Grotesque (29 page)

N A T S U O K I R I NO

pletely. There was always a part of her that resisted. If a kid knows she’s not bright, she’s always somewhat suspicious. But not Kazue. She swallowed my lies hook, line, and sinker.

“Oh, no! What do you think? What can I do to compete with her?”

Kazue peered over at me expectantly. In the end her narcissism had won out. Kazue was quickly regaining her self-confidence.

“Well,” I declared convincingly, “you’re good in school, for starters, and you know Kijima likes smart girls. But then he did mention Mitsuru.

Maybe he’s interested in her.”

“Mitsuru?” Kazue wheeled around to stare at her. Mitsuru was sitting at her desk reading a book. It was covered with a book wrapper so I couldn’t be sure, but it looked like an English-language novel. As Kazue scrutinized Mitsuru, I could sense the heat of the jealousy rising off her cheeks.

Mitsuru must have sensed Kazue’s stare because she turned around and looked at us. She didn’t reveal any interest in us. I thought it odd that Mitsuru hadn’t even mentioned my grandfather’s visit last night to her mothers bar. Maybe her mother hadn’t told her he’d stopped by.

“Hey? Hey!” Kazue began to pester me. “Did she say anything about the kind of girl Kijima likes?”

“Well, I think we can assume he likes a pretty girl—he’s male, after all.”

“A pretty girl, right…”

Kazue took a few more nibbles of her rice ball and sighed. “I wish I looked like Yuriko! If I’d been born with a face like t h a t … I can’t even imagine how much better my life would be. A whole new world would open for me. Really, to have a face like that—and brains—what more could you want?”

“That’s because she’s a monster.”

“I suppose. But if I could get where she is without having to study, I’d be glad to become a monster too.”

Kazue was absolutely serious. And, in the end she did become a fullfledged monster. Of course, at that moment I couldn’t have imagined how things would turn out. What? You think Kazue turned out the way she did in response to what I did back then? You’re saying I’m responsible for her eccentricity? I don’t believe that for a minute. No. What I believe is that there is something implicit in everyone, which forms that person’s character and is responsible for everything else. There was 1 8 0

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something inside Kazue herself that was accountable for the change in her appearance. I’m sure of that.

“You really eat like a bird. You must overeat at breakfast,” I said maliciously.

Kazue shook her head vigorously. “No way. I only drink a bottle of milk.”

“Really? The other day when I was visiting you ate everything on your plate. You even gulped down the dipping sauce.”

Offended, Kazue glared at me. “Well, I don’t do that anymore. I’m watching what I eat. After all, I want to be as beautiful as a model.”

Just then I thought of something very cruel. If she were to be any thinner than she already was, she would look so horrible there’s no way anyone could be attracted to her.

“Yes, you’re absolutely right. If you lost just a little bit more weight you’d be perfect,” I said.

“I know. That’s what I think too.” Kazue lifted her skirt bashfully. “My legs are so fat. They’ve told me at practice that the thinner you are the lighter, which makes it easier to skate.”

“All you need to do is try just a little bit more. Kijima is thin too, you know.”

Kazue nodded with conviction when she heard what I said. Then she noted happily, “If I were a little thinner, I’d be pretty, and Kijima and I would look really good together.”

She wrapped her empty lunch box in a tomato-stained handkerchief.

Mitsuru appeared, her book tucked under her arm. She tapped me on the shoulder, “Yuriko s here. She said she has something to tell you.”

Yuriko? How many times had I told her never, ever to come looking for me? Surprised, I turned toward the hallway. She was standing in the doorway with Kijima Junior, looking in at me. Kazue still hadn’t noticed them, so I gave her a quick shove.

“It’s Kijima.”

Kazue s cheeks turned beet red and she became completely flustered.

What’ll I do? What’ll I do? I’m not ready for him to see me yet! What’ll I do? This was written all over her face.

I stood up. “Don’t worry. They’ve come to talk to me.”

“But you told Yuriko that I like Kijima, didn’t you?”

“I didn’t tell her.”

I left her to her panic and headed toward my two visitors. Yuriko i 8 1

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stared at me as I approached her. She stood straight as a ramrod and was now more than four inches taller than I was. The arms that hung from her short-sleeved blouse were long and slender and beautifully shaped.

Even her fingers were gorgeous.

“What do you want?”

I noticed Kijima Junior flinch in surprise at the rudeness of my tone.

“Professor Kijima’s my supervising instructor; I think you already know that. Anyway, he’s asked me to fill out an information sheet about my family, and I don’t know what I should write. I think it’ll be weird if you and I don’t have the same answers.”

“Why don’t you fill it in with information about Johnson and Masami?”

“But Johnson’s not really family. Unless he’s more than family?”

Kijima Junior smiled slyly and stared at Yuriko’s face. At that moment I saw Yuriko blush. A light glimmered in her eyes. Anger gives birth to determination—and in Yuriko’s eyes I saw the glimmer of determination.

Yuriko had no business possessing determination. I would have to trample out whatever it was that had given birth to it.

“I filled the blanks in with information about you and Father. But if Professor Kijima asks me about it, I’ll just tell him to come talk to you.”

“Fine.”

I looked at Kijima Junior. “Aren’t you Professor Kijima’s son?”

“Yeah. What’s it to you?” He glared back at me. Clearly he hated nothing more than being asked about his father.

“It’s just that Professor Kijima’s such a great teacher, that’s all.”

“Well, at home he’s a great dad too.” Kijima parried.

“You and Yuriko are always together. You must be really good friends.”

“Well, that’s because I’m her manager,” Takashi responded playfully.

He stuffed both hands in his pockets and shrugged his shoulders. Those two were up to something. And I was so eager to find out what it was, I could hardly contain myself.

“What kind of manager would that be?”

“I do a little of this and a little of that. Oh, and by the way, Yuriko has decided she’ll join the cheerleading squad.”

Now isn’t that ironic, I thought, as I turned to look back at Kazue. She was looking down, pretending she wasn’t the least bit interested. But I knew every fiber in her body was trained on us.

“Kijima, what do you think of that girl there?”

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Takashi glanced over at Kazue and shrugged without the slightest interest. Yuriko looked annoyed and tugged on his arm.

“Kijima, let’s go.”

When Yuriko turned to walk away, it suddenly dawned on me. She was no longer the little girl who had chased after me along the snowy road that night. Just six months ago, when she set off for Switzerland, she hardly ever spoke out, but now that she’d been separated from me she seemed much more assertive.

“Yuriko?” I asked, as I grabbed her arm. “What happened to you in Switzerland?”

Was her body temperature low? Yuriko’s arm was icy cold. What was the point of my question? It was obvious, I suppose, and also extremely ill-tempered. But I wanted to induce her to tell me what I had already discerned—she’d had sex with a man. She was no longer a virgin.

But Yuriko surprised me.

“I lost the person I loved the most.”

“Who?”

“Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten already.” The glimmer in Yuriko’s eye intensified momentarily, as if it were a flame. “Our mother, of course.”

She looked down at me with contempt. Her face twisted, the light in her eyes flickered, and her expression turned to one of sorrow. I longed to make that face of hers even more hideous than it was right then.

“And you don’t look even one bit like her!”

“Resemblance is meaningless.” With that as her parting shot, Yuriko latched onto Takashi’s shoulder. “Kijima, I’ve had enough. Let’s get out of here.”

Kijima barely had time to turn around before Yuriko dragged him off.

But he did manage to gaze back at me with a curious stare. Yes, that’s right. I was completely taken with the question of resemblance, and I would continue to be. I am even now. I don’t know why.

Before I could return to my seat, Kazue dashed over to me and began her grilling.

“Hey, what were you talking about with them? You were out there a long time.”

“Oh, a lot of things. You didn’t come up in the conversation, though.”

Kazue lowered her unnaturally double-lidded lids and thought about it for a moment before asking, “What should I do to get Kijima to notice me?”

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“Why don’t you write him a letter?”

Kazue’s face lit up at my suggestion. “What a great idea! I’ll write a letter.

But before I send it could I show it to you? It would help to get an impartial opinion.”

Impartial? My lips twisted into a smile. I noticed that the smile was an imitation of the one Yuriko had used earlier.

• 2 •

Can you guess what I did that night? I was imprisoned by the notion of resemblance. When I came to this realization, I made up my mind to press my grandfather for some answers. I wanted to know who my father was. Of course, I already knew I was half. There could be no denying that. I knew my mother was Japanese, and I was convinced that my father had to have been from a different country. Well, look at my skin.

It’s not yellow, is it? Well, is it?

But I was absolutely certain that my father could not be the same Swiss who had fathered Yuriko. Why? Well for starters we don’t look a bit alike. And in the second place, how could such a mediocre man have fathered such a clearheaded child as myself? It certainly wasn’t likely.

Besides, my father’s treatment of me was abusive. He always kept me at arm’s length, and though he had no trouble scolding me, I never once felt any love from him.

Ever since we were children, Yuriko would pick on me because we looked so little alike. Oh? You can’t imagine Yuriko ever picking on me?

Why not? Is it because she’s beautiful? Well, looks can be deceiving.

Yuriko was ten times more spiteful and vicious than I ever was. She had absolutely no qualms about boring straight through my heart. “I wonder where your daddy is, huh?” she would chide me. “Because you don’t look a bit like my daddy.” This was always her ultimate weapon.

I realized that my Swiss father was not my real father when I first became aware of Yuriko’s existence. True, Yuriko did not resemble any-1 8 4

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one, but she clearly had both Asian and Western features. And the fact that she was dumb made her even more the spitting image of our parents.

I also did not resemble anyone and yet, unlike Yuriko, my face was more clearly Asian-looking. And I was smart. So where did I come from?

Ever since I was old enough to be aware of things I was racked with doubt about my parentage. Who was my father?

Once during science class I thought I’d found the answer to my question: I was a mutation. But the euphoria of my discovery soon evaporated.

It was far more likely that the beautiful Yuriko was the mutant.

Once that theory was shot to hell I was back where I started: perplexed, chagrined, and completely without an answer to the question that tormented me and would continue to torment me. Even now I have no answer. And Yuriko’s return to Japan brought all my doubts back to the surface again.

My grandfather seemed to have gone out for the evening; at least he wasn’t home. And he hadn’t made any dinner preparations. So, lacking an alternative, I started rinsing the rice. I took the tofu out of the refrigerator and made miso soup. We had nothing else in the house—no side dish of any kind—so I suspected my grandfather had gone out to buy something and waited for his return. Night fell. I waited, and still he did not return. It was close to ten o’clock when I heard the front door open.

“You’re late!”

“Oops,” Grandfather mumbled. I went to the entry hall and found him bowing his head in a playful show of contrition, just like a child being scolded. Huh? I thought to myself, Grandfather’s gotten taller! He was slipping out of a pair of snug-fitting brown shoes I’d never seen before. When I looked closer at them, sitting on the entryway floor, I saw they had heels as high as a woman’s shoe.

“What’s with the shoes?”

“These are known as secret bootsl”

“Where on earth do they sell shoes like that?”

“What’s wrong with them?” Grandfather scratched his head bashfully.

The smell of pomade that wafted around his shoulders was particularly pungent. Grandfather was very self-conscious and never went without his pomade, even when he was just puttering around the apartment, but 1 8 5

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that night he had used more than twice the usual amount. I held my nose and scrutinized him. His brown suit, which I’d never seen him wear before, did not fit properly, and he had borrowed a blue shirt from his friend the security guard. I knew this was the case because I remembered seeing the security guard wearing the shirt with great pride sometime earlier. Besides, it was obvious he was wearing a borrowed shirt because the sleeves hung out below the sleeves of his jacket. To top it off, he was wearing a very bright silver-colored necktie.

“Sorry. You must be starved,” he said, and handed me a small wrapped parcel. He was in good spirits. I caught the whiff of grilled eel. The odor was so strong I thought for a minute I might faint. The package was stained with sauce and still lukewarm. I took it in both hands and stood there for a moment without saying anything. My grandfather looked so strange. Maybe he had gotten over his obsession with bonsai. But how was he able to buy new clothes and shoes? Where was he getting the money?