Nan-Core by Mahokaru Numata Page B

made love in broad daylight, on an overhang above a mountain stream that served as a natural observation platform. While we were anxious of hikers happening upon us welet the strange lust take hold of us anyway. In the end we only accomplished half of what we desired and rushed back to my room. For the next three days—the whole of the last August’s
O-bon
holiday—we gave up on plans to see movies or go on drives and instead shut ourselves up in my room, barely leaving my creaky single bed.
    When I heard Chie was gone, it was purely a physical sensation of loss that hit me first. It was so powerful that it knocked the life out of me, and it took a while before I was able to register the sadness in my heart. I still didn’t know, even today, if it was Chie herself that I missed, or if it was her smell, her warmth, her weight, the touch of her skin, the physical sensation of her.
    She had been dressed in the light clothes of a hiker when she turned up unexpectedly at the construction site a couple of years ago, just as we were finishing up work on the cafe’s foundations. She had been walking the hills when she had caught sight of the “Opening Soon” sign at the worksite entrance, and apparently had known immediately that she wanted to work at the cafe.
    When she took off her cap her face was pale and radiant in the light, gleaming with a light sheen of sweat. She had a mysterious power over me from the beginning.
    She had graduated from a vocational college in Okayama before starting work at a trading company in Osaka. After that she went through a number of jobs, never finding anything she genuinely enjoyed. She was strong for a woman and madly in love with dogs, perfect for a place like Shaggy Head. She said she wouldn’t be fussy about pay if I took her on.
    As she told me this, her willful expression occasionallyslipped into something altogether more fragile, and for some reason the strange contrast roiled my emotions. I kept getting so worked up that I had to look away.
    I was in a daze thinking about her for the rest of the day, right until I got into bed that night. Even though we had only spoken briefly, I couldn’t bear the thought that the woman called Chie had expressions that I had not yet seen. I had to see them all for myself. I was surprised to realize that I would do whatever was necessary to make that happen.
    The busy months that led up to the cafe opening were like a happy dream. Chie was perfect for the job, and I had already suspected that a woman’s perspective would be necessary for running a business of this kind. She happily threw herself into helping, displaying her own unique style as she worked on the interior of the cafe, on plans for the kitchen equipment, and even on the design of the cafe’s logo. It was her idea to plant flowering ash trees between the parking lot and the building, and her choice to have thick, cement-colored cups and saucers.
    As we worked to get the cafe ready for opening, our personal relationship rapidly developed. I had already stopped thinking of Shaggy Head as my business—in my head, the cafe was ours. We discussed starting dog-training classes, opening a “hotel” to board pets on a short-term basis, doing more thorough testing to find the best coffee beans, and baking additive-free bread. Our future seemed to naturally unfold before us.
    Once the business was running smoothly we would buy a house in a nearby residential area, and we didn’t care if it was old or small. We would build a wooden deck around it, plantflowers in the garden, and raise kids in a stress-free environment. We talked about these things as though they were all long since decided.
    It all felt so natural I hardly felt the need to propose. When I gave her a ring, a year later, it was purely out of a sense of formality.
    Then she disappeared. It was almost half a year ago, in early February.
    Blustery winds bearing sleet had all but shut down the cafe for a few days. I didn’t pay