Pathway to Japanese Literature

I

At the peaceful early summer seaside, even the breeze carried no hint of vigor. Four or five carefree students lay sprawled on the sandy beach, their boisterous chatter blooming aimlessly without restraint. “Crossing Yura’s strait, enduring the boatman’s oar—a path of love with no known destination... Ah, when I think of it now, those days already feel so nostalgic. No—rather, it’s the Karuta gatherings at Muri’s place.” “What’s with that uncharacteristic look of yours? You!” “But I have properly nostalgic memories to share—quite impressive ones indeed. Now listen well.”

“However……”

At that moment, a lanky man who had been winding a portable key under the sandy beach umbrella spoke up in an oddly cloying tone, “Considering how such capable individuals always gather together yet not a single one among them has stirred up any notable love affair—it’s truly lamentable when you think about it. Whenever you gather, you just noisily praise women’s beauty—getting all worked up and sentimental, going around in circles like this! What on earth are you doing, gentlemen!”

Crossing his arms with an exaggeratedly solemn, oratorical tone, the lively, cheerful-looking man who had earlier tried to speak up—

“Tahachi immediately puts on that serious look—I get so sick of it.” “This isn’t some novel—how could we endure love incident after love incident?” “If you keep finding poetic moments amidst this emptiness—that’s what youth is.” Having his story interrupted, he muttered in a low voice, his face flushing faintly. “Really now, gentlemen—don’t you find yourselves pitiful? I’ve resolved today—I absolutely won’t rest until I find a lover!”

Regardless of the previous man’s involvement, if he continued such things, “When you put it that way, I can’t stay fixated anymore either.” “Truly, I can’t spare even a moment now…”

Lying on his back with his mouth agape, one particularly carefree fellow who had exposed his bare chest and belly to the sky vehemently agreed—then suddenly, “A whale!” After shouting this, he blew out a stream of cigarette smoke in one breath without moving. The smoke stretched out long and thin, smoothly and steadily reaching the sandy beach umbrella beside them without dissipating. No matter who chattered or quarreled about anything, it all vanished instantly without leaving even a ripple—such was the truly tranquil seaside on that spring afternoon nearing dusk.

“What an appallingly long breath you’ve got there!” “It’s just like Dr. Luther’s belly!” “If someone stomps your belly flat, I bet it’d feel damn satisfying.”

Everyone roared with laughter. But they paid no heed to the oratorical tone, “All of you—take Miss Muri Yuriko’s case these days, for example—you’re getting so worked up over her, utterly obsessed with being at her beck and call. But what if she were to vanish completely before long? No—rather, she’s bound to disappear…” He involuntarily gulped, his throat tightening. —“Not a single one of us making such a fuss has even touched her leg...”

“Lament all you want, but don’t surrender to reckless passion—merely hearing this discussion, a bolt of icy lightning suddenly ripped through me from chest to belly with furious force!” “That’s precisely why we must forge a collective resolve…” “But consider—should such a dazzling beauty wed one of our comrades, condemning us to spectate…or vanish like a peacock into foreign skies, leaving us staring at one another…which would you choose?” “If pressed, I would unhesitatingly choose the latter.”

“Such spinelessness of ours—it infuriates me! Why aren’t we crossing swords and clashing? You blockheads!”

There was also someone who bellowed in a gruff, self-directed voice as though berating himself. Near the shore’s edge, a flock of gulls swirled through the low sky in a great vortex. “She’s quite the siren—manipulating us all just enough to never let anyone feel particularly special.” “She’s not manipulating anyone! We’re simply letting ourselves be swept up by her charm.” “So what’s this grand nostalgia you’ve got about those karuta gatherings? Out with it already!”

“No good, no good—it’s heartbreak!”

That man who had buried his face in the sand—

“If we’ve all had our hearts broken—yeah, all of us—then let’s just slice this guy’s belly open together!”

Pointing at the man who kept imitating a whale, someone teased him. Tagami, Ondo, Kujirai, Mori, Aono—but there was no need to distinguish whose words belonged to whom, as the youths simply chattered away without restraint, their demeanor suggesting they were merely playing with the shifting time and light.

“Let’s swim.”

And someone shouted. “It’s not cold anymore!” No sooner had they stripped down to their swimsuits than they raised a “Watsu!” battle cry and dashed off as if taking flight through the air. Near the shore’s edge, their leader executed a brilliant midair flip and plunged into the waves—whereupon the rest followed in unison, somersaulting through the water without surfacing for what felt like ages.

“Why aren’t you swimming, Ondo-kun?”

While Ondo was alone listening to a serenade, Yuriko shook her parasol from behind and—

“I was watching from the second floor.” “Then I wanted to swim too and came down here, but it still looks chilly, doesn’t it!”

While saying this, she aligned her white bare feet with Ondo’s and lowered herself onto the sand. And then—as if trying to take it off—while removing it—she threw off her orange fur coat and was left in nothing but a swimsuit. “I’ve gotten terribly fat.” “Last year it wasn’t like this, but now it’s gotten so tight that if I’m not careful, it might tear.”

Yuriko, in her maroon swimsuit cinched with a red band, stroked her chest over the fabric and hunched her shoulders, “Ondo-kun, you’re so mean! Here I am talking to you, and instead of replying, you just keep staring at my face.”

“Earlier here, we decided Miss Yuri resembles Sylvia Sidney—but she claims being compared to anyone at all is disagreeable.” “Disagreeable? Fuji-san said the very same thing—and seemed rather proud of it!” “Who’s this Fuji-san? Where’s he from? Out with it!” “Ha ha ha… Let’s just say he’s not part of your little circle—how’s that?” “It’s not cold… but I’ve no energy to join.” “You delinquents—calling for me so insistently—”

Yuriko extended one hand high, fluttering it, “I’ll give you a sandwich, so come on out…” she shouted.

On the other side of the waves,

“From this vantage point, it makes for quite the spectacle—but with comrades nearby, we can rest easy.” “Shall we envision it? A scene where she’s lost in some intense mood with a lover unknown to us…” “—Unbearable! Just picturing it makes my chest feel ready to burst.” “We’ll taste the full depths of jealousy!” “Merely training—preparation for when we’re cast down into those depths of jealousy and despair.”

“There’s gotta be some lucky bastard in this world—where the hell’s this guy she’ll choose even living right now?!” “I’m the one who wants it!” “Help! Save me!” Splashing water and bobbing up and down in frenzy, the group— “That’s Her Majesty’s summons!”

The moment they acknowledged this, they all aimed for shore with furious strokes like torpedoes. “Let’s build a fire—we’re shaking!” “Instead of a fire, let’s surround our mermaid…” The group, their lips purple and trembling, found that even rolling around in the sand did nothing to warm them, so they ordered Ondo to clang away at the Torabatoure while surrounding Yuriko and launching into a violently chaotic carol.

“It’s not cold, you fool! “…sending up spray like rain…” Unmindful of Yuriko Muri’s screams as she fled in confusion, the group—like wind-buffeted paper lanterns—spun round and round with ferocious intensity, continuing their frenzied game of ring-around-the-rosy until dizziness overtook them and they collapsed with a thud.

“Are all these people insane?” Yuriko gazed at the group—sprawled here and there as if hurled by a tengu—writhing in apparent agony, then murmured with a faintly eerie air. ...If that were the case, who would Yuriko rescue first? With that having been settled through their earlier wager, they each held their breath and lay perfectly still playing dead while indulging in dreams of sweet whispers—but no matter how long they waited there came no response at all until finally hearing the sound of a lunchbox being opened made them all scramble up with cries of “Hey! Hey!”, scratching their heads as they sluggishly revived.

II

On a hazy evening when clove flowers beneath the window distinctly perfumed the air, as Mori and Aono immersed themselves in a card game at Ondo's room on the town's edge, beyond the trifoliate orange hedge—

“Ondo-kun, are you there?” With Tagami’s voice—strangled as though he were on the verge of death—the three inside the room involuntarily leapt up and leaned their upper bodies out the window,

“The mermaid is about to lose her virginity! Come out here at once…”

Before he could even finish speaking, Tagami’s figure vanished. Chasing after Tagami as he fled through the pine forest with thief-like swiftness, the three dashed headlong onward—and just as a few people from the blacksmith and tobacco shops at the street corner rushed out, mistaking this for a genuine robbery pursuit, suddenly from all directions came shouts of “Fire! Fire!” Exclaiming in alarm, the townspeople began gathering around. “They say it’s a robber!” “Well now, to have such commotion so early in the evening...”

“Those who enter and those being entered ought to be called the very epitome of idiocy.”

At the hour when townspeople—making witty remarks about moonlit pot-stealings or young lords being fox-spirited on spring nights—pointed at the moon risen over the seaside, Tagami had just dashed down to the beach and run barely a hundred meters before reaching his excitement's peak, losing control of his legs and pitching forward in collapse when the three men caught up to him, “Isn’t this a dream, Tagami! Mermaid losing her virginity—how the hell are we supposed to believe that?!”

The three had flown into a rage all too easily, fumblingly hoisting Tagami’s shoulders as though rescuing a fallen comrade. Tagami, like a mortally wounded soldier with both arms draped over Mori’s and Aono’s shoulders, was being carried unsteadily while— “Don’t forget this moon—next year’s tonight of this month, the year after’s tonight of this month—if the moon should cloud...” With expressions that seemed to say, “Of all the times to clown around”—when the two took another look at Tagami’s face, far from jesting, his eyes were brimming with tears.

“Recalling that this was the night Yuri-chan had already lost her virginity—there’s naught left but to curse the moon!”

Tagami screamed at the top of his voice.

What had come over him? Ondo, who had been leading the way, dashed off without a moment’s regard for his companions. His figure from behind, racing across the sandy plain that resembled water’s surface under a hazy moon, seemed to dance suspended in midair. “Ondo-kun!…Kujirai’s collapsed under Mermaid’s cliff—administer artificial respiration!” Tagami shouted after him in a quavering voice.—Then, as Tagami clawed at his chest and managed to whisper something into his two companions’ ears, they stood rigidly in unison—so reminiscent of tragedians from old plays steeped in extreme sentiment—and gazed up at the moon that itself resembled an aged stage backdrop.

Following the curved edge of the pine grove, Ondo discovered a comrade clinging to the rocks and sobbing convulsively beside a stone wall where the sandy ground sloped upward, about to become a hill.

“Whale!” “Whale!” “They’re all coming!”

When Ondo clung to his back, he bit his lip, and his arm pointing toward the cliff trembled violently, tracing futile circles in the air. He simply couldn’t bear to watch alone and had inadvertently tumbled down to this spot. Earlier, when he had gone with Tagami intending to visit Yuriko by climbing up here as usual along the garden path— "They’d been utterly overwhelmed by that truly outrageous sight!"

“So this Mr. Fuji really was her lover after all. That bastard showed up, huh?”

Ondo, as if he had grasped everything, glared up at the cliff with breath coming fast.

“The Yuriko Muri Love Prevention Club will be annihilated as of tonight.” Kujirai and Tagami were explaining to Ondo how they had discovered the most passionate romantic scene at Yuriko’s window when the other “club members” arrived. They had imagined a club by that very name and sworn to protect their Diana’s virginity at all costs. When Tagami and Kujirai went up along the beach to Yuriko’s house after arranging a dance appointment, they found a three-sided bathroom with glass doors—jutting out from the grassy garden in a structure meant to overlook the sea—blazing with light, Yuriko’s shadow cast upon the frosted glass. Realizing they had come too early, they discreetly covered their eyes and smoked tobacco in the garden-corner gazebo when Yuriko suddenly burst into song.

“She’s coming up!” When the two turned around, Yuriko—wearing a pajama coat—swiftly dashed down the corridor, and light flashed on in her room directly facing the gazebo. Since her family resided in Tokyo and Yuriko had become sole mistress of the spacious house, garden visitors could always find her in an illuminated room.—Yet now when light also came on upstairs, they looked up to notice the shadow of a man leaning against a rattan chair in the corridor, leisurely smoking. Though his features remained indistinct, he was clearly a tall imposing figure who seemed impatiently awaiting Yuriko’s arrival—rising to pace idly back and forth along the passageway. Downstairs, Yuriko’s form—wholly absorbed in preening before the mirror—stood clearly reflected upon the curtain, through whose gaps glimpses of her pulling on stockings could intermittently be seen.

Before long, Yuriko—having finished dressing—fluttered her pure white dress skirt as she ascended to the second floor, whereupon the man abruptly spread both arms and swept his lover into his arms.

“Well gentlemen, there can be no room for doubt.” “On the man’s lap, she fluttered like a startled bird—then suddenly went limp!” When Kujirai and Tagami heaved sighs as deeply as they could,

“And then?”

And the three of them strained their eyes at once. "I leave the rest to your every imagination!" "After roughly an hour-long suffocating scene... Though during that time, she did put up considerable resistance—" "Several times we braced ourselves to leap in for rescue—"

When the former two took turns speaking out, the other three followed suit, “Didn’t she scream?” some interjected, while others demanded, “Why doesn’t he just rush in already!”—now belatedly bracing themselves—“Major incidents do tend to erupt on hazy moonlit nights. “And if that were to be her end...” they cried, clutching at their own throats. As their circle began to unravel, “The man stood up, cradling the woman who seemed drained of all strength—” Kujirai’s voice faded, leaving the scene hushed once more. “Tagami, keep going—I can’t bear this.”

“Gentlemen, do you know her bedroom?” “On the study’s second floor, beneath the window parallel to the sea, there lies a bed.” “She would often throw open the window and read in bed.” “It had served as a sanatorium once, you see…” “Well then—isn’t she being taken into that bright second-floor sunroom, too wholesome to merit being called a bedroom, a place we ourselves never even imagined as such… by that man?”

“After quietly placing her on the bed, the man drew the green curtains around.” “We can’t just barge in there—she’s not even putting up a fight anymore!”

“What a reckless family to leave their daughter alone in a house like that! What on earth is her father thinking!” When one finally vented their righteous indignation, “Naturalist bourgeois!” “Her legal parents!” “Must be Yankee recklessness!” Amidst the uproar, they began hurling curses at Yuriko. “She completely outsmarted us—maybe inviting us to dance was all part of her scheme to flaunt it in our faces!”

“No matter how I think about it, this knot in my chest won’t loosen—why don’t we all sneak into the front garden and sing something or——” “No—we’re utterly wretched, thoroughly defeated.” One faction insisted, “Let’s drown ourselves in decadent dreams right here and play her funeral march,” while the other demanded they first uncover the man’s identity and monitor Yuriko’s movements—

While they had split into two factions—one stubbornly insisting, “If we can save her, we must save her”—and were arguing amongst themselves, Ondo, who had gone out on a precautionary scouting mission, returned and— “As if the entire house were a coffin—it lay utterly silent beneath the moonlit night.” Having reported this, he clutched his head with both arms. And the group, maintaining indescribably grave expressions and huddled together as they heaved sighs— “Oh, you’re all here!”

And from above the Love Prevention Club members' heads, Yuriko let out a hushed voice. Then in nightclothes, she lowered her voice further, "I was so scared—I finally managed to escape!"

Having said that, she hurriedly ran off, trying to hide in the shadow of the boat over there because it was dangerous here.

III “Because… you see, Papa suddenly came.” “When I said I wanted to invite everyone over to play, he made such eyes—” Yuriko pressed her rounded fingers to both eyes,

“Absolutely not allowed!” “He went on like this,” “Those people are all delinquents—utterly preposterous, I tell you!” “...and in a very loud voice…”

Amidst the hulls of boats piled with fishing nets, Yuriko sat surrounded by the men like a pirate captain. “When you put it that way, I suppose we’re not exactly model citizens ourselves.” “I threw such a fit on Papa’s lap, but he absolutely wouldn’t let go!”

“A lady throwing a fit on Papa’s lap—that’s just too indulgent.” “Oh yes, he dotes on me so much—if I just throw a fit like that, he usually ends up giving in to most things.” “He still thinks I’m just a child, doesn’t he?” Twenty-something? Even so, the listeners found themselves strangely imagining the scene of a Lady of similar age to themselves climbing onto someone’s lap—be it Papa or whoever—and acting spoiled, their hands growing clammy.

“And yet today of all days, he simply wouldn’t permit it.” “He carried me straight to the bedroom still holding me, then ordered me to take off that kimono and go to sleep!” “But...”

When they heard her explanation, the listeners involuntarily exchanged glances, but no one with the resolve to confess their own absurd commotion appeared. The group members recognized that their faces had frozen in shame due to their indecent fantasies. “We’re damn well out of our minds!”

Ondo muttered belatedly and lamely, "Is it the weather's fault?" — "A blunder of overexuberance!" — "Let's go home and sleep." They were just muttering such things in unison, unbearably sheepish. "Ondo-kun, lift that board for me."

Having been told by Yuriko, he lifted the floorboard and peered into the boat’s bottom.

“Oh, beer bottles are lined up here!” He muttered without showing the slightest surprise, somehow sounding listless—Yuriko had secretly stashed those things in the boat’s bottom at dusk for when everyone would inevitably tire of playing indoors and come down to the seaside to gather here and toast! Yet despite his explanation, the group remained dazed in perpetuity, not a single one lowering their hands. “What’s wrong with all of you? I went through such trouble escaping here to be cozy with you—so why are you all dawdling about?”

Then Whale proudly declared, “Aah, we were just about to get cozy too—we’d gone and lost our steam, that’s all.”

“Aah!” “Aah!” —He stood up on the net and kept taking exaggerated deep breaths repeatedly. Following this, the other Love Prevention Club members also aligned their chests in unison to gaze at the moon, then imitated actual whales as they violently expelled tremendous breaths.—Then this time, as if the party members’ personalities had abruptly transformed in exchange for their previous state, they began frolicking about—each vying to seize a cup first—resulting in a truly flamboyant toast.

The group suddenly transformed into demons of drunkenness— “Let’s dance! Let’s dance!” Shouting such things, they hopped down onto the sand. Yuriko tried to join her companions, but when she looked, their dancing soon transformed into a chaotic brawl, and they were just clamoring and tussling about. As they raised incomprehensible shouts—kicking, punching, and hurling things in such an uproar that there was no calming them—Yuriko stood transfixed by the net, watching the spectacle. When a breeze carrying moonlight blew directly against her from the front, where she stood stripped to a single gauzy garment, the white cloth billowed like smoke around her. Only the contours of her body remained vividly outlined, rendering her figure equivalent to a statue of a nude.

She gazed down at the preposterous commotion beneath her with a dreamlike expression, as if enraptured by her own figure bathed in light and wind.—The suspiciously drunk men, while forming a scrum and casting swift glances toward Diana’s statue even as they grappled with one another, gradually took on the form of a fearsome whirlwind resembling a windmill as they spun across the sand.

四

At that moment, Ondo—who had suffered cerebral anemia after someone’s fist struck his nose bridge—remained bedridden for three or four days, unable to rise from his pillow. Judging by how no one else appeared afterward, they too must have all been injured—but even for Ondo, looking back now, having acted out such a frenzied state felt unbearably mortifying, and for some time he would feel hesitant to face his comrades’ visages.—Still, imagining how if things had continued like that, the party members—intimidated by Yuriko’s phantom image—might soon descend into any manner of shameful antics, even picturing how they would look when her marriage was eventually announced filled Ondo with creeping dread.

That night, her father had visited partly to discuss her marriage, but Yuriko dismissed such talk in a tone that...

“But I still say marriage must start from love to have any meaning,” she was saying.

It was at that moment—so the one she truly desires is among us after all! And what they thought was—!

“If we’re choosing from club members, then without regard for the others—I want someone to decisively point out one person already! In that case, since we’ve even established a strict rule that the others will transform into gentlemen overnight, pointless modesty is strictly forbidden, I tell you!”

The one who dared to give voice to what each of us held in our hearts—it was undoubtedly Tagami that night! Then she shrugged her shoulders cheerfully,

“That’s something I’ve been thinking about too…” Didn’t she nod emphatically! “So the man Yuri likes does exist among us after all?” Didn’t he hurriedly fire back the question!

“I suppose that must be the case.” “I shall make an announcement soon.”

She said this in a theatrically exaggerated tone, deliberately muttering in a jesting manner to express her earnest thoughts. And as they gazed at her with that richly lingering smile of hers, the commotion erupted!

Ondo would recall this and that, and no sooner had he suddenly leapt up on his bed with eyes shining in delight than he would sink back into the depths of despair and let out a groan—spending his days and nights in this peculiar state of illness.

“Papa says he won’t interfere at home anymore—so if you have a lover, just say so plainly! There are circumstances forcing the marriage to be hurried along—I tell you!” Ondo, fidgeting restlessly, kept mimicking Yuriko’s speech from that evening over and over.

"She kept dropping these suggestive remarks—just how long did she mean to torment us?"

It was on an evening not long after that a pink envelope reached Ondo—who had been spending his days wandering through dreams of "Heaven and Hell" in restless agony.

“The lotus flowers bloomed during this time apart from all of you—I’ve been alone all along, you know. Alone, pondering so many things…and I concluded being alone truly is rather dreary.” Such aimless matters continued across two or three pages in smiling penmanship until— “Ondo-kun, are you unwell?” Ondo’s lips quivered unbidden. “I meant to visit you with lotus blossoms for comfort.” “I arranged a bouquet.” “…but I wish to present that bouquet to you in my chamber—I’m certain you’ll come—”

Ondo leapt up and continued reading frantically. “If Papa were here it wouldn’t do, but when dusk falls, enter through the back gate from the shore and check for any lights. If the light on the second floor isn’t on, then Papa probably isn’t there—. And if my window is lit, whistle from under the wisteria trellis as our signal—blow it casually, like someone out for a stroll, ever so softly. The Lorelei melody would be lovely—such an old-fashioned scene befitting our village’s Romeo and Juliet. If the window is still dark, rest assured I’m in the bath—so wait hidden beneath the wisteria trellis by the lantern where no one will find you until it brightens. And when the light comes on, whistle softly. That way, the window will open for Ondo-kun. I want us to make the story of the window where lotus flowers bloomed into a memory that will last a lifetime. Then I’ll be waiting.”

Five

It was a dark evening when one could not distinguish between sea and land.

Ondo dashed along the shore with the sensation of an ecstatic ghost. Had there been a little more time, he might have considered stopping by Tagami and Mori’s places along the way—but with no room in his heart for such hesitation, he practiced the melody of an old school song he barely remembered, basking in a radiant feeling as though he had become the protagonist of a story. Passing through the pine grove, climbing the narrow slope between stone walls, and creeping along the lotus hedge, he found the back gate left half-open. He bent down to pass under the hedge, then after confirming no one was around, quietly concealed himself in the shadow of the lantern beneath the wisteria trellis directly across from Yuriko’s room. The window was still dark. The light on the second floor wasn’t on either. It seemed Papa’s visit had not materialized after all. To the right, beyond the garden pond, only the bathroom window behind the azaleas remained hazily bright and steamed up.

When Ondo thought about waiting here until she finished dressing after the bath, he found the prospect all the more delightful the longer it took. He crouched like a frog at the base of the stone lantern and gazed intently toward the bathroom. The young shoots of wisteria clusters extended so that they might reach the lantern's cover in just four or five more inches—their form dimly discernible by the light from the bathroom. Recalling how Tagami and the others had once said that from this garden vantage point, one could indeed observe every corner of the house's interior without obstruction—how seeing such human shadows here would be exactly like watching moving pictures—Ondo found that evening's affair now absurd beyond reason, while by contrast, the composed grace of his own position tonight felt almost wasteful.

“When do you suppose the moon will rise?” As Ondo opened the bathroom window facing the sea, he suddenly caught Yuriko’s voice musing aloud. “My, just as I thought—still utterly dark!” From his oblique vantage point, Yuriko’s figure leaning out of the seaward window showed only a faint profile backlit against the glare, her flushed upper body seemingly bared to the breeze. She shut the window with a rough clatter, the shadow on the frosted glass dissolving once more into steam. Ondo reasoned she must still be unaware of his presence—else she’d never lean out so carelessly regardless of the window’s orientation—and resolved that if questioned later, he’d insist having arrived precisely when her window lit up! This deception felt imperative to maintain.

It was a quiet night, so still it felt suffocating, broken only by the occasional splash of carp in the garden pond. If he were to whistle, how clearly it would resonate through this air—he must take great care to blow it in the lowest register possible——Ondo held his breath, transfixed by the fathomless silence between waves that threatened to swallow him whole.……Before he knew it, he found himself creeping along the edge of the garden pond toward the bathroom window——and heard the sound of a shower running.

“Since the kimono has been laid out, please bring it over here.” The other night, she had apparently dashed down the hallway completely naked with a towel draped over her—but upon reflection, perhaps she was now being cautious, concerned that he might already have arrived—when Ondo suddenly felt envy and jealousy toward Tagami and the others who had reportedly witnessed her in such a state. As Yuriko began to emerge onto the balcony-like corridor extending from the bathroom, Ondo panicked and fled along the edge of the lawn to the cliff’s brink, then cautiously glanced back from the tree’s shadow to find her merely holding a towel to her chest as she sat before the Western-style vanity, polishing her nails. Truly, it was as though gazing at a mermaid in a tank—only that brightness emerged as a resplendent stage amidst the darkness.

The letter had contained words to the effect of, “You mustn’t move from the lantern’s shadow—it would be terrible if someone found you—”, but the splendor of observing every gesture of this stage-bound mermaid was an exhilaration beyond compare, and Ondo—trembling all the while—ended up scrutinizing her every motion until she had finished putting on her dress. And after making a wide detour around the edge of the lawn, he returned to the original wisteria trellis and secretly clutched his chest.

“Though I know not why, my heart grows desolate...” Ondo took a deep breath, and as he imagined that poignant melody in preparation to whistle, tears of joy nearly welled up. His entire body trembled so violently with anxiety—Could he even manage to whistle?—that he involuntarily curled up like a bird that had tucked its head under its wing to sleep, exhaling hot breaths against his chest. “Upon the rock stands a lovely maiden…” Ah, I would gladly give my life for Yuriko—how brilliantly this longing must shine, transforming into a poignant whistle—he was so entranced by the dream of drifting drowsily along a stream like hot spring waters that he nearly ceased breathing.

By then, the pale green curtain above his eyes had already taken in the bright light, and the shadow of the flower vase by the window stood out distinctly. Even a garden chair that appeared to serve as a stepping stool could be discerned beneath the window. —And there, Ondo suppressed every surge of passion, broadly expanded his chest, drew in a profound breath, and now—losing himself in the dream of flowing rivers, utterly entranced by the vision of a maiden upon the crag—began to blow a whistle whose resonance lingered long in the air.

As the quivering melody, bearing the full weight of his yearning, carried toward his lover's window—and he, enraptured—gradually began sounding it more boldly, was it his ears deceiving him? He suddenly doubted—yet even after his own whistle ceased, a lingering melody still hummed about him, swirling like mountain echoes that refused to fade. When he strained his ears anew, it proved no echo—from every shadowed cranny, identical school-song whistles came bubbling forth! Still distrusting his ears, when he himself resumed singing, the whistles beneath the window soon aligned flawlessly, transforming into an uncannily boisterous chorus.

“……” Yuriko, wearing a smile that seemed to overflow, drew the curtain close and beckoned with her hand—whereupon from the shadow of the stone lantern, from the azalea roots, beneath the balcony railing, within the blooming lotus hedge, and behind the shrine at the pond’s edge, five shadowy figures—frog-like, kappa-like, thief-like—wobbled out in a comical tiptoe forbidden from making noise, startling one another as they emerged.

Needless to say, they were the five members.

…… "Everyone loves me, you know. I'm so sorry." When surrounded by members whose faces blended the demonic, the wrathful, and the Pierrot-like, Yuriko had no sooner laughed out those words than she let out a "Wah!" and collapsed weeping onto the lawn.

Six

When the wisteria flowers bloomed soon after, they were notified by letter of Yuriko’s marriage—a letter stating she would go to a stranger’s side without ever knowing love… Yet strangely, not a single one among them showed even a flicker of expression. They had discovered a new "Mermaid" at the shabby fishing houses on the town’s outskirts and had become fierce rivals vying against one another. When the new Mermaid, O-Sato-chan—wearing a tattered old student cap, a men’s shirt, and boots—appeared for the morning and evening dragnet hauls, they would gather from all directions, cling to a single rope, and devote themselves to the net-pulling labor while chanting “Heave-ho!” in unison.

The sea grew increasingly purple by the day, while the seagulls’ wings shone starkly white above the water. The net held mostly sardines and horse mackerel, and the commotion of gathering the small fish that had spilled onto the shore was lively.