she was gone.
This is my place. Another Billie Holiday disc. She sang “Some Other Spring,” and the audience clapped until they too faded into the heat of a long-lost Chicago summer night.
• • •
The phone.
“Hi, Satoru. It’s only Koji.”
“I can hardly hear you! What’s that racket in the background?”
“I’m phoning from the college canteen.”
“How did the engineering exam go?”
“Well, I worked really hard for it.…” He’d walked it.
“Congratulations! So your visit to the shrine paid off, hey? When are the results out?”
“Three or four weeks. I’m just glad they’re over. It’s too early to congratulate me, though.… Hey, Mom’s doing a sukiyaki party tonight. My dad’s back in Tokyo this week. They thought you might like to help us eat it. Can you? You could sleep over in my sister’s room if it gets too late. She’s on a school trip to Okinawa.”
I ummed and ahhed inwardly. Koji’s parents are nice, straight people, but they feel it’s their responsibility to sort my life out. They can’t believe that I’m already content where I am, with my discs and my saxophone and my place. Underlying their concern is pity, and I’d rather take shit about my lack of parents than pity.
But Koji’s my friend, probably my only one. “I’d love to come. What should I bring?”
“Nothing, just bring yourself.” So, flowers for his mom and booze for his dad.
“I’ll come around after work then.”
“Okay. See you.”
“See you.”
It was a Mal Waldron time of day. The afternoon was shutting up shop early. The owner of the greengrocery across the street took in his crates of white radishes, carrots, and lotus roots. He rolled down his shutter, saw me, and nodded gravely. He never smiles. Some pigeons scattered as a truck shuddered by. Every note of “Left Alone” fell, drops of lead into a deep well. Jackie McLean’s saxophone circled in the air, so sad it could barely leave the ground.
The door opened, and I smelled air rainwashed clean. Fourhigh school girls came in, but one of them was completely, completely different. She pulsed, invisibly, like a quasar. I know that sounds stupid, but she did.
The three bubbleheads flounced up to the counter. They were pretty, I guess, but they were all clones of the same ova. Their hair was the same length, their lipstick the same color, their bodies curving in the same way beneath their same uniform. Their leader demanded in a voice cutesy and spoiled the newest hit by the latest teen dwoob.
But I didn’t bother hearing them. I can’t describe women, not like Takeshi or Koji. But if you know Duke Pearson’s “After the Rain,” well, she was as beautiful and pure as that.
Standing by the window, and looking out. What was out there? She was embarrassed by her classmates. And so she should have been! She was so real, the others were cardboard cutouts beside her. Real things had happened to her to make her how she was, and I wanted to know them, and read them, like a book. It was the strangest feeling. I just kept thinking—well, I’m not sure what I was thinking. I’m not sure if I was thinking of anything.
She was listening to the music! She was afraid she’d scare the music away if she moved.
“Well, have you got it or haven’t you?” One of the cutout girls squawked. It must take a long time to train your voice to be so annoying.
Another giggled.
Another’s pocket phone trilled and she got it out.
I was angry with them for making me look away from her.
“This is a disc collector’s shop. There’s a toy shop in the shopping mall by the metro station that sells the kind of thing you’re looking for.”
Rich Shibuya girls are truffle-fed pooches. The girls at Mamasan’s, they have all had to learn how to survive. They have to keep their patrons, keep their looks, keep their integrity, and they get scarred. But they respect themselves, and they let it show. They respect each other. I respect them.
This is my place. Another Billie Holiday disc. She sang “Some Other Spring,” and the audience clapped until they too faded into the heat of a long-lost Chicago summer night.
• • •
The phone.
“Hi, Satoru. It’s only Koji.”
“I can hardly hear you! What’s that racket in the background?”
“I’m phoning from the college canteen.”
“How did the engineering exam go?”
“Well, I worked really hard for it.…” He’d walked it.
“Congratulations! So your visit to the shrine paid off, hey? When are the results out?”
“Three or four weeks. I’m just glad they’re over. It’s too early to congratulate me, though.… Hey, Mom’s doing a sukiyaki party tonight. My dad’s back in Tokyo this week. They thought you might like to help us eat it. Can you? You could sleep over in my sister’s room if it gets too late. She’s on a school trip to Okinawa.”
I ummed and ahhed inwardly. Koji’s parents are nice, straight people, but they feel it’s their responsibility to sort my life out. They can’t believe that I’m already content where I am, with my discs and my saxophone and my place. Underlying their concern is pity, and I’d rather take shit about my lack of parents than pity.
But Koji’s my friend, probably my only one. “I’d love to come. What should I bring?”
“Nothing, just bring yourself.” So, flowers for his mom and booze for his dad.
“I’ll come around after work then.”
“Okay. See you.”
“See you.”
It was a Mal Waldron time of day. The afternoon was shutting up shop early. The owner of the greengrocery across the street took in his crates of white radishes, carrots, and lotus roots. He rolled down his shutter, saw me, and nodded gravely. He never smiles. Some pigeons scattered as a truck shuddered by. Every note of “Left Alone” fell, drops of lead into a deep well. Jackie McLean’s saxophone circled in the air, so sad it could barely leave the ground.
The door opened, and I smelled air rainwashed clean. Fourhigh school girls came in, but one of them was completely, completely different. She pulsed, invisibly, like a quasar. I know that sounds stupid, but she did.
The three bubbleheads flounced up to the counter. They were pretty, I guess, but they were all clones of the same ova. Their hair was the same length, their lipstick the same color, their bodies curving in the same way beneath their same uniform. Their leader demanded in a voice cutesy and spoiled the newest hit by the latest teen dwoob.
But I didn’t bother hearing them. I can’t describe women, not like Takeshi or Koji. But if you know Duke Pearson’s “After the Rain,” well, she was as beautiful and pure as that.
Standing by the window, and looking out. What was out there? She was embarrassed by her classmates. And so she should have been! She was so real, the others were cardboard cutouts beside her. Real things had happened to her to make her how she was, and I wanted to know them, and read them, like a book. It was the strangest feeling. I just kept thinking—well, I’m not sure what I was thinking. I’m not sure if I was thinking of anything.
She was listening to the music! She was afraid she’d scare the music away if she moved.
“Well, have you got it or haven’t you?” One of the cutout girls squawked. It must take a long time to train your voice to be so annoying.
Another giggled.
Another’s pocket phone trilled and she got it out.
I was angry with them for making me look away from her.
“This is a disc collector’s shop. There’s a toy shop in the shopping mall by the metro station that sells the kind of thing you’re looking for.”
Rich Shibuya girls are truffle-fed pooches. The girls at Mamasan’s, they have all had to learn how to survive. They have to keep their patrons, keep their looks, keep their integrity, and they get scarred. But they respect themselves, and they let it show. They respect each other. I respect them.
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