Grotesque (15 page)

G R O T E S Q U E

The first to pick up the phone when the operator placed the call was my father, who was still in a state of shock.

“We’re in turmoil here; it’s just terriblel” The last word he spluttered out in English. “The police came and asked all kinds of questions. They think it’s odd that your mother died while I was out, but it’s only natural under the circumstances, don’t you think? Your mother had lost her mind, you know. It’s got nothing to do with me. I got mad and had to argue for my own security. It was an awful conversation. Just terrible.”

Again with the English word. “It’s so sad but also very, very bitter. It’s so painful to be under suspicion like this.”

“Father, you mean innocence, don’t you? You had to argue for your own innocence.”

“Illness? What?”

“Forget it. Why do they suspect you?”

“I don’t want to discuss it. It’s not something to discuss with a daughter.

But they’re sending a detective over at four. I’m angry as hell.”

“Well, what about the funeral?”

“It’ll be the day after tomorrow, at three.”

My father barely managed to finish his sentence before Yuriko got on the phone. I wondered if she’d yanked the receiver out of his hand. I could hear him scolding her in German.

“It’s me, Yuriko. As soon as the funeral’s over I’m coming back to Japan. Father’s being impossible. He said the shock might cause his Turkish girlfriend to suffer a miscarriage, so he’s brought her here—to this house! With Mother’s body still here! So I told the police about her.

I told them Father’s girlfriend was the one who was most responsible for Mother’s death. That’s why the detective came. It serves him right!”

“That was really stupid, Yuriko. You’re turning this whole thing into a soap opera!”

“Maybe so, but this time he went too far!”

Yuriko started to cry. It seemed like they’d been in an uproar since I talked to them this morning.

“Mother’s death was so sudden, no wonder Father’s in shock. I don’t care how many women he brings home with him, you need to lighten up.

At least he has someone to help him through this.”

“What are you talking about? Have you lost your mind?” Yuriko was furious. “How can you be so cold? Mother’s dead! And you’re not here, so you can’t possibly understand what’s going on. Mother commits sui-8 9

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cide and yet he brings that woman here. In a few months you and I are going to have ourselves a little brother or sister. Of course I’m furious!

Mothers death might have been caused by Fathers affair, you know. It’s as if he killed her himself. Or you could say it’s as if that woman did it. It’s the last straw. I’m cutting my ties with that man once and for all!”

Yuriko’s shrill voice raced over the six thousand miles separating Switzerland from Japan and seeped out of the black telephone receiver, entering the gloomy living room in Kazue’s house.

“Mother died on account of her circumstances.” I laughed through my nose. “You say you’re going to cut all ties with Father, but you don’t have any money. If you come back to Japan, you won’t have any place to live and you won’t be enrolled in school.”

I was trying my best to block Yuriko’s return. But what the hell was my father thinking, bringing his pregnant girlfriend into the house the very day Mother died? Even I was shocked. I noticed Kazue’s family sitting there in the living room holding their breaths, their eyes riveted on me.

I met Kazue’s father’s stare head on and refused to look away. Shame on you for bringing such a conversation into my house! his eyes accused. I tried to end the call as quickly as I could.

“Okay, well, let’s talk later.”

“No, we have to decide this now. The police are coming any minute, and I have to go with them when they take Mother’s body to the funeral parlor.”

“Get your mind off Japan,” I screamed at her. “It’s out of the question!”

“You can’t tell me what to do, you know. I’m coming back.”

“Where to?”

“I don’t care. If I can’t stay with you, I’ll ask the Johnsons.”

“Fine by me. Ask away.”

“You think only of yourself, don’t you,” Yuriko said.

That ridiculous Johnson couple: they’d be perfect for Yuriko! I felt like a huge burden had been lifted from my shoulders. As long as I didn’t have to see my sister, I didn’t care if she came back to Japan or stayed in Switzerland. All I wanted was to preserve the quiet life I had with my grandfather.

“Call me when you get back.”

“You don’t give a damn. You never did.”

Upset, I hung up the phone. It seemed like we’d talked for over ten minutes. Kazue’s family averted their eyes. I waited for the operator to 9 0

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call back and inform me of the charges. And I waited and waited and waited. I had assumed the call would come any minute. When the phone finally rang, Kazue’s father got to it before I could, leaping across the room with amazing agility.

“It’s ten thousand eight hundred yen. If you’d called after eight it would have been cheaper.”

“I’m sorry. I don’t carry that kind of money with me. May I give it to Kazue tomorrow?”

“Please be sure to do so.”

Kazue’s father spoke in a very businesslike tone. I thanked him and left the living room. I heard the door open behind me as I stood in the gloomy hallway looking up the dark flight of stairs. Kazue’s father had come out after me. The light from the living room filtered out into the hallway in a long narrow stream through the crack he’d left in the door.

But no one said a word. It was as quiet as a crypt in the living room, as if the two sitting there were holding their breath trying to hear what Kazue’s father would say to me. Shorter than I am, her father pressed a scrap of paper into the palm of my hand. When I looked, it was a reminder of the amount I owed for the phone call: ¥10,800, written in crisp clear marks.

“There’s something I want to talk to you about.”

“Yes?”

The light from Kazue’s father’s eyes was intense, as if challenging me to bend to his will. It made me feel slightly dizzy. At first he spoke in insipid tones as if trying to butter me up.

“You’ve been admitted to Q High School for Young Women, so I imagine you’re a very fine young lady.”

“I suppose.”

“How hard did you study for the exam?”

“I don’t remember.”

“Kazue has been a diligent student ever since elementary school. Fortunately she’s a smart girl, and she enjoys studying. So it’s only right that she’s made it this far. But I don’t think just studying is enough. She’s a girl, after all, and I want her to pay attention to how she dresses. And since she’s now at Q High School for Young Women, I want her to become more ladylike. To try, you know. And for her part she’s still doing all she can to meet my expectations. So she’s very dear to me. I’m praising her blindly because I’m her father. Both my daughters are so submis-9 1

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sive that I worry about them. But you. You’re different. When compared to my daughter, you seem much more sure of yourself. I work for a major corporation, and I’m a good judge of character. I can spot a persons true character a mile away. What does your father do?”

Kazue’s father leered at me. He did not try to conceal the fact that he was sizing me up. I was sure he’d find my father’s work of no value whatsoever.

So I lied.

“He works for a Swiss bank.”

“Which bank, I wonder, the Swiss Union Bank? Or perhaps the Swiss Credit?”

“I’ve been told not to divulge that information.”

I was completely clueless and confused, but I did my best to answer with care. Kazue’s father let out a short snort and nodded. A slight wave of respect washed over his face. Did he feel somewhat humbled? It surprised me to realize that I found the encounter quite enjoyable. Yes, laugh at me if you will, but I found myself saying exactly the sort of thing my grandfather, the con man, always said about my father’s work. I had managed to adapt myself to this man’s sense of values. I knew of no one else who was as clear-cut as he on what was worthy and what was not.

But it terrified me that he would force his biased logic on me. I was only sixteen at the time, after all.

“Kazue told me you were the one who put her up to the discussion about the clubs. My daughter’s the type to take everything seriously and do her best as a result. She’ll apply herself naively to anything anyone tells her to do. And you knew this, didn’t you? But I’m the one who controls my daughter, see? It’s best if you stay out of it.”

I tried to meet him head on. “Sir, you don’t know what it’s like at our school, and you don’t know about my friendship with your daughter, so why would you say such a thing?”

“There’s friendship, is there, between you and Kazue?”

“There is.”

“But you’re not an appropriate friend for one of my daughters. It’s a pity about your mother. But from what I can tell, the circumstances of her death are not what one would call normal. I selected Q High School for Kazue because I knew I couldn’t go wrong there. I knew Kazue would be able to make friends with good girls. Kazue’s a wholesome girl from a normal family.”

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What he meant was that my family was not normal. Yuriko and I were not wholesome. I wonder what he would have said if Mitsuru had come.

“I don’t think that’s fair. I—”

“That’s enough. I’m not interested in what you have to say.”

I could feel the anger burning in his tiny upturned eyes. His anger was not directed at me as a child but as a separate force that threatened his daughter.

“Of course, a friendship with a girl like you might prove to be a good lesson for Kazue. She could learn more about society that way. But it’s still too early for her, and you have nothing to do with our family.

Besides, I have my younger daughter to think of, so I’m sorry to have to say this but I don’t ever want to see you here again.”

“I see.”

“Please don’t hold a grudge over what I’ve just said, either.”

“I won’t.”

This was the first time I’d ever been so clearly rebuffed by an adult.

He might as well have said, You’re worthless. It shocked me.

My own father had of course wielded paternal authority within the home. But because he was a minority in Japan, he had never really been able to communicate that authority to the outside world. My grandfather was a timid convict who did whatever I told him to do. If anything, it was my mother who represented our family to the rest of society. But my mother had no influence in the home and gave in to my father on everything. Therefore, when I saw a person who used the rigidity and absurdity of social conventions as steadfastly as Kazue’s father did, I was impressed. Why? Because Kazue’s father did not really believe in the social values he represented, but he clearly knew that he had armed himself with them more or less as a weapon of survival.

Kazue’s father obviously paid no attention to the internal affairs at Q High School for Young Women. He was utterly unconcerned with the impact this would have on Kazue or the way it would make her suffer.

He was one self-centered son-of-a-bitch. That much I understood with crystal clarity, even as a high school student. But Kazue, her mother, and her younger sister lived in complete ignorance of this man’s intentions or his character; yet he was able to apprehend the evil intentions that Mitsuru and I nurtured, take them for his own, and use them to protect his family. Protecting the family was nothing short of protecting himself. In 9 3

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that sense, I couldn’t help but envy Kazue and her strong father. Dominated by her fathers strong will, Kazue trusted his values implicitly.

When I think about it now, I realize that the power he had over her was tantamount to mind control.

“Well, then, take care on your way home.”

I started to climb the stairs, feeling as though Kazue’s father were pushing me from behind. After he had watched me for a bit, he went back into the living room, slamming the door closed behind him. The darkness in the hallway felt all the deeper.

“You took long enough!”

Kazue was annoyed to have been kept waiting. It looked as though she’d been trying to stave off her boredom by doodling in the notebook she had spread out in front of her on the desk. She’d sketched a picture of a cheerleader in a miniskirt hoisting a baton. When she saw me looking down at the drawing, she quickly covered the page with her hands, just like a child.

“He let me make an international call.” I showed Kazue the bill her father had written out. “I’ll give you the money tomorrow.”

Kazue glanced at the amount. “Wow! That was expensive. I was wondering, How’d your mother die anyway?”

“She committed suicide—in Switzerland.”

Kazue dropped her gaze and looked like she was searching for the right words, then looked up again. “I know this sounds awful, but I kinda envy you.”

“Why? Do you wish your mother were dead too?”

Kazue’s answer was barely more than a whisper. “I detest my mother.

Recently I’ve begun to notice that she acts more like she was my father’s daughter than his wife. What a way for a mother to behave! My father only has hopes for his daughters, you know, for us—so having her around is really annoying.”

Kazue brimmed with joy at the thought that she was the only one able to measure up to her father’s expectations. Kazue was a “good girl,” a filial daughter whose only reason for living was to please her father.

“Yes, I suppose he doesn’t need another daughter,” I said.

“You’ve got that right! And I could do without my little sister too!”

Without thinking I let out a sympathetic laugh. My own family was far from normal, a fact I well understood without having Kazue’s father 9 4

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point it out. I realized this was something a die-hard disciple like Kazue would never understand.

As I was stepping out of the house into the dark street, I felt someone clutch at my shoulder. Kazue’s father had followed me out.

“Just a minute there,” he said. “You lied. Your father doesn’t work for the Bank of Switzerland or anything of the sort, does he?”