Pathway to Japanese Literature

When the mourning period ended and her mother-in-law’s heart had finally settled， Kiyoko and she resolved at last to return to their hometown of Akita with her husband’s remains. Though called Akita, it was actually the small town of Gojōme, way out near Lake Hachirōgata. In truth, they had arranged with Zenpukuji-san to inter the remains before the thirty-fifth-day memorial service, but with her chronic rheumatism keeping her mother-in-law bedridden and her using that as a pretext to appear generally unwilling, matters had dragged on until now. This was because her mother-in-law had grown accustomed to their hometown elders’ custom that the deceased’s spirit remains in the roof beams during the forty-nine days, and leaving that roof beam spirit behind seemed unbearably pitiful to her mother-in-law.

On the morning before their departure, having sent off most of their belongings, Kiyoko cooked tea porridge for the first time in a while and shared it with her mother-in-law. To her husband’s remains, she offered a small portion in the everyday rice bowl he had used. This tea porridge had been Ryōjin’s favorite. As he had long been known among his colleagues and in magazine articles as a gourmet, earnest Kiyoko found herself swept up by such praise and began making porridge zealously. This continued every morning until even her mother-in-law and Ryōjin ended up bursting into laughter.

Kiyoko’s tea porridge was a direct teaching from the old priest of Zenpukuji Temple. It was prepared with premium-grade green tea. Rather than simmering it in tea broth from the start, adding a small bag of tea to the porridge in the earthenware pot just before it finished cooking made both the aroma and flavor far superior. The precise handling of this tea bag’s addition was truly difficult. By listening to the sound of the porridge cooking to gauge its readiness, she made her mother-in-law marvel at her mastery of porridge-making. And so she threw herself even deeper into it, devising various porridges that delighted them. Shiso porridge, green pea porridge, seaweed porridge, pickled plum porridge—Ryōjin had even written about this pickled plum porridge in the New Year’s issue of *Gastronomic Chronicles*. When the porridge began to bubble vigorously, she would drop a pickled plum into the center of the earthenware pot, then patiently simmer it over low heat. The porridge drew out the pickled plum’s tartness while the plum plumped up with mellow richness, creating an indescribably delicious flavor. The smooth texture was particularly pleasing; older pickled plums worked best. The Meiji 26-pickled plums that Ryōjin’s office custodian had cherished like treasure—the ones she had begged him to share—remained carefully preserved to this day. Once when there was a neighborhood fire, Ryōjin’s appearance as he wandered about clutching this small jar of pickled plums became a lasting joke.

Because Kiyoko would concoct all sorts of porridge using just a single earthenware pot, Ryōjin used to tease her by calling her “Porridge Granny.” Even though it required neither great expense nor effort, it was Kiyoko’s porridge that served to entertain guests. Ryōjin often teased her like this. “If the office ever fires me, I’ll have you start a porridge shop.” “Or maybe put up a sign saying ‘Kayu-Kiyo’ or something.” “No matter how you slice it, ‘Porridge Granny’ just won’t do—it’s got no charm at all.”

He chuckled to himself at his own idea. He would tack on things like this. “Then, if I may, I’ll just show up empty-handed and have you feed me.” Kiyoko wasn’t outdone either.

“You’re welcome. In that case, I’ll have you wear an apron and start from washing the rice and lighting the fire, then have you handle deliveries.” “Oh my! To think I’d be ordered about by my wife’s smoking pipe.” “Far from a smoking pipe—I’m swamped with the abacus!”

Looking back, even these once-joyful exchanges had now become nothing but futile repetitions. Only now had Kiyoko begun recalling her late husband with something resembling clarity, yet what lingered in her vision was not his face but those strangely imposing shoulders and ink-stained fingers. Kiyoko grew flustered at this unexpected shift. Ryōjin’s slightly stooped right shoulder alone appeared hunched in anger, making his back resemble that of a testy old man. Years of using hard-tipped pens had formed a rock-like callus on his right middle finger where ink alone had seeped in, staining it black—a mark that refused to fade no matter how thoroughly he bathed.

Ryōjin had been a family registry clerk at the ward office. He began working at twenty-seven and spent about a year in custodial duties, but remained in the family registry section until his death this year at forty-one. After graduating from his hometown’s normal school, he had immediately taken a position at Ichinichi City Elementary School, but aspiring to pass the Bunken exam, he eventually moved his entire family to Tokyo. While attending the advanced teacher training program at night university, the ward office job he had begun as a mere stopgap ended up becoming his permanent position. As for the Bunken exam, he had given up on it at some point.

Ryōjin’s section had writing as its primary duty，and on busy days，he would hurriedly finish even his eagerly awaited lunches and keep writing. Because he had a habit of writing with forceful，upward-slanting strokes，he often broke glass pens when still unaccustomed. The careless Ryōjin often made mistakes like catching his pen on the ink-stained sponge and dropping the container. As this happened frequently，he became reluctant to request replacements from the supplies section，and in the end resorted to using an empty cosmetic cream jar brought from home as a sponge container. After the incident occurred，administrative work became exceptionally congested，and every section was rushed as if being driven. The government office building was old and dimly lit，and above each section’s desks，lights had been left on low since morning. In Ryōjin’s section，certified copies and extracts were issued by the dozens every day. Around this time，certified copies had increased even more due to mid-sized merchants and industrialists changing jobs or becoming unemployed. The overtime continued. After returning home and sitting down to the late dinner table，unable to move his chopsticks well，Ryōjin would often massage his fingers.

“My hand’s gone numb.” To Kiyoko, who looked doubtful, Ryōjin laughed and said this, then demonstrated by shaking his right wrist with a stiff *clunk-clunk*.

He would often stain his face with ink or return home still wearing his sleeve covers. This cover was Kiyoko’s own handiwork. The purchased ones were of flimsy quality and would tear quickly, so Kiyoko had taken her mother-in-law’s disused figured satin obi and made two or three sturdy sleeve covers in advance.

“Today there was this strange marriage registration form.” “Both the bride and groom were named Misao.”

He was not one to talk much about office matters, but even so, he would occasionally share stories with his mother and Kiyoko while chuckling at memories. “Of course, since they’re both Misao it’s fine—but if it were Arima Shō-kun and Sen-san, their marital squabbles would never end.” “There might be some squabbles—no, even without them, they’d be butting heads constantly.” “What’s that supposed to be—the punchline?”

Kiyoko chuckled softly. Having been told the reason behind it, her mother-in-law joined in laughing. Among the various types of registrations he handled, Ryōjin felt a slight sense of purpose only when processing marriage registration forms. Ryōjin, who commuted via the government railway, would often perform imitations of the morning trains’ crowded chaos upon returning home to make his mother-in-law and Kiyoko laugh—but particularly at Shinjuku Station’s platform serving as a transfer hub, where according to the small-statured Ryōjin’s description, “you’d get swallowed whole” by human avalanches that left no room for careless blinking. Blink, and you’d get pushed out in the crush—or so he’d say. Ryōjin would clutch his bento box tightly against his chest with both hands—and when carrying an umbrella would grip that too in the same manner—looking just like an armless Daruma doll as he was shoved aboard. “Boldly! Swiftly! And meticulously!” had been Ryōjin’s boarding motto during crowded chaos—but ever since that time when carelessly empty-handed he nearly got dragged along by the crowd, he brandished this motto all the more fervently, particularly drilling “meticulously!” into himself with firm resolve in his gut.

“This morning, you know, there was this student in front of me with a natto bean stuck right on his chest. Even if I’d wanted to tell him, there was just no way…” Once aboard, they said, you couldn’t move a muscle. If you turned your face, you’d be carried along with it still turned. The small-statured Ryōjin would turn himself into a Daruma doll, enduring the breath—the food-tinged breath—of those around him. “I’d love to take you there once. Murderous crowded chaos. Someone like you’d have your sleeves—heck, everything—torn right off!”

Ryōjin had a habit of widening his eyes and slightly raising his angry right shoulder whenever he was pleased. This time too, as Kiyoko saw Ryōjin’s wide eyes, she found it strange—what could possibly make this man so happy while being jostled in a crowd?

When it came to the difficulties Kiyoko faced concerning her husband, it was the side dishes for the bento she packed every morning. No matter how much he loved salted salmon, she couldn’t very well subject him to it every single day. Since Ryōjin disliked store-bought side dishes, Kiyoko agonized over various options from the night before. She would make kinpira burdock root, prepare stir-fried tofu, or pack croquettes she had secretly set aside from her own portion the previous night. Occasionally Ryōjin would treat himself to udon at the office cafeteria, but after muttering self-deprecatingly to his own udon-loving mouth—“If I eat two bowls, this doesn’t balance out”—he’d end up bringing a bento with salted salmon after all.

The time when he used this bento was Ryōjin’s greatest pleasure.

The topic of charcoal shortages came up. The topic of alcohol being unobtainable came up. The topic of having stood in line for over an hour to buy sweets came up. However, the simplicity of their frugal lifestyle brought on by material shortages was nothing new to those working at the government office—in the end, it had become a familiar, manageable way of living. The man in the residence registration section across the way was one who regularly brought boiled beans in his bento without tiring of them, but he had a daughter attending girls’ school who apparently took care of preparing his meals. When there was unexpectedly a rolled omelet inside, he would grin through his wispy beard that never caught the wind, place a slice on the lid, and offer it over to us. The talk of food took off. Someone talked up the nutritional value of whale’s red meat. When made into cutlets, it was said to have quite the beef-like flavor. Because it was inexpensive and could be eaten to one’s heart’s content, it was quite popular. It was at such times that Ryōjin’s gastronomic discussions would begin.

“When it comes to someone with a refined palate like Mr. Suzuki, there’s just no way to compete.” Within the government office, Ryōjin had an established reputation as a gourmet. The listeners would draw out various unknown flavors from Ryōjin’s stories and secretly let their tongues revel in them through imagination.

“The oysters these days—how delicious they are! I tell you—” “Crisp, I tell you.” “The other day, I received some Matsushima oysters as a souvenir and stewed them in miso…”

It was someone’s talk like this that would trigger Ryōjin to display his gourmet expertise. “When it comes to oysters, Tottori’s summer oysters are unmatched.” “Here they say summer oysters are taboo, but Tottori’s summer oysters—absolutely irresistible.” “They’re called Shima oysters too—cling to rocks at the deepest seabed.” “Ama divers haul them up, swing hammers right there to crack open the shells, slip a blade in to extract the flesh—these things are enormous.” “Easily about the size of your palm.” “The flesh is large and thick, with a splendid sheen.” “You remove these black frills, wash them thoroughly in saltwater, then dunk them in vinegar.” “Delicious.” “Truly delicious.” “In one bite?” “No way you could eat something like that in one bite……”

When he spoke earnestly, a country accent would unconsciously creep into Ryōjin’s tone.

“Abalone? Coastal varieties are out of the question, I tell you. Now if it’s from around Numazu, I suppose I could stomach it... but eating it right there in Numazu would ruin the experience. They salt-pickle them in barrels, load those onto horses’ backs, and haul them all the way to Kōfu. Clattering through Mount Fuji’s foothills until they reach Kōshū—that’s when abalone hits its peak flavor, I tell you. Absolutely irresistible. And Wajima’s abalone—that’s Wajima in Noto, famous for lacquerware—theirs is something special. The masterpiece of abalones, I tell you. The shell’s rock-hard exterior—press your teeth against it and it won’t give an inch. But bite through? Surprisingly tender. Crunchy... yet it melts away on your tongue. Tough outside, soft inside—no, wait—hard exterior yielding to tenderness inside. That’s the abalone’s quintessence right there.”

Ryōjin’s stories grew increasingly animated. The listeners interjected with various comments. “This story makes me want to have a drink.” There were also old men who would sip bancha while making such remarks. Ryōjin’s stories took off. And then they gradually grew more elaborate. Fucha cuisine appeared. He began with the origins of Ōbaku Fucha cuisine. At Ōbaku, tempura in particular was Ryōjin’s specialty; he had recently introduced it in an acquaintance’s magazine, *Nutrition and Home*, and had also written about it in the newspaper’s household column. Unlike regular tempura that uses sesame oil and such, Ōbaku’s employed aged rapeseed oil and wheat flour as hard and clumpy as mouse droppings. When it came to dissolving this powder in water, Ryōjin would mimic with his hands, making a gesture as if vigorously scraping from the far side of the bowl with thick chopsticks. If stirred too carefully，it develops stickiness and can’t achieve aburaage’s characteristic crisp texture. In Ōbaku, they serve neither broth nor grated daikon. The ingredients—mushrooms, shrimp, and fruit—are pre-seasoned with a simmered flavor. The true essence of tempura lies in being fried in oil yet not greasy. When it came to loach, there was honkuro simmered whole, which you couldn’t eat unless someone removed the bitterness with egg whites—or so he claimed. As for chicken, he claimed capon sukiyaki was supreme—spreading the bird’s own fat across the iron griddle, grilling the meat while devouring it with grated daikon sauce. Ryōjin’s gastronomic discussions knew no end.

However, in Ryōjin’s case, it wasn’t that he frequented delicacy shops, nor that he was a connoisseur of professional kitchens, nor that he toured regional specialties across the provinces. It was merely talk. Ryōjin’s memory and imagination directed toward taste were extraordinary; he would never forget things like half-heard stories or passages that caught his eye in magazines and books, and on occasion, he would lend them wings of imagination. Such gastronomic discussions of Ryōjin’s could unfold anywhere. In the packed commuter train where one could barely move, while gazing at the fresh greenery flowing through the gaps between people’s shoulders outside the window, he would envision blanched young aralia and lacquer tree leaves, or butterbur dressed in sesame. Then he would delve even into the progression of the first hearth tea kaiseki. While savoring the courses one after another—soup, appetizer, bowl dish, grilled item… the quintessence of June—Ryōjin’s satisfaction reached its zenith. It was truly a strange phenomenon, but in this crowded train car, an array of dishes materialized—the green perilla leaves so vibrant they seemed to sting the eyes, the small sea bass releasing wisps of steam when their lids were lifted—all appearing laid out before him as if still alive.

“You’re strange, aren’t you? To know so much about dishes you’ve never even tasted… It’s all pointless if you don’t eat them.”

To Kiyoko, who found this amusing, Ryōjin—

“Imagining it was way more fun.” “And I can eat anything anyway.”

He said while laughing. That might be true, she thought—Kiyoko sensed a mystique in Ryōjin, known as a gourmet, and continued to respect him nonetheless.

That evening, after finishing a modest dinner alone with her mother-in-law, Kiyoko propped the hand mirror she’d forgotten to put away against a pillar and styled the old woman’s hair. Because the morning train departed early, the impatient old woman seemed unable to rest unless she prepared everything thoroughly now. The mother-in-law’s hair required considerable effort. It had become customary for her to style it, but with her hair now thinning and a large bald spot at the crown—a lingering toll of the elaborate updos from her youth—inserting false hair and binding it all together demanded significant work. Even at seventy-three, did her mother-in-law still care about appearances? When neatly styled, she would beam at their mirrored reflections.

“Mr. Nishio is taking his time, isn’t he.” “Has he been waylaid by drink again?”

The mother-in-law had been waiting for Nishio from *Nutrition and Home*, who was supposed to take care of their remaining luggage. He was a friend of her late husband and the only fellow townsman Kiyoko and the others could rely on in Tokyo.

“Make sure t’dust that shelf proper.” It concerned the bookshelf they would leave behind as a memento for Nishio. Nishio, who had recently started a household of his own, was set to move into this house soon. Leaving this home they had lived in for so many years pained both Shūtome and Kiyoko, but now that Ryōjin’s spirit had ascended from the roof beam onto a journey from which he would not return, clinging to remnants would’ve been futile no matter how long they stayed.

“Mr. Ito from the village office must’ve gone and forgotten to buy souvenirs.” “Oh dear, this is a problem.”

The mother-in-law, who had been counting off on her fingers who should receive what, suddenly looked perplexed in the mirror. For relatives and acquaintances in their hometown they were returning to after so long, they had prepared twenty-odd souvenirs, but upon counting them out found they had forgotten a few names. They decided to buy those along the way, but with preparations for tomorrow morning and meals for the train ride, the mother-in-law still seemed restless. She also reminded them not to forget newspapers in case seats couldn’t be secured.

“Tomorrow night we’ll get to soak in the hot springs.” “My legs and hips’ll be so surprised!” The mother-in-law had been looking forward to this hot springs visit. The elderly housewife from Ura no Kaō who’d suffered the same rheumatism had seen her pain vanish completely after going to Reisenji Hot Springs in Shinshū for treatment years ago. It was because of that story—and her lifelong wish born from hearing it—that they’d decided to make this detour on their journey home. “If my legs lighten up, things’ll get so much easier.” “Ahh, pure paradise!”

It was the first time for both Shūtome and Kiyoko to visit a hot spring. Shūtome appeared buoyant. She chattered about tomorrow’s anticipated pleasures. She pressed on, talking constantly. She carried herself in such a fluster, as if her listener Kiyoko might slip away at any moment. Kiyoko found something heartbreaking about her mother-in-law’s demeanor. Given Shūtome’s usual reticence, Kiyoko found her light remarks since Ryōjin’s death piercing. Her words clung to Kiyoko, coiling around her as she spoke.

During her late husband’s first-week memorial service, when a relative who had come from their hometown casually brought up the topic of Kiyoko’s remarriage, the mother-in-law had agreed in the moment, but her subsequent unsettled demeanor—her anxious floundering—seeped into Kiyoko’s heart. Ever since losing Ryōjin, the hearts of Kiyoko and the mother-in-law had drawn closer together—in a sense, the two had become each other’s support beams. Precisely because she was aging, the mother-in-law all the more could not go on without this support. When Kiyoko took a bit longer with the shopping, the mother-in-law would come out to the street corner to wait. When Kiyoko began preparing to go out, she would fuss about restlessly tending to things, then suddenly gaze at her with uncertain eyes. Held back by such displays, Kiyoko found it harder to leave.

One night, as Kiyoko was about to go to the toilet, the mother-in-law suddenly called out to stop her—

“Don’t go anywhere.” she pleaded in a strained voice, clung to her. It later became clear she had been frightened by a bad dream, but after this incident, Kiyoko made even more effort not to leave her mother-in-law’s side.

For Kiyoko and her husband, who had not been blessed with children, the mother-in-law alone had become the object of their affection. They were often asked whether Ryōjin was an adopted son or a son-in-law, but to others’ eyes, the relationship between Shūtome and Kiyoko seemed to appear that way. Ryōjin often joked, “If you keep neglecting me like this, I’ll go away somewhere, I swear.” he would threaten. In the beginning, even Kiyoko had felt some resentment toward such a mother-in-law. When Ryōjin had wanted to take Kiyoko as his wife, it was none other than this mother-in-law who had objected, calling her a “curly mop.” Kiyoko of the curly mop later heard about this from Ryōjin and felt deeply resentful. Though her mother-in-law had been convinced when Ryōjin laughed, “Even the Buddha has curly hair, doesn’t he?”, this time it ended up with Ryōjin imposing a lingering sense of obligation on Kiyoko—a gratitude that felt more burdensome than welcome.

When Shūtome first caught sight of Kiyoko at the deputy matchmaker’s house, she had worn a beaming face, “Even if her hair’s a curly mop, that bride’s got lucky ears—plenty of fortune’ll come to this house.” she was said to be in the highest of spirits. These ears were what Kiyoko prided herself on most among her features, their thick, plump earlobes utterly charming. Yet fourteen years had passed since Kiyoko married into this family, and though she had quietly turned thirty-six with the passing years, not a trace of good fortune had visited this household.

However, during the time when Ryōjin was in good health, this household had not a hair’s breadth of complaint or dissatisfaction. Kiyoko’s sole wish had been to own a sewing machine. For ten years she had waited for her husband to buy her one. Whenever they went out together, Kiyoko would invariably urge Ryōjin to stop before the sewing machine shops along the street. In their large display windows, several splendid black-lacquered machines stood lined up alongside Western dolls with yellow pigtails and pink dresses. The couple would stand gazing before them for long stretches, feeling a faint thrill of anticipation as they stealthily estimated prices. Gradually Kiyoko resigned herself to believing her wish had been too extravagant, and would return home perfectly content after borrowing the neighboring housewife’s tabletop machine.

The mother-in-law’s hair was troublesome to style. She would neatly trim her sideburns and top them with a small store-bought bun—this modern hybrid of Japanese and Western hairdressing had become routine since Kiyoko joined the household. “Well hidden now, Mr. Moon?” Shūtome fussed over her hair, then hoisted Kiyoko’s hand mirror to peer at her reflection by craning and ducking her neck. Ever since Ryōjin had likened her bald patch beneath thinning hair to “the midnight moon cloaked in clouds,” both women had taken to addressing it as “Mr. Moon.”

After finishing styling the hair and going to wash her oily hands, Kiyoko had just gone down to the sink area when Nishio came in with his usual hurried air.

“Sorry I’m late… The luggage?” “Ah, I’ll handle the rest, I will!” No sooner had he taken off his shoes than he began handling the scattered luggage around him, but was stopped by her mother-in-law and switched to tea. “Today as well, at the office, Mr. Suzuki came up in conversation—succumbing to acute pneumonia just doesn’t suit him.” “If only it had been a more... fitting illness, you know—something related to the stomach... There should’ve been some gourmet-appropriate way for him to go...”

Nishio gulped his tea with a throaty sound, his jaw muscles twitching as he devoured the rakugan from the sweets dish with unseemly haste.

“I’ve resigned myself to thinking this too is fate.” “Hey now, Mr. Nishio—my boy was such a glutton, I bet even in the afterlife he’s stuffing himself till his belly aches.” “Next time he’s born, if he don’t bring back loads of souvenirs, ain’t gonna balance the scales, I tell you.” As she poured his tea, the mother-in-law looked up at Nishio with her grainy, glistening eyes and laughed. “That’s right, Mother.” “By now, Mr. Suzuki must be eating to his heart’s content.”

Nishio had been drinking tea aimlessly while averting his eyes from the old woman’s face, but when Kiyoko came upstairs, he called out to her.

“Mrs. Suzuki, it’ll be lonesome for you at first when you return to the countryside, won’t it? Tokyo won’t be easy to forget.” “After all, I’ve been here so long. But when I return to the countryside, dealing with children will keep me occupied.” “Ah, so has the school matter been settled then?” “I’ve already asked the deputy mayor… And we’ve received a letter from the principal assuring us it’s settled.”

“That principal’s a kind man.” “I had him in higher elementary school… We called him Red-Beard—the teacher’d come around with his snot twinkling under his nose.”

The conversation turned to their elementary school days. Nishio and Kiyoko had both attended that elementary school in their hometown, but among the teachers from those days, only that red-bearded old principal still remained. “If Gonome didn’t work out, I was going to try asking at Umakawa or Iidagawa schools… But in Iidagawa, most of the teachers from my time are still there.”

Before her marriage，Kiyoko had worked as a substitute teacher at that Iidagawa elementary school. Regarding how Kiyoko would live after returning home，her parents and relatives were quite vocally interfering，but Kiyoko resolved to take up a post at a school to protect her mother-in-law. She couldn’t bring herself to go anywhere and leave her lonely mother-in-law behind. “Oh right，I almost forgot—the magazine came out earlier.”

Nishio pulled the bag closer by the entrance step and took out a copy of *Nutrition and Home* that reeked of printing ink. “The manuscript we received from Mr. Suzuki has been published here.” “It was the 25th of the month before last—right, just before he took to his bed.” “So this would be his final work then.”

He had been flipping through the pages when he suddenly stood and placed it before the remains in the alcove. “Mother, I’m glad I got this desk.” “Perfect.” Nishio rapped his knuckles against the adjacent desk and pulled open its drawers. “Hmm, some doodles here… What’s this? Geometry problems?” “After all, I bought that when he started middle school…” “So that makes twenty-six or twenty-seven years now.”

Kiyoko also stood up to look. "It’s about time a clever little tanuki like this one started shape-shifting, I tell ya."

The mother-in-law said such things and made both of them laugh. After tying up the luggage and leaving the rest for morning arrangements once Nishio had gone, Kiyoko soon had her mother-in-law go to bed. Given the older woman’s early rising habits and the fact that it was already past ten. As she packed her personal effects into the duffel bag, Kiyoko found herself unable to lie down when she realized this house too would become just a memory after tonight. The aged house’s atmosphere—permeated with something like the ingrained grime of countless touches—filled her with sorrow.

Kiyoko stood and flipped a page of the pillar calendar she had forgotten to remove. Then she stood up again and went to touch the single remaining white Seto ware hat rack in the entryway. Traces of Ryōjin were everywhere. Kiyoko gently shook his back and urged,“It’s time to say goodbye now, goodbye.”

she urged. The lingering image of Ryōjin—slightly stooped, his angry right shoulder held rigid—appeared as though it would cling to this house forever. Suddenly noticing, Kiyoko picked up the magazine in the alcove that Nishio had left behind earlier. With a heart reluctant to encounter Ryōjin’s writing, she turned the pages. It was a magazine packed with home cooking recipes, short stories, humorous novels, and more. Kiyoko read “The Nutrition Comedy Routine” and involuntarily started to chuckle.

When she finally came across Ryōjin’s writing, her heart gave a sudden lurch as if bracing herself. What I still cannot forget is Hiroshima’s early summer “dancing whitebait” cuisine. A red-lacquered vessel—though one might say it’s shaped more like a small washbasin—contains whitebait swimming within. Plump and well-formed, each one splendidly over three sun in length. Red vessel with whitebait! What a striking contrast! You pluck the swimming ones nimbly—with chopsticks, of course. They’re surprisingly tricky to catch. You dip the squirming morsel at your chopstick tip into the prepared yuzu-infused soy sauce and take a bite—its deliciousness defies description. It’s also perfectly fine to eat them with vinegar miso. Some may say the tiny black eyes have an earthy taste they can’t stand, but that very earthiness is what gives it its refined charm. To call it “dancing whitebait” without appreciating that taste is terribly vulgar. Other dishes etched in this tongue’s memory include Hiroshima’s “raw sea bream preparation” that I once tasted there and Izumo’s specialty “thread-like carp preparation.” For the sea bream dish, they bring out a whole large, lively sea bream to the dining table. When a drop of sake is dripped onto its eye, the entire sea bream suddenly fans open like ripples spreading. It was a spectacular sight. They make sashimi by cutting into a live sea bream with a kitchen knife—pitiable as it is for the bream, there’s no delicacy that delights the tongue quite like this. “As for the ‘Thread-Making’ dish, carp are sliced into thread-like strands, each one meticulously entwined with glistening carp roe—an extravagantly laborious delicacy of astonishing refinement.”

Ryōjin’s writing continued on, meticulously detailing even down to the preparation method of Tosa’s “seared bonito” dish.

As she read, “Lies, all lies!” she reproached the invisible Ryōjin. She grew furious at how he wrote lies about dishes he’d never tasted, yet strangely, delicacies escaped from Ryōjin’s prose to array themselves before her eyes—and as the impulse to reach out gripped her, Kiyoko found saliva welling up despite herself.

The train was nearly full at Ueno.

The cherry blossoms along Kumagaya’s embankment were eighty percent in bloom, with bustling food stalls lining the path. But once they passed Usui Pass, the season seemed to retreat, and winter’s attire remained visible on both mountains and forests. Here and there in sunny spots, plum blossoms bloomed.

Though it was a journey with his ashes and the three of them, Shūtome was so animated it verged on sorrowful—chatting incessantly, sharing nori rolls with students in neighboring seats and offering candies to the old man across the aisle. For her mother-in-law, who needed frequent bathroom breaks, Kiyoko had taken a seat near the door, but the constant opening and closing made such a racket she couldn’t even doze off. The crowded chaos of that morning’s train came back to her. Having never ridden an early morning train before, Kiyoko had been jostled and shoved as she let out cries, doing her utmost simply to protect her mother-in-law. Nishio, who had seen them off with luggage in both hands, also looked comical with his jacket shoulders slipped down and his tie twisted. In the midst of being unable to move, she suddenly noticed her own posture—the right shoulder raised stiff with nervous tension—and felt an odd sensation. It was exactly like Ryōjin’s.

Between Shūtome and the old man, a lively conversation about soba had sprung up. Komoro was near. The old man invited them to get off and try the local specialty soba. Then he took down his furoshiki-wrapped bundle from the luggage rack, put on his faded double-layered coat, and bade farewell before the train reached the station.

The memory of Ryōjin came back to her—he used to insist that authentic soba must be made with second-grade buckwheat flour and served fresh, like at Takinogawa’s Yabuchū or Ikenohata’s Rentangen.

When the train entered Komoro Station, the student in the neighboring seat pointed toward the direction of the castle ruins and Toson’s monument, kindly explaining. A fluttering sound arose, and a pigeon flew past the window, skimming close to the glass. When she followed it with her eyes, it fluttered about on the gravel of the tracks before busily taking off again. The pigeon paced around on top of luggage boxes and across the concrete baggage area with the hurried impatience of someone searching for something. Some would alight briefly on a laborer’s shoulder before flying up toward the roof. The roof too was crowded with pigeons. Their cooing sounded like Buddhist prayers chanted deep in the throat, and the older ones, their feathers worn with age, seemed listless. Under the overpass, there was a large corrugated iron sheet, and the gap between them appeared to have become a pigeon’s nest. Both the overpass and the corrugated iron sheets had turned pitch black from the smoke of trains running beneath them, and the sight of pigeons nesting in such a place appeared pitiful.

The two pigeons that had been flitting about the precarious edge of the corrugated iron sheet no sooner alighted on the tracks one after another than one abruptly returned to the metal sheet. The remaining one whirled around in a flustered motion to give chase, but the other paid it no heed. It kept pursuing relentlessly. They pressed close and rubbed their beaks together. They would try to perch on each other's backs only to be flapped away. Kiyoko averted her eyes without quite knowing why.

By the time they arrived at Reisenji Hot Springs Inn, even Shūtome was exhausted. This was partly due to having been jostled about for so long in the shared vehicle during the journey. However, Shūtome regained her energy as soon as she entered the bath. She was in high spirits—gargling with tap water, placing a wet hand towel on her head like everyone else did, and having Kiyoko massage her feet.

“Look here, see how light my legs feel! “My legs feel so light... These hot springs are truly a blessing.” Shūtome walked briskly in front of Kiyoko to demonstrate her vigor, and then, paying no heed to attempts to stop her, ventured out into the garden where evening shadows were already deepening.

The structure was simple. It felt less like an inn and more like a meticulously maintained farmhouse. The garden too was better for not being overly arranged. From their detached room, Kiyoko and the others could gaze upon an ancient plum tree directly before their eyes. At only the tips of its branches, countable white rings of blossoms wafted with an unexpectedly intense fragrance. It was as though one were witnessing the obstinate pride of an aged and withered tree.

A meal tray was brought to the kotatsu. Had they gone all the way to Maruko Town to prepare this? There was even sashimi and simmered fish arranged alongside. Alongside blanched field parsley sat a large lacquered bowl of tororo soup bubbling with frothy foam. Whether made from some local specialty yam, the grated paste was pale-fleshed and stubbornly viscous. The spread seemed too extravagant for this mountain hot spring inn. While moving her chopsticks, Kiyoko found herself thinking of Ryōjin again. Now she felt an oddly vexing emotion. It was an irritation that made her want to shove every dish from this tray into Ryōjin’s mouth. An unbearable, pathetic urge—to pry open those silent lips and force everything in.

From the bamboo grove out back came the piercing cry of a small bird.

It was a quiet room where one could view the mountains without leaving. The mountain, its lower slopes trailing into twilight, wore a mere cap of snow on its faintly bright summit. The voice of a mother calling her child could be heard from afar. In the clear air, the voice echoed and trailed long, seeming to linger in the sky forever. The side of the room stepped down one level into a covered walkway leading to the bathhouse. Because the roof was so low, from the kotatsu one could only occasionally glimpse the feet of people passing through there. While Shūtome was at the bath, Kiyoko, with nothing to do, gazed vacantly there. Naturally, her eyes kept being drawn there, which she found somewhat embarrassing. The pigeons she had seen at Komoro Station unexpectedly came to mind. The harmonious sight of the two birds together had seared into her eyes. With a whistle and lively footsteps, a person in a tea-striped tanzen passed through the lower corridor. Whether the tanzen was too short or worn carelessly, their post-bath crimson shins were fully exposed, and even the feet spilling out of slippers—with veins bulging—looked thoroughly healthy. Kiyoko had been listening half-consciously to the footsteps with a flushed restlessness, but suddenly flustered as if struck, she went down toward the bathhouse to fetch her mother-in-law.

That night, for the first time in a long while, Kiyoko dreamed of Ryōjin. It was the first dream she’d had since his death. Ryōjin, his hair disheveled from sleep, gently pinched Kiyoko’s earlobe as he rambled on in a tangled voice about something. Irritated by his endless rambling, Kiyoko within the dream sullenly fell silent.

The morning at Reisenji dawned with songbirds' voices. A wagtail, its pale green back glistening as it flew, first caught the eye. It let out a rapid series of chirps as it flew. Perched on the roof, it tapped the tiles with its long tail and trilled two clear notes—first high then low. Its voice was pure and beautiful. Another that had descended to the pond’s edge to drink water continued crying while tapping away with its tail. By the pond, a maple tree stretched out its branches over water clumps of dwarf bamboo gathered at its base while adonis flowers bloomed with shy grace in the bright sunlight.

Before breakfast, Kiyoko accompanied her mother-in-law on a walk. There were only four or five hot spring inns, small shops selling sundries and cheap sweets, and beyond the river, farmhouses scattered here and there. The temple building on the small hill near the mountains had a grandeur ill-suited to this place. A decaying mountain gate, a massive zelkova tree hollowed at its core, a moss-covered eternal lantern—even the shachi ornaments adorning the top of its canopy had been torn off or broken. Though it was said to have been erected in Bunsei 6 (1823), the aged eternal lantern’s stately presence seemed clearly evident in the thick moss covering its entire body. A large plaque reading "Reisenzenji Temple" hung on the main hall’s facade. They appeared to have remained closed for several days. Peering through the shutters’ gaps, she saw tatami mats tinged crimson by stray sunlight gleaming coldly, while the principal image remained too deep within the sumeru dais to be properly worshipped.

They retraced their steps along the river. The current was swift and transparent. At every doorway, women squatted washing leafy greens and rinsing rice. There were children picking parsley too.

Clasping her hands behind her back for the first time in ages, Kiyoko thought of her friends from girlhood days. And so it felt as though the modest life she and Shūtome would share in the years ahead had now begun before her very eyes. "My, how empty my stomach feels! Can't hardly stand it!"

Her mother-in-law quickened her pace even as she spoke with discomfort. She remarked that the fresh air was medicinal, but laughed that with her stomach this empty, she couldn’t possibly ration rice properly.

“Grated yam again this morning.” “Earlier, the landlady was hard at work turning the grinder.” “Day breaks with grated yam and ends with grated yam—ain’t that just how it goes?” The two chuckled together.

The inn was close. In front of a farmhouse entrance, children scrambled to thrust their hands into an empty can to pluck out earthworms and peer into a wire mesh. Inside the wire mesh was a crow. In its beak's not yet fully colored hue and the disheveled bulk of its feathers in restless disarray, there was visible an endearing immaturity—a sense it had not yet fully grown. When the children dangled earthworms through the mesh, the crow startled slightly, opened its red mouth, and caw-caw-cawed hastily while flapping its wings. The tips of its wings had been cut, making them appear oddly stubby and awkward.

Inside the wire mesh was a chipped small bowl with rice grains scattered about. When they confirmed the crow chick showed no interest in competing for the earthworms, the children turned to opening the door and tackling the drawer. After a while, it toddled unsteadily up to the doorway but soon retreated back into the mesh, crouching there motionless. It became clear from the children's explanation that they had snatched it from its nest while it was still a fledgling. They had raised it on kitchen scraps, but now it refused to eat anything except rice grains. Just the other day, they explained with visible disappointment, they'd even tried feeding it frog meat to no avail.

While watching the crow chick with fearful eyes in the wire mesh where earthworms crawled about, Kiyoko remembered Ryōjin. There had been that time when he was invited to his first magazine roundtable discussion and treated to Chinese cuisine, but upon returning home he soon developed a stomachache and declared he was through with lavish meals. Whenever he ate something unusual, he would inevitably complain of a stomachache afterward. Yet it had been Ryōjin who took such delight in porridge.

Shūtome, who had returned to the inn earlier, was drinking tea by the hearth in the cleaned room.

From the thicket behind them came the sound of a bush warbler. “Mother-in-law, it’s a bush warbler.” She didn’t seem to hear it. “Mother-in-law, the bush warbler is singing.” Her mother-in-law turned around, keeping the teacup pressed to her lips, “This tea’s brewed just right!”

Shūtome nodded in agreement.

Kiyoko left it at that and did not mention the bush warbler.