecting a contrast medium into the subject's veins. Nobody would be coming in until the test was finished. For that brief interval, Reiko and Kaoru had been left with a private room all to themselves.

With Ryoji's test regimen reaching this point, Reiko found herself face to face with the prospect of her son entering chemotherapy. She was dejected. A bitter battle was beginning. Anti-cancer drugs harm normal cells in the process of attacking cancer cells. She knew she'd have to watch her son suffer from lethargy, loss of appetite, nausea, and the prospect hurt her more than anything, especially as she knew that his enduring this suffering wouldn't guarantee the extinction of his cancer cells. All it would do would be to slow their rate of reproduction, and thereby delay the final moments. This cancer was destined to metastasize, and there was no way to prevent it.

Kaoru didn't know what to say to this mother whose son had been taken away from her. Platitudes would only make it worse.

But Reiko looked him in the eye and said, "The miracle will come if we wait for it."

She enfolded Kaoru's hands in hers; it seemed to be a habit of hers.

"I just don't know."

"I'm sick and tired of living like this."

"Me, too."

"Well, do something! Please! Help us! I know you can."

Like I can do anything! Kaoru felt like screaming, but managed to keep himself from saying anything.

Reiko's bangs were still wet and several strands clung to her forehead. Beneath them her eyes were moist and pleading. Her mouth quivered as if she might break out into sobs at any moment; Kaoru's heart went out to her. If only he could help. He wanted to, badly. He couldn't stand by helplessly and watch this magnificent body laid low.

The faucet next to them hadn't been shut off all the way-a little trickle of water came out of it. The sound filled the room and stimulated his desire. The noise of the water itself was what urged him into action.

Reiko looked at the faucet, and tried to free one hand to turn it off. But Kaoru only gripped her hand tighter, pulling her toward him with great force.

At first she made as if to resist, a complex series of emotions clouding her features. Conflicting feelings raged within her-Kaoru knew this by the touch of her skin. Her obligations as a mother, and her desires as a woman.

Still holding her to him, he shifted positions and tried to lay her down on the bed. But she resisted slightly, so that she ended up sitting on the floor with her back pushed up against the edge of the bed.

Pinned against a sickbed missing its owner, hunched over with death a burden on her shoulders, Reiko tried to confront the sexual impulses pressing in on her. The spectre of death was assaulting her from everywhere, except the direction from which lust came, boiling up as if to prove that she was still alive. Then she thought of how her son at this very moment was undergoing cruel tests, and the knowledge enervated her desire. Her maternal instincts began to crowd out her sexual needs.

But not Kaoru. He was beyond reining in now, as his mind and body came together in pursuit of a single goal.

He didn't care that Reiko was infected with MHC. He was aware of the data showing that the virus spread even more easily through genital contact than oral, but for the moment that knowledge was clean gone from him.

He sat down next to her, intertwined with her, on the floor of the sickroom. He placed his mouth over hers, nimbly undid the buttons of her blouse. These bold, play boyish actions surprised even him: he was relatively inexperienced at romance.

While Kaoru basked in his memories of the previous afternoon, Hideyuki obstinately hammered away on the dangers of exposing oneself to the virus.

… Your blood test came back negative? … I was your age once - you 've got to be careful with women… You can't let yourself get careless… Don't give in to momentary temptation…