Pathway to Japanese Literature

Prologue

I possessed all sorts of things.

Those various things went into action to torment me. My eyes saw society and nature, and made me sad. My limbs too performed nothing but futile acts, leaving me disappointed. The very act of thinking led me to the abyss of terror, and emotions that flared up fiercely only to fall silent did nothing but exhaust me.

However, among them all, I realized there was just one thing—forgetfulness—that hadn’t been tormenting me. Forgetfulness had been keeping me alive. And I had come along a winding path—at times recklessly dashing forward, at others trudging along with my head bowed. And yet, suddenly today, I turned to look back. Why was that? From within the haze-filled smoke, I was seized by an impulse to seek out the very path I had painstakingly retraced. In other words, this is an attempt to summon back memories. I am trying to discard the very act of forgetfulness. Even though I know that if I lose forgetfulness, I cannot go on living...

I did not miss the moment when the character for death flashed through my mind. I had often heard people say that when you board a plane intending to self-destruct, all your past memories line up before you in rapid succession at that final instant. I was not now facing death. Yet my sudden convulsive turn—that intuition of death which must have been something vague like fate—tightened its grip on my chest.

I began recalling things with increasing vividness. A playful young girl popped into view within the grey. That was me. My backdrop was grey. Though I had dreamed of a rose-colored life, I found myself nothing but grey by twenty. Before that oppressive backdrop, I began watching the girl strike one affected pose after another. The curtain had already risen.

Chapter One

A boy, a girl, and then the next baby to be born was named Sumiko. The plump, large-featured baby—perhaps finding her given name ill-suited to herself—began calling herself Bobi in her halting speech, and accordingly, the adults too came to call her Bobichama. The three-year-old me, who always kept the thumb of my right hand in my mouth, was that Bobi.

In the Meiji era, the blood of a Satsuma merchant who had rapidly risen to prominence and that of an impoverished noble who had governed a small domain formed my body.

At that time, my father served as an executive at the industrial company founded by my great-grandfather, and my mother was a refined, fastidious Edo-born socialite, so my swaddling clothes were apparently always clean and crisp. Moreover, since my mother was fond of going out, there was a wet nurse dedicated solely to me who looked after me all day long—which meant my bibs with their beautiful embroidery must have been changed constantly. The Wet Nurse was plump with milky-white skin. Both breasts hung heavily, and while sucking the fingers of my right hand, I would fiddle with those soft, warm breasts using my left. Even at night when I slept, my parents were not by my side, and I would press my face between my Wet Nurse’s breasts to sleep.

Around that time, they rented a villa on the coast of Kii Province for my older brother, who had been frail since birth. My older brother, older sister, myself, the younger brother born shortly after, the Wet Nurse, and a maid came to live at the seaside villa. At the edge of a pure white, wide beach stood a tall stone-clad single-story house, where I listened to the sound of waves around the clock. During daylight hours, those waves served as a distraction from boredom and stirred up all manner of dreams, but when I awoke abruptly in the night, they seemed like the dreadful voices of demonic creatures. At such times, I would begin sniffling and press my ear against the Wet Nurse’s breast.

The fine white sand filled me with an indescribable joy. I walked barefoot along the water's edge, my feet slapping against the wet sand. And immediately those footprints would vanish beneath the waves. No matter how slowly I pressed my feet into the sand, how carefully I formed each impression, the waves swept them away without trace. Determined that today would be different—that today my footprints would remain—I repeated this small ambition until growing bored with shoreline play, then turned to collecting fish and shells instead, gathering strangely shaped pebbles from between the rocks. These treasures were carefully arranged along the corridor or stored away in empty candy boxes.

Every morning at five o'clock, the conch shell sounded. We would hang onto the maid's hands and go to where the conch shell was sounding. The fishermen would return from the sea, and there would be an auction of their catch. I liked that fishy air. There was a large platform where hoarse-voiced men used chalk to scribble something on bamboo spatulas, flipping them over before turning them back up. I watched the fish quivering amidst the rough handling without any particular sympathy. Bright red blood dripped. Scales like my own fingernails flew off. My favorite fish of all was octopus. Without fail, I would bring my hand to those round suction points and took interest in how my tiny fingers got pulled with force. I would make each finger stick one by one into the numerous holes. While doing so, I would get scolded for being a nuisance. However, toward the fishermen with their thick bellies wrapped in bulky knitted belly bands and clad in black boots, I felt a closeness that surpassed even family ties.

Every day, I would select new fish, declaring "That one looks good," or "I like this one," and take them back. That became one of my morning tasks. When I returned home, bean porridge would be simmering. I later learned that following local custom here, small bean pods and leaves that had been shade-dried were mixed into the porridge as it cooked; along with that, pickles and miso soup were invariably served. There was a small bowl with a balloon design painted on it that I cherished dearly.

During the day, I would also catch dragonflies and frogs in the fields. I would pinch dragonfly wings between my fingers, and when both hands were full, release them high into the sky. And then I would start all over again. Of course, I couldn’t catch dragonflies by myself, so I had the country boys and local women catch them for me, and clomping in straw sandals, I walked along the rice paddy paths with my brothers. I didn’t feel the slightest bit lonely being separated from my parents. Amidst those simple-hearted sentiments of the country people, I thrived freely.

However, according to our parents' opinion that country life did not contribute positively to education, my siblings and I were taken back to the city along with my brother, who had grown considerably stronger. The seaside villa would now only be rented during the summer months. Having returned to my parents' care, from that day onward I received strict discipline from Mother. I suddenly became timid and developed a cowardly disposition. While my other siblings adapted relatively quickly to city life and became well-mannered, I found myself unbearably longing for country life, hating the crowds and noise. Mother was ashamed of my country bumpkin ways. I was made to attend kindergarten. The adult teachers there were stricter than Mother. Hating prayers, I would get confined to small rooms or thrown out into the garden. Though I often cried at first, eventually I came to feel there was something noble about being treated this way - calmly playing marbles or cat's cradle in dim locked rooms, or climbing over garden walls to escape back home. Then Mother would shove me into the storehouse. I'd sit on the cold floor for hours refusing to apologize.

Because the kindergarten inflicted such harsh punishments, my Wet Nurse said she felt sorry for me, argued with Mother, and ultimately succeeded in having me withdrawn from kindergarten. Mother left me completely to my own devices. I had no particular desire to cling to Mother; rather, I was pleased to be left to my own devices. Even haphazardly picking up books to look through became something I, the third child, could now do. Running through hallways was something else I managed to accomplish. I was told not to enter, but I would stretch out in Father’s study and guest rooms anyway. Having regained my vigor, I took pleasure in stirring up trouble wherever I could. From around that time, was my ordinary, monotonous life an unbearable torment?

I would stand up on chairs, touch the stone statues atop the mantelpiece, and try to go up and down the stairs without holding the handrail. However, because I lacked tenacious patience, whenever I couldn’t do something, I immediately moved on to other things.

However, such a life did not last long. This was because I resented adults from the depths of my heart and developed a wariness that I would never allow myself to be deceived. From that day onward, I became a sullen and gloomy child.

One day—it must have been sunny. Led by the hand by Mother and the maid, I was made to accompany them shopping at K Department Store for the first time. I looked with curiosity at the various shapes and colors. I didn't know what Mother had bought, but before long found myself accompanying her to the fabric department. Then, right before my eyes, a large doll began spinning round and round. I stood utterly captivated before it. The maid remained beside me while Mother went off shopping again and returned, but I refused to leave the mannequin. Even when urged, "Come on, let's go home," I kept insisting, "No! I'm taking that one home!" refusing to yield. In the end, I burst into tears and screamed relentlessly that I wanted it. Mother grew desperate while the manager rubbed his hands together, attempting to placate me with other toys. But I stubbornly repeated that I absolutely had to have that doll. Then Mother suggested to the manager, 'If we take her to the mannequin room, she'll surely get frightened and change her mind,' leading me into that dim space. There lay mannequins with severed necks and scattered limbs—women, children, figures of various sizes arranged in rows. The adults' scheme backfired. I became increasingly fascinated by those eerie forms, now clinging to a naked female figure in that storage area. Though the doll's expression remained rigid, its limbs slender and feet chilling against my cheek, I felt an inexplicable attraction. Mother must have been mortified by my aberrant behavior. Howling, I was dragged from the store by Mother and the maid gripping each arm. Even after boarding the train, my weeping continued,

“We’ll have Papa bring you one as a souvenir from Tokyo.” Mother said in a gentle voice.

I finally managed to secure a firm promise and waited, counting down the days on my fingers, for Father’s return from his business trip to Tokyo exactly one week later.

Father went on business trips to Tokyo about once a month. And without fail, he would buy each of us siblings one book as a souvenir. Due to the laissez-faire approach that continued because of me, my younger brother became acquainted with books from age four, free to read and look at anything he wanted. That he came to be treated as a genius and called a child prodigy was through my doing—yet I often found myself feeling profoundly inferior because of it.

To meet Father—since at that time his business trips always arrived on Sunday mornings via the Tsubame train with its white line—Mother and the children went by automobile. With my heart pounding at the thought of sleeping every night with that large doll, I stood waiting on the platform. However, Father carried nothing besides his leather briefcase.

“Papa, where’s the doll?” I asked without even first saying, “Welcome home.”

“It’s inside this. Once we’re home.”

I was certain its arms and legs could be detached piece by piece and neatly packed inside the leather briefcase, so I suppressed my racing heart and returned home. Opening the briefcase, the siblings all peered inside at once. My brother, who hated reading, received his package with a look that seemed to say, "Another book?" My older sister received a beautiful English comic book. However, to me, a square box was handed. It was roughly the size that could hold nothing more than the head of that doll. Even so, with a shred of hope, I unwrapped the package. Inside lay a commonplace doll. In my small chest, I had never before felt such fury. I suddenly grabbed the Western doll’s hair and slammed it against a pillar. "Mamaaa!" I cried, and the doll’s head shattered.

“Papa lied! Mama lied! Bobi understands now! Bobi understands!” From that day onward, I ceased believing in adults altogether. And I shut my heart tight, determined never to reveal it to anyone. Then came the devastation of my shattered dream—the dream of sleeping with that large naked doll—coupled with bitter resentment at being deceived by adults (for by then, I could no longer touch my Wet Nurse’s breasts in my younger brother’s presence). These emotions warped me strangely, and most terrifyingly, a conviction that lying might be permissible welled up turbulently within me. And that particular breed of lie began generating the pleasure of fantasy and imagination. With cool composure, I cast myself as protagonist in fabricated stories and recounted them to my younger brother and the maid.

“Hey, listen to this! You know Bobi here—Bobi was born in a far, faraway land, with no Mama or Papa. There were so many trees, and rabbits and deer raised Bobi, you know.”

I created a different story every day. And thus I came to realize how delightful it was to present such nonsensical stories. In my small head, I filled myself with thoughts of stars and flower fields, and beautiful people—who were none other than those nude mannequin figures—dancing and singing.

I took no pleasure in the kindness adults showed me.

My family was an extended family; since my father’s brothers had not established separate households and my grandmother remained in good health, large numbers of people would invariably gather for occasions like New Year’s or memorial anniversaries for my grandfather. At such times, I too was dressed up properly and obliged to offer formal greetings. Yet I never accepted the adults’ compliments at face value, and whenever they tried to give me things, I refused them, suspecting some ulterior motive. Consequently, the adults naturally came to regard me as a warped child and ceased paying me any attention. Moreover, my younger brother made a showy presence. My younger brother resembled our mother in looks and possessed an endearing dignity. All my great-aunts and uncles doted on my younger brother.

“Do you know ‘Andaumare no Mikoto’?”

This was the riddle created by my younger brother, not yet five years old. “Who could it be? What kind of god is it?”

The adults inquired. "Well, ya see, it's Yasuda Seimei!"

The adults were genuinely surprised. He seemed to have been listening to people’s conversations and had gradually begun reading the phonetic guides in newspapers. I remained utterly clueless about what that trick even meant. I resented my younger brother being favored. Yet whenever I quarreled verbally, I lost. When I tried using my fists instead, I was overpowered. I grew all the more withdrawn.

New Year’s.

In the large house where Grandmother lived alone, I detested even meeting with my cousins. I sat solitary in a corner of the vast garden, doing nothing but draw pictures of mannequins. I was unbearably sad. And I thought how pitifully unfortunate this existence was. No—perhaps I was forcing myself to fabricate a tragedy. I must be a stepchild. Such warped feelings gradually accumulated within me. There were times when, listening to the maid read my older sister’s girls’ novels aloud, I felt as though I were the protagonist myself, tears welling up in my eyes. I kept myself alive within tragedy and grieved for myself alone, yet never spared sympathy for anyone else.

Birdie, Puppy, Bunny

Those animals were kept for the children’s sake, but I didn’t so much as glance at the Japanese tits or canaries in their cages.

Around that time, someone suggested that my older sister—who had developed polio and walked with a limp—should learn Japanese dance. Though it wasn’t Mother’s preference, my sister began attending the dance instructor’s place about twice weekly, dressed in a kimono with large sleeves. While frequently accompanying my Wet Nurse on these visits, I too came to want to learn and became a disciple myself. This was the year before I entered elementary school. Then through another of Mother’s initiatives—again following somewhat after my older sister—I began taking piano lessons. For me, dance held greater fascination, and I progressed swiftly. I performed love stories I barely understood, supplely swaying my neck while naturally adopting coquettish expressions as I danced. (Was this unconscious? In any case, photographs from that time show my eyes to be remarkably alluring.)

The instructor taught me strictly. “Smooth-step-sway—step-sway-turn—redo that waist position—there, your hands!” If you bent your hips skillfully, your five fingers would splay awkwardly; if you fixed your gaze properly, your mouth would fall slack. “The young lady has natural aptitude.” “I’ll make her a licensed master without fail—you’re so gracious.” The instructor doted on me even while scolding harshly. The Wet Nurse who adored nagauta ballads rejoiced at this, but Mother showed little delight. Kamuro, Fuji Musume—I soon began appearing on elevated stages for recitals.

On the other hand, my older sister preferred the piano. This time, it was a teacher with honeyed gentleness who would have me breeze through pieces despite my lack of practice,

“Bobichama has such natural talent, don’t you agree, Mama Madam? Her playing sounds absolutely beautiful.” “I will truly nurture her talent to its fullest—why, I too find great motivation in this endeavor.” And she praised me again. Around this time, despite being a spiteful child, I began to gain confidence and resolved to astonish the adults through my lessons. Was it around this time that the fabrication of tragedies had temporarily ceased? Though daunted, this very fear instead transformed into an unyielding spirit, a stubborn resolve, and even arrogance.

Wearing a white cape with gold buttons, I passed through the gates of elementary school. My father had also graduated from this school, and I entered it in a manner that was welcomed, following in the footsteps of my siblings. However, there was one sad thing. An elderly nurse, “Is the young lady breastfed or bottle-fed?” She seems to have asked Mother. Anyway,

"I was almost entirely bottle-fed," I remember Mother replying.

As if this had once again confirmed that I was a stepchild, the intense sadness I felt at that moment remains etched clearly in my heart. And it seems that was also when I was scolded for being unsightly as I kept twirling the gold buttons around and around.

Because I had no attachment to my family, going to elementary school didn’t particularly trouble me. I couldn’t get close to adults, but I quickly became friends with children my own age and was something of a ringleader. As for the reading textbook, I could read fluently from the very first page to the last, and since I had naturally picked up simple arithmetic calculations from being around my older brother and sister, I could get good grades without studying at all.

What others couldn't grasp, I understood. This was the joy of superiority implanted in my young heart. But there remained one unpleasant thing that oppressed me. That thing was order itself.

Chapter Two Line up in two rows. Bow. Turn right. We repeated them endlessly. Being short placed me near the front. From morning assemblies in the schoolyard to strapping on my randoseru backpack at day's end—this regimented life choked me unlike my carefree past. When we raised our hands for alignment drills, my position always warped the formation. I detested straight lines with visceral intensity. Simple enough for others, yet I never stood properly until teachers forced correction. In class I stared at walls. Our play exercises—mechanical spins and prescribed steps—bored me stiff. Scoldings came daily for poor posture. The accumulated strain left me hollowed out. There—in that exhaustion—I rediscovered lies' sweet relief.

“Teacher, my hands hurt.” I said this when required to raise my hands. The teacher immediately accepted my excuse. After all, I was a child from an esteemed family—likely considered the school’s pride. Returning home, I never studied but instead flipped through picture books and spun stories as always. My lessons continued progressing steadily. Yet I grew to despise creating formulaic shapes. I played records to invent my own dances, composed nonsensical melodies, and neglected piano études. But this willful behavior proved advantageous. Adults declared me prodigious. I grew increasingly emboldened. Then around second grade, I began committing something dreadful. Theft. Though fully supplied with pencils and notebooks, I discovered intense joy in stealing. I confided in my desk neighbor and swiftly turned her into an accomplice. That girl and I visited the stationery store daily, pilfering pretty straw boxes and decorative flowers. I never knew stealing was wrong. I flaunted my plunder brazenly, playing the hero. My small wooden desk brimmed with loot. Delighting in sharing spoils, I distributed them to classmates.

The thrill of stealing extended even to cheating on exams. My partner-in-crime neighbor girl would diligently complete her homework each morning to show me, and during tests tolerated my peeking with magnanimity. Around that time, I had developed an immense dread of numbers. Multiplication and division had begun. Numbers screeched as they lined up on the blackboard. I simply couldn't grasp them. Why did this happen? Wonder filled me until it curdled into terror. Arithmetic hour arrived. At those times my chest would crumple inward. I detested incomprehension. Thus I grew to loathe numbers themselves. Yet through brazen cheating—conducted unaware it constituted wrongdoing—I escaped poor marks altogether. My favored subjects remained composition and drawing. During writing lessons without fail, my work would be exhibited before the class, swelling me with pride. Moreover, my reading style—honed through childhood storytelling sessions—eschewed monotony for peculiar cadences that teachers praised extravagantly. Hence at school festivals and Doll Day celebrations alike, I dominated the auditorium stage. Biannual piano recitals and dance performances forged natural stage poise within me; this gradually unraveled my wariness toward adults while self-styled heroics instilled such confidence that I became a child who feared nothing. Hordes of friends flocked to my house. Disdaining confinement to the children's room, I'd lead them into forbidden parlors where we hurled cushions and vaulted over sofas.

Then my favorite playground became the closet. The naphthalene smell and dusty cotton scent delighted me. There was even a time I shut the door tight and made a girl undress in total darkness. It was after all just an extension of my dream about sleeping while hugging a mannequin. Following the hero's orders, the docile girl took off her short skirt. Touching that white skin with its milky odor made me grow sentimental.

My mother was almost never at home even when I returned from school. She belonged to groups like the Mother's Association or Friends' Association, constantly occupied with outside matters. Even when my younger brother hovered between life and death with pneumonia, I would later often hear from my wet nurse that she hadn't been home. Apparently of an optimistic nature—and perhaps because she disliked needlework or kitchen chores—I never once saw my mother engaged in such tasks.

“When you return home, you must say, ‘Mother, I’m home.’”

When the teacher said that, I put on a deeply sorrowful expression, “Mama isn’t home.” I once protested. However, that sorrowful expression was clearly just an act, and there existed not the slightest longing for my mother. In fact, it was better that she wasn’t home—I could play freely.

Another cause for loving my mother even less arose around that time. In the second-floor storage room stood a chest of drawers that creaked when opened or closed, containing a navy-blue kimono with rabbit patterns woven into its omeshi silk. Mother would occasionally wear it. She must have worn it during winter—I say this because I used to feel sad whenever she layered a black haori over it, hiding one of the rabbits—and though I wonder now if it was actually a lined garment, I adored it terribly. Then I would declare, “When Bobi grows up, I’ll have that garment,”

I would frequently declare to my sister and wet nurse. Mother had also promised. But before I knew it, that kimono had vanished. Mother did not wear it. I quietly opened the creaking chest of drawers, but it wasn’t inside. One day, I asked Mother.

“Oh, that kimono? I gave it to Ms. Kazariin when she went back to America.”

Mother said that offhandedly. Ms. Kazariin was the kindergarten principal. At that moment, I found her blue eyes and the pinkish-white skin densely covered in peach fuzz utterly repulsive. And so I resented Mother for giving away my beloved kimono to that detested teacher, and there I came to hate from the bottom of my heart the adults who broke their promises. However, this mother liked my compositions and the sound of my piano playing. And yet there were times when I thought I liked Mother—they were not entirely nonexistent. Because Mother liked flowers, whenever she invited guests over she would take me all the way to a distant florist with a greenhouse to buy them. I became intoxicated by the pungent floral scent and recalled various fantasies. At such times Mother would invariably,

“Bobi, which flowers do you like?” she would ask and always buy the ones I chose. At that time, I thought Mother was a good person. She would bring back the bouquet of flowers, and I watched from beside her as she arranged them in cut-glass vases or twisted ceramic pots. The snip-snip of scissors made my heart dance. Mother trimmed the leftover flowers into small pieces and gave them to me. I decorated them in the study room my sister and I shared—we called the west-facing room with dolls, books, and pasted cut-out pictures by that name.

Around that time, I often fell ill when winter came. In the detached room connected by the hallway, one of my siblings was always bedridden, but my stays seemed to have been the longest. On Christmas Eve, it had become our custom to be invited to the hotel's family gathering every year, but I would develop colds or pneumonia as though destined to take to bed about a week beforehand. For Christmas, they would have everything from my coat to my shoes newly made for me, but I would neatly arrange them by my pillow,

“It’s almost Christmas now, you’ll be better soon.” I was made to drink the bitter medicine offered by the old doctor. I clearly remember the pink dress with flounces hanging in the gloomy six-mat room reeking of disinfectant. That pink year stayed abed until spring. By my pillow hung numerous origami-crafted paper spheres suspended from the ceiling, and occasionally their long dangling paper strips would brush against my cheek. I also memorized the popular songs that the nurse sang while I lay bedridden. Mother had strictly forbidden singing in front of children, but when cleaning the inhaler or tidying the bedside—as she wore her white uniform—a song would naturally escape from her lips,

“Under the willows of Ginza…” The song would burst forth. I immediately memorized it and tried to feel some kind of poignant emotion. When I wasn’t ill, my usual daring life continued.

It was around the time when the China Incident and the Kansai Flood occurred. As I was generally indifferent to anything beyond myself, while children around me began idolizing soldiers and military nurses, I remained utterly uninterested. There were times when I drew Hinomaru flags and took them to stations and piers, but this didn’t mean I disliked the war—I had no capacity to judge right from wrong. As ever, I was relishing a certain kind of thrill.

Before long—perhaps because dance practice had become somewhat troublesome for Mother, who disliked anything showy, and my sister’s legs were now completely concealed from view—I too was ultimately made to quit altogether. As for the piano, I had come to play simple sonatas. I played them whimsically without any particular effort.

However, the time had come once again when my heart would be utterly crushed.

One afternoon after school, I came to the front of a large mansion with five girls in tow. There was a tennis court in the garden, and beyond it, a profusion of poppy flowers bloomed wildly. I wanted them so badly I couldn’t stand it. The other girls wanted them too. We gazed at them through the wire mesh. Finally resolving myself, I threw my schoolbag and lunchbox onto the road and began nimbly climbing over the wire mesh. Ten earnest eyes appeared lined up between hands gripping the wire mesh firmly. I nimbly leaped over. The white lines struck my eyes with particular clarity. I felt as though I had been entrusted with some extremely significant duty, bent over, and started running. I quickly reached the cluster of poppies. I plucked six stems of purple, red, and white flowers. I turned around and grinned, then gripping the bouquet tightly, dashed back. At that moment, the girls suddenly ran away.

“Teacher! Teacheeer!”

The pencil case clattered noisily inside the bag.

The underlings had abandoned their leader and left. I no longer had the energy to climb back over the wire mesh and stood there dejectedly. The teacher came. It was the long-faced male teacher in charge.

“What are you doing?”

I looked at the flowers I was clutching. Then I found myself holding six limp stems - bald-headed things with only two or three petals remaining, nothing but their cores left. I turned around. Parallel to the white line, red and purple petals lay scattered in spots. I suddenly burst into tears. The teacher used a stick to easily unlock the wire mesh door from the inside and pulled me out.

All my past misdeeds had been exposed. I did not readily apologize.

“I took them because I wanted them.” I repeated.

“I’ll tell your mother.” At these words, I was completely overwhelmed and prostrated myself in apology. The teacher went to return everything that had been left in my desk to the stationery store. From that day onward, I became like a samurai stripped of his splendid gold and silver armor. During recess, I had no desire to play and moped about alone. No one respected me anymore, nor did they gather around me. The friends who used to show me their exams during tests were gone too.

However, I couldn't stop breaking rules and telling lies. Because of this, I was often struck in the classroom. I had a heavy stencil file placed on my head and was made to stand by the blackboard for a full hour. But I didn't feel particularly ashamed, and even while being struck, I kept thinking about other things.

Around that time, one of my habits became exaggerating things when telling people about them. I would take trivial matters that occurred at school and stretch them out elaborately when recounting them to my family. Father and Mother would listen with amusement or sorrow. Even when describing my own experiences, I would emphasize them tremendously. I went on a field trip and had an adventure. I scaled a rocky cliff. I miscalculated a jump down some stairs and bruised my leg. A neighborhood child coiled a snake around my neck. I raced around the schoolyard ten times over. Such stories would be trotted out at dinner time, enlivening our meals.

The top male student in our class was reading an Iwanami book one day. At that age, while everyone else read nothing but large-format illustrated books with large print, he alone read volumes from the Iwanami Bunko series—the kind lined up in his father’s study with content that seemed exceedingly difficult—and I felt profound respect for him. However, that book turned out to be Andersen’s Fairy Tales, which I myself had been reading all along. I returned home and informed Father that it was Soseki’s Botchan. Why I went out of my way to lie about such things—the reason remained unclear even to me—but I delighted in seeing the adults’ surprised expressions.

Our house—a family of four children, three maids, a wet nurse, and our parents—had quite a number of rooms but was old and inconvenient in many ways, so major renovations were decided upon for the year after the flood damage. The scent of new wooden pillars and fine sawdust made me recall my daily life by the seaside. There was a certain shared appeal between the carpenters and the boatmen. Every day after returning from school, I would go watch the construction work at the site without causing disturbance. On the second floor, new Japanese-style and Western-style rooms were made for my sister and me; the gloomy detached sickroom was converted into two adjoining rooms for my brother; and the parlor had its wallpaper completely redone with a veranda added. Mother lined up two dressers with pretty decorative cabinets in my and my sister's room. For the Western-style room, she had new chairs, a desk, and bookshelves made. They let us children select things like wallpaper designs and curtain fabrics. I wanted pink curtains against light gray patterned wallpaper. My older sister insisted on cream-colored walls with green curtains. In the end, the walls became cream-colored and the curtains pink, while for the desk lamp shades Mother gave my sister green ones and me light gray ones with a floral motif of flying blossoms.

Suddenly feeling somehow like a proper adult, I seemed to devote myself somewhat diligently to studying for the time being. Yet my poor arithmetic skills persisted, and when it came to be called mathematics instead, they grew even worse.

To celebrate the renovations, we decided to invite friends. Around that time there was an Ainoko* in our class who had transferred from Tokyo; I came to like her very much—perhaps because I felt secure that she didn't know about my misdeeds—and invited only her to my house. She was a crisp-tongued Edoite dressed in flashy American-style outfits with chic flair and had facial features resembling those of Western dolls; Mother took an immense liking to this girl.

Moreover，she could play the piano，and when asked，would promptly do so． She was an innocent socialite． “Auntie，this dress—Arii’s mama sewed it on the sewing machine！Isn’t it nice？”

She called herself Arii, Arii. There seemed to be an excess of fabric gathered around the chest area of her smock. I begged Mother repeatedly to make me one just like it, but when I finally put it on after she made it for me, my fantasy of becoming like Arii was utterly shattered; after seeing myself in the mirror that first time, I never wore it again. Arii had pale skin covered in downy hair and blue eyes. My eyebrows were black, my eyes were black, my complexion was dark. And compared to Arii with her slender long legs, I remained stout and chubby.

“Good day!” This greeting from Arii delighted Mother again. Mother often told me to invite her over frequently. I liked Arii’s skin. I realized it shared the same lineage as Ms. Kazariin’s, yet the difference between an elderly woman and a child was even more stark than among Japanese people. With a soft, tender feeling, my heart would race whenever we held hands or walked arm in arm. I wanted to see Arii naked at least once. But I no longer had the courage to demand it.

When December arrived, as was the annual custom, I attended the piano recital. The kind teacher had about forty students. My older sister and I being the most senior students, we played a duet last—it might have been the composer's name—of something called "Daiyaberii." Then I became the conductor of Toishinhonii. We performed Jingle Bells using tambourines, castanets, taiko drums, and triangles in ensemble. Over my white taffeta dress at the time, I wore a black velvet vest and waved the baton. Feeling tremendous honor and confidence, I conducted the performers from a raised platform. Among the many bouquets sent was one from Arii—a greenhouse-grown sweet pea arrangement in pure wisteria hue. Though different from expensive orchids or roses, Mother and I both delighted in that single color alone being to our taste. That day, Arii had tied a large white ribbon into her long chestnut hair that flowed down her back. While everyone our age kept their hair cut in bobs, from that day onward I too stopped cutting mine and began growing it out. Yet this too ended in disappointment—for my coarse hair only grew long enough to cover my ears without developing the soft waves hers possessed. And so swallowing my tears, I chopped it all off again.

She doted on me. Perhaps influenced by her speech patterns, she seemed older than me. She was Catholic and wore a cross around her neck. For some reason, that alone I had no desire to emulate. Though my family observed Buddhism, we kept no household altar—because our ancestral tablets were enshrined at the main house where monthly memorial services were held—but since Mother followed Konkōkyō instead, the northern room on the second floor was called the God’s Chamber and contained an altar. From childhood we were taught we lived through divine grace, clapping our hands each dawn and dusk in prayer. Not understanding what Catholicism truly was yet assuming from the start it involved tedious prayers like kindergarten devotions, I detested it instinctively. She often pressed me to attend church—promising pretty holy cards or sweets from the Mother Superior. But this alone among my beloved friend’s suggestions I refused. Whether through Arii’s influence or that exposed misconduct’s aftermath—though I might quibble with calling it “misconduct,” public judgment left no doubt—I grew docile. During recess we’d huddle whispering in schoolyard corners. She delighted in hearing my fanciful tales. Daily without fail I studied her prominent incisors and that conspicuously large mole on her cheek.

Disrupting rules was something Arii hated. Therefore, I gradually became an obedient child. In the classroom too, I grew quiet and began properly completing my homework. When returning home, I did nothing but read books. I preferred historical narratives over Western fairy tales. Samurai, villains, princesses, and merchants' daughters bleeding or being slain fascinated me. What I came to cherish through the years were Sōma Gyofū's works on Issa, Ryōkan, and Saigyō; as for Priest Saigyō, I adored him alongside Shimizu no Jirōchō.

Father composed haiku and had an affinity for painting. My siblings and I would attend poetry gatherings where we composed haiku, and on certain anniversaries, we contributed writings on paper the size of hanging scrolls or framed pictures. Father doted on me especially.

In the evening, when the entrance bell rang, everyone would rush out to greet him.

“Where’s Bobi?” If I was even slightly late in coming, Father would ask that. Growing weary of going out to greet him every day, I once drew faces with ink on eggshells, lined up five of them, and placed them at the entrance.

“You don’t have to come out to greet him today.”

Having said that, I prohibited everyone from going out to greet him. When Father came home and got angry about it, Mother praised me for being good at drawing portraits. However, starting the next day, I resumed formally greeting him by placing my hands on the tatami mat and leapt up to hang Father’s hat on the hat rack.

I had become the favorite of the entire household. I had come to enjoy putting on playful acts. By that time, the sadness of having been betrayed by adults and the wariness born from that sadness had almost loosened. And I had stopped even thinking about being Mama’s little girl. I had become an ordinary girl and an unremarkable student.

Chapter Three

The 2600th Year of the Imperial Era arrived in a flurry of commotion. Lantern processions wound through streets, flower-bedecked trams clattered along tracks, and celebratory events filled nearly every month of that year. To my childish mind, the reason for such extravagant festivity remained an utter mystery. For me, there had been no meaningful difference between the 2599th Year and this new designation—it was merely one digit added to an endless count, and numbers had always been my sworn enemy. The very concept of tracking years or days felt like an elaborate practical joke played by adults. When we entered fourth grade, boys and girls were divided into separate classes. This arbitrary segregation made my heart pound strangely, as if I'd been granted a secret glimpse into adulthood's inner sanctum. Every day I prayed fervently to be placed in Arii's class, and through some divine mercy, my wish was granted. By second term I'd been appointed class leader, a position that filled me with absurd delusions of grandeur. Weekly parade drills became my personal theater—standing at the column's head barking "Right face!" with military precision. Only one duty marred this glorious role. Each noon before opening my lunchbox, I had to stand at the teacher's podium and lead recitations from imperial edicts and moral tracts. Memorization proved my eternal nemesis—I still counted subtraction problems on my fingers and stumbled through multiplication tables. The lengthy rescripts might as well have been written in Sanskrit for all I could retain of them. My repertoire shrank to brief excerpts from the Classic of Filial Piety and Emperor Meiji's simplest poems until that fateful day when the teacher ordered me to recite the full Imperial Rescript on Education meant for youth indoctrination. My lips moved in silent pantomime as I trailed behind my classmates' booming voices. The humiliation burned worse than any physical punishment—that night I hunched over my desk repeating phrases until dawn's light bleached the paper, yet the words slipped through my mind like water through a sieve.

Among the games of that era, what made me ecstatic was make-believe theater. As for handball and beanbag games, clumsy as I was, I remained poor at them and always ended up excluded from the group. Make-believe theater was a game I created—one where instead of preparing stories beforehand, we would make up endings by randomly exchanging lines. Those who agreed to this game were Arii and four or five other friends; using cardboard crowns and drawing masks, we would stand on the platform after school, delighting in how repeating the same actions gradually transformed into different stories.

Before long, something happened that once again suppressed my exhilarated mood. It was the funeral service at the church across from our house, the pilgrimage procession, and Arii’s coming of age.

One day, there was a funeral service for a teacher from the Girls’ Academy at the church. The weather seemed bad with sporadic rain beginning to fall, but rows of female students in navy sailor uniforms lining both sides of the asphalt road were crying out loudly as if singing choruses. With my school backpack strapped on, I stood at the gate watching this spectacle half-curiously, half-astonished. Since neither relatives nor acquaintances had died in my memory up to that point, I hadn’t known death could be so agonizing. As I watched without understanding why, I suddenly grew sad and began crying in sympathy. When I rushed into the house,

“What happens when you die? What happens when you die?” I asked the maids. They bent their arms and swayed them while teaching that we become ghosts. Later, when I asked Mother, “Good children go to God’s side. “Bad children cross over a mountain of needles and a sea of fire.” I was told. And when I reported that the maids had said we turn into ghosts, Mother scolded them.

I imagined myself walking across a mountain of needles. I imagined myself swimming through a sea of fire. Yet I couldn't grasp at all what defined a bad child or where the boundaries lay for being good. Still, that teacher's death incident cast me once more in a tragic light. The pilgrimage passed by right after that incident. At dusk, I watched from the back door as Nichiren Buddhist monks formed a long procession, beating drums and clanging gongs while passing through. When they placed a handful of sacred rice into their alms bowls, they began chanting sutras while staring fixedly at my face. Looking at the monk's face, I too felt like Saigyō. But soon the monk departed, leaving me with an inexplicable loneliness lingering within that procession.

Arii had become an adult around January of the following year. After a long break—whether it was vacation or sick leave remained unclear—when I unexpectedly appeared at school again, the first thing that caught my eye was Arii. Arii had suddenly grown taller, the area around her waist where she wore her jumper skirt having become fuller. Moreover, the short skirt that had once exposed her thighs was now greatly lengthened, swaying with an odd stillness around her knees. I was utterly shocked by that appearance.

“Arii-chan, you’ve changed so much.”

I lamented. Arii gave a knowing smirk and told me in detail about things I didn't know. I simply couldn't believe it. During the physical examination at the start of term, Arii showed me her plump breasts. I grabbed them with all my strength. Arii cried out in pain. From that moment on, I could no longer interact with Arii as intimately as before. I gradually began keeping my distance from her. Arii too started making faces that suggested talking to someone like me wasn't worth her while, until she hardly spoke at all. I spent my days drowning in girlish sentimentality.

When several months passed and early summer arrived, I noticed that both of my breasts were beginning to swell. They were only slightly swollen, but when I got into bed and touched them, the pain was sharp enough to make me leap up. I wanted to remain a child forever—yet there I was, desperately wishing for just that.

Having reached the step before the highest grade, we were given a share of school duties, with four or five students from our class being assigned red armbands—I barely managed to be included among them. I was so happy about wearing the armband that I didn’t take it off even when I returned home. The homeroom teacher was a quiet young man. So we didn’t take things seriously at all in the classroom. We would tear pages from the backs of our notebooks, write letters on them, and pass them around during class; every time the teacher turned toward the blackboard, we’d toss our boxed lunches into our mouths. Then, little by little, we began reading romance novels. In the corner of the third-floor classroom with three-sided windows bathed in sunlight, we exchanged hardcover books and magazines.

That autumn, I began developing feelings for a male student one year my senior. He was a pale-faced young master living in an imposing Chinese-style mansion. He would perform solos at school arts festivals and act in plays. His voice carried clear and bright - I became utterly entranced when secretly listening to his rehearsals from the auditorium's corner. Beneath his camel-colored sweater lay an immaculate white shirt, his wrist adorned with a watch. Elementary students wearing wristwatches were exceptionally rare. Whenever we passed in hallways, I felt that gleaming timepiece transformed him into someone extraordinary. Before long, I grew desperate to plunder his possessions. The watch. Too precious - its theft would be instantly discovered. Thus I resolved to steal the stubby pencil from his pencil case. I simply wanted some piece of him always on my person. One afternoon, I went alone to reconnoiter his classroom. The sixth graders perpetually stayed late for entrance exam prep. I cracked the frosted glass window a sliver to peer inside. A dozen boys worked through arithmetic problems chalked on the blackboard. Among them I immediately found him. But entering through the door meant certain discovery. I paced the corridor's length, thinking.

After about an hour had passed, people came clamoring out of the room. I realized they were going out to the schoolyard to play catchball. After seeing them off as they descended the stairs, I confirmed there were no figures in the hallway and slipped through the door. When I reached where he had been sitting, he had tidied up neatly, and a black school backpack bearing his name hung beside the desk. I hurriedly opened it. Sure enough, there was a black leather pencil case containing a fountain pen. I pulled out a single green yacht pencil and swiftly slipped it into my pocket. It measured fifteen or sixteen centimeters and had been smoothly sharpened. I wanted to see his handwriting too. So I took out a notebook. Square characters filled the pages with reading notes and pronunciation guides below. I tore out the most densely written page, folded it into a square, and stuffed it back into my pocket. At that moment, I heard footsteps approaching. Feeling my chest throb, I crouched low between desks. It was his homeroom teacher—the most feared in the entire school. He settled at the teacher's large desk and began reviewing materials. Cornered with no escape, I had to remain perfectly still. Yet the volume of documents he was examining seemed enormous. He'd surely stay until the students returned from the schoolyard. My anxiety kept intensifying.

I slowly began to move forward with desperate resolve. I hunched my body to avoid touching the desks and chairs, crawling toward the doorway. The teacher was making a stern face as he wrote something in red pencil. I finally reached the rear door—the one farthest from where the teacher sat. The door was closed. I was at a loss again. But I suddenly stood up, opened the door at the same moment, slipped out into the hallway, and rushed headlong to the stairwell corner.

“Who’s there?” I heard his furious bellow. By then, I had already scrambled down near the lower floor. I walked slowly along the first-floor corridor with feigned innocence. I emerged into the schoolyard. I watched him hurl the ball skyward again and again. I shoved my hand into my pocket and clutched the pencil and torn paper tightly.

Fortunately, that incident ended without anyone discovering it. I would put the scrap of paper and pencil inside my pillowcase when I slept, and in the morning, stow them away in a corner of my school backpack.

Occasionally I would encounter him at school, and each time I would involuntarily look down. However, that emotion did not last long. When we sang "Hotaru no Hikari" and they graduated, making it impossible to find him anymore, that scrap of paper was tossed into the wastebasket, and the pencil was either used up or lost. He no longer dwelled within my heart.

Having advanced with relatively good grades and become a senior student, I began developing feelings for a girl who maintained the top position in our newly shared class. Since our homeward paths aligned, we naturally grew close through conversation, and I came to revere everything she said and did. I began studying alongside her at our shared desk. I studied diligently solely from a desire to draw closer to her. I kept up with homework assignments and preparatory studies too. She was generally competent at everything yet possessed no exceptionally outstanding talents. She crammed tiny, precise characters into her notebook and drew maps and science diagrams with exquisite beauty. She also excelled at sewing and handicrafts. I absolutely detested sewing and had scarcely any completed works. I even found it mystifying how others could sew straight stitches in perfect alignment. When I sewed, my stitches staggered unevenly, forming puckers and creases between them. Even with gluing tasks, I couldn't properly align lids with their bases. But still, to avoid being ridiculed by her, I had my Wet Nurse secretly craft these items for me to bring to school.

Because I had feelings for her, I became such an exemplary student that I would occasionally receive praise, but I ended up receiving just one troublesome thing from her. That was nearsightedness. During class, she would stealthily take out her glasses and copy the text from the blackboard. I was unbearably envious of that. They were ordinary amber-colored temple glasses, but I became deeply attached to the way she looked when putting them on, or her face as she slightly narrowed her eyes to gaze into the distance. When writing characters in her notebook, she maintained a posture so hunched over it looked like she was lying face down. I forced myself to imitate her, and prayed to that same god who granted every wish that I might be able to wear glasses. With startling effectiveness, by the end of the first term - which had lasted two months - I had become genuinely nearsighted. The area above my eyelids puffed out, and when looking into the distance, I had to crease the space between my eyes. I had my long-awaited glasses made. With amber-colored, ordinary-framed glasses, during class when the teacher wrote characters on the blackboard, we would quietly slip our hands under the desk together, take out our glasses, and with grimacing faces, place them on our low noses.

Her house was an imposing structure with a tennis court in the garden. Her siblings and I would play leapfrog there and toss balls about. The interior contained numerous rooms too, her bedroom walls papered with firefly patterns. She who loved collecting small kokeshi dolls, chiyogami paper, envelopes and stationery would gradually share them with me. Even at school, she and I remained inseparable companions. Yet whenever studies were concerned, she transformed into a relentless grind who bitterly lamented losing to me by even a single point. Though truth be told, I had only bested her by one mark that solitary time—more often than not I found myself obliged to concede victory.

It was precisely around the time when the war had finally become a war worthy of the name. We made air raid hoods and monpe. Japan was achieving overwhelming victories, and we were ordered to paint the Philippines bright red and mark even the smallest islands in the South Seas with Hinomaru flags on our maps. There was a commemorative day called Imperial Rescript Observance Day once every month, and on that day we would listen with bowed heads to lengthy imperial edicts. It was said that we absolutely had to memorize them for the entrance exams, but in the end I could only retain about two lines.

The purpose of war. What should we do for the sake of war? We repeatedly studied such things. The cry of "Certain Victory" resonated effortlessly into our young guts, and when speaking of great men, we had no choice but to cite Hideki Tojo. When during the actual entrance examination I was asked, "Who is the person you revere?" and answered "Shimizu no Jirocho and Priest Saigyo," this might have been truly inexcusable both as a woman and as a modern woman of the wartime era.

Father was exclusively of the pessimistic view. He never took the war lightly. I became indoctrinated by the school’s teachings about the war’s certain victory and found Father’s views frustrating. Mama and Papa were no longer acceptable, so around that time I began calling them Father and Mother. Having been scolded by the teacher, we resolved to reform throughout the household.

At school every morning, cold water rubdowns were conducted to rhythmic chants of "Heave-ho! Heave-ho!" during drill commands. All the students lined up in perfect rows across the schoolyard, stripped to the waist, and rubbed their skin red with hand towels. While one might overlook small children, the exposed state of upperclassmen verging on maturity—even in wartime—was hardly a pleasant sight, yet it remained nearly compulsory by command. Because of this, a strange game involving breast-grabbing skirmishes became popular.

However, the war's influence held neither great significance nor importance for me. I still lacked any critical faculty to interpret it, you see. Yet there was something else that had been given to me instead. The workings of my mind had completely transformed and now become nearly fixed in their course. That something was Buddhism - a world toward which I had maintained utter indifference until now.

The homeroom teacher was a devout believer of Shin Buddhism. I found myself abruptly drawn to Namu Amida Butsu. By chanting Namu Amida Butsu, I would be saved. I convinced myself I could escape all manner of hardships. Yet I felt not the slightest inclination to repent for my thefts or apologize for my tyrannical behavior. I simply chanted the invocation with single-minded focus and secretly began carrying prayer beads. Since my family's Zen Buddhism and the Shin faith I was entering remained completely foreign to me, I chanted Namu Amida Butsu even at family memorial services held in temples. There was no way to learn the doctrines properly—reading books offered no hope of comprehension either. At most I read simplified biographies of renowned monks, likely drawn more to their strange tales than spiritual teachings. I began yearning for a nun's life. Having never before considered adulthood prospects, my first aspiration became taking monastic vows through tonsure. That I—who had always loved Saigyo—now grew more deeply devoted to him went without saying. I began reading annotated copies of Sanka Shū. Though failing to grasp "the pathos of things," I sensed it wasn't mere sadness or dejection but something profound whose outline I dimly discerned. Priest Saigyo took deep root within my heart. And I resolved in earnest to become a nun.

I had become completely cut off from people. The girl next to me grew distant from me. Once, when visiting her house, I discovered the handkerchief I had given her crumpled up and thrown into the wastebasket. In that moment I felt intensely sad, but without ever resenting her, it came to seem inevitable, and I naturally drifted away. I spent more time thinking about Buddhism than applying myself to my studies, remaining unperturbed and feeling no loneliness even when alone.

No matter how much contempt I received or how mocked I was, I discovered that keeping faith in one thing left my heart perpetually calm, without even a tremor of agitation. People condemned me with various interpretations—labeling me an eccentric, a pretentious show-off, arrogant. Mother said wrapping prayer beads around my arm was unbecoming. Yet perhaps people's opposition served instead to fortify my faith. In any case, for six months I never once faltered.

Chapter 4

The graduation ceremony came. At the maudlin melodies of farewell songs and the recited words, the girls around me began to sob quietly. I had even forgotten how to cry. That people parted or died had come to seem a matter of course.

Immediately after exiting the elementary school gates, the entrance examination was held. It was that lingering season when one still yearned for sunlit warmth. I took the entrance exam for a nearby private school. It was a school of lower standing than my sister's. It was a newly constructed school with a short history, situated mid-slope on a mountain.

A schoolgirl wearing a long navy-blue skirt with many pleats guided us one by one to the interview room. For some reason, they looked unclean. Their posture of walking slowly while leaning forward, their voices that seemed to emerge from behind a thin membrane, their long hair with an excessive number of hairpins—though these should have been elegant, to me they only seemed unclean. There were four rooms for oral examinations only, and the first room was the principal’s interview.

“Why did you choose this school?”

“Because it’s close,” I answered immediately. He gave a wry smile. Only after being admitted did I learn that I alone had said I came because it was nearby—apparently quite a rude response. As expected, I got the math problem wrong. Tracing numbers on my knee with a finger, I finally managed to correct myself and was told it would suffice. The rest I had mostly gotten right.

I did not even go to see the passing announcement. Because there was absolutely no anxiety about failing.

When April came, I began commuting daily to the girls' school—carrying a handbag from my home just ten minutes away by foot. Each morning I arrived two hours before anyone else. Walking amidst that straggling crowd had become unbearable for me. After leaving my bag in the hushed classroom, I would climb to the elevated playground above, stretch out on the assembly platform, and gaze down at the sprawling town below. This was, in truth, a wholesome routine. My firm convictions and towering pride grew stronger still. Standing alone in that vast space with arms spread wide to embrace the disordered town became a newly discovered heroic pleasure. Yet before long, these two impulses—the masculine bravado and the compulsion to clutch prayer beads while clinging to Amida—began crushing me from opposing directions, bringing anguish. Then came the theft incident that banned early arrivals, destroying my ritual and forcing me gradually toward one extreme.

I was unable to make friends.

Because this private school’s motto was “gracefully and refreshingly,” it felt as if only truly quiet women surrounded me, making closeness impossible. I didn’t particularly want friends either; rather, I had come to think loneliness should be listed first among my defining traits. I became a class officer immediately after enrollment. Having received my certificate, I was entrusted with giving commands for a year. At morning assembly, I had to stand at the front. My low-pitched voice carried resonance—more commanding than other leaders’, properly authoritative. The sole nuisance of this honored duty lay in counting heads. Each morning when the whistle blew, I had to line everyone up and report our class’s present and absent numbers. The vice-class leader and I would count all the way to the back. I simply couldn’t double-count rows—two columns meant multiplying by two—without chanting “choo-choo-taco-kaina” under my breath while folding one left finger down, then stacking another atop it with each repetition. Subtracting absences from total enrollment proved equally vexing; before reporting I’d mouth calculations for seconds—when train delays swelled latecomers’ ranks, I inevitably needed the vice-leader’s arithmetic. My math skills hovered at third-grade level. As war escalated, our girls’ school militarized completely—commands and rigid stances left even these graceful students frayed. Standing motionless for even one minute agonized me; frequent scoldings followed. Marching in step proved equally grueling—during drills (soldiers teaching rifle skills) and gym class alike, they’d pull me from ranks or make me stay behind for endless repetitions. Though wholly unfit for officerships otherwise, my sense of responsibility doubled others’; bearing blame alone came easily—almost nobly so. This perhaps earned classmates’ and teachers’ regard.

At that time, we spent many more hours per week on labor tasks—digging air-raid shelters, transporting soil, preparing potatoes in fields—than on formal classroom lessons. Though unavoidable during wartime, this amounted to grueling labor. I worked hard. As an honorable duty I had to fulfill it, and perhaps the spirit of faith compelled me to find joy in labor. Wearing prayer beads around my right arm, I was treated as an eccentric by teachers and students. Moreover, hair had begun growing around my mouth. Mother had instructed the barber since my childhood not to shave our faces (we had developed the routine of monthly visits where the barber would come to our sunlit veranda and press disinfectant-smelling clippers against our necks), so peach fuzz had grown densely all over our faces—but mine was particularly thick, and it had become noticeable around the time I entered girls' school. My eyebrows were thick and large on both sides, majestically connected at the center, while the hair around my upper lip undulated like waves. I was laughed at by my classmates. They asked why I didn't shave. Because of that reason too, I was thought to be a strange person. I secretly used Father's safety razor to shave off my eyebrows and the hair around my mouth. My eyebrows became uneven, and I was laughed at even more. The razor had the opposite effect; the hair grew back even thicker and more vigorously, until I finally felt like no matter how much I shaved, I could never keep up and would have to give up. And I even stopped taking care of my hair. Braiding it, tying it into ponytails, letting it sway around my shoulders—all of this was too troublesome, so I rarely used a comb even after waking up in the morning. With a loud clank, it was fastened with a single large pin; when seen from behind, it apparently looked as if a storm were raging.

I wore monpe work pants and carried an air raid bag packed daily with an air raid hood, gaiters, triangular bandages, and dried rice. Air raids on the homeland remained scarce still, and during summer we could go swimming at nearby beaches or hike in the mountains. My face and limbs had turned deep brown, and though my body stayed healthy, when autumn approached my sustained chanting of Namu Amida Butsu had grown too effortless—so much so that it instead began breeding unease within me. I started thinking I needed greater suffering, that salvation required enduring harsher trials. As I recited the invocation, my chanting self solidified into distinct existence, barring entry to selfless transcendence. This self-awareness widened the gulf between Buddha and me. I tried reading Zen texts. I consulted our family temple's priest. Mahayana or Hinayana? Self-power or other-power? At this crossroads I began earnest reexamination. Inner peace had vanished. Yet with my youthful mind, grasping clear conviction proved impossible. I steered my turmoil toward different channels. Painting became the outlet. Studying nanga with Father, I found religious serenity through frenzied sketching of Buddhist images and landscapes. Yet I couldn't relinquish the prayer beads. Drawn deeper into Eastern aesthetics, I abandoned piano entirely. It felt absurd performing others' compositions without understanding their creators' emotions. Though Mother begged tearfully and teachers implored earnestly—using neighborhood gossip as pretext during this era of instrument bans—I instead took up tea ceremony and flower arranging alongside painting. Tea ceremony's repetitive constraints chafed my nature, but the progressive flower teacher permitting free-form arrangements let me continue floral art with painting. Creating brought joy.

What was known as morimono—arranging vegetables and fruits into decorative displays—became an immensely pleasurable activity. I would arrange tree roots and stones gathered from the mountains, altering the atmosphere of the tokonoma nearly every day.

The war grew increasingly fierce. My frail older sister took a leave of absence from school and went to a small island south past three prefectures for convalescence, and subsequently my younger brother was evacuated as well, but I remained and continued attending girls' school. Mother frequently commuted to that island, bringing back fish and rice as provisions. The wet nurse had gone to that island with my sisters and never returned. With my brother commuting to the factory, the maid now alone, and Father in his national uniform with his head shaved completely bald, our life had become austere. Amidst the tumult, we advanced a grade, and I was once again appointed as class officer. Moreover, since our house was near the school, even after returning home, I had to go back whenever an alarm sounded to protect it and was assigned numerous duties—leaving my time for self-study, even moments to think—increasingly whittled away. War, war—the matter never left my head for a moment, and my nerves were constantly frayed. Father had developed asthma two or three years prior—it would reliably flare up around the equinoctial week—and under the strain of war and company duties, it had gradually worsened. Father was deeply pessimistic about this war.

It was an era when one could hardly express their emotions freely, and the girl students had withdrawn into themselves. I held small dreams through reading novels with a few friends. Though reading novels at school was prohibited, we covered them with newspaper and read secretly during breaks and after school. And I began to take an intense interest in the concept of romance.

It was April, when the air still held a lingering chill. In a deserted bookstore, as I flipped through a magazine, I saw a photograph in the upper right corner of a page and felt myself being dragged along. It was a photograph of a naval officer who had died in battle as a member of a special attack unit. Until now, I had felt little emotion toward reports of warriors meeting heroic deaths, yet here, in this photograph I had chanced upon, I found myself drawn in—stripped of any consciousness of war. Feeling as though I had met him somewhere before, I bought the magazine and tore out that page. And without reading a single line of the article, I stared fixedly at that photograph. I came to believe that I had indeed met him before. It was identical to the image of the man I had envisioned in my mind. I had even imagined the sensation of gripping that sturdy hand clad in white gloves and began to believe in it. It was a strange emotion. I convinced myself that I harbored romantic feelings for him. The peculiar imagination I’d possessed since childhood, along with this penchant for fabricating tragedies, had suddenly resurfaced once more. Lying sprawled on the sofa in the pitch-dark parlor, I kept calling out his name. Moreover, when I asked Kokkuri-san—which was popular at the time—"Who is the person I love?", his name was indicated. I found myself deepening this strange love I felt for him more and more.

School labor kept increasing. Even on Sundays there was work to do—loading horse manure onto carts and hauling it away, tending fields, and fetching water for air raid supplies. Study time dwindled to almost nothing, and English vanished entirely. My mathematics remained poor, and every class period I was scolded with remarks like, "Is the class officer just a figurehead?" Sewing was no different—no matter how neatly I tried to stitch, I had to undo my work time and time again.

However, I was well-regarded among the teachers as a diligent student. It was merely that I had to feign seriousness out of a sense of obligation from my duties, and I even felt my own constrained, immobile state seemed pitiful. Indeed, discipline and order were constraining. The desire to dash about unhesitatingly as I once had was something that remained constant within me. But by then, I had already left the realm of childhood, so there was also half a resignation that I couldn’t move about freely.

In the seat next to me was an ardent Catholic believer. More dogmatic in faith than even Arii, she persistently tried to pull me into Catholicism. She zealously recruited classmates, acting as though those who attended church had an obligation to bring one new believer each time they went. I went to church two or three times and spoke with the Mother. The catechism seemed absurd, and the priest’s sermons were full of contradictions. Religions during the war had to speak of things they’d rather not—like government oppression—while remaining silent about what they truly wished to say; such may have been the church’s position. I’m not certain whether it was around that time or somewhat later, but there was an election campaign at the church. The priest began a recommendation speech in the middle of his sermon. I was completely outdone by this. I discontinued church attendance before ever grasping Catholic doctrine. Yet my Buddhist faith remained half-hearted as well; I read this and that—the Hekiganroku, Tannishō, stories about God—but of course, they remained beyond my understanding. I also went to listen to lectures on spiritual cultivation. I learned how to put ants and winged insects into suspended animation through sheer will and even demonstrated it in the schoolyard.

The number of evacuees swelled, and our group’s ranks dwindled conspicuously. When summer passed, the war intensified further, forcing us to endure frequent wails of air raid sirens. Classes were all but canceled, making it impossible to complete assigned tasks within their designated hours.

One day during an air raid alert. As an information unit member, I was taking notes by the radio. That day alone—with no discernible motive—visions of my gruesome death drifted restlessly through my mind’s periphery. When I first became aware of death three or four years prior, I’d lacked the depth to contemplate it seriously, let alone believe myself facing mortality—yet now I felt cornered. The radio bulletins refused to penetrate my ears. This wasn’t fear of death. Rather, a concrete impulse toward dying—simply “I will die, I will die”—more visceral than anything from those earlier years. I couldn’t remain still. The instinct to flee death erupted suddenly—I flung aside paper and pencil, bursting outdoors. I don’t want to die. I want to live. Not that death terrifies me. But I do cherish this life.

The students had entered the shelter. I ran through the deserted schoolyard and charged toward the mountains. It wasn't that I held any common-sense notion about bullets not coming from the mountains. It was simply that I started running out of an emotion that made staying still impossible. I arrived at the base of a high mountain cliff. Continuing to run had become physically impossible. I threw myself into a clump of bamboo grass. I closed my eyes and remained lying face down, feeling the clash between my mind that wanted to keep running and my body that could no longer move. I felt nothing particular toward humans dying unnatural deaths for war's sake. Only regarding my own death was I fixated—and on that alone.

How many hours had I been like that? I dozed off while thinking. I dreamed of having my limbs bound with thick rope. As I slept, I pulled at the prayer beads. The thin twisted thread around my wrist snapped with a pop without slipping off. Tiny beads rolled into the grass clump. I remained unaware until the chill of dusk, unable to tell whether it had been dream or reality.

At school, there apparently was a huge uproar. Since the one who should have conducted roll call had disappeared, they must have immediately begun searching. I heard voices calling my name. Even so, I remained still. At the base of the cliff came into view the figure of the female gymnastics teacher. She found me. My air raid hood stood out conspicuously, being jet-black with crimson cords.

“My, what in the world happened?”

I followed her without saying a word.

I was transferred from that female teacher to the head teacher. The head teacher was a stern, buck-toothed male history teacher who called himself a Spartan-style educator. He pressed me about my responsibilities and obligations. I remained silent, looking past his shoulder at the darkening window outside. He grew irritated and began firing off questions in rapid succession. I stayed utterly silent, in a state where I didn't even feel scolded. I clenched my right and left hands in front of me. The prayer beads were gone. I started.

“What is that posture?” He grabbed both my hands and made me straighten them along the sides of my legs. I remained standing upright and did not try to open my mouth.

I suddenly felt a sharp stinging sensation on my cheek. I staggered and unintentionally fell to my knees. “Get up!” I did not strike back. I put on a pained expression and even let tears spill out. It was permissible to admonish students, but there was a school rule against laying hands on them. He had committed a foul and struck me. He seemed to have noticed this, for after about five minutes, he mumbled something like “No, really” under his breath and slammed the door shut as he left. I immediately jumped out of the room and returned home.

There were people who recommended a change of climate for Father's asthma, and about a week prior, Father had left with Mother for convalescence at my sisters' island, leaving the house empty with only one maid guarding the spacious home. My older brother and I ate our meal in silence under the dim electric light.

From the next day onward, I couldn't bring myself to attend school and spent two or three days lazing around the house without notice. But when information came in from students that an inquiry would be coming from the school, I decided to submit a week's absence notice and depart for the small island where my parents were staying. The maid said she was worried. I brushed it off, and without informing my older brother, boarded the train early in the morning with my lunchbox and air raid bag slung over my shoulder. I had to transfer two or three times onto countryside-line trains. Moreover, I hadn’t contacted them in advance, and there were times when I had to wait nearly an hour. The train was packed tight with people out shopping for provisions, and I had to endure this unpleasant state for three hours—chest pressed flush against the door, breathing in the musty stench of farmwomen’s hair and the fishy odor of their clothes. With my eyes closed, I kept my hand on the vertical handrail beside the door. As I was dozing off, I suddenly felt a cold sensation flash across my hand, then—as the temperature gradually warmed—began to perceive it growing intensely firm. I parted my eyes slightly. It was a hand. It was a man's hand. A large, gnarled black hand was firmly pressed over mine. I shifted my gaze from that hand to his chest, then up his torso, until I reached his face. He was a young man wearing a combat cap who looked like a laborer. I tried to extract my hand from within his grasp. Whereupon it was gripped even more firmly with stronger resistance. I became frightened. But I had to remain still like that. From that sensation, I gradually began to feel something pleasant. I closed my eyes again.

I twisted my upper body away from the man while keeping only my hand extended toward him in this posture until we reached the next transfer station. The man also got off and, without any sentiment, briskly descended the stairs to a different platform. I transferred again to a small, rattling box-like train, and this time was rocked for nearly two hours on a chugging steamship. Between islands, capes, and inlets, the ship advanced, oiling its way through. The lone city-bred girl was stared at openly by the country students and men. I lay sprawled on the upper deck—about a meter and a half wide—steeped in the scents of sky, clouds, and wind. It was a peaceful autumn evening. As I watched the occasional plash of spray rising up—each sharp splash breaking the calm—my heart seemed to have truly grasped loneliness itself, letting tears trail down my cheeks. I clenched both hands. The man’s hand from earlier sprawled like a spider through my mind. I suddenly felt as though I had touched something filthy, and spat as fiercely as I could toward the water’s surface. The white foam flowed away behind the ship.

When the surroundings turned completely dark, the half-broken steam whistle sounded. A small light became visible at the island's landing dock before me. The figures of village children waving their hands gradually grew larger until I could clearly discern their curious expressions as they looked at me. I slung my bag over my shoulder and jumped down onto the squelching wet dock. Since it was a village of only eighty houses, when they asked the children where my sisters lived, they immediately realized I was the youngest daughter and—whispering "Sumi-chan"—took my luggage to lead the way ahead. They were all my sister's friends. One girl over ten years old wore my remade Western-style clothes that had been worn out. "Toshi-chan made them for me." They were affectionately calling my sister's name.

Father regarded my sudden visit with suspicion and fired off a barrage of questions. Mother, having arbitrarily interpreted that I must have come longing for familial affection, was delighted. The Wet Nurse was surprised at me traveling alone. My elder sister and younger brother simply welcomed me with a "You're here."

I tried to reflect on my actions. I considered my responsible position at school. However, I reached a temporary conclusion that following my emotions was only natural. After eating white rice and fish sashimi, I slept soundly, exhausted from the journey.

The next morning when I awoke, I didn't think about what to do next and went for a walk with my sister, younger brother, and the village children. Within me, there was no longer any Buddhist reassurance, and the feelings I'd harbored for that fallen soldier I'd loved had vanished. I did not even reprimand myself—this self that felt like it was floating in mid-air. Things like war or belief in certain victory—none of those existed within me anymore.

We boarded the Tenma boat and went out to play along the opposite shore's coast. Elder sister skillfully rowed from the stern while singing a rustic song.

I feared my unsettled mind might reveal itself to my elder sister, younger brother, and parents, so I desperately hid it behind a forced smile. Yet even on this island, my heart found no respite. Feigning cheerfulness for my family became an ordeal. I had claimed school was closed for five days as my excuse, but by the third day I declared I would return, coming back to Kobe with Mother. She departed again for the island two days later. When I finally returned to school after long absence, the head teacher beat me for two hours before delivering his lecture. I begged him to relieve me of my duties as class officer. He refused. From that day on, I was compelled to busy myself with orders, messages, and assigned tasks. My body grew gaunt from meager rations and exhaustion—made worse by having utterly lost any sense of service toward the war or nation—until I frequently collapsed from strokes during work shifts and had to rest in the infirmary. An external force seemed to demand I discard my fierce attachment to life itself—the war, its tainted education system—all opposed me through every sound reaching my ears, every word and character before my eyes, tormenting me without cease. In that terrible void born from collapse, I reconsidered: perhaps relinquishing all love, pity, and meaningful feeling toward my solitary existence might paradoxically sustain what remained of my life.

Chapter Five

With the new year having begun, the upperclassmen were mobilized and departed one after another. In the third term, we welcomed a new Japanese teacher. She was a passionate unmarried woman. I felt a strange fascination with her dark, resilient skin. She gathered her hair into a single mass tied back at the nape, perpetually furrowed her brow, and in an accented tone (we quickly discerned she was from Kyushu by her speech) recited a poem by Takamura Kōtarō. The poem was a brave one dedicated to the Nine War Gods.

I, who wanted to touch her hand, had intentionally brought the attendance register beforehand before a certain class began, and respectfully presented it to her standing at the lectern.

“Ah, I was looking for this—wondered if it might be in the faculty room…” “My apologies.” “There was something I needed to verify.” I laid the slender attendance register across her palm. Reaching out swiftly, I brushed her fingertips— Casually. Yet in that instant, the icy sharpness of her fingers surged violently from my hand to my chest. After a formal bow, I returned to my seat. She must be undernourished. Living alone away from home, cooking for herself. While entertaining these speculations, I let her vehement words and those large characters—scrawled as if pounding chalk against the blackboard—seep into my consciousness. Yet their meaning held little appeal.

While wanting to get closer to her, I had been waiting for the right opportunity. One morning as I walked to school, I happened to fall into step beside her. She was shorter than I’d imagined, with an unexpectedly long torso. A square patch had been sewn onto the knees of her navy-blue monpe. The stitches were small. On my monpe’s knees too, patches had been applied. The brown monpe bore navy-blue cloth secured with crude black stitches—thick and clumsy, puckered and loose in places.

“You’re quite amusing with this patch.”

She punctuated each sentence ending clearly and giggled softly. I muttered, "Haa..."

“Ah, it’s cold, isn’t it? It really is cold after all.” At the point where the road curved sharply, while facing the north wind head-on, she said cheerfully. I again muttered, “Haa...” I had nothing to say.

The next opportunity came on the road. Suddenly, the air raid siren blared, and under the orders of the Civil Defense Corps members, the teacher and I were pressed together with other passersby as we hurried into a roadside air raid shelter. I was holding her hand. Her breath sounded close by, and I caught a scent like hay. "My hometown is wonderful, you know." "There are pine groves and whitish sandy beaches." "There are rice fields, forests, and the guardian deity of the shrine." "You're such a city girl, aren't you?"

I told her that I too had been raised in the countryside, and that there too had been white sand. “Ah, right… I’d love to take a trip,” she said. While nearly bumping against the ceiling, we pressed our heads together and whispered in hushed voices. She told me to come visit. Then, on a page from a small notebook, she wrote down a map and address, and pressed it into my hand. I said, “Since tomorrow is Sunday and there are no work assignments, I’ll come visit.” When the all-clear sounded, she and I parted ways atop the shelter.

The next morning, I visited her lodgings bringing rice balls and candy drops. She was arranging plum blossoms in a bamboo tube on the veranda. Her way of arranging them was forceful, and the three plum branches jutted out awkwardly. I gave a wry smile. She showed me a notebook commemorating her travels. There were haiku, waka, and pale ink paintings. Until noon, she and I drew pictures. She roughly sketched a Hannya mask and gave it to me. I arranged the profile of Kannon and a plum tree on a half-sized sheet, drew them in ink alone, and presented it to her.

“How lovely.” “I…” “When the school year begins anew, I’ll return to my hometown; sometimes gazing and remembering you.”

I couldn't bring myself to beg her to stay in Kobe. It was only natural that she would return to her family - there was nothing to be done even if I tried to stop her. Moreover, teachers weren't there to teach, but existed solely to work alongside us in the factories.

“I don’t believe in gods or Buddhas.” “I believe in myself, you know.”

When we went for a walk to a nearby mountain, she suddenly said that.

“It’s just that I like temples and Buddhist statues.” “Are you a Buddhist?” “I heard rumors in the staff room…” “Everything’s become unclear… but without understanding, I’ve somehow grown stronger.” “I threw away my prayer beads…” “Have confidence.” “You must have confidence.”

She gripped my hand. It was a rough hand, like that of a man.

At the end of the semester, she gave her resignation notice and returned to Kyushu.

When the new semester began, I became especially busy. Just like that, I was appointed as an officer and finally deployed to the factory. In the auditorium, I read aloud a pledge—a heroic-sounding document. At any rate, my busyness became an outlet for my self-centered worries, and naturally, I even began to forget those worries—but whenever Kobe was air-raided again and again, turning the immediate neighborhood into burned ruins with casualties mounting, death became vividly etched into a corner of my mind once more. I fastened pure white prayer beads around my right arm. It wasn’t that death frightened me. Having become constantly aware of death, I wanted to give some meaning to being alive. Around this time, I came to think that I myself had committed a sin. It may have been a trivial sin, but to my small heart, even that alone weighed heavily. I thought I must punish myself. And then, I began to perceive the world after death with vivid clarity. To me, the existence of heaven and hell seemed humanity’s great misfortune. I thought how I wanted to become someone who wouldn’t suffer even a little after death, no matter what wrongs I committed while alive. That was too convenient a notion. Every night, I dreamed of myself standing in flames or walking across mountains of needles. This suffering—I thought it might be punishment for my sins. I wanted salvation through faith in Buddhism.

As the air raids intensified, my parents, sister, and brothers completely relocated back to Kobe. Because if one of the family were to die, they must have thought they wanted to be together. “Even for a moment, it’s more reassuring to see each other’s faces,” my elder sister said.

I woke up early every morning, doused myself with water, and chanted Namu Amida Butsu. The path of Mahayana had been too arduous for me from the very beginning, so in the end I hoped to attain salvation through a title. I didn't want to suffer. This was only natural to consider. I took the train to the factory, a place that manufactured aircraft parts. There we did manual work. We ate boxed meals filled with soybean meal and sorghum, and bread threaded with fibrous strands. When the air raid alarm sounded, we would run for ten minutes to reach the mountain shelter.

On a clear day in May, they bombed the factory district. Even in the mountain shelter, we took quite a severe shock. From a small shrine office ten meters away from the shelter, I listened to the radio and made announcements through a megaphone. But with bombs falling overhead, there was no need for announcements. What's more, the radio soon cut out. The head teacher clung trembling to a large tree. That man who'd always been so terribly defiant—how utterly graceless he looked now—I exchanged bitter smiles with the other announcer. But then that girl too said she was scared and ran back to the shelter. With no other choice—dangerous glass shards flying everywhere—I went out to the grassy garden, lay down, and started reading a book. To me, air raids and bombings weren't frightening; what scared me more was punishment for my own sins. I'm certain I was reading an Ozaki Kōyō novel—Two Wives, I think it was. While reading, I'd plunged completely into that world. I must have been reading alone like that for quite some time when the air raid ended, though occasional explosions still made our stomachs twist and students' sobs hung in the air. Suddenly I noticed mud-caked military boots beside me—the head teacher's. My upward gaze from below collided with his eyes glaring through black-framed glasses. Abruptly he kicked my book with his foot. Flaring up, I stood and glared at the teacher.

“What is the meaning of this—forgetting your duties and reading a novel…”

I tried to pick up the book.

“Are you listening?” A barrage of shouts ensued. When I happened to glance through the trees, the students stood neatly lined up, looking this way. I reluctantly apologized. Apologizing was easy. The teacher picked up the book himself and, upon seeing its title, trembled with even greater rage.

“Do you think reading this kind of book is permissible…” The book remained clamped in his hand, never returned. I went back to my position, tallied the students, and gave my report.

The factory also sustained damage. The railways also came to a stop—all three lines. I walked back along the railway tracks for four ri—nearly sixteen kilometers.

From the next day onward, there was no work at the factory. The electricity didn’t work, and the materials for work no longer arrived from other factories either. Moreover, since we had to evacuate to the mountains every day due to air raids, I especially couldn’t understand why we still bothered to commute there. Every day, the number of students coming to work dwindled. Around that same time, most of the school buildings had burned down too. We took turns going to school to clear the burned ruins. We sorted through reddened walls, charred planks with protruding nails, and melted glass before turning the site into farmland. By then, even extreme physical labor wasn’t so unbearable anymore, but I felt our work was pointless. Because I believed the day when we’d all die was drawing near anyway.

In the dead of night in June, a massive air raid occurred, and our long-inhabited family home burned down completely. I had no attachment to my own home. The memories there were nothing but layers of sin and events reeking of unpleasantness.

I went out to the drying platform and watched the city burning away below with my father. It was utterly spectacular. With a whooshing sound, we practically flew down to the lower floor. Everything around us was already engulfed in flames. The eerie colors and sounds of incendiary bombs detonating at our feet. My younger brother, the maid, my elder sister, and I walked back and forth along the corridor. Mother held a gold brocade bag from within the altar—something that was not to be looked upon. Father was standing despondently.

“It’s scary! So scary!” My younger brother, crying out in fear, pressed his body tightly against mine and trembled. With great effort, we managed to rush out into the main road. Extinguishing the fire was utterly impossible. My older brother had not returned, as he was on night watch at the factory. The Wet Nurse had remained in the countryside. We, strangely, could not bring ourselves to believe we would die even as we faced death. And we didn’t even have the luxury to indulge in sentimentality. On the road, a great crowd of evacuees trudged along in a weary procession. We too began walking without any destination in mind. When several hours had passed and the air raid subsided, Father left for his company. We finally arrived a little past noon at our grandmother’s place in the countryside—located in the same prefecture but forty to fifty minutes away by train—after setting out on foot that morning. Mother and I boarded a truck and returned to Kobe that evening. The scorched earth still smoldered. Father was there discussing cleanup arrangements with the stewards and uncles. One safe lay toppled over on its side. The piano’s iron bars had twisted limply, their thin wires snapped into sporadic fragments, and the phonograph—if you could even recognize it as such—presented itself as an ugly remnant of what it once was. The pages of books scattered away piece by piece every time the wind blew. I watched the incomplete burning of those objects without a trace of sentimentality.

From that day on, we came to live at the main family’s estate—an imposing stone-walled house in the suburbs. The main family’s uncle had relocated to Grandmother’s evacuation site in exchange.

There, we came to lead a crowded life with Father’s sister’s widow, her daughter and son, and a distant relative’s family of seven who had been burned out.

When I left in the morning with my lunchbox, I spent busy days handling tasks like checking on classmates affected by the disaster, contacting the school, and distributing salaries from the now-defunct factory that had completely burned down. When I wasn’t handling duties, I did nothing but talk with friends. Even with close friends, I—unable to speak from the depths of my heart—kept putting on airs and never told the truth. There were times when, with a can of roasted soybeans beside me, I’d lie back and lose myself in sex talk, forgetting both the war and our times. This was a sorrowful state of affairs. Because ours was a warped adolescence where any approach to men had been absolutely blocked, leaving no outlet for what smoldered in our chests. While gazing down at the burned ruins, we dreamed our dreams amidst the stifling heat rising from the grass on the mountain cliffs. Our fantasies bore no resemblance to reality. When evening fell, I returned to the temporary shelter. We placed bowls on the measuring machine, served rice that was mostly beans, and the whole family ate hurriedly. On Sundays, we organized the scorched remains of our house. The pearls inside the safe had completely discolored. We’d already given all our diamonds and platinum to the government, leaving only pearls as jewelry—but even those could no longer be used or sold. A few of Father’s cherished ceramics remained intact, though they were vases and bowls that would crack if filled with water. Two or three seals from my paintings emerged from the soil, still stained. That became my one joyful discovery. I began painting. Then our large family started holding poetry gatherings too. This became our nightly ritual during the rainy season. But two months later, on August sixth, that mansion also burned down in an air raid.

It was exactly the evening my older brother had enlisted. Toward my older brother standing at the station entrance—the Hinomaru flag slung diagonally across his uniform as he saluted with grave formality—I felt the bonds of familial love. Among all my siblings, I got along best with him and cherished him more than our parents. That night I went straight to bed without doing anything, but stayed lying down until the air raid siren sounded. Almost simultaneously with the alarm, I heard planes and incendiary bombs. I rolled off the bed, feet tangling in the circular mosquito net as I pulled work pants over my sleepwear and rushed downstairs to join the crowd. Those frantic minutes defied counting. We fled the house immediately. Though it was an estate where magnificent Japanese and Western buildings formed a key-shaped compound, we felt no attachment—already running before bombs fell. Our group of sixteen dodged along the riverbank to avoid falling ordnance. Mansions around us burst into flames one after another; our abandoned home too began burning spectacularly. Bombs still fell when we headed toward mountains; flames surged from southern skies. Wandering aimlessly, we took shelter in a fire-scarred house surrounded by woods. For about an hour I sat on a garden stone resolved to die there. The nembutsu spilled naturally from my lips. Mother chanted norito prayers. This time I’ll burn to death, I thought. I imagined an ugly corpse. Charred bodies, blistered bodies, naked bodies—those with clothes torn and fused to flesh—I had already witnessed many corpses. I told myself I must believe in souls.

I imagined something separating from within my own corpse. It closely resembled a pitch-black lump of charcoal. This was no soul shining like crystal. As I desperately chanted the nembutsu prayer, that charcoal-like blackness began fading until it seemed almost transparent. I kept chanting “Nanmandabu” without pause. When I abruptly regained awareness, everything had fallen silent. The planes were gone now, and the explosions—their intervals growing longer—sent sharp cracks echoing sporadically across the landscape like afterthoughts, faint tremors still pulsing through my body.

I knew I had escaped death. I stopped chanting the nembutsu.

That day, our family scattered and stayed in people’s houses in groups of two or three. I forgot the pain in every joint of my body and continued to sleep soundly.

The next day, we finally moved into a vacant house left behind by evacuees, together with my parents, sisters, and aunt’s family. The seven distant relatives parted ways and headed toward the countryside.

A hollow life began. For a week, as if avoiding even uttering words, we only looked at one another's faces. My elder sister, younger brother, and cousin all fell ill. They were so exhausted and terrified that they couldn't even eat. The Soviet Union joined the opposing side, atomic bombs fell on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and then the day of defeat arrived. On the evening of the 14th, Father gathered the family and conveyed the news. We said nothing more. There was no profound emotion. I did not particularly rejoice that the war had ended. Though my life might have been given a green light—having used the war as pretext to forget spiritual pains and leave unattended actions needing consideration—the sudden emergence of time and mental space now forced thorough self-examination. It was by no means a joy. Rather, it became great pain. Until then, I had thought a little and suffered a little while carrying on without clear interpretation. The war had only permitted me half-hearted conclusions. I could not fully pursue Buddhism nor death. Surprisingly, this proved relieving. I had to consider what I should do here.

My father said he might be executed by firing squad. And as if he had developed neurasthenia, he remained constantly irritable. It was indeed a gloomy household. We spent our days grinding soybeans with a grating sound and boiling roadside grasses; beyond such tasks, we passed each day without laughter, wearing expressions that suggested we were each lost in thought. After a month, my older brother returned—the one thing everyone rejoiced over. I hated idle time.

School began. The principal and head teachers' speeches didn’t reach my ears. It was an utterly absurd, comically flustered affair that seemed to float in midair.

English was revived, and classes were conducted by partitioning the fire-scarred auditorium into four sections. However, tasks like clearing burned ruins, demolishing shelters (those things we had desperately built a year prior), and dismantling various air defense equipment occupied most of our daylight hours.

Having become a committee member again through election, I had no choice but to work diligently. I held my prayer beads and chanted the nembutsu. This was an effort to fill the emptiness that comes before thought. I had also begun to read. Yet none of it entered my mind. The trains commuting to school were terribly crowded, with people climbing through windows repeatedly. A raw intensity permeated the streets. Yet within it lingered a distinctly nihilistic scent. Jostled in the packed train, I listened to people's conversations with melancholy. Gradually, calmness and quiet began to settle over our household. Father had only been purged from public office; there was no longer any fear of execution. We held weekly haiku gatherings that became one of our few pleasures. A piano had been left in that rented house. I enjoyed creating melodies on the spot without sheet music. But when the house's owner returned after two months, we moved to a room in a mansion serving as the company dormitory. Our family had always been raised to suppress emotions between parents and children, so living with relatives didn't feel particularly burdensome. Autumn nights slipped away as we prepared for winter and managed memorial day meals. As postwar days accumulated, I found myself thinking. I thought how lonely it was to have no purpose in life. By then, I had already stopped wanting to become a nun.

Because I had become parched for human love and had come to think only of wanting to love people. I thought that within human contact, I would discover joy and purpose. I thought I wanted to love someone. And I wished for them to reciprocate my affection. I wished to have my heart stirred by my brother’s friends or the young people I met commuting by train, but none held any appeal.

The school was gradually regaining its proper school-like atmosphere. A peculiar trend of mock romantic affairs between female classmates suddenly sprang up. They tied ribbons in their hair, tucked photos into their commuter pass holders, and—since uniforms were still not fully restored and casual wear remained permitted—colors gradually grew more vivid. I lacked feminine grace and took a sort of pride in my disregard for appearances, so I stubbornly kept wearing my wartime work clothes and loose mompe trousers, my hair perpetually disheveled. Yet this very appearance came to be admired by the girls like Takarazuka's male-role performers. Every day without fail, classmates would press pink or blue envelopes into my hands and make me read their tear-blurred cursive letters. I enjoyed letter-writing myself, so I'd immediately scribble brusque replies in messy handwriting on notebook scraps. Though I felt no genuine interest in these girls, I began interacting with countless people purely for the pleasure of correspondence. My school life started drawing conspicuous attention. Little by little, I grew more animated, the audacious boldness I'd nurtured since childhood beginning to sprout forth. I started playing with incidents. Each day I wanted to fabricate some new novelty around myself, finding amusement in these situations without considering personal gain or loss. Yet the prayer beads never left me. Wearing them had long ceased being any meaningful act of faith, but still I wouldn't let go. It had become habitual—like a wristwatch one forgets to remove.

Chapter Six

As the new term began, I continued serving as a committee member and came to take on roles in organizations like the student council—products of democracy. I blurted out whatever came to mind. It was not under the name of school spirit or liberal ideology, but because it was interesting. However, almost none of our demands were accepted by the school authorities; with the flimsy pretext of having "discussed it at a staff meeting," everything was carried out solely through the principal’s arbitrary decisions. Since I considered this to have no real impact on me, I took pleasure in dredging up incidents and presenting those stories. School reconstruction bazaars and events like arts festivals and music concerts began proliferating. I nonchalantly performed in plays, gave solo recitals, played piano, or sang my own compositions backstage (—what nerves of steel!—) regaining popularity all over again. Gifts and letters came flying into desks and handbags. People chased me through corridors or pressed their bodies against mine weeping—I found it unburdensome and sent each a thank-you note. It was a peculiar sort of pleasure.

Around that time, we finally found a standalone house where only our family moved in. It stood right below the school and close to the burned-down house. I took delight in my cramped Western-style room on the second floor—just half a tsubo in size—where after fitting in a bookshelf and desk, there remained barely enough space to shift a chair. Every night I had to write four or five letters.

Among them was a letter from a female teacher. She had succeeded the Japanese teacher whose skin I once loved and now taught me Japanese grammar. She possessed no charm whatsoever. She would enter the classroom as if rolling her obese frame forward, reciting classical texts in a voice of remarkable clarity. We used to say among ourselves—the class representatives and I—that she should have been an announcer, so unusually clear and warm was her voice. She often ordered me to stay behind after class and invited me on mountain walks. While accompanying her, I would walk behind as she quietly narrated translated novels or recited beautiful poetry. During one Japanese lesson, we were each made to give a five-minute speech. I was skilled at speaking. I had to speak about something—anything. Going through topics in attendance order—stories from my childhood, air raid experiences, family matters—I declared I wouldn't speak about myself and instead rambled about Pestalozzi and Yoshida Shōin. In any case, I detested that catchy phrase "reading, writing, abacus," and believe I thoroughly demolished it. She spitefully opposed my views. Lacking knowledge to refute her, I stared expressionlessly with upturned eyes at her face. That afternoon, she told me my expression had been charming. I felt faint indignation but stayed silent. She began sending me frequent letters. I showed her whimsically written poems and essays seeking critique. She adored my poetry. Yet she detested my prayer beads.

“I have this dream… Only your hands, bloodied hands, come chasing after me. The prayer beads on those hands glint.” “I have such dreams every night.”

She often told me to take off those prayer beads already. I did not remove them.

She was cooking for herself alone in a corner of the school's etiquette room. In that room, I lay sprawled out until sunset talking with her. In the staffroom, because my relationship with her had grown too conspicuous, I was scolded by the supervisor and she was reprimanded by the principal. I did not particularly love her. However, she was rich in topics, skilled at conversation, and hearing her voice was a delight. Moreover, I had never known how to act clingy toward others. Even at home, we always had to observe proper decorum and obedience, and my mother stood on an even higher plane. So it became a great joy when she would occasionally treat me—whether to pumpkin sweets or steamed buns with a baking soda aftertaste that clung unpleasantly—or comb my hair. Around that time, due to things like property taxes, my family had begun gradually letting go of land and selling off household items. And so Father grew weaker, his nerves constantly frayed; my older brother developed chest ailments, and my elder sister's marriageable age approached—everything fell into disarray. Though we knew the phrase "family togetherness," we had lost any real sense of what it meant. We would return home, take our meals, silently withdraw to our respective rooms, and when bedtime came, lay out our futons however we pleased. The children upstairs, the parents downstairs. And we remained completely unaware of whatever might be happening to each other. Children were not permitted to question their parents' ways. For instance, even when selling a single item—losses mounting due to Father's passive approach—if we uttered so much as a word of complaint, Father would rage and declare, "Do not insult your parents." We children knew nothing of how much family wealth remained or what state our finances were in. Yet it seemed the land of my burned childhood home, the main estate grounds, even the Rokko villa—all had passed into others' hands. I found it deeply lamentable how money matters could fray people's spirits. Then after I graduated from girls' school came the incident where I begged my parents to let me attend higher school so I could become a teacher—only for them to flatly refuse and force me to grudgingly accept that women belonged at home doing sewing and cooking.

Just before that, my elder sister—who had regained her health—had her request to enter medical school rejected, though she too wanted to become a doctor. Such matters increasingly set parental and filial emotions at odds, driving them further apart. My elder sister possessed a scientific mind rare among women, being exceptionally skilled at mathematics—to the extent that solving trigonometry and factorization problems all night long counted among her pleasures. Given how the mere sight of numbers made me nauseous, it was only natural we would never see eye to heart. My sister would calculate swiftly and act upon those calculations. I acted with reckless abandon, guided solely by whim. Though we clashed repeatedly, the moment our conflicts arose we each withdrew into ourselves, refusing to probe deeper. My elder sister was an egoist, and I too was an egoist.

I informed that female teacher of the family discord and consulted her about what I should do regarding my position. She always said one should sensibly follow their parents' opinions. I felt furious, but I didn’t quarrel with her.

Before long, a major problem erupted for me at school. It was during an ethics class near the end of the first term. It was a time of teacher shortages, and the person teaching ethics was a music teacher who held only the nominal title of vice-principal and was utterly divorced from ethics. I despised him from the bottom of my heart. This was because he was someone engaged in music yet devoid of musical sensibility. He would bang on the piano. It sounded exactly like typing on a typewriter. Moreover, his baton differed not one iota from a metronome—all mechanical rhythm without a shred of emotion. That this person taught ethics—or "citizenship," as they termed it—while occupying the vice-principal position through mere seniority of over a decade’s service, was utterly absurd.

I thought it utterly absurd to even take notes as he wrote words like "right and wrong," "consciousness," or "action" on the blackboard and explained them, so I always wound up thinking about other things. That day too, as I sat there zoning out, he suddenly ordered us to spend twenty minutes reflecting on our own conduct, using reason to discern right from wrong, and writing down any points we considered evil to hand over. This would apparently serve as our ethics exam substitute. Papers were distributed. I asked the student next to me what was happening. She faithfully repeated to me exactly what he had said. I stood up. I started rattling off words nonstop. I kept insisting I absolutely refused. The students stirred restlessly. He grimaced.

“What’s the purpose of doing something like that?” He tersely replied that self-reflection was important. “Self-reflection should be done alone,” I maintained. “And using it as exam substitution is utterly unacceptable,” I pressed. At my words, he bellowed louder, declaring it an order. I dug in my heels, refusing absolutely to comply.

And in the end,

“Excuse me, but have you not realized how heavy a burden it is for someone who isn’t even a confessional priest to demand confessions from forty or fifty students?” “I will handle my own actions myself.” “Even if I were to confess to you, it wouldn’t amount to anything.” “I don’t believe that confessing one’s misdeeds to others could possibly lighten the burden of that suffering.” “Moreover, you are merely a music teacher, aren’t you?”

It seems I went on at length about such things. He twitched his eyebrows irritably and berated me in a voice so loud it could be heard in other classrooms. Flaring up, I pressed my opposition even more vehemently. Among my other classmates, two or three supported me.

“A diary isn’t something you show to others.” The big-eyed, short-statured girl who wrote me letters every day said that. Most of the others wore expressions that seemed half fearful of him and half delighted at this incident killing time, their eyes shifting between me and the teacher. I felt tears streaming down my burning cheeks. These were tears of girlish excitement. “How tasteless... wanting to hear about people’s wicked deeds like this...” With a strange smile twisting my lips, I spoke through tears. My sins rose unbidden before my eyes. Theft. Cheating. Deceptive words and deeds. I plopped back into my chair.

“Teacher. If I were to obediently write exactly what would satisfy you now—if I spread open that answer sheet before you—you would be met with shock, terror, and yes, regret. You will come to regret your own actions. For example, suppose I were to engage in acts of prostitution…”

A burst of loud laughter rippled through the classroom. However, most students didn't understand the term. The teacher stared at my face, too appalled to speak. “Of course you'll mark my exam paper Pass or Fail.” “You don't understand my psychology or the motives behind my actions.” “Yet you who just stamp 'Fail' are being completely irresponsible.” “If you truly considered this as an ethics teacher, you'd regret your excessive responsibility before marking it Fail.” “After the emotional shock and terror...”

He threw the chalk in a fury and left, leaving behind vague words about putting this matter "on hold for now."

This incident of mine quickly spread throughout the entire school. The students' eyes toward me completely changed. I came to be regarded as a delinquent girl. I heard from that Japanese language teacher that in the staff room, they were discussing how to guide me properly. I was reprimanded by the head teacher again. When the term ended and I saw that my report card had a "Good" mark in Civics, I found the whole thing utterly absurd. The title of delinquent girl did not disappear even when the second term began. My fans gradually diminished. At the time of that incident, only the girl who had agreed with my opinion still gave me things like violet flower cards. I doted on her, who resembled a Goya painting. I gradually lost interest in school. And then I began skipping almost all of the tedious classes—gymnastics, sewing, commerce. My body was not robust, and wartime fatigue had begun manifesting around that time; even walking pained me so that I obtained a doctor's diagnosis and had my occasional absences overlooked. I lay in the sick bay watching the blue sky. I stuffed small translated novels into my futon and read them there. Growing bolder, I began leaving school early to see old Western moving pictures on my way home. The delinquent girl had become genuine. I would sometimes skip school for entire days to visit Kyoto temples. I wrote and submitted absence notices secretly from my family. I began feeling as though the air itself inflicted pain upon my body.

The autumn air was like a vacuum. I began to feel extremely anxious about my ability to keep living. I wondered why I was alive. There, I could discover nothing resembling true happiness. Though I wanted to live exactly as I pleased, I knew it was impossible. Rules. Law. And families still encased in feudal rigidity. Uninspiring school life. Even solving mathematics or learning commercial forms amounted to forced studies utterly disconnected from my being. I could no longer find any joy. I detested constraints yet knew no way to free myself from them. I want to live freely and unrestrictedly, guided solely by my own emotions.

And yet—family. School. Society. I had to live suppressing and ignoring my emotions across all these—family, school, society—unable to grow into my true self. How utterly dull human existence was! I lost all energy for anything. I finally cast the prayer beads from my hand. I no longer believed in gods or Buddha. Even in those moments when I chanted invocations, turbid waves of anxiety and doubt welled up from my heart. I became utterly hollowed out, severed from everything. I sold off the Buddhist texts. With that paltry sum, I ventured into town. To call it a town was charitable—just drab postwar shacks lining the streets. Then came the black market. There, thick with the body odor of Chinese vendors and rancid food smells, both sides of the narrow path seemed nothing but clamor. I wondered if there was anything I wanted. Nothing called to me. At dusk, I dragged myself home through despair, confusion, and exhaustion. From that day on, death’s impulsive urge circled endlessly through my mind.

I took a long absence from school. Japanese language teachers and friends came to visit. "I will die," I said. They said, “It must be a joke.” I also smiled bitterly. I had not considered the means to die. I thought about hanging myself. A scene from Ninjin floated into my head. I attempted it a few days later. However, I couldn't die. My relatives, having noticed my actions, grew wary of me. I received their admonishment. My parents repeated over and over that they had toiled to raise me. That made me even angrier. However, I went a full week without dying, even as I kept saying "I'll die, I'll die." I couldn't even die. I had thought that dying would only leave behind a corpse, but I simply couldn’t find a way to die.

A great many letters pleading "Please live" came into my hands. From the former Japanese teacher who had gone back to her rural hometown as well,

I can offer you no comfort, nor can I persuade you. But please, go on living. Please go on living.――

she wrote. From friends, ――When I imagine that you’ve died, I won’t even have tears left to cry. The only happiness I have is being able to see you. Please take pity on me.

——

From the fat Japanese teacher,

"I can understand your disdain for common sense, but I want you to keep living for the sake of your talent. Do take a little better care of yourself."—— This letter seemed to me the most ridiculous of all. How could I possibly love myself? I despised myself as much as I despised the world, people, and common sense—and even if I did possess some talent, it would be of no use in surviving.

White clouds—carefree, drifting through the sky.

From a certain lady I liked who always kept this hanging scroll displayed in her living room,

――Thirteen years have passed since I was widowed. I live in solitude. To love someone—to love them ardently from the heart—and to live for that. You too must love― A letter written on purple paper arrived. The lifeblood that allowed her to keep living while loving someone dead seemed almost mysterious to me. She was the mother of my friend and had been closer to me than that friend herself. The widow too had despised societal conventions. And she said that up until now, she had lived like white clouds. She said that for the sake of her love, she had been disowned from her family and had lived only with her one husband. To me, she seemed like a soulless doll controlled by her deceased husband. And yet, I couldn’t help but feel that such a life wasn’t free in the slightest. Bound by an invisible force, yet she did not suffer from it. Still not knowing love, I was ultimately unable to understand her feelings.

It seemed family meetings were being held every night without me. I wasn't going to school, and for my parents, this must have been an unprecedented crisis. I thought it didn't matter what became of me and lay sprawled listlessly every day.

By my mother's will, I was made to attend a music school in Osaka. It was already on the verge of graduation in just five more months. I couldn't refuse being thrust into this changed world. After all, there had been a faint expectation that I might find something there. Initially, I entered under the title of special auditor. I was to study piano and vocal music. My hands had grown nearly stiff, and since I hadn't practiced any études, I couldn't play a thing. I had to practice scales daily on the dilapidated piano at the neighboring church. Each morning, commuting to school took a full two hours. And then I would enter a small practice room and bang away. There were music theory, composition techniques, and practical training. And then it would take another full two hours to return.

That life was even more unpleasant than my recent days at the girls' school. There was no trace of any musically sensitive atmosphere to be found. I often wondered in disbelief how I hadn't gone mad. Since the practice rooms had inadequate soundproofing, the sounds of pianos from neighboring and opposite rooms constantly reached my ears. Bach, Chopin, and etudes jumbled together in chaos. Therefore, every pianissimo had to be continued as forte without change. It was an even more sorrowful sound than those bombs during the war. Moreover, the piano itself rattled madly. I couldn't help finding it strange that the other students remained unfazed. This wasn't music. The city's noise felt more musical by comparison. By the end of the first week, I lost all desire to go. I would show up only for composition and theory classes; on other days, I watched movies in Osaka before returning home. Sometimes I'd leave home in the morning and spend the whole day at that widow's place. When winter break began, I quit the school altogether. I had developed a nervous breakdown. I couldn't sleep deeply, with Bach's Inventions ceaselessly spinning through my head. I couldn't even read sheet music anymore—the five lines appeared to undulate while the black notes flickered in and out of sight with uneven postures. I slammed the sheet music onto the floor and declared my farewell to the piano.

Mother lamented that she had always kept an image of me standing on stage as a first-class pianist in her heart. However, recognizing that my mental state made it impossible to continue grappling with the piano any longer—and fearing that forcing me would make me suicidal again—she permitted me temporary freedom after consulting with Father and brother. Whenever I received a small sum of money, I would go walking in the suburbs. And I read nothing but poetry. I loved Sakutarō. Around that time, I even wrote poetry. A certain poet looked at my poems and said, “You like Sakutarō, don’t you?” So thoroughly had I steeped myself in Sakutarō and absorbed something from him.

I moved to Tokyo alone. However, unable to adjust to the fluent accent, I returned immediately. I still thought I wanted to die. It wasn't sentimentality. Simply, I wanted to escape from suffering. My pragmatic brother scoffed that suffering was utter nonsense at my age. However, at my age, that suffering was immense. I wanted to live as I wished, and I understood that it was impossible. Moreover, I had no strength. I lacked patience and perseverance. In my own way of thinking, I even came to envy my wartime self. That life without room to breathe back then was still easier. I wanted a relentless busyness that would wear myself away. I thought it would be fine if my existence vanished through busyness. If I could live without being conscious of myself, I thought that would be the easiest thing. I sought employment. My parents flatly opposed it. For them, the image of the stately gate—firmly rooted in place—had not faded from their minds. A disgrace to the family. This was their primary objection, and I was scolded for my frivolousness in seeking to enter society merely to pursue emotional thrills in fleeting moments.

I myself couldn't determine whether that hope was frivolous or sincere. To put it plainly, my voluntary withdrawal from girls' school might have been frivolous too, and skipping classes or missing school to watch movies and wander around Kyoto and Nara was undoubtedly frivolous. Moreover, I'd started smoking. Since this involved being a minor, it verged on illegality. Objectively speaking, every action I'd taken up until then could only be called frivolous. But at each moment back then—at each moment—my feelings toward my own actions were undeniably genuine. I was earnestly examining myself. This desire to work now stemmed from forcing myself to create an unconditional slogan—"one must live"—which made employment necessary; thus I had my own peculiar justification. Without telling my parents, I'd clipped newspaper ads and hunted for jobs. I wrote a résumé, interviewed at a woolen fabric wholesaler, and became an attendant. By then my parents just stood dumbstruck and stopped interfering altogether. It was midwinter's bitterest stretch. Dressed in a rumpled navy blouse and dust-caked slacks, my pallid skin turned parched and flaky. My eyes grew dull and clouded; my brow and lips kept twitching spasmodically—not a trace remained of that heroic air I'd carried as a child. At the time I was sixteen years old.

Chapter Seven

“Have you ever seen unemployed people who can’t even get their daily meals loitering in front of the employment office, huh?”

These were the first words given to me as a shop clerk. A plump female secretary who had worked there for ten years shielded me.

“Ms. Ishioka, that way of thinking won’t do.” “Even a young lady from a good family needs to boldly gain experience out in society.”

It was a fortunate misunderstanding. I seemed to appear in her eyes as a courageous modern woman engaging in social observation.

The director—the president’s younger brother, nearly incompetent and referred to as "Bunke-san"—called me a bothersome girl. However, I quickly mastered the technique of flashing a bright smile and promptly won his favor. From that day onward, I displayed unwavering loyalty. Each morning, I cleaned nearly alone in the dusty space—a warehouse that had survived wartime destruction and been converted into an office. The company executives had all risen from shop-boy positions, so they noticed every trivial detail and perpetually scolded the younger staff. My work involved menial tasks like cleaning, serving tea, binding newspapers, and organizing mail, primarily rushing about under the secretary’s orders.

By the time my fingertips turned bright red and my chapped hands throbbed, the other female clerks would arrive for work. Then, as a token gesture, I would take up a broom or duster and change the water for the flowers. When noon approached, I lit the charcoal brazier to warm lunchboxes and added more charcoal to the hibachi. When clients or representatives from the woolen fabric company that boasted being Japan’s finest came—since we were their exclusive distributor—I served premium tea using premium utensils. The water had to remain at a perpetual boil. Whether the brew proved too strong or too weak, these paragons of Japan’s textile industry would lodge complaints with unflinching authority. Even when facing their most junior clerks, our executives bowed low in deference. Sitting in the frigid reception area, I waited for their arrivals—

“Mydo, thanks.”

they would greet us with a curt "Mydo, thanks." If one dared ask their names, they would fly into a rage. From midday onward, they served mahjong and lavish meals. They went to negotiate at nearby restaurants. Even when geishas came clattering in on wooden clogs alongside Shachōhān, we had to treat them courteously. They seemed more devoted to the company than I was. Since I hadn't been assigned to any department, typists came asking me to check copies, sales staff ordered me on errands, and accounting told me to go to the bank. The daily bustle lasted from five until six. With things like the Labor Standards Law completely ignored, there was naturally no chance of overtime pay being provided.

I didn't particularly feel tired. Due to the ceaseless physical labor, I had even less time than during the war to contemplate my own worth as a human being or how I ought to live. This was a good thing. Since I could grasp how to greet people and handle phone calls within two or three days, I didn't grow weary from nervousness or anxiety. Even when scolded, I couldn't bring myself to snivel and cry like the other girls. I was treated kindly by both my superiors and those below me. I wasn't jaded; I'd say "Right away" and do whatever was asked. It wasn't as though I worked out of genuine respect for them or old-fashioned loyalty to the employer; but at that time, I could effortlessly conceal my inner self so skillfully.

When the company closed, I would go out with my fellow clerks to eat udon or oden, or go see a movie. When I returned home, I would sleep without exchanging many words with my family.

Every day wasn’t particularly enjoyable, but at least the life I led to earn my salary wasn’t entirely without purpose. My first salary was 1,500 yen. With that, I could sufficiently cover my tobacco expenses, coffee expenses, buy picture books, and go see plays. As for tobacco, I often smoked at the janitor auntie’s place. She too was a heavy smoker. Had the old maid secretary discovered this, I would have undoubtedly been lectured or fired, but fortunately, since I managed not to smoke too much, I remained safe. The young boys with closely shaved heads often came pestering me for cigarettes. They would lend me mimeographed lewd books and teach me the peculiar jokes and slang associated with such topics. There were times when I felt bewildered by the gap between the romance I imagined and the romantic feelings they harbored. And I felt a faint disappointment, yet still held an interest in them. However, I was bound to the company and could no longer cause incidents as I had before. In the most constrained of lives, I grew accustomed to the constraints, became numb, and gained something akin to resignation. I no longer felt any particular contradiction in calmly suppressing my emotions, and my actions gradually became more calculated.

When March arrived, our grade graduated. At that time, my graduation certificate had been sent to my home. I learned this fact from that Japanese teacher herself; Mother had never shown me the diploma. Because of this, my classmates completely severed ties with me. There was another student who had withdrawn due to family circumstances—though this occurred after my case—and the fact they couldn't obtain their certificate apparently exacerbated the controversy. Back then, I hadn't considered a mere sheet of paper so valuable, so it wasn't that I particularly desired it. If anything, I nursed a peculiar pride in having voluntarily left school myself, which made me resentful toward the scheming adults who'd disregarded my autonomy. The matter apparently caused an uproar at a faculty meeting. However, since my father had once been influential—having donated to the school and served as board member—the principal had dispatched my diploma through what amounted to unilateral decree. This disgusted me. Yet I could forget it instantly. My hectic daily work saw to that. The Japanese teacher resigned, declaring the school lacked vitality without me, and returned to her hometown. Being utterly severed from school and friends brought me no loneliness, nor any regrets.

Due to soaring prices, my salary rose almost every month. I took pleasure in buying small ceramic ashtrays and such. The janitor auntie found it suspicious that I didn't wear makeup despite being a woman.

“Why don’t ya put on just a bit of lipstick?” Because I worked so diligently, she—the one who always looked out for me—said this. I got a perm and began lightly applying makeup. Mr. Bunke smirked while staring at my face. He always sat vacantly at his large desk with his mouth slightly agape. He was even worse at arithmetic than I was. Sheepishly using an abacus and counting on his fingers, he would slowly hand me the payment for my lunch of fried rice. He had a short temper and often yelled. His stammer made him scatter saliva everywhere.

“My pipe, p-p-pipe?”

This was a ritual that would unfailingly spring from his lips every single day. Lighters and cigarettes followed the same pattern. Whenever I had free time, I observed his behavior. Having memorized where he left his pipe, I would quietly inform him. He disliked being told too promptly. I had committed his acquaintances' phone numbers to memory—since he never kept records himself—and made sure to respond immediately. Among all the female clerks, I alone understood his temperament well enough to act on his commands. Though I harbored deep loathing for him, I felt an odd attachment to his foolish expression. On Saturday afternoons, I watched with wry amusement as he went out to dine with his wife, who visited him clad in gaudy kimonos. Though I received his scoldings most frequently, his tyrannical manner paradoxically endeared him to me—even while being reprimanded, I did everything for his sake.

The secretary and I got along well. She would often giggle and fool around with the president in his office, but once she stepped out, she would command even the accounting manager and key sales figures with such imposing authority that the elderly men would stiffen their postures in her presence. The old maid’s hysterics frequently occurred. She swung her ample hips while ranting angrily. Since her menial tasks had been passed on to me, I was able to frequently enter the president’s office, and her saccharine words before him struck me as comical. Watching her skillfully transform everything from her facial expressions to her voice with just a single door between us was one of my few interests. Jealousy and slander were constantly repeated. Moreover, trivial matters—like who was getting along too well with whom or who was harboring resentment—not only affected the work but also flowed directly from the secretary to the president, and though it even seemed absurd that the president would interfere in such things, I came to realize that these very things had a significant impact on one’s career advancement. Although I was the youngest and never caused any incidents with others, I was always placed in the lowest position compared to the girls who joined after me. That was because I lacked clerical skills. I couldn’t do bookkeeping or use an abacus. I couldn’t type on a typewriter and didn’t know how to handle fabric. I didn’t particularly feel jealous of the colleagues who overtook me from behind. While being the busiest, the lowest position had a sense of stability that came from having nowhere left to fall. I continued to alternate between standing and sitting at the desk beside the entrance and the corner of the reception area. I was well-regarded by visitors. It was probably because my speech was fluent. Having given speeches at school and due to the rigorous language training I received from a young age, I could use honorifics without difficulty.

Five busy months passed. For the first time, I was handed a large envelope called a bonus from the president and gave presents to my parents, siblings, and that friend’s mother. Receiving money and the joy of giving things to others were what gave purpose to my life during that time.

Before long, I noticed that the shaven-headed Ōoka-kun was being especially kind to me. We would often meet by chance while running errands, or stand under someone else’s eaves and exchange a few words until the evening shower passed. Ōoka-kun was a country bumpkin whose face was covered in pimples. One day, we were organizing the warehouse basement, joined by other boys. It was past five o’clock, and amidst the dust, humidity, and musty smell from the fabric, we were bundling and tidying up items, working while covered in straw scraps. Ōoka-kun was perched on the ladder, and I was handing him small packages from below. His legs were wrapped in thick hair, and the toenails of his sandal-clad bare feet were jet-black with accumulated grime.

Heave-ho. While he chanted “Heave-ho,” I listened half-entranced to his vigorous breathing and shouts resonating above me. His running shirt was stained light gray with sweat and grime, and every time he stretched his body, his sturdy skin and spine came into view. As we handed over the packages, our fingertips brushed against each other. With rough, calloused fingers—indeed caked with grime under the nails. When handing over the final package, as I informed him this was the end, I realized for a moment that his fingertips, the parcel, and my own fingertips settled into a motionless position. Unable to suppress the sudden rush of embarrassment, I innocently stuck out my tongue and let go. He skillfully tossed it up, then attempted to jump down from there onto me. I made no attempt to move away, mesmerized by the dynamic pose he struck in that instant. With a thud, when I felt the weight on my shoulder, his lips and mine reacted by brushing against each other ever so slightly. Suddenly irritated, I broke into a half-run for five or six steps and joined the other boys.

“I’ve already finished my part here. “I’ll help you out.” Entering among them, I began organizing the items. Ōoka-kun came over wiping his face with the towel hung around his neck and, like me, began silently assisting with the work.

After that incident, I became self-conscious whenever speaking with him, constantly worrying whether someone might be watching our movements. I found myself considerably drawn to his robust physique. Sometimes after work, we would eat okonomiyaki under the dim lights of the black market or slurp greasy udon noodles while sweating profusely. The country boy possessed a fearsome appetite. He disdained cold drinks and frozen treats. With giddy fascination, I watched him boldly score the sizzling mass on the iron plate—using a square tin implement they called a *kote*, resembling an egg flipper—before devouring it in great gulps.

Ōoka-kun and I never became gossip material. He possessed such an unremarkable appearance that he couldn't possibly draw attention, and was clueless to a laughable degree. The commotion always centered around demobilized employees in their late twenties who'd returned to the company, or those chubby-cheeked red-faced boys. When superiors berated him, I'd pretend not to hear. He endured daily shouting from all directions about his thoughtlessness. I shielded him whenever possible, even abandoning my own station to help when he juggled three or four tasks at once. This sometimes earned me reprimands too. The branch family member—hands jammed in pockets while blankly surveying the office—would contort his already twisted mouth into stranger shapes whenever he caught Ōoka-kun and me conversing, leaking odd chuckles. Each time our eyes met, I'd mold a bashful smile and tilt my head coquettishly. He favored me.

Around the time lightweight wools and yarns began appearing in the city, Ōoka-kun was suddenly transferred to the Tokyo branch. There was no particular reason—after about six months, they were to be rotated through three different branches. He greeted everyone in the company without a trace of loneliness. Even before me, he bowed solemnly and placed a small package atop both my hands beneath the desk. Since I was the last one he greeted, Ōoka-kun promptly left the room. The small package contained a foreign-made lipstick wrapped in newspaper labeled "memento." Though the wrapping and contents were absurdly mismatched, I let slip a smile. I carefully unfolded the newspaper again searching for any written message, but found only "memento" scrawled in angular pen strokes. The origami-sized scrap turned out to be an old issue of the commonplace *Shōken Nippō*, devoid of any suggestive text. The lipstick came in a golden case. Clearly black-market goods—an expensive American brand—but twisting the base revealed a garish peony red that made me burst out laughing even as disappointment prickled my chest. This color lay worlds apart from my preferences. Yet I imagined him favoring both the gaudy case and this vulgar shade. It matched the crude substantiality of those okonomiyaki we'd shared. He must have deliberately chosen this specific hue from countless options. Still, I gratefully accepted the earnestness behind his choice.

On my way home, I meticulously applied that color to my lips. My lips glared garishly. And then I went to meet Ōoka-kun again, who was packing his belongings in the janitorial room.

“Thank you for earlier. “Take care. “You’ll often go on business trips and come back. “Let’s meet again then, okay? “I don’t have anything to give you, and with payday being the day after tomorrow, my wallet’s feeling a bit thin. “But here, take this.” I handed him the small mirror from my handbag. When sent on business trips, an order would come down permitting us to let our hair grow out. He obediently accepted it and simply said, “Goodbye.” While looking at my face, whether he noticed the lipstick color or not, he remained emotionless and expressionless.

On the way home.

I suddenly felt something sorrowful welling up from the depths of my chest.

From the next day onward, I resumed arriving early to clean as usual. I couldn’t bring myself to wear the lipstick he’d given me. The subtle red of cheap Japanese lipsticks suited me better. Company life repeated the same routines daily. Once fully accustomed to the work, I grew acutely self-aware. I’d lean against my desk and let my mind wander. Each scolding made me neglect visitors and calls more—the accounting clerk recounting bills thrice over, snapping over a single sen; sales staff clacking abacuses dawn to dusk with pencils behind ears; export typists hammering sample costs; executives bowing like wind-up toys; girls debating actors’ charms; delivery boys mimicking Tarzan between errands; the president visiting his mistress’s house—details the secretary divulged to me like privileged gossip—and calls from women who never gave names.

What had once been a tremendous source of interest to me—these daily occurrences—gradually became nothing at all, until only the branch family member's every gesture and movement held my attention.

One evening, I came across him strolling through town with an unlit cigarette dangling from his slack-jawed mouth. He always kept his hands thrust in his pockets. He walked with legs splayed outward and stomach protruding. From afar I immediately recognized him. Having just left work, I had redone my hair and applied light makeup. After a moment he noticed me.

“Heading home? Finished work?”

He demanded arrogantly. I smiled and nodded. “Come with me.” He commanded. I obediently followed two or three steps behind, with the demeanor of a maid. After turning down two or three alleyways, we arrived at a secluded house with a latticed door. He briskly took off his shoes—never bothering to untie the laces—and headed into the tatami room. I hesitated, lingering in the entryway. “Fumi... Fumi, you there...?” A young maid with her hair neatly tied up in a bun popped her face—thickly plastered with white powder—out from the corridor and bestowed an amiable smile upon the branch family member and me.

“You there—serve the sake... And you—get in here.” He issued commands to both her and me at once. I arranged my faded black sandals in the corner and approached the room where the maid was beckoning—the six-tatami space with blue-green mats where he sat sprawled in a wide-legged stance. “Get in here.” I settled neatly in front of the central vermilion-lacquered table. “You’re gonna smoke, aren’t you? I know.” He yanked out a cigarette box from his pocket—white cellophane wrapping over a vivid red circle. I plucked one up and put it between my lips.

“Hmph.” He let out something between a laugh and a sigh, then deliberately brought his own lighter close to my face. It was still a bit early for dinner, so there were no other guests. From the cheaply built ceiling of the shack-like structure, the white lampshade resembling a shoji screen stood out beautifully. Soon after, a small bowl and chopsticks were brought out alongside a sake flask. The maid from earlier poured sake for him and me. “Hey, Fumi.” “Don’t you go blabbing about this.”

He showed his thumb. I realized it referred to the company president. “You keep your mouth shut too.”

He glared up at me through lowered eyelids as he commanded. I found myself grinning uncontrollably—the sight of us sitting face-to-face drinking sake struck me as absurdly comical. He barely spoke. I ate the sushi that had been brought later in silence. A faint buzz warmed my head. “Mr. Branch Family, why’re ya treatin’ me?”

I deliberately used Osaka dialect to ask. “Hmph.” He smiled contentedly. His glazed eyes steadily grew sharper. Outside grew dim, and the lights came on.

“Thank you very much for the meal. “I’ll take my leave now.”

I placed both hands on the floor and bowed politely. “You ain’t goin’ home.” He glared at me intently. Then suddenly grabbed my hand on the table. The sake cup and chopsticks rolled away. Then a scene straight out of those popular magazine novels—the ones with covers gaudily painted in blues, yellows, and reds—began unfolding right beside me, drawing me into its midst. I resisted. The vermilion-lacquered desk rattled as it was pushed into the corner.

“Mr. Branch Family, let go, let go!” I said in a small voice. The snap on the side of the cotton dress came undone with a pop. “You’re disgusting—stop!” I mustered every ounce of strength, grabbed his arm, and shoved his upper body away. This happened two or three more times. Suddenly he rolled onto his back in the corner of the room like a frightened animal. “Hmph. You’ve been messing around with Ooka—I know all about it.” A surge of anger suddenly welled up inside me.

“Mr. Branch Family, even joking about such things is vile.” I snapped at his cowering form. “Hngh.” That familiar snort escaped his lips. “Mr. Branch Family—let’s go home. “This is undignified. “It’s still twilight outside. “And you’ve a proper wife waiting, haven’t you?” I’d always suspected him of being mentally unhinged. I yanked his hand to pull him upright. He offered no resistance. I buttoned his dress shirt and retied his necktie. The secretary had told me about his wife—a domineering woman prone to hysterics. I knew he’d again become her puppet. For all his years, he retained a boyishness that made me pity his loneliness. I dragged his liquor-numbed hand toward the entryway.

“Hngh... shoehorn.” He barked. With relief flooding through me, I quickly fished the shoehorn from his right trouser pocket and guided his foot into the shoe. The next day, he stumbled into work around noon. I brewed extra-strong tea and carried it to his desk. He said nothing, refusing to meet my eyes. I redoubled my efforts to serve him diligently. Through my actions, I showed pity for this man our colleagues scorned as utterly incompetent—this president’s brother who commanded respect through blood alone.

Company life was occupying the greater part of my day, and I had become almost estranged from my family. Before I knew it, my elder sister had fallen in love, and as that developed into marriage, I began to realize my own position within our household for the first time. It was a time of consecutive Sundays and holidays as winter approached. My elder sister held her wedding ceremony. The partner was a wealthy young gentleman.

Chapter Eight

Suddenly, I felt pained by how I was living in resistance to so many things.

One rainy afternoon, when visitors were scarce and the reception desk stood quiet, I found myself flipping through discarded documents to doodle on their blank backs. Nearly abruptly, I became aware that all my strength had drained away. My daily existence felt hollowed out. I began envisioning myself as some sort of automaton. The act of bracing against life's currents while maintaining diligent service now struck me as utterly farcical—why resist what needn't be resisted? This conscious resistance amounted to self-inflicted torment.

Impulsively, I felt death's temptation. My affection for Mr. Branch Family was nothing but futile nonsense. Jealousy toward my sister—I burned with anger that she had forced through what she called a happy marriage (though that was merely her perception then) by sheer willpower. I couldn't even manage romance. Loving others brought me no love in return. I lacked any semblance of qualifications to be loved. My sister boasted both beauty and a razor-sharp mind. She effortlessly embodied feminine grace while excelling at every womanly task. She had properly graduated from school and cultivated robust health. Then there was me. My own education remained half-finished. I worked as a server yet possessed not a shred of kindness or selfless devotion—even this reality reeked of absurdity.

When work ended, I visited that widow’s house.

“Auntie, I want to die again.” “I can’t stand any of it anymore.” “I truly have no attachments left, no desires—I’m too wretched to keep living like this.” “That’s pointless.” “I hate working any more, and I hate sitting still to think quietly.” “I can’t even bring myself to gaze at nature, and interacting with people to love them feels like too much effort for me.” “I’ll die and be done with it all.”

She watched over me with a gentle gaze as I spat out my hasty words. “Do as you please.”

She offered me a cigarette and exhaled a slow stream of smoke from her long pipe. I violently flung open the piano lid and began playing Chopin’s Farewell Waltz. My sentiment-laden behavior struck me as comical. I kept repeating the same motif over and over while

“It seems utterly complex yet simple. The psychology of someone dying? Even the motive for death can be summed up in one word. You die because you want to die. Why, you ask? It can’t be rationalized. It’s biological. It’s impulsive. Crying, laughing, dying—they’re all the same. Just trivial gestures, don’t you think?” When the piano’s sound and the words I was spewing became unbearable, I slammed the lid shut and hurriedly began preparing to leave.

“Auntie, goodbye.” “Kimi-chan, goodbye.”

Kimi-chan was my classmate. She remained silent from beginning to end.

I turned up the collar of my overcoat, boarded the train, got off five minutes later, and stopped by a pharmacy. I bought forty tablets of the red-marked medicine labeled “Drama” and returned home.

I brightly finished my meal alone, late after everyone else. When I entered my narrow, solitary room, I took out stationery from the desk. I wanted to stage one final performance. I wrote a letter to a fictional lover. I fashioned myself so that my cause of death would be heartbreak. From various love stories, I extracted well-turned phrases and listed them. The fictional lover became various people. Twisted lips, greasy shoulders and backs, a large-eyed student companion, even faces I didn’t recognize—all existed within that illusion.

I rolled the die. With the lone die in hand, I tried rolling it while repeating to myself that if an odd number came up, I would take the pills immediately. It landed on one. I fetched water in a cup and took all the medicine. I lay down on the futon without even having time to change into my nightclothes and pulled two quilts up to my neck. At that moment, the telephone rang downstairs. Soon after, Mother called out from downstairs.

“Bobi, there’s a telephone call.” “Just tell them I’ve already gone to bed…”

I barely managed to say that. My head rang fiercely as my heartbeat thudded violently. My entire body went numb until I felt like I was spinning round and round. Soon I could no longer feel anything.

That both committing suicide and failing to die were utter comedies—this realization came to me several days later.

I had no memory whatsoever of myself during those fifty hours. According to others, I thrashed about, writhed in agony, vomited, tore out my own hair—it was what they call a living hell.

When I came to，the radio reached my ears.

F minor, huh? I seemed to mouth the words silently, but no sound emerged. My legs and hands wouldn't move no matter how I tried. I dimly saw a doctor monitoring my expression nearby. I faintly felt that I was alive. I closed my eyes and formed a thin smile. That smile hovered between self-mockery and resignation. Had two or three hours passed? I began feeling pain throughout my entire body. I slowly moved one hand and touched my other arm. I realized the unevenness of my skin came from injection marks. With that hand, I touched my limbs. I felt even more uneven patches. I had a high fever along with severe headaches and lower back pain. Over my eyes—as if covered by a thin film—everything appeared tinged with grey. An unrelenting thirst kept me clamped to the water vessel's spout, channeling cold water straight to my stomach.

That was from evening into night.

The next day, with my consciousness mostly clear, I felt my own existence as terribly wretched. I saw my parents' and brothers' faces. I wanted to see written words. However, even when someone brought the newspaper beneath my desk, the characters had doubled or tripled before my eyes, rendering even the size-six type illegible. I raised my upper body and looked out the window. The way the wind rattled sharply against the windowpanes and how nearly all the cherry and maple leaves had fallen appeared strikingly novel. My forged suicide note appeared to have already been read, for my brother tried to investigate my love life. In response, Mother pressed her lips together and motioned for him to stop such probing. For some reason, I let out a stifled laugh. Why did I have to falsify even such matters? As for deliberately forcing myself to display things that invited misunderstanding from those around me—I myself could scarcely comprehend it by any ordinary measure. I felt the white bedsheets, the gerbera beneath my pillow (Mother had told me these were from that widow's visit), and my own body to be utterly discordant with one another.

It was several days later that I came to think this. If only I hadn’t gone to the widow’s house that day—if only there had been no phone call—it had been a call from the widow. —The entire household must not have noticed me until the next morning. If that had happened, I might have died. It wasn’t that I felt particularly horrified. It was simply that these fateful events struck me as utterly absurd. Suicide should have been most condensed and greatest of all resistances I’d ever mounted—and yet there I was, having lost even the strength to resist, attempting this final resistance against life itself. I gave a wry smile at the thought. It was the day after that when I had someone bring a brush and inkstone and began doodling on tissue paper. I was unfeeling. I felt no shame toward myself for having shamelessly survived, nor did any dutiful feelings of apology for causing such an incident arise. Emptiness had occupied my heart considerably even before that incident. I slid the brush across the page, scrawling nonsensical sentences in large characters while staring up at the ceiling.

The doctor came twice daily to give me injections. The elderly attendant would arrive each afternoon to massage my limbs. A week passed in this manner. I regained the ability to walk with a cane. My family offered no remarks about my attempted death. My desk remained untouched except for the removal of the suicide note. The urge to try dying again never surfaced immediately. Nothing held meaning anymore—even dying felt as tedious as living. When the new year came, I kept reporting to work while carrying this emptiness. Neither Mr. Bunke held any lingering interest for me, nor did the newly hired youths stir any emotion. I merely performed what was commanded. Salary envelopes no longer brought their former thrill, nor did giving gifts provide any sense of superiority. Accepting wages came to feel like an entitlement; I stopped giving altogether, deeming it vain posturing. Gradually I noticed my body tiring with unnatural ease. Morning cleaning tasks felt like grueling labor. Two steps with a bucket set my heart pounding. Even bearing a tray of teacups to guests made my arms ache. I stumbled down stairs, spilled medicine kettles, repeated clumsy mishaps. Constant headaches plagued me, accompanied by low-grade fevers. After examination, I learned I had developed an acute though mild thoracic condition.

I was ordered to resign from the company. I had to recuperate for three months. I didn't particularly feel any fear toward the illness. Simply, I had become able to move exactly as told, and expressing my own will felt like a bother. No—I must not have had any will at all.

At the end of March, I received the meager retirement allowance and that month’s salary, bowed obsequiously in farewell to the president and everyone below him, and left the company. Mr. Bunke told me he wanted me to come back once I got better. The secretary gave me a doll. The janitor’s aunt repeated many times, “You worked so hard.” Mr. Ishioka, who had made a sarcastic remark when I joined the company,

“After all, you were just a frail young lady, weren’t you?” he said. I heard those words without registering any particular resonance. I paid no attention to how my skin had turned bluish and lost its luster, nor to how my chest area had formed a gaunt hollow. I calculated that with my retirement allowance, I could idle away two months. It wasn’t that I required absolute bed rest—just daily vitamin injections, with no medication to take. The shadowed area visible on the X-ray wasn’t particularly large, and if I avoided mental strain, the fever would subside quickly. While overwhelmed by tedious hours, I felt no compulsion to read or watch movies, finding slight solace only in occasional doodling. That sudden severance from society didn’t strike me as particularly lonely. I began feeling it preferable to love the hues of air and nature rather than affections between people.

That I had come back to life didn't strike me as strange—it was merely having had an experience, and even damaging my body didn't rouse me to investigate its cause; it all seemed fated. I placed myself in the flow and recognized myself being carried along in its current direction. Perhaps I'd grown weary of the endlessly repeating incidents until now. Both body and spirit had lost the vigor and confidence to seek any sort of adventure. No passion remained whatsoever. I realized I'd cast off the garments I'd worn until then and entered a world of austere simplicity. It wasn't that I entered with noble resolve, nor did I cling to any lingering attachment to youth. It was nothing more than an aimless longing for stark simplicity. Material desires too were fading away. I felt no interest in forcing myself to think earnestly about anything. Though still two or three years shy of twenty, I wore my hair in a tight bun, dressed in dark clothes, and remained shut away at home without even applying makeup.

My family regarded my transformation with skeptical eyes. However, they also seemed somewhat reassured by my demeanor, which appeared to them as a kind of calm.

Around that time, I began to consciously recognize myself as a woman—as if for the first time. No—even before that period, during my days commuting to work—I would casually apply makeup and examine my face in a hand mirror or pay attention to my posture while walking, yet I had never truly touched upon the inner depths of what it meant to be a woman. I occasionally skimmed through essays by Japanese women writers. Yet the women I found there were either utterly spiritually abnormal or, failing that, I could only discover women too tethered to daily existence—merely reacting to stimuli around them. Though I yearned to understand what flowed in those deeper undercurrents, those writings left me unsatisfied.

As I observed myself, my mother, and other women—their thoughts and actions—I came to realize how ridiculously they were being skillfully manipulated by men or life itself, being molded into round or square forms. Even if there were exceptional cases, they weren't accepted in society, and I could only see them as stubbornly maintaining a facade to cover their weakness. I despised both. And I loathed myself as well, including myself among them.

A certain writer had said that when women look in the mirror, they are looking at themselves while simultaneously seeing how they appear. To me, it seemed that every woman was constantly trying out all sorts of poses for the sake of how she appeared. Even if a woman were to experience romance, it seemed to me nothing more than self-satisfaction—both in her adeptness at performing it and in how she appeared in others’ eyes—rather than deriving from the momentary pleasure of genuine love. (Though that may be women’s pleasure) Even in the romance films I had watched through tears countless times until then, when I looked back, all the various women who appeared there seemed to me like nothing more than that very self-satisfaction. Even if it didn’t become a happy ending, women would proudly proclaim their tragedies; their suffering was undoubtedly about performing suffering for show. And even when it wasn’t romance—whether women writers published novels or female Diet candidates ran for office—it seemed to me they weren’t expelling their true selves, but rather layering themselves in multiple exaggerations. I was disappointed by that. And there were no women I wished to praise, followed by a prolonged state of self-loathing.

With fatalistic resignation, I came to realize several days later that I should try to maintain a facade of femininity. I devoted myself diligently to household work. My body too was gradually recovering. Amidst the endless cycle of laundry and cooking, my family grew increasingly reassured about me.

“After all, you’re just a woman.” My brothers said that. I simply smiled. I would quickly have an ordinary marriage, act obediently, and spend each day consumed by daily life. I wished to become that. No—I had thought there was no choice but to become that. Even if I had regained enough confidence to express myself freely, I no longer held any interest in doing so.

Then came a year.

That year stood in stark contrast to my previous hectic life—quiet and uneventful. I arranged flowers, spent hours gazing at ceramic surfaces, and occasionally took evening strolls through Yamate district.

Resignation made me do so. As my intense, unrestrained nature was being whittled away in equal measure, there were no great joys. A nostalgia for primitive things comforted me. I neither tried to artificially shape myself nor agitate my nerves.

It was a solitary life. Yet the loneliness of solitude had ceased to torment me. Rather, that very loneliness became a sort of melancholy happiness. It was around this time that my premature white hairs began multiplying abruptly.

A self I wanted to cast off. A self I despised. If it had grown this unresponsive, I thought with a bitter smile, there was nothing to do but resign myself.

During that time, our family's living conditions gradually deteriorated as sellable items ran out; the anxiety of complete income loss clashed with lingering attachments to our former lifestyle, and Father aged ten years beyond his actual age, his words during nightly meals growing increasingly harsh. Father had Father's vanity. Children had children's vanity. That was vanity of an entirely opposite orientation.

They had to do something. Starting a business would be fine.

The children thought so too—if they could get money, their little luxuries would be met. Father opposed this. "I simply cannot bring myself to bow and scrape before others," he declared. "And if we revealed our hardships to the world, we'd lose the bank’s trust altogether." The children found this reasoning incomprehensible. Such excuses were just Father’s arbitrary interpretations—I became convinced it was his own rigid, old-fashioned vanity preventing any real action. Conflicts arose frequently. Yet absolute authority remained with Father. The items that had survived the fire in the warehouse were secretly removed. We never admitted we’d sold them—Father insisted they had merely been "transported elsewhere." Eventually our own house reached the point of being sold off too, and we came to live with relatives in the same city.

“The house we moved into after the war is rather inconvenient, you see—and living together with others proves more practical in various ways. Plus from here, we can even walk into town…” Listening to Father’s explanations to people, I couldn’t help but give a bitter smile. Things to sell had run out. Since we’d already sold this too. Each time the number of items dwindled—while repeating those words—they managed to preserve a state where three daily meals could still be taken for granted.

The life together with Father’s sister’s family, who had shared the wartime years and the few months after the war with us—now with Grandmother added to the mix—began. Just like my spirit, our family’s life had come to a full stop.

I didn't know about a month from now. I truly didn't know what would become of things. The section of garden before our eyes had passed into others' hands, and even our sole family heirloom scroll had made its ceremonious departure. Yet though each of them must have harbored their own restlessness, it never surfaced in their actions—the exterior remained perfectly tranquil. They had realized that Father's exchanges of opinions with us children amounted to nothing but empty chatter. Such days. Such a self. Neither held any future. What would become of me—I refrained from pressing myself to consider it.

The era was changing relentlessly. However, I continued to live with stagnant emotions, thoughts, and daily life. Could this have been my own laziness?

Epilogue

The posed posture remained still for a time, but no matter how comfortable that position was, before I knew it, I would again find fatigue and constriction there. Like sunlight after the rainy season, I began to move again. It glared harshly. It began to whirl at a rapid tempo. Until age twenty. From then until I turned twenty, I soared high and cleanly, collapsed into ugly sprawls, plummeted into sharp curves, and climbed back up again—repeating it all over and over. However, I do not remember that in precise detail. Even if I did remember, the closer I approach my present self, conversely, that very self shows signs of fleeing away. I frantically tried to catch it, stretching my hand out with all my might to touch it, but like a jellyfish, it slipped smoothly out of my grasp.

My attempt ended in failure. The spasmodic motion of my turning around, just short of completion, could not perfectly merge with my present self.

In other words, I am not dying. If my past self had vividly connected with my present self, I had interpreted that I would be able to die with ease. The fateful time of death must have approached, then suddenly made a sharp turn and receded into the distance. This might be a self-serving interpretation. However, I felt a single disappointment and a single relief.

I was unable to grasp yesterday’s self. I was unable to know what underlay yesterday’s pose. However, were I to go on living for several more years—and when a considerable distance had arisen between that future self of mine and my present self, or rather the self just before reaching this present—then once again I would be able to continue my grey memories.

The curtain was about to descend on the play with no ending. Before it had fully fallen, the audience yawned and rose. The curtain hung limply halfway down, left dangling between.

(Showa 25 [1950])