Grotesque Read online

  She was wearing a black jacket over her sari. I was reluctant to be seen with her, her outfit was so bizarre, But when I saw how happy she looked I didn’t have the heart to say no.

  “There’s a coffee shop in the basement that should be okay. Ah, what a luxury this is—to be able to move about freely!” Mitsuru’s voice was buoyant, but she kept looking nervously over her shoulder. “I’m followed by detectives, you know.”

  “That’s awful.”

  “But what am I complaining about? You’re the one who’s really had it rough, aren’t you?” Mitsuru said sympathetically. She gave my arm a squeeze as we stepped into the elevator. Her hand was warm and damp and I found it annoying. I pulled away.

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Well, Yuriko. It’s so awful—to have had something like that happen. I just can’t believe it. And Kazue! What a shock!”

  When the elevator reached the basement, I moved to get out and collided with Mitsuru, who had stepped ahead of me. She had stopped square in the doorway, too nervous to go farther.

  “I’m really sorry! I’m just not used to being out in public.”

  “When did they release you?”

  “Two months ago. I was in for six years,” she whispered.

  I looked at Mitsuru from behind. There wasn’t the slightest trace of the bright studious girl she had been in high school. Squirrel-like, sagacious Mitsuru! Now she was thin and flimsy and rough like a nail file. She looked like her mother—her mother who was so frank and so pathetic. Her mother who had betrayed my grandfather. I’d heard it was her mother who encouraged Mitsuru—and also her husband, who was a doctor—to join that religious group. But I wonder if that was true.

  “How is your husband?”

  “He’s still in. I have two sons, you know. They’re being brought up by my husband’s family, and I worry about their education.”

  Mitsuru sipped her coffee. A few drops dribbled off her lip and onto the front of her sari, staining it, but she didn’t seem to notice.

  “Still in?”

  “In confinement. I imagine he’ll serve the maximum sentence. It’s to be expected.” Mitsuru looked up at me, somewhat embarrassed. “But what about you? I just can’t believe what happened to Yuriko. And Kazue too. I can’t imagine that Kazue would do such a thing. She was such a hard worker. Maybe she just got tired of trying so hard.”

  Mitsuru pulled a pack of cigarettes out of the cloth bag she was carrying and lit one. She started to smoke, but she didn’t look used to it.

  “We’ve put on the years, you and I! I think the gap between your teeth has grown larger.”

  Mitsuru nodded in agreement. “You’ve aged too. Maliciousness just gushes from your face now.”

  The words triggered thoughts of the events in the courtroom that day. If anyone had a face from which maliciousness gushed forth, it was Zhang! That’s the face of a lying scoundrel if ever there was one. His ridiculous deposition was just varnished with lies. It’s clear that he killed a whole host of people in China to get their money. He raped his younger sister and killed her. And there’s no doubt he murdered both Yuriko and Kazue.

  “Tell me,” I asked Mitsuru. “A face that gushes with maliciousness: is that someone dogged by bad karma? I’m wondering what kind of karma I have, and I figured that if anyone could tell me, it’s you.”

  Mitsuru stubbed her cigarette out and frowned. She looked nervously around the room and finally spoke in a hushed voice.

  “Please don’t say such crazy things. I’ve quit the organization; I smoke now as proof. But you’ve misunderstood the doctrines of my former religion. Buying into all the garbage the mass media spews out just makes you despise people who are really sincere about what they believe.”

  “Are you showing me a face that gushes maliciousness, then?”

  “I’m sorry! I was wrong. I keep doing these things ever since I got out. I have no self-confidence, and I don’t know how I’m supposed to act. I mean, I’ve forgotten. I really need to get into some kind of rehab. I came here specifically because I thought I’d see you. I just used the Yuriko-and-Kazue trial as an excuse to see you again. Since I hate class reunions and gatherings of that kind, I figured it was the only chance I’d have.”

  Mitsuru raised her face as if she suddenly remembered something. “The letters I sent you from prison—did you get them?”

  “I got four: New Year’s cards and midsummer wishes.”

  “Sending New Year’s cards from a place like that was hard. They played the ‘Red and White Singing Contest’ on the radio. I’d listen to it, sitting zazen style, and cry. What the hell am I doing here, contemplating my navel? I’d wonder. But you never answered. Weren’t you pleased to learn that the straight-A student had ended up in prison? I’m sure you thought it appropriate. You must have thought it justified.” Her voice grew rough. “I made a royal mess of things, and I’m sure all the world rejoiced.”

  “Mitsuru, you’ve come to resemble your mother, haven’t you?”

  Whenever Mitsuru’s mother wanted to say something, she just blurted it out, letting the chips fall where they might. It always had an avalanche effect. Things would take on a momentum of their own; before she knew it, she’d said more than she should have and ended up where she hadn’t anticipated. The liar Zhang was the exact opposite, I thought, and once again I recalled his crafty face in the courtroom.

  “Hmm, have I?”

  “I remember your mother gave me a ride to school in her car once. It was on the same morning I learned that my mother had committed suicide. Your mother said she probably killed herself because she was menopausal.”

  “Right. I remember. How I wish I could go back in time! If only I could return to the days when I was able to live without knowing any of what I know now. If I could, I wouldn’t spend all my time studying like a maniac. I would fool around like the other girls and have fun dressing in the latest fashions. I would join the cheerleading squad or the golf team or the ice-skating club. And I would hang out with boys and go to parties. I just wish I’d lived the life of a normal happy teenager. You probably feel the same way, don’t you?”

  Hardly. I had never once thought of returning to the past. But if there were a time in the past that I would have wanted to return to, it would have been those peaceful days I spent with my grandfather when he was obsessed with his bonsai. However, then he got all tangled up in the lustful ripples that reverberated from Yuriko, went crazy over Mitsuru’s mother, and changed completely. So, no, there really was no time in the past I would want to visit. I suppose Mitsuru had completely forgotten the way we had convinced each other of our talents for survival. She began to irritate me, rather like the irritation I had felt earlier for Yuriko and her stupidity.

  Mitsuru peered at me anxiously. “What are you thinking about?”

  “About the past, of course. The distant past that you say you want to return to. I’d go back to the point in time when Yuriko was a flowering plant, and I was a naked-seed plant. Except, of course, Yuriko would be all dried up.”

  Mitsuru stared at me quizzically. I didn’t try to explain. When she saw I wasn’t going to continue, she blushed and turned away. There it was! There was the expression that was unique to her in high school.

  “Sorry, I know I’m acting strangely,” Mitsuru said, as she gripped her cloth bag. “It’s just that I can’t help feeling that everything I worked so hard for, everything I believed in, is now meaningless—and I can’t bear it. When I was in prison I did my utmost not to even think about it. But now that I’m out, it’s all coming back to haunt me, and I just panic. Of course, what we did was horrible, a huge mistake. I don’t know how I could have killed all those innocent people. But I’d been brainwashed. The leader of the sect could read what I was thinking and he controlled me that way. There was no way I could have escaped. I think it’s all over for me. I’m sure my husband will die in prison. I just cling to my children and wonder what to do. I’ve got to try my hardest