1Q84 (118 page)

“Miss Takai, to repeat myself, I know you’re in there. So please stop playing this silly game of hide-and-seek. You’re inside, and you’re listening to my voice.”

The man was saying almost exactly the same things he had said the previous time, like a tape being replayed.

“I told you I would be back, but you probably thought that was just an empty threat. You should know that I always keep my promises. And if there are fees to collect, I most definitely will collect them. You’re in there, Miss Takai, and you’re listening. And you’re thinking this: If I just stay patient, the collector will give up and go away.”

He knocked on the door again for some time. Twenty, maybe twenty-five times.
What sort of hands does this man have?
Aomame wondered.
And why doesn’t he use the doorbell?

“And I know you’re thinking this, too,” the fee collector said, as if reading her mind. “You are thinking that this man must have pretty tough hands. And that his hands must hurt, pounding on the door like this so many times. And there is another thing you are thinking: Why in the world is he knocking, anyway? There’s a doorbell, so why not ring that?”

Aomame grimaced.

The fee collector continued. “No, I don’t want to ring the bell. If I do, all you hear is the bell ringing, that’s all. No matter who pushes the bell, it makes the same harmless little sound. Now, a knock—
that
has personality. You use your physical body to knock on something and there’s a flesh-and-blood emotion behind it. Of course my hand does hurt. I’m not Superman, after all. But it can’t be helped. This is my profession. And every profession, no matter high or low, deserves respect. Don’t you agree, Miss Takai?”

Knocks pounded on the door again. Twenty-seven in all, powerful knocks with a fixed pause between each one. Aomame’s hands grew sweaty as they gripped the bat.

“Miss Takai, people who receive the
NHK
TV signal have to pay the fee—it’s the law. There are no two ways about it. It is a rule we have to follow. So why don’t you just cheerfully pay the fee? I’m not pounding on your door because I want to, and I know you don’t want this unpleasantness to go on forever. You must be thinking, Why do I have to go through this? So just cheerfully pay up. Then you can go back to your quiet life again.”

The man’s voice echoed loudly down the hallway.
This man is enjoying the sound of his own voice
, Aomame thought.
He’s getting a kick out of insulting people, making fun of them and abusing them
. She could sense the perverse pleasure he was getting from this.

“You’re quite the stubborn lady, aren’t you, Miss Takai. I’m impressed. You’re like a shellfish at the bottom of a deep ocean, maintaining a strict silence. But I know you’re in there. You’re there, glaring at me through the door. The tension is making your underarms sweat. Do I have that right?”

Thirteen more knocks. Then he stopped. Aomame realized she was, indeed, sweating under her arms.

“All right. That’s enough for today. But I’ll be back soon. I’m starting to grow fond of this door. There are lots of doors in the world, and this one is not bad at all. It is definitely a door worth knocking on. At this rate I won’t be able to relax unless I drop by here regularly to give it a few good knocks. Good-bye, Miss Takai. I’ll be back.”

Silence reigned. The fee collector had apparently left for good, but she hadn’t heard any footsteps. Maybe he was pretending to have left and was waiting outside the door. Aomame gripped the bat even tighter and waited a couple of minutes.

“I’m still here,” the fee collector suddenly announced. “Ha! You thought I left, didn’t you? But I’m still here. I lied. Sorry about that, Miss Takai. That’s the sort of person I am.”

She heard him cough. An intentionally grating cough.

“I’ve been at this job for a long time. And over the years I’ve become able to picture the people on the other side of the door. This is the truth. Quite a few people hide behind their door and try to get away with not paying the
NHK
fee. I’ve been dealing with them for decades. Listen, Miss Takai.”

He knocked three times, louder than he ever had.

“Listen, Miss Takai. You’re very clever at hiding, like a flounder on the sea floor covered in sand.
Mimicry
, they call it. But in the end you won’t be able to escape. Someone will come and open this door. You can count on it. As a veteran
NHK
fee collector, I guarantee it. You can hide as cleverly as you like, but in the final analysis mimicry is deception, pure and simple. It doesn’t solve a thing. It’s true, Miss Takai. I’ll be on my way soon. Don’t worry, this time for real. But I’ll be back soon. When you hear a knock, you’ll know it’s me. Well, see you, Miss Takai. Take care!”

She couldn’t hear any footsteps this time, either. She waited five minutes, then went up to the door and listened carefully. She squinted through the peephole. No one was outside. This time the fee collector really had left, it seemed.

Aomame leaned the metal bat up against the kitchen counter. She slid the round out of the pistol’s chamber, set the safety, wrapped it back up in a pair of thick tights, and returned it to the drawer. She lay down on the sofa and closed her eyes. The man’s voice still rang in her ears.

But in the end you won’t be able to escape. Someone will come and open this door
.

At least this man wasn’t from Sakigake. They would take a quieter, more indirect approach. They would never yell in an apartment hallway, insinuate things like that, putting their target on guard. That was not their MO. Aomame pictured Buzzcut and Ponytail. They would sneak up on you without making a sound. And before you knew it, they would be standing right behind you.

Aomame shook her head, and breathed quietly.

Maybe he really was an
NHK
fee collector. If so, it was strange that he didn’t notice the sticker that said they paid the subscription fee automatically. Aomame had checked that the sticker was pasted to the side of the door. Maybe the man was a mental patient. But the things he said had a bit too much reality to them for that.
The man certainly did seem to sense my presence on the other side of the door. As if he had sniffed out my secret, or a part of it
. But he did not have the power to open the door and come in. The door had to be opened from inside.
And I’m not planning on opening it
.

No
, she thought,
it’s hard to say that for sure. Someday I might open the door. If Tengo were to show up at the playground, I wouldn’t hesitate to open the door and rush outside. It doesn’t matter what might be waiting for me
.

Aomame sank down into the garden chair on the balcony and gazed as usual through the cracks in the screen at the playground. A high school couple were sitting on the bench underneath the zelkova tree, discussing something, serious expressions on their faces. Two young mothers were watching their children, not yet old enough for kindergarten, playing in the sandbox. They were deep in conversation yet kept their eyes glued to their children. A typical afternoon scene in a park. Aomame stared at the top of the slide for a long time.

She brought her hand down to her abdomen, shut her eyes, and listened carefully, trying to pick up the voice. Something was definitely alive inside her. A small, living something. She knew it.

Dohta
, she whispered.

Maza
, something replied.

The four of them had
yakiniku
, then went to another place where they sang karaoke and polished off a bottle of whiskey. It was nearly ten p.m. when their cozy but boisterous little party broke up. After they left the bar, Tengo took Nurse Adachi back to her apartment. The other two women could catch a bus near the station, and they casually let things work out that way. Tengo and the young nurse walked down the deserted streets, side by side, for a quarter of an hour.

“Tengo, Tengo, Tengo,” she sang out. “Such a nice name.
Tengo
. It’s so easy to say.”

Nurse Adachi had drunk a lot, but her cheeks were normally rosy so it was hard to tell, just by looking at her face, how drunk she really was. Her words weren’t slurred and her footsteps were solid. She didn’t seem drunk. Though people had their own ways of being drunk.

“I always thought it was a weird name,” Tengo said.

“It isn’t at all.
Tengo
. It has a nice ring to it and it’s easy to remember. It’s a wonderful name.”

“Speaking of which, I don’t know your first name. Everybody calls you Ku.”

“That’s my nickname. My real name is Kumi. Kind of a nothing name.”

“Kumi Adachi,”
Tengo said aloud. “Not bad. Compact and simple.”

“Thank you,” Kumi Adachi said. “But putting it like that makes me feel like a Honda Civic or something.”

“I meant it as a compliment.”

“I know. I get good mileage, too,” she said, and took Tengo’s hand. “Do you mind if I hold your hand? It makes it more fun to walk together, and more relaxed.”

“I don’t mind,” Tengo replied. Holding hands like this with Kumi Adachi, he remembered Aomame and the classroom in elementary school. It felt different now, but there was something in common.

“I must be a little drunk,” Kumi said.

“You think so?”

“Yup.”

Tengo looked at the young nurse’s face again. “You don’t look drunk.”

“I don’t show it on the outside. That’s just the way I am. But I’m wasted.”

“Well, you were knocking them back pretty steadily.”

“I know. I haven’t drunk this much in a long time.”

“You just have to get out like this sometimes,” Tengo said, quoting Mrs. Tamura.

“Of course,” Kumi said, nodding vigorously. “People have to get out sometimes—have something good to eat, have some drinks, belt out some songs, talk about nothing in particular. But I wonder if you ever have times like that. Where you just get it out of your system, to clear your head? You always seem so cool and composed, Tengo.”

Tengo thought about it. Had he done anything lately to unwind? He couldn’t recall. If he couldn’t recall, that probably meant he hadn’t. The whole concept of
getting something out of his system
was something he might be lacking.

“Not so much, I guess,” Tengo admitted.

“Everybody’s different.”

“There are all sorts of ways of thinking and feeling.”

“Just like there are lots of ways of being drunk,” the nurse said, and giggled. “But it’s important, Tengo.”

“You may be right,” he said.

They walked on in silence for a while, hand in hand. Tengo felt uneasy about the change in the way she spoke. When she had on her nurse’s uniform, Kumi was invariably polite. But now in civilian clothes, she was more outspoken, probably partly due to the alcohol. That informal way of talking reminded him of someone. Somebody had spoken the same way. Someone he had met fairly recently.

“Tengo, have you ever tried hashish?”

“Hashish?”

“Cannabis resin.”

Tengo breathed in the night air and exhaled. “No, I never have.”

“How about trying some?” Kumi Adachi asked. “Let’s try it together. I have some at home.”

“You have hashish?”

“Looks can be deceiving.”

“They certainly can,” Tengo said vaguely. So a healthy young nurse living in a seaside little town on the Boso Peninsula had hashish in her apartment. And she was inviting him to smoke some.

“How did you get ahold of it?” Tengo asked.

“A girlfriend from high school gave it to me for a birthday present last month. She had gone to India and brought it back.” Kumi began swinging Tengo’s hand with her own in a wide arc.

“But there’s a stiff penalty if you’re caught smuggling pot into the country. The Japanese police are really strict about it. They have pot-sniffing dogs at the airports.”

“She’s not the type to worry about little details,” Kumi said. “Anyhow, she got through customs okay. Would you like to try it? It’s high-quality stuff, very potent. I checked into it, and medically speaking there’s nothing dangerous about it. I’m not saying it isn’t habit forming, but it’s much milder than tobacco, alcohol, or cocaine. Law enforcement says it’s addictive, but that’s ridiculous. If you believe that, then pachinko is far more dangerous. You don’t get a hangover, so I think it would be good for you to try it to blow off some steam.”

“Have you tried it yourself?”

“Of course. It was fun.”

“Fun,” Tengo repeated.

“You’ll understand if you try it,” Kumi said, and giggled. “Say, did you know? When Queen Victoria had menstrual cramps she used to smoke marijuana to lessen the pain. Her court doctor actually prescribed it to her.”

“You’re kidding.”

“It’s true. I read it in a book.”

Which book?
Tengo was about to ask, but decided it was too much trouble. That was as far as he wanted to go picturing Queen Victoria having menstrual cramps.

“So how old were you on your birthday last month?” Tengo asked, changing subjects.

“Twenty-three. A full-fledged adult.”

“Of course,” Tengo said. He was already thirty, but yet to have a sense of himself as an adult. It just felt to him like he had spent thirty years in the world.

“My older sister is staying over tonight at her boyfriend’s, so I’m by myself. So come on over. Don’t be shy. I’m off duty tomorrow so I can take it easy.”

Tengo searched for a reply. He liked this young nurse. And she seemed to like him, too. But she was inviting him to her place. He looked up at the sky, but it was covered with thick gray clouds and he couldn’t see the moons.

“The other day when my girlfriend and I smoked hashish,” Kumi began, “that was my first time, but it felt like my body was floating in the air. Not very high, just a couple of inches. You know, floating at that height felt really good. Like it was just right.”

“Plus you won’t hurt yourself if you fall.”