From the beginning this was an apocalyptic teaching.
"The church's leaders found they couldn't suppress the radical faction that had sprung up among them, so they went to the police. Sensing this might happen, the radical faction dispersed throughout the country. No one knew when or where they might attack a nuclear plant. At this point the leaders asked to hold a press conference. They indicated ahead of time what they planned to do and asked for full-scale coverage. I'm sure the authorities helped out in this as well.
"The first leader-Patron, as he's called now-sat in front of the cam- eras on live TV and told the church's radical faction members scattered throughout the country to abandon their plans to occupy a nuclear plant.
We are neither saviors nor prophets, he said. Everything we've preached till now has been one big joke. We abandon the church. Everything we've said and done was a silly prank. Now that we've confessed, we want you to stop believing.
"Especially you members of the radical faction, he went on. I want you to understand that our church is a sand castle built as a lark. We enjoyed play- ing the savior of the world and the prophet at the end time, using all those high-sounding phrases and acting solemn and grave. Thanks to all of you we had a wonderful time, especially getting incorporated as a religious founda- tion two years ago and receiving tons of money for our playacting. But this is as far as we'll take it. It's all a big farce, get it? Look at me, here on TV. How could you possibly believe I'm the savior of mankind? How can this scornful- looking partner of mine sitting here really be the prophet of the end of the world?
'Through this TV performance, the nation learned all about their Som- ersault, to use the term coined by the Times correspondent. The word became a Popular expression in Japan for a time.
To tell the truth, I don't know the scale of this event in Japan. I know that the news shows on commercial networks followed up on the story, treat- lng it as slapstick comedy, though I heard that NHK didn't report on it at all.
•dn t you see this when you were a child? What interested me while I was ln the United States was the correspondent's follow-up article on the after- math of the incident. 'The Japanese have a psychological aversion to recanta- tions,' he wrote, 'so with this announcement that everything they preached was just a joke, this false savior and false prophet came under severe attack.'
The correspondent also reported the outrage of ordinary Japanese citizens, who heaped abuse on the two men, and he included letters from people un- connected with the church who complained about its immorality.
"The correspondent found this one-sided attack rather strange.
'Through the Somersault of this false savior and false prophet,' he wrote, 'it is possible that several cities were spared a nuclear holocaust. The authorities insisted it was impossible for a nuclear power plant to be invaded and said a bunch of young amateurs would never be able to convert it into a stationary nuclear weapon. But how true was this? The people of Japan didn't give any credit to the church's two leaders who'd risked everything to defuse the cri- sis, concentrating instead on a moral critique of their recantation. This criti- cism became even more intense once it was known at the trial of the radical faction that, because of the deal they'd made with the authorities, the two lead- ers were going to avoid prosecution.' The correspondent ended by saying that the Japanese were certainly a strange race.
"Ikuo, I'm sure you saw these reports on TV and elsewhere about pub- lic opinion in Japan at the time, right? You wanted to be there to see the end of the world, after all. What did you think about it?"
"As I said before, I had nothing but scorn for them," Ikuo replied, "especially when those afternoon women's talk shows kept playing the so- called savior of mankind's recantation speech ad nauseam. Even though I was only a kid, it made me laugh. Deep down inside, though, I think I was disappointed."
3
Having talked for so long, Kizu drove in silence for a while. From Ikuo's continued silence, Kizu could sense something he couldn't quite lay a finger on, something he hadn't been conscious of recently. His liaison with Ikuo had given him back his self-confidence, though he sometimes felt their relation- ship was different from that of gay couples he used to see in his university community. Maybe it was the same with those couples, but Ikuo didn't seem to accept the kind of closeness you'd expect to arise from physical intimacy and made it clear he wanted to maintain a certain distance from Kizu.
Ikuo seemed genuinely interested in the reunion with the girl he'd had such a strange encounter with fifteen years ago, an interest mixed with curi- osity about the former religious leaders she was now working for. Ikuo's com- ments after listening to Kizu made him sense both how strong his interest was in Patron and Guide and also that he was hiding something.
Kizu turned to slowly look at Ikuo; the latter's face had lost its wine- induced flush and again looked like a statue with skin covering the indenta- tions and protruding bones. Shake it a bit, and the heavy lump of a head looked like it would tip right over.
The next day, though, after modeling for Kizu in the morning, Ikuo himself brought up the subject of the girl, as if filling in all his previous silence.
"The girl met Patron and Guide after their Somersault, yet she believes in them totally. The world's going to end, she said, and Patron and Guide will show us the way to deal with that. What they said and did during their Somersault doesn't seem to faze her."
"She puts more emphasis on their suffering over the past ten years," Kizu said. "I wonder if that's the basic approach the two of them will take as they start over. This new beginning means a great deal to her. That's why she got so angry when you used the word game. "
"Was I wrong to say that?" Ikuo turned his dark, affectionate eyes to Kizu, who felt a surge of desire race through him. "Like I said yesterday, I'm serious about the end time. But she changed the subject. I wish I could have heard more about Patron.
"This morning when I woke up, I regretted not asking for more details about what these leaders' ten years of suffering was all about. AU I remember from watching TV was this frivolous old guy blabbing on and on."
"Maybe this new beginning for them is a casual somersault in the oppo- site direction," Kizu remarked.
"Gymnasts sometimes move forward by doing one somersault after another," Ikuo said. "Unless we talk to them directly, though, we're merely tossing metaphors around."
In other words," Kizu said, "even if they're phonies you want to meet this self-styled savior of mankind and his prophet, right? Well, you have a standing invitation from her. And I think I'd like to go with you."
'Let me get in touch with her first."
Kizu couldn't read anything in Ikuo's expression, but as he looked at Ikuo s muscular chest and neck, exposed at the loose collar of the robe he'd thrown on over his nude body, Kizu found himself less interested in pur- suing the meaning behind Ikuo's expression than simply standing in awe at this young man's magnificent physique. What a waste, he thought, for such a fertile body to be given to someone who has so much still to attain spiritually.
No doubt Kizu was so involved in drawing Ikuo, preparing to create his tableau, because he wanted to capture this young man-for himself alone-before he leaped to the next stage, where that wonderful body would go hand in hand with spirituality. Kizu loved to imagine that Ikuo's body was already lending a sense of solemnity to the privileged thoughts that lay within him. And what convinced Kizu that something special lay in Ikuo's inner being was none other than what he had witnessed fifteen years before: beau- tiful eyes in the wildly ferocious face of someone who looked less a child than a small man.