Haruki Murakami - Kafka on the Shore

Yup, you're in a strange position, all right. You're in love with a girl who is no more, jealous of a boy who's gone forever. Even so, this emotion you're feeling is more real, and more intensely painful, than anything you've ever felt before. And there's no way out. No possibility of finding an exit. You've wandered into a labyrinth of time, and the biggest problem of all is that you have no desire at all to get out. Am I right?

Oshima comes in a little later than yesterday. Before he does I vacuum the first and second floors, wipe down all the desks and chairs, open the windows and clean them, wash out the restroom, throw out the garbage, pour fresh water in the vases. Then I turn on all the lights and switch on the catalog computers. All that's left is to open the front gate.

Oshima checks my work and gives a satisfied nod. "You learn pretty quick, and don't fool around, do you?"

I boil some water and make him some coffee. Like yesterday, I have a cup of Earl Grey. It's started raining outside, pretty heavily. You can hear thunder off in the distance. It's not yet noon, but it's like evening it's so dark.

"Oshima, I have something I'd like you to do for me."

"What's that?"

"Can you get hold of the sheet music for 'Kafka on the Shore' somewhere?"

Oshima thinks it over. "As long as it's on a music publisher's website, I imagine you could download it for a fee. I'll check it out and let you know."

"Thanks."

He sits down on a corner of the counter, puts the tiniest lump of sugar into his coffee cup, then carefully stirs it with a spoon. "So you like the song?"

"Yeah, a lot."

"I'm fond of it myself. It's a lovely tune, quite unique. Simple yet deep. It tells you a lot about the person who composed it."

"The lyrics, though, are pretty symbolic," I venture.

"From time immemorial, symbolism and poetry have been inseparable. Like a pirate and his rum."

"Do you think Miss Saeki knew what all the lyrics mean?"

Oshima looks up, listening to the thunder as if calculating how far away it is. He turns to me and shakes his head. "Not necessarily. Symbolism and meaning are two separate things. I think she found the right words by bypassing procedures like meaning and logic. She captured words in a dream, like delicately catching hold of a butterfly's wings as it flutters around. Artists are those who can evade the verbose."

"So you're saying Miss Saeki maybe found those words in some other space-like in dreams?"

"Most great poetry is like that. If the words can't create a prophetic tunnel connecting them to the reader, then the whole thing no longer functions as a poem."

"But plenty of poems only pretend to do that."

"Right. It's a kind of trick, and as long as you know that it isn't hard. As long as you use some symbolic-sounding words, the whole thing looks like a poem of sorts."

"In 'Kafka on the Shore' I feel something urgent and serious."

"Me too," Oshima says. "The words aren't just something on the surface. But the words and melody are so inseparable in my mind, I can't look at the lyrics as pure poetry and decide how persuasive they are by themselves." He shakes his head slightly. "At any rate, she was definitely blessed with a natural talent, and had a real sense for music. She was also practical enough to grab an opportunity when it came along. If that terrible incident hadn't taken her out of circulation, I'm sure she would've developed her talent even further. In any number of ways it's a real shame…"

"So where did all that talent go?"

Oshima looks at me. "You're asking where Miss Saeki's talent went after her boyfriend died?"

I nod. "If talent's a kind of natural energy, doesn't it have to find an outlet?"

"I don't know," he replies. "Nobody can predict where talent's headed. Sometimes it simply vanishes. Other times it sinks down under the earth like an underground stream and flows off who knows where."

"Maybe Miss Saeki focused her talents somewhere else, other than music," I venture.

"Somewhere else?" Oshima, obviously interested, narrows his brow. "What do you mean?"

I'm at a loss for words. "I don't know… I just feel maybe that's what happened. Maybe into something intangible."

"Intangible?"

"Something other people can't see, something you pursue for yourself. An inner process."

Oshima brushes his hair off his forehead, locks of it spilling between his slender fingers. "That's an interesting idea. For all we know, after Miss Saeki came back to town maybe she used her talents somewhere out of sight-as you said, for something intangible. But you have to remember she disappeared for about twenty-five years, so unless you ask her yourself there's no way of knowing for sure."

I hesitate, then decide to just go ahead. "Can I ask you something really stupid?"

"Really stupid?"

I blush. "Totally off the wall."

"No problem. I don't necessarily mind stupid, off-the-wall things."

"I can't believe I'm actually saying this to somebody."

Oshima tilts his head ever so slightly, waiting for me to go on.

"Is it possible that Miss Saeki… is my mother?"

Oshima leans back against the counter, taking time to search for the right words. The clock on the wall ticks away as I wait.

Finally he speaks up. "So what you're saying is that when she was twenty, Miss Saeki left Takamatsu in despair and was living alone someplace when she happened to meet your father, Koichi Tamura, and they got married. They were blessed with you and then, four years later, something happened and she ran away, leaving you behind. After this there's a mysterious blank, but then she shows up back in Shikoku. Do I have that right?"

"Yeah."

"It's not impossible. What I mean is, at this point I don't have any evidence to refute your hypothesis. So much of her life is a total mystery. Rumor has it she lived in Tokyo. Plus she's about the same age as your father. When she came back to Takamatsu, though, she was alone. How old did you say your sister is?"

"Twenty-one."

"The same age as me," Oshima says. "I'm not your sister-that much I know for certain. I've got parents, and my brother-all related by blood. A family way too good for me." He folds his arms and looks me at for a while. "I've got a question for you. Have you ever looked at your family register? That would give your mother's name and age."

"Of course I have."

"So what did it say?"

"There wasn't any name," I say.

He looks surprised. "No name? How can that be?"

"There wasn't any. No kidding. I have no idea why. As far as the family register's concerned, I don't have a mother. Or an older sister. There's just my father's name and mine on the register. Legally, I'm a bastard. An illegitimate child."

"But you actually had a mother and a sister at one time."

I nod. "I did, until I was four. The four of us lived together. It's not just my imagination. I remember it very clearly. The two of them left soon after I turned four." I pull out my wallet and show Oshima the photo of me and my sister playing at the shore. He gazes at it for a moment, smiles, and hands it back.

"'Kafka on the Shore,'" he says.

I nod and put the photograph back in my wallet. The wind swirls outside, pounding rain against the window. The ceiling light casts a shadow of me and Oshima on the floor, where we look like we're having an ominous talk in some alternate world.

"You don't remember your mother's face?" Oshima asks. "You lived together till you were four, so you should have some memory of what she looked like."

I shake my head. "I just can't recall, not at all. I don't know why, but the part of my memory where her face should be is dark, painted over, blank."

Oshima ponders this for a while. "Tell me more about why you think Miss Saeki might be your mother."