I wanted to breathe the outside air, so I decided to go shopping nearby. I walked down the street, wearing my new sneakers. I felt as if these new shoes had transformed me into a new being, entirely different from what I had been before. The street scene and the faces of the people I passed looked somewhat different too. In the neighborhood supermarket, I picked up vegetables and eggs and milk and fish and coffee beans, paying for them with the bills I had received as change at the shoe store the night before. I wanted to tell the round-faced, middle- aged woman at the register that I had made this money the previous day by selling my body. I had earned two hundred thousand yen. Two hundred thousand yen! I could slave away at the law office where I used to work, doing overtime every day for a month, and I might come home with a little over one hundred fifty thousand yen. That's what I wanted to say to her.
But of course I said nothing. I handed over the money and received a paper bag filled with groceries in return.
One thing was sure: things had started to move. I told myself this as I walked home clutching my bag of groceries. Now all I had to do was hold on tight to keep from being knocked off. If I could do that, I would probably end up somewhere-somewhere different from where I was now, at least.
My premonition was not mistaken. When I got home, the cat came out to greet me. Just as I opened the front door, he let out a loud meow as if he had been waiting all day and came up to me, bent-tip tail held high. It was Noboru Wataya, missing now for almost a year. I set the bag of groceries down and scooped him up in my arms.
5 A Place You Can Figure Out If You Think About It Really, Really Hard (May Kasahara's Point of View: 1)
Hi, Mr. Wind-Up Bird.
I'll bet you think I'm in a classroom somewhere, studying with a textbook open in front of me, like any ordinary high school kid. Sure, last time we met I told you myself that I was going to go to another school, so it would be natural for you to think so. And in fact, I did go to another school, a private boarding school for girls, far, far away, a fancy one, with big, clean rooms like hotel rooms, and a cafeteria where you could choose whatever you wanted to eat, and big, shiny new tennis courts and a swimming pool, so naturally it was pretty expensive, a place for rich girls. Problem rich girls. You can imagine what it was like-an honest-to-goodness refined-country-school kind of thing in the mountains. It was surrounded by a high wall topped with barbed wire, and it had this huge iron gate that Godzilla himself couldn't have kicked in and round-the-clock guards clunking around like robots-not so much to keep people on the outside from getting in as to keep people on the inside from getting out.
So now you're going to ask me, Why go to such an awful place if you know its so awful? You're right, but I had no choice. The main thing I wanted was to get out of the house, but after all the problems I had caused, that was the only school charitable enough to accept me as a transfer student. So I made up my mind to stick it out. But it really was awful! People use the word nightmarish, but it was worse than that. I really did have nightmares in that place- all the time- and Id wake up soaked in sweat, but even then Id wish I could have kept dreaming, because my nightmares were way better than reality in that place. I wonder if you know what thats like, Mr. Wind-Up Bird. I wonder if you've ever been in the pits like that.
So finally, I stayed in this high-class hotel/jail/country school for only one semester. When I got home for spring vacation, I announced to my parents that if I had to go back there, I was going to kill myself. Id stuff three tampons down my throat and drink tons of water; Id slash my wrists; Id dive headfirst off the school roof. And I meant what I said. I wasn't kidding. Both my parents put together have the imagination of a tree frog, but they knew- from experience- that when I got going like that, it wasn't an empty threat.
So anyhow, I never went back to the place. From March into April, I shut myself up in the house, reading, watching TV, and just plain vegging out. And a hundred times a day, Id think, I want to see Mr. Wind-Up Bird. I wanted to slip down the alley, jump the fence, and have a nice long talk with you. But it wasn't that easy. It would've been a replay of the summer. So I just watched the alley from my room and wondered to myself, Whats Mr. Wind- Up Bird up to now? Spring is slowly, quietly taking over the whole world, and Mr. Wind-Up Bird is in it too, but whats happening in his life? Has Kumiko come home to him? Whats going on with those strange women Malta Kano and Creta Kano? Has Noboru Wataya the cat come back? Has the mark disappeared from Mr. Wind-Up Birds cheek ... ?
After a month of living like that, I couldn't take it anymore. I don't know how or when it happened, but for me that neighborhood is nothing now but Mr. Wind-Up Birds world, and when I'm in it, I'm nothing but the me contained in Mr. Wind-Up Birds world. And its not just a sort-of-kind-of thing. Its not your fault, of course, but still... So I had to find my own place.
I thought about it and thought and thought, and finally it hit me where I had to go.
(Hint) Its a place you can figure out if you think about it really, really hard. You'll be able to imagine where I am if you make the effort. Its not a school, its not a hotel, its not a hospital, its not a jail, its not a house. Its a kind of special place way far away. Its... a secret. For now, at least.
I'm in the mountains again, in another place surrounded by a wall (but not such a huge wall), and theres a gate and a nice old man who guards the gate, but you can go in and out anytime you like. Its a huge piece of land, with its own little woods and a pond, and if you go for a walk when the sun comes up you see lots of animals: lions and zebras and-no, I'm kidding, but you can see cute little animals like badgers and pheasants. Theres a dormitory, and thats where I live.
I'm writing this letter in a tiny room at a tiny desk near a tiny bed next to a tiny bookcase beside a tiny closet, none of which have the slightest decorative touch, and all of which are designed to meet the minimum functional requirements. On the desk is a fluorescent lamp, a teacup, the stationery for writing this letter, and a dictionary. To be honest, I almost never use the dictionary. I just don't like dictionaries. I don't like the way they look, and I don't like what they say inside. Whenever I use a dictionary, I make a face and think, Who needs to know that? People like me don't get along well with dictionaries. Say I look up transition and it says: passage from one state to another. I think, So what? Its got nothing to do with me. So when I see a dictionary on my desk I feel like I'm looking at some strange dog leaving a twisty piece of poop on our lawn out back. But anyway, I bought a dictionary because I figured I might have to look something up while I was writing to you, Mr. Wind-Up Bird.
Also I've got a dozen pencils, all sharpened and laid out in a row. They're brand-new. I just bought them at the stationery store-especially for writing to you (not that I'm trying to make you feel grateful or anything: just-sharpened, brand-new pencils are really nice, don't you think?). Also I've got an ashtray and cigarettes and matches. I don't smoke as much as I used to, just once in a while for a mood change (like right now, for instance). So thats everything on my desk. The desk faces a window, and the window has curtains. The curtains have a sweet little flower design-not that I picked them out or anything: they came with the window. That flower design is the only thing here that doesn't look absolutely plain and simple. This is a perfect room for a teenage girl-or maybe not. No, its more like a model jail cell designed with good intentions for first offenders. My boom box is on the shelf (the big one-remember, Mr. Wind-Up Bird?), and I've got Bruce Springsteen on now. Its Sunday afternoon and everybody's out having fun, so theres nobody to complain if I turn it up loud.