Dance Dance Dance by Haruki Murakami
I made some coffee, and at half past six the others woke up. Mei had on a bathrobe. Mami came in wearing a paisley pajama top and Gotanda the bottom. I was in my jeans and T-shirt. We all took seats at the dining table and passed around the toast and marmalade. The FM station was playing “Baroque for You.” A Henry Purcell pastoral.
“Morning at camp,” I said.
Cuck-koo, sang Mei.
At seven-thirty Gotanda called a taxi for the girls. Mei kissed me good-bye. “If you find Kiki, give her my best,” I said. I handed her my card and asked her to call if she learned anything.
“Hope we can meet again and shovel some more snow,” she winked.
“Shovel snow?” Gotanda asked.
Gotanda and I sat down to another cup of coffee. It was like a commercial. A quiet morning, sun rising, Tokyo Tower gleaming in the distance. Tokyo begins its mornings with Nescafé.
Time for normal people to be starting their day. Not for us though. Like it or not, we two were excluded.
“Find out anything about Kiki?” asked Gotanda.
I shook my head. “Only that she’d disappeared. Just like you said. No leads, not a clue. Mei didn’t even know her real name.”
“I’ll ask around the film company,” he said. “Maybe somebody knows something.”
He pouted slightly and pressed at his temple with the handle of his coffee spoon. He sure was good at it.
“But tell me, what do you plan to do if you find her?” he asked. “Try to win her back? Or is it just for old times?”
I told him I didn’t know. I hadn’t thought that far.
Gotanda saw me home in his spotless brown Maserati.
“Mind if I call you again soon?” he said. “It really was terrific seeing you. Don’t know anyone else I can talk to like we did. That is, if it’s okay by you.”
“Of course,” I said. And I thanked him again for the steak and drinks and girls and …
He gave a quiet shake of his head. Without a word, I understood everything he meant to say.
The next few days passed uneventfully. The phone rang, but the whole time I kept the answering machine on and didn’t bother picking up. Nice to know that my services were still in demand, though. I cooked meals, went into Shibuya, and saw Unrequited Love every day. It was spring break, so the theater was always packed with high school students. It was like an animal house. I wanted to burn the place down.
Now that I knew what to look for, I was able to find Kiki’s name, in fine type, in the opening credits.
Then after her scene, I’d leave the theater and walk my usual course. From Harajuku to the Jingu Stadium, Aoyama Cemetery, Omotesando, past the Jintan Building, back to Shibuya. Sometimes I’d stop for a coffee along the way. Spring had surely come, bringing its familiar smells. The earth persisted in its measured orbit of the sun. I always find it a cosmic mystery that spring knows when to follow winter. And how is it that spring always brings out the same smells? Year after year, however subtle, exactly identical.
The town was plastered with election posters. Ugly and repugnant. Trucks were making the rounds, blaring out speeches by politicians. So loud you couldn’t tell what they were saying. Noise.
I walked and I thought about Kiki. And before long I noticed I’d regained my stride, a lift had come back to my step. My awareness of things around me had sharpened. I was moving forward intently, one step at a time. I had focus, a goal. Which somehow, quite naturally, lightened my step, almost gave me soft-shoe footwork. This was a good sign. Dance. Keep in step, light but steady. Freshen up, maintain the rhythm, keep things going. I had to pay careful attention where this was leading me to next. Had to make sure I stayed in this world.
The last four or five days of March passed in this way. On the surface, there was no progression at all. I’d do the shopping, make meals in the kitchen, see Unrequited, go for long walks. I’d play back the answering machine when I got home—inevitably calls about work. At night, I’d read and drink alone. Every day was a repeat of the day before.
Drinking alone at night, I fixated on sex with Mei the Goat Girl. Shoveling snow. An oddly isolated memory, unconnected to anything. Not to Gotanda, not to Kiki. But ever so real. Down to the smallest details, in some sense even more vivid than waking reality, though ultimately unconnected. I liked it that way. A self-bound meeting of souls. Two persons joined together respecting their illusions and images. That fine-we’re-all-friends-here smile. Morning at camp. Cuck-koo.
I tried to picture Kiki and Gotanda sleeping together. Did she give him the same ultra-sexy service as Mei gave me? Were all the girls at the club drilled in such professional know-how? Or was Mei strictly her own technician? I had no idea, and I couldn’t very well ask Gotanda. All the time Kiki was living with me, she was, if anything, rather passive about sex. Sure, she warmed up and responded, but she never made the first move, never had demands of her own. Not that I ever had any complaints. She was wonderful when she relaxed. Her soft inviting body, quiet easy breath, hot vagina. No, I had no complaints. I just couldn’t picture her delivering professional favors to anyone—to Gotanda, for instance. Maybe I lacked the imagination.
How do prostitutes keep their private sex separate from their professional sex? Before Mei, I’d never slept with a call girl. I’d slept with Kiki. And Kiki was a call girl. But I didn’t sleep with Kiki the call girl, I slept with Kiki. And conversely I’d slept with Mei the call girl, but not Mei. There probably was nothing to gain from correlating these two circumstances. That would only make matters more complicated. And anyway, where does sex stop being a thing of the mind? Where does technique begin? How far does the real thing go, how much is acting? Was sufficient foreplay a spiritual concern? Did Kiki actually enjoy sex with me? Was she really acting in the movie? Were Gotanda’s graceful fingers sliding down her back turning her on?
Caught in the cross hair of the real and the imaginary.
Take Gotanda. His doctor persona was all image. Yet he looked more like a real doctor than any doctor I knew. All the dependability and trust he projected.
What was my image? Did I even have one?
Dance, the Sheep Man said. Dance in tip-top form. Dance so it all keeps spinning.
Did that mean I would then have an image? And if I did, would people be impressed? Well, more than they’d be impressed by my real self, I bet.
When I awoke the following morning, it was April. As delicately rendered as a passage from Truman Capote, fleeting, fragile, beautiful. April, made famous by T.S. Eliot and Count Basie.
I went to Kinokuniya for some overpriced groceries and well-trained vegetables. Then I picked up two 6-packs of beer and three bottles of bargain wine.
When I got back home, there was a message from Yuki, her voice totally disinterested. She said she’d call again around twelve. Then she slammed down the receiver. A common phrasing in her body language.
I dripped some coffee, then sat down with a mug and the latest 87th Precinct adventure, something I’ve failed to quit for ten years now. Then a little past noon, the phone rang.
“How’s it going?” It was Yuki.
“Okay.”
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Thinking about lunch. Smoked salmon with pedigreed lettuce and razor-sharp slices of onion that have been soaked in ice water, brushed with horseradish and mustard, served on French butter rolls baked in the hot ovens of Kinokuniya. A sandwich made in heaven!”
“It sounds okay.”
“It’s not okay. It’s nothing less than uplifting. And if you don’t believe me, you can ask your local bee. You could also ask your friendly clover. They’ll tell you—it really is great.”
“What’s this bee and clover stuff? What’re you talking about?”
“Figure of speech.”
“You know,” said Yuki, “you ought to try growing up. I’m only thirteen, but even so I sometimes think you’re kind of dumb.”
“You mean I should become more conventional? Is
“I want to go for a drive,” she ignored my question. “How about tonight?”
“I think I’m free,” I said.
“Well, then, be here at five in Akasaka. You remember how to get here, don’t you?”
“Yeah, but don’t tell me you’ve been alone all this time?”
“Uh-huh. Nothing’s happening in Hakone. I mean, the place is on top of a mountain. Who wants to go there to be alone? More fun in town.”
“What about your mother? She hasn’t returned?”
“Not that I know of. I can’t keep track of her. I’m not her mother, you know. She hasn’t called or anything, so maybe she’s still in Kathmandu.”
“What about money?”
“I’m okay for money. I’ve got a cash card that I pinched from her purse. One less card, she’ll never notice. I mean, if I don’t look out for myself, I’ll die. Mama’s such a space cadet, as you know.”
My turn to ignore her. “You been eating healthy?”
“I’m eating. What did you think? I’d die if I didn’t.”
“That’s not what I asked. I said, are you eating healthy?”
Yuki coughed. “Let’s see. First there was Kentucky Fried Chicken, then McDonald’s, then Dairy Queen, … And what else?”
“I’ll be there at five,” I said. “We’ll go somewhere decent to eat. You can’t survive on the garbage you’ve been putting down. An adolescent girl needs nourishment. You’re at a very delicate time of life, you know. Bad diet, bad periods.”
“You’re an idiot,” she muttered.
“Now, if it’s not too much to ask, would you give me your phone number?”
“Why?”
“Because one-way communication isn’t fair. You know my number, I don’t know yours. You call me when you feel like it, I can’t call you. It’s one-sided. Besides, suppose something came up suddenly, I wouldn’t be able to reach you.”
She paused, muttered some more, then gave me her number.
“But don’t think you can change plans anytime you feel like it,” said Yuki. “Mama’s so good at it already, you wouldn’t stand a chance.”
“I promise. I won’t change plans. Cross my heart and hope to die. You can ask the cabbage moth, you can ask the alfalfa. There’s not a human alive who keeps promises better than me. But sometimes the unexpected happens. It’s a big, complicated world, you know. And if it happens, don’t you think it’d be nice if I could get through to you? Got it?”
“Unforeseeable circumstances,” she said.
“Out of the clear blue sky.”
“Nice if they didn’t happen,” said Yuki.
“Nice if they didn’t,” I echoed.
But of course they did.
They showed up a little past three in the afternoon.
I was in the shower when the doorbell started ringing. By the time I got there, it was on ring number eight. I opened up, and there stood two men.
One in his forties, one in his thirties. The older guy was tall, with a scar on his nose. A little too well-tanned for this time of the year, a deep, tried-and-true bronze of a fisherman, not the precious color you get from the beach or ski slope. He had stiff hair, obscenely large hands, and a gray overcoat. The younger guy was short with longish hair and narrow, intense eyes. A generation ago he might have been called bookish. The fellow at the literary journal meeting who ran his hands through his hair as he declared, “Mishima’s our man.” He had on a dark blue trench coat. Both guys in regulation black shoes, cheap and worn-out. The sort you wouldn’t glance at twice if you saw them lying by the side of the road. Nor were the fellas the type you’d go out of your way to make friends with.
Without a word of introduction, Bookish flashed his police ID. Just like in the movies. I’d never actually seen a police ID before, but one look convinced me it was the real thing. It fit with the worn-out shoes. Something in the way he pulled it out of his pocket, he could have been selling his literary journal door-to-door.
“Akasaka precinct,” Bookish announced, and asked if I was who I was.
Uh-huh.
Fisherman stood by silently, both hands in the pockets of his overcoat, nonchalantly propping the door open with his foot. Just like in the movies. Great!
Bookish filed away his ID, then gave me the once-over. Me in bathrobe and wet hair.
“We need you to come down to headquarters for questioning,” said Bookish.
“Questioning? About what?”
“Everything in due time,” he said. “We have formal procedures to follow for this sort of thing, so why don’t we get going right away.”
“Huh? Okay, but mind if I get into some clothes?”
“Certainly,” said Bookish flatly, without the slightest change of expression. If Gotanda played a cop, he’d do a better job. That’s reality for you.
The fellas waited in the doorway while I got some clothes on and turned off switches. Then I stepped into my blue topsiders, which the two cops stared at as if they were the trendiest thing on the market.
A patrol car was parked near the entrance to my building, a uniformed cop behind the wheel. Fisherman got into the backseat, then me, then Bookish. Again, like in the movies. Bookish pulled the door shut and the car took off.
The streets were congested, but did they turn on the siren? No, they made like we were going for a ride in a taxi. Sans meter. We spent more time stopped in traffic than moving, which gave everybody in all the cars and on the street plenty of opportunity to stare at me. No one uttered a word. Fisherman looked straight ahead, arms folded. Bookish looked out the window, grimacing like he was laboring over a literary exercise. The school of dark-and-stormy metaphors. Spring as concept raged in upon us, a somber tide of longing. Its advent roused the passions of those nameless multitudes fallen between the cracks of the city, sweeping them noiselessly toward the quicksands of futility.
I wanted to erase the whole passage from my head. What the hell was “spring as concept”? Just where were these “quicksands of futility”? I was sorry I started the whole dumb train of thought.
Shibuya was full of mindless junior high students dressed like clowns, same as ever. No passions, no quicksand.
At police headquarters, I was taken to an interrogation room upstairs. Barely three meters square with one tiny window. Table, two steel office chairs, two vinyl-covered stools, clock on the wall. That was it. On the table, a telephone, a pen, ashtray, stack of folders. No vase with flowers. The gumshoes entered the room and offered me one of the steel office chairs. Fisherman sat down opposite me, Bookish stood off to the side, notepad open. Lots of silent communication.
“So what’d you do last night?” Fisherman finally got going after a lengthy wait. Those were the first words I’d heard out of his mouth.
Last night? What was I doing? I could hardly think last night was any different from any other night. Sad but true. I told them I’d have to think about it.
“Listen,” Fisherman said, coughing, “legal rigmarole takes a long time to spit out. We’re asking you a simple question: From last evening until this morning what did you do? Not so hard, is it? No harm in answering, is there?”
“I told you, I have to think about it,” I said.
“You can’t remember without thinking? This was yesterday. We’re not asking about last August, which maybe you don’t remember either,” Fisherman sneered.
Like I told you before, I was about to say, then I reconsidered. I doubted they would understand a temporary memory loss. They’d probably think I had some screws loose.
“We’ll wait,” said Fisherman. “Take all the time you need.” He pulled a pack of cigarettes from his jacket pocket and lit up with a Bic. “Smoke?”
“No thanks,” I said. According to Brutus magazine, today’s new urbanite doesn’t smoke. Apparently these two guys didn’t know about this, Fisherman with his Seven Stars, Bookish with his plain Hopes, chain-smoking.
&n
“Don’t rush the guy. He’s an intellectual,” Fisherman said to Bookish. “According to his file here, this isn’t his first time talking to the law. University activist, obstruction of public offices. We have his prints. Files sent to the prosecutor’s office. He’s used to our gentle questioning. Steel-reinforced will, it says here. He doesn’t seem to like the police very well. You know, I bet he knows all about his rights, as provided for in the constitution. You think he’ll be calling for his lawyer next?”
“But he came downtown with us of his own volition and we merely asked him a simple question,” Bookish said to Fisherman. “I haven’t heard any talk of arrest, have you? I don’t think there’s any reason for him to call his lawyer, do you? Wouldn’t make sense.”
“Well, if you ask me, I think it’s more than an open-and-shut case of hating cops. The gentleman has a negative psychological reaction to anything that resembles authority. He’d rather suffer than cooperate,” Fisherman went on.
“But if he doesn’t answer our questions, what can we do but wait until he answers? As soon as he answers, he can go home. No lawyer’s going to come running down here just because we asked him what he was doing last night. Lawyers are busy people. An intellectual understands that.”
“Well, I suppose,” said Fisherman. “If the gentleman can grasp that principle, then we can save each other a lot of time. We’re busy, he’s busy. No point in wasting valuable time when we could be thinking deep thoughts. It gets tiresome. We don’t want to wear ourselves out unnecessarily.”
The duo kept up their comic routine for the allotted five minutes.
“Well, it looks like time’s up,” Fisherman smiled. “How about it? Did you remember anything?”