Goth (22 page)

“Is that your only car? Then you live alone, right?”

“Yes.”

The boy looked at the garden.

“That’s a lot of trees.”

“My hobby. Like my own little forest.”

After asking permission, the boy turned back into the garden. Saeki followed after him.

Under the cloudy sky, everything Saeki had grown looked as though it were dark green. The boy passed a row of evergreens, sounding impressed. “This is quite a big garden!”

Just past the evergreens, the garden opened up. This was the space on the south side of the house, between the porch and the wall. Several flower beds were framed by stones, but nothing grew there now. There was only the dry earth.

And over by the wall, there were several bamboo poles. Where the morning glories had been, there was scattered straw, and underneath that …

“No trees here?”

“Keeping the view from the porch.”

… Underneath that was the girl and whatever remained of Kousuke.

The bamboo poles stood in a row along the wall, unmoving. The boy had not yet focused his attention on them, only perceiving them as part of the garden. But what if the girl in the ground grabbed the end of the pole and shook it? The boy would see it moving strangely and go to investigate.

Saeki had to end this before that happpened. He told the boy to sit on the porch.

“I’ll get some tea,” he said, stepping up onto the porch and heading inside.

“I wonder where Morino disappeared to … ?” he heard the boy mutter. Saeki froze in his tracks, staring at the boy’s back.

“I’m not quite sure how to explain this, but she gives off some sort of … pheromone that attracts strange people,” the boy said, turning to look up at Saeki. It was obvious he had intended his muttered comment to be overheard. “Walking around in a cloud of those pheromones means those abnormal individuals often come after her.”

“Wait a moment—I’ll just get that tea,” Saeki said, leaving the boy. He could not be sure if the boy had deliberately brought the subject up to distract him, but there had been something sinister lurking behind the boy’s tone.

As he boiled water for the tea in the kitchen, Saeki took a kitchen knife out of the drawer. He could think of no other weapons to kill someone with.

The blue fire on his gas stove began heating the water in the kettle. He placed a cup and a teapot on a tray and the knife next to them. He gazed down at the metallic sheen of the blade, trying to imagine himself swinging it down to attack the boy on the porch from behind. The blade shimmered, reflecting the light of the burner. He was only making one cup of tea, so there wasn’t a lot of water, and it began to boil quickly.

Saeki put his hand on the edge of the sink, steadying himself. Otherwise, he couldn’t have remained upright. Nothing of the sweet sensation he had felt while burying the girl was left. Instead, he felt terrible, like he was living a nightmare. Everything he saw, everything he touched seemed to be giving off the stench of rot. But the ugliest thing of all was himself. He had killed Kousuke, he had buried that girl alive, and now he was about to stab this boy. Compared with the strength of the girl’s belief in her boyfriend, his own heart seemed so pathetic. His nightmare had begun the moment he’d killed Kousuke.

Or perhaps he had been doomed to this nightmare the moment he had been born. The moment he had been granted life, his soul may well have been possessed by the unavoidable urge to murder.

The water boiled, steam pouring out of the mouth of the kettle. Saeki reached to turn off the flame and realized …

Kousuke …

Steam rose, the water in the kettle boiling furiously.

What had Kousuke looked like … ?

Saeki could not remember the face of the young boy he had killed. Although he had gone with him to the park and they had played together any number of times, Saeki retained no memories of him, as if the boy had been disposable.

What was wrong with him? He no longer knew. Part of him was a good citizen who tried to be nice to people, but another part of him was a monster who buried people alive for fun. These two fought like multiple personalities, but they were not different people—they were connected, aligned, the same.

But in that case, who was he then? Who was the man he had thought he was? He could no longer believe in himself, so what could he believe in?

He picked the knife up off the tray, his hand trembling …

He turned off the stove and filled the pot. Then he headed toward the boy on the porch.

Saeki walked quietly. As he turned the corner, he was in sight of the porch, and he could see the boy’s back. The boy was facing the garden, sitting on the porch.

In his hand was a cell phone, held to his ear. Was he calling the police? For a moment, Saeki was terrified.

He crept quietly forward.

Saeki could hear the boy talking on the phone. From his tone, he was not talking to the police, but to a friend.

As he stood behind the boy, the boards under Saeki’s feet creaked.

The boy turned around, hanging up. “Saeki, that took ages!” the boy said. “And you look even sicker …”

Saeki put the tray down next to the boy. “Yes, well … I’m getting very dizzy …” He poured the tea into the cup.

He had to fight the terrifying beast that lurked within his heart. He held the cup out to the boy, silently making up his mind.

He had left the knife in the kitchen. When he realized he could not remember Kousuke’s face, he felt like he had no choice. This seemed to be the only escape from the nightmare.

The boy took the cup. White steam rose from the pale green liquid, vanishing into the air. He watched it for a while, and then he put the cup down without drinking.

“Saeki, I have good news,” the boy sighed, looking slightly relieved. “Morino did go missing yesterday, but apparently she just came home.”

iv

When the clock on the wall reached midnight, Saeki was curled up in a ball in the corner of his room with the lights out, hugging his knees and breathing softly in the darkness. He couldn’t stop shaking. He’d been like this since well before sunset, and he no longer knew if he was hot or cold, alive or dead.

The long hand of the clock moved forward another notch. As it did, it apparently moved into the perfect position to reflect the moonlight pouring through the window. It glittered white. The gleam caught the corner of his eye, and Saeki finally found his resolve. He stood up and went downstairs and to the garage. He picked up the trowel he kept there and a crowbar to pry the lid off the box, and then he went into the garden.

He had been waiting for the world to be submerged in darkness. He’d been afraid someone might look over the wall during the day and see what he was doing. But the longer he waited, the more his imagination had taken over, driving him half-insane. Overcome with terror, he had nearly passed out in the darkness, and before he knew it, he’d been curled up like that for more than six hours.

He passed the evergreens and came out in the clearing between the wall and the porch. Staring at the row of bamboo poles along the wall, he took another step forward. The back of his hand stung painfully, right where the girl’s nail had broken the skin the night before.

Saeki stood in front of the chest-high dry bamboo poles, the poles that connected to the girl’s coffin. His hand hurt so much he could have sworn it was bleeding.

First, he called out to the girl. She didn’t respond. Hands trembling, Saeki yanked the pole out of the ground and dropped it to one side. He brushed the straw aside, uncovering the hole where the pole had been.

He stabbed the tip of his trowel into the ground and began to dig.

He worked without light, to avoid attracting attention. The clouds that had covered the sky all day had been swept away by the wind. Like the night before, everything was bathed in the pale light of the moon. There were no sounds from the road beyond the wall, and he worked in almost total silence, the only sound coming from his trowel as it bit into the earth. He was still incredibly dizzy, his body weak like he was running a fever. As he dug, he remembered what the boy had said on the porch.

“It sounds like she had a pretty rough time of it, but she’s safe and sound now. I just spoke to her on the phone. I’m headed over there now—thanks for taking the time to talk to me.”

The boy had said all this before his tea was even cold, bowed his head, and then rose to leave.

Saeki had merely blinked at him, unable to parse the boy’s meaning. There was no way the girl could be aboveground.

But the boy had picked up his bag and headed toward the gate without seeming to notice Saeki’s confusion.

Saeki had stepped off the porch, slipped on his shoes, and followed after, through the trees.

“She’s … she came home … ?”

That had to be a lie. But he couldn’t stop himself from asking.

“Yes, she did. It sounded on the phone like she was still in a state of shock. But I wouldn’t worry; she’ll recover soon enough.”

The boy went through the gate, turning toward the park. Saeki stopped just outside the gate. He put one hand on the gatepost, supporting himself, and watched as the uniformed boy walked away.

The boy had stopped at the intersection not far from the gate, and he’d waved down the cross street. Someone Saeki couldn’t see must’ve been coming that way. Eventually, that person stepped onto the corner and stood next to the boy. It was a long-haired girl whom Saeki recognized at once.

He couldn’t believe his eyes. He stared at the girl’s face: even, beautiful features, pale skin. The girl he had buried alive. She was talking to the boy.

Was he dreaming? He was so dizzy that the houses and telephone poles were all bending. The road and walls were all moving like waves in a pond …

He’d glanced toward the bamboo poles where he’d buried the girl—and then he’d broken into a run. The moment he took his eyes off the duo at the corner, the boy had turned toward him. But all Saeki cared about was under those poles.

Saeki stood where he had buried the girl. He spoke to the poles that led into the coffin. There was no answer. No sound came from underground, and all he could see inside the poles was inky blackness, like dirty water.

The girl must have escaped.

No. Saeki dismissed the idea. The earth hadn’t been disturbed. So then … what the hell had he buried … ?

He called down the bamboo pole any number of times after the boy left, until it was dark. But she never once responded. No matter how hard he thought, Saeki couldn’t figure it out. Eventually, he decided there was nothing he could do except wait for dark and open the coffin lid.

In the moonlight, it was silent save for the sound of earth turning over. Saeki poured all his attention into the work. The black walls of forest stared down at him from either side. The damp night air made the scent of the evergreens all the stronger.

There was a white mist drifting through the trees, covering the garden. The trees were breathing. Saeki felt like this white mist was the breath of the trees he had planted.

He could feel the trowel stabbing into the ground, could feel the weight of the earth as he lifted it and tossed it aside, but he felt like he was trapped inside a nightmare. The repetitive, simple task he was performing didn’t help. He could no longer believe he really lived in the world; he was simply a human-shaped thing that had been trapped in the darkness for aeons, forced to turn over dirt for all eternity.

His hand hurt. He was sure the red scratches on the back of his hand harbored the girl’s curse.

What was it that lay buried under him? The deeper the hole, the less certain he was. Tears rolled down Saeki’s cheeks. With each scoop of earth, he had to wipe his eyes with his shoulders just to see. He was terrified of what lay underground. The embodiment of the sin he had committed lay there. He was sure it would be like a mirror, reflecting his inhuman inner nature.

He felt like he had been working forever, but then he finished at last. The wooden box he’d made had gradually appeared in the hole at the edge of the garden, surrounded by white mist and the scent of the earth, and bathed in the pale moonlight. The lid was still nailed shut. It didn’t appear as if it’d been opened. The thumb-sized holes in the lid were dark. The box terrified him. It was like some cold, otherworldly thing. Sobbing, Saeki pried open the lid with a crowbar.

The first thing that hit him was the smell of blood, so strong it nearly knocked him backward. Then he saw the uniform-clad girl in the box. She was lying on her back with her hands on her chest. Her face, the sides of the box, and the lid were all red. There was a deep pool of dark liquid in the bottom of the box.

It was blood, blood that had poured from the girl’s throat. In her hands was a mechanical pencil. Just as she’d said she would, she’d stabbed the pencil into her neck.

The blood must have sprayed out of her, coating the inside of the box. Saeki slapped his hands to his mouth, backing away from the hole. He needed to get away from her. He stumbled along the wall, collapsed on his knees near the evergreens, and threw up. But he hadn’t eaten a bite all day, and nothing came out but stomach acid.

“As you may have noticed, she was not Morino Yoru …”

As his shoulders shook with fear, Saeki heard a voice say those words. At first, he thought the voice came from inside his head, but it soon came again. It was the voice of the boy he’d met that day.

“Saeki, you only thought that she was Morino.”

He heard footsteps near him. Saeki looked up, and a figure appeared out of the mist. It stood in the trees, backlit by the moon, staring down at Saeki. He couldn’t see the figure’s face, but he knew it must be the boy.

Farther away came a different set of footsteps. There was someone else beyond the mist, through the evergreens. They walked right past Saeki, over to the coffin he had excavated. It was a tall, sturdy male, bigger than either Saeki or the boy. He appeared to be about the same age as the boy. Saeki saw his face in the moonlight, but he didn’t recognize him.

The man headed directly for the girl Saeki had buried but didn’t recognize. What was going on? He couldn’t understand. Was this real? Had he fallen asleep? He wasn’t sure. Saeki looked up at the boy and shook his head, demonstrating his confusion. Tears flowed down his cheeks.