Yôko Ogawa - The Gift of Numbers aka The Housekeeper and the Professor

Before I'd finished, he pushed me away and turned his back; and as he did, I realized I had made the most basic mistake: he no longer remembered the baseball game, or even who I was. He sat on the bed staring down at his lap, his back more hunched over than it had been the day before. His tired body remained still, his mind wandered in a fog. All passion had deserted him, and even the affection he showed toward Root was gone.

A moment later, I realized he was sobbing quietly. At first, I couldn't tell where the sound was coming from him-it sounded like the stuttering of a broken music box. These sobs were very different from the ones he'd cried when Root cut his hand; they were private, desolate, and for no one other than himself.

The Professor was reading the note clipped in the most prominent spot on his jacket, the one he could never avoid seeing as he got dressed. "My memory lasts only eighty minutes." I sat down on the edge of the bed, unsure whether there was anything more I could do for him. My mistake had been the simplest one-and perhaps the most fatal. Every morning, when the Professor woke up, a note in his own hand reminded him of his affliction, and that the dreams he'd dreamed were not last night's but those of some night in the distant past back when his memory had ended-it was as though yesterday had never happened. The Professor who had shielded Root from the foul ball last night was gone. Somehow, I had never quite understood what it meant for him to wake up alone each morning to this cruel revelation.

"I'm your housekeeper," I said, when the sobs had subsided for a moment. "I'm here to help you." He looked up at me through his tears. "My son will come this evening. We call him Root, because his head is flat. You gave him that name." I pointed to the picture of me on his jacket, grateful it had survived the bus ride home from the ballpark.

"When is your birthday?" he said. His voice was weak from the fever, but I was relieved to hear a sound other than sobbing.

"February twentieth," I said. "It's an amicable number, 220, good friends with 284."

His fever lasted three days, and he slept nearly the whole time. He didn't wake up for meals or show any interest in the snacks I left by his bed, so finally I was forced to feed him bite by bite. I would prop him up in bed and pinch his cheeks, and when he opened his mouth, I was ready with the spoon. He could barely stay awake for a full cup of soup, nodding off before I'd managed to feed half of it to him.

In the end, he recovered without seeing a doctor. Since going out had caused his fever in the first place, I felt that the best thing was to keep him at home in a peaceful place. Besides, it would have been all but impossible to get him up and dressed and out to the clinic.

When Root arrived from school, he would go straight to the study and stand by the Professor's bed, watching him sleep until I told him he had to do his homework.

On the morning of the fourth day, the fever finally broke, and he soon made a quick recovery. He started sleeping less, and his appetite returned. Soon, he was well enough to sit at the dinner table, and then to tie his own tie; and before long he was back in his easy chair reading his math books. He even resumed working on his puzzles. I knew he was fully recovered when he began scolding me for interrupting his work, and when he started greeting Root at the door again with a hug. They took up their math drills, the Professor rubbed Root's head-everything was normal again.

Not long after the Professor had recovered, I received a message summoning me to the office of the Director of the Akebono Housekeeping Agency. It was a bad sign to be called in when it wasn't time for a regular performance review. It could mean that a client had complained and you were going to be reprimanded, or that someone was demanding a formal apology, or that you were about to be fined for some transgression or for damage to the client's property. But I knew that the Professor's limited memory made a complaint from him unlikely, and I had kept my promise to his sister-in-law to avoid bothering her; so, I reassured myself that the Director probably just wanted to know how I was managing with a client who had nine blue stars from previous housekeepers.

"I'm afraid this is serious," he said almost before I'd taken my seat, bursting my little bubble of self-delusion. "There's been a complaint." He was rubbing his high forehead and looking terribly pained.

"What sort of complaint?" I stammered.

I had been the subject of complaints before, but in each case the Director had seen immediately that it was the result of a misunderstanding or some eccentricity on the part of the client, and he had simply told me to make the best of the situation. But this time was different.

"Don't play dumb with me," he said. "You spent the night at your client's house?"

"I've done nothing wrong. Who made such a ridiculous, disgusting suggestion?"

"It's not a 'suggestion.' You stayed there, didn't you?" I nodded meekly.

"You know perfectly well that you must let the agency know if you plan to work overtime, and in the case of an emergency, you have to get the client's written approval for overtime pay."

"Yes, I know," I said.

"Then you broke the rules, and the accusation is not 'ridiculous.'"

"But it wasn't overtime. I was just taking care of my client… though I might have gone a little overboard."

"If it wasn't overtime, what was it? If you weren't working when you stayed the night at a male client's house, I think you'll agree it sounds a little suspicious."

"But he was ill! He had a fever and I couldn't leave him alone. I was wrong to ignore the rules, and I'm sorry. But I was only doing what any good housekeeper would do."

"And what about your son?" The Director changed tack, tracing the edge of the Professor's client card with his finger. "I made a special exception for you. I'd never allowed anyone to take a child along to work, but since it seemed as though it was the client's wish, and it was an unusually difficult situation, I decided to let it go. But I immediately started getting complaints from the other girls that I was playing favorites, so I needed you to be beyond reproach on this job."

"I'm sorry, really I am. I was careless. And I'm grateful for your help with my son…"

"I'm taking you off the job," he said. I started to object but he went on. "You're done there. Take today off, and then tomorrow you'll go for an interview at a new place." He turned over the Professor's card and added a tenth blue star.

"Wait a minute. This is all too quick. Who wants me fired? Is it the Professor?"

"It's the client's sister-in-law."

"But I haven't seen her since the interview," I said, shaking my head. "And I don't remember having done anything to offend her. She made me promise not to bother her with the Professor's problems, and I haven't. I realize she pays my salary, but she doesn't know a thing about what goes on in the Professor's house. How can she fire me?"

"She knows you stayed overnight with him."

"She was spying on us?"

"She has every right to keep an eye on you while you're at work."

I remembered having seen someone by the gate in the hedge that night.

"The Professor is sick, and he needs special care. If I don't go to him today, he'll be in a bad way. He's probably getting up right now, all alone, reading his notes…"

"There are plenty of other housekeepers who can look after him," said the Director, cutting me off. He opened the drawer in his desk and filed away the card. "This is not negotiable," he said. "We're done here."

And that was how I came to leave my job at the Professor's house.

My new employers were a couple who ran a tax consulting service. It took more than an hour by train and bus to reach their home, and my duties often lasted until nine o'clock at night. They tended to blur the line between tasks I would normally do in the house and things they asked me to do for their business, and the woman had a cruel streak. But worst of all, Root was once more a latchkey kid. It was the Director's way of punishing me.