Kojo Suzuki - Spiral

The run seemed to bother Masako, because she kept rubbing her knee.

Ando felt he’d never get tired of watching her every move. She came out of nowhere, and now I’m falling for her.

He wondered if he really was. Maybe he was just becoming desperate, dissolute. If he’d become a carrier of the ring virus as a result of having read that strange report, if his body was being eaten away by the hour, then his nascent pleasure was something he couldn’t afford to lose.

Back in college, he’d read a novel set in a little mountain village that featured a female character who was rather like the woman he was confronted with now. The fictional woman is possessed of above-average looks, but because she doesn’t speak and act like others, the villagers have branded her as crazy. She ends up providing comfort to men who have no fixed companions. The image of a woman without a home wandering the woods in a disheveled state, accepting the local men one and all without discrimination, embodied a certain high Eros, aided by the exotic setting. The mountain village gave the story a perfect harmony of character and setting, and at the time Ando had felt that if the author had placed such a woman in the city, the novel wouldn’t have acquired the right atmosphere.

Well, he was in Ginza now, smack in the middle of Tokyo, not some alpine hamlet. But Masako had the same aura as the heroine of that book, and her modern beauty didn’t seem at all out of place on a stool in a fast-food joint.

Ando suddenly remembered how the novel ended. Alone in the mountains, the woman gives birth to a child, having no idea who the father is. The story closes with that baby’s first cries piercing the forest and echoing across the mountainside.

I can’t let that happen.

Ando admonished himself. He had to take precautions to protect Masako’s body. He recalled that the night before he’d been so overjoyed at the prospect of coupling that he’d forgotten himself and neglected to use birth control.

Masako was running her fingers in a circle over her kneecap, gradually making the hole bigger. The skin of her leg showed white where it peeked through the rent, so white as to make it a shame to cover it up with stockings.

The hole got bigger. Ando stopped her by laying his hand on top of hers.

He asked her, “What were you saying back there in the theater?” He meant to ask why she was repeating the characters’ lines.

Masako’s reply was: “Take me to a bookstore.”

She liked to deflect his questions that way. She asked Ando to do things far more often than she answered his queries. But of course, Ando was incapable of saying no to her.

He took her to the biggest bookstore in Ginza. Masako flitted from shelf to shelf, in the end spending over an hour in the bookstore reading on her feet. Ando, who didn’t share that habit, ended up wandering around aimlessly until he discovered, next to the registers, a stack of pamphlets from Shotoku, the publisher. Since he’d visited their offices only the other day, and the pamphlets were free, he picked one up.

The pamphlet included a short essay but consisted mainly of ads for future Shotoku releases.

I wonder if Ryuji’s in here? Ando flipped through the pamphlet expectantly. The other day, Ryuji’s editor Kimura had told Ando that Ryuji’s collection of philosophical essays was just about to be published. Ando was hoping to see a friend’s name in print.

But before he could find it, he was dragged out of the bookstore by Masako. “How about another movie?”

Her plea was a mild one, but the way she gripped his arm and pulled him along suggested she wouldn’t take no for an answer. Maybe, while reading in the bookstore, she’d found out about another movie and decided she had to see it. Ando slipped the pamphlet into his coat pocket and asked, “What do you want to see?”

She didn’t answer, but simply squeezed his hand and tugged him forward.

He hung back a bit, saying, “Pushy, aren’t you?” Then he noticed that she was still clutching an event-guide magazine and came to a full stop. Masako hadn’t spent a single yen since the night before. She hadn’t made a move to pay for anything, always leaving it to Ando to pick up the tab. He didn’t imagine for a moment that she’d purchased the magazine with her own money. Indeed, it wasn’t in a bag, and she held it bare rolled up in her hand.

She lifted it.

Ando looked back toward the bookstore. Nobody was coming after them. She’d managed to elude the sharp eyes of the clerks. It was only a three-hundred yen magazine; even if she’d been caught, it wouldn’t have been a big deal. As he let Masako pull him along, Ando was beginning to feel bolder than ever before.

When he put the key in the lock he could hear the phone in his apartment ringing. Figuring he wouldn’t make it in time anyway, Ando decided not to hurry. He turned the knob. When friends called, they usually only let the phone ring five or six times, because they knew how small his apartment was. Hence he could usually guess the caller by how long it took him or her to give up. As he’d expected, by the time he got the door open the ringing had stopped, a sure sign of someone who knew him and how he lived. There weren’t too many people who had visited him. It was probably Miyashita, Ando figured, looking at his watch. It was just past eight o’clock in the evening.

He opened the door wider and beckoned Masako inside, then turned on the lights and the heat. Clothing was scattered about exactly as they’d left it that morning. Masako had left her belongings there, seemingly having decided to spend another night with Ando.

Ando’s shoulders and back were stiff from watching movies in the morning and afternoon. He wanted a soak in the tub.

Starting to take off his coat, he found the publisher’s pamphlet in his pocket. He took it out and placed it on the bedside table, thinking to examine it at leisure after a bath. He’d decided to buy Ryuji’s book, and he needed to look up the title and publication date.

He stripped down to his shirt and rolled up his cuffs. He gave the tub a quick rinse and then adjusted the water temperature and started to fill it. It wasn’t a large tub, so it wasn’t long before it was ready. The bathroom was full of steam, and turning on the fan didn’t do much good. He thought he’d have Masako bathe first, so he stuck his head into the other room. She was sitting on the edge of the bed taking off her stockings.

“Would you like to take a bath?”

She stood up. At the same time, the phone rang.

As Ando walked to the telephone, Masako took his place in the bathroom, disappearing behind the accordion-style shower curtain.

It was Miyashita, as he’d expected. As soon as Ando had the receiver to his ear, his friend yelled, “Where the hell have you been all day?”

“At the movies.”

Miyashita obviously hadn’t expected that answer. “At the movies?” he blurted.

“Two of them, in fact.”

“Must be nice not to have a care in the world,” Miyashita sneered in heartfelt disgust. Then he continued with his harangue. “I don’t know how many times I tried to call you.”

“I do go out, you know.”

“Well, whatever. Do you know where I am now?”

Where was Miyashita calling from? It didn’t sound like he was at home. Ando could hear cars. He must have been in a roadside phone booth somewhere.

“Please don’t tell me you’re in the neighborhood and you want to come up?”

Now was a bad time. Masako was in the bath. Ando was prepared to refuse if that was Miyashita’s plan.

“Don’t be an idiot. Think theater, man, the stage.”

“What are you talking about?”