And that was how I began my brief career as house pianist in the Tom and Mary Jazz Lounge, near Inokashira Park in Kichijoji.
Inokashira Park is a big part of living in Kichijoji. The place has pedal boats and performers. Artists display everything from hand-painted umbrellas to crickets folded from straw. The cherry trees blaze in spring, and the maples along the river flame out spectacularly in fall. To get to the park, you walk down a bustling pedestrian mall. A warren of side streets lead to underground restaurants and bars and places like the Tom and Mary.
The buildings are so close together you’d have to turn sideways to walk between them. They look like they would go down like dominoes in a decent earthquake. The street is strung in a spider’s web of electrical lines and lit by fixtures that look like old-fashioned gas lamps. Kichijoji is upscale.
I’d always assumed the Tom and Mary was a slightly shady hotel, but if you pushed down instead of up in the tiny elevator, you skipped the sketchy rooms and ended up in a jazz lounge instead. I sometimes wondered whether spending so much time underground was very smart or very stupid. But the place was always full. Maybe that meant it was super safe. Or maybe some Japanese people wanted to be listening to jazz when the roof fell in.
As for Akiko’s “father,” his name was Mr. Goto. He was working out surprisingly well. My first night on the job, he was all business, if you could ignore his outfit. The cream linen suit had been replaced by a shiny black one with wide lapels from the seventies and a brown leather vest peeking out from underneath the jacket. He even kept his shoes on, a pair of shiny black wingtips I would probably have tripped over. The man had style. It just wasn’t anybody else’s.
“Frank-san,” he said, sticking out a hand. He wore leather fingerless gloves, as though he’d sped to the Tom and Mary in a Formula One race car. He pulled me over to the bar and introduced me to Kenji, who wore black trousers and a blinding-white shirt with sleeves rolled to just below the elbow. The rolls looked like they’d been tailored into the shirt.
“Kenji, ah, he speak good English. He gonna explain rule.”
The place was full, and it felt like every customer was watching. My stomach did a rollover.
“It’s simple,” said Kenji. He filled a lacquered tray with drinks as he talked. “Three sets, two breaks, you keep the tips. We got regulars—they know jazz. Goto-san says you know jazz.”
“Lots,” I said. Kenji’s hands never stopped moving.
“Goto-san wants the old songs. You play them your way. You get requests for anything else, okay. Customer is God. We like it, you can stay.”
“So this is just a trial.”
“We don’t like it, back to piano lessons for rich Japanese ladies.”
I didn’t care for Kenji or his pencil mustache. Goto watched us intently, his big lower lip thrust forward and his head turning from side to side. He might not have understood everything, but he wasn’t giving up control.
“He’ll like it,” I said.
“Ten thousand yen a night.” He reached under the counter and handed me a single banknote.
I was paying the Australian guy a twelve hundred dollars a month for his microscopic apartment. Kenji had just given me $106, which wouldn’t go far. He shrugged.
“I told you. Tips are yours.” He said something to Goto in Japanese. Goto said, “Hah!” and clapped me on the shoulder. He grabbed a drink off Kenji’s tray and pushed me toward the piano. I felt like the spaniel that’s lost a pissing contest with a couple of Dobermans.
But I could play piano, and they couldn’t. I sat down beneath a limpet-shaped lampshade, and suddenly Kenji and his boss were on the other end of the transaction. I started with “My Funny Valentine” for old times’ sake, and I played right through my first break. By the time I finally stood up again, there were three of those nice ten-thousand-yen notes on the polished black surface of the music desk. Somebody liked me.
When I finally walked over to the bar, Kenji’s cuffs were as immaculate as ever and his hands were still moving. He gave me a tiny head duck and slid a cold glass of beer across the bar, along with two skewers of yakitori.
“So, not too awful?” I said.
Kenji went back to his wall of bottles. It was my turn to shrug. Goto was nowhere to be seen, which was fine with me. I finished the beer, wolfed the grilled chicken and went back to play my last set. I was deep into a long riff on the old standard “The Man I Love” when I realized there were people beside me. A quick look—three people, Goto in the middle, wearing a blissed-out expression and an alcohol buzz. The guys on either side of him wore identical black suits and stone faces. The only thing different about them was their hair. One had lots of it, slicked back in fifties greaser style. The other man’s hair was cut short, but it took off from a low forehead and shelved up and back at a steep angle. His face looked like the business end of a chisel. The two of them oozed testosterone and cheap cologne.
Goto belched. His breath was sweet with alcohol. His friends watched while he pulled banknotes from a gold money clip and placed them on top of the others. This was heady stuff. It beat staying at home and watching The Eating Championship on TV. I was on top of the world.
Within a couple of weeks, I’d settled into a routine. I still had my students, but now I also played five nights a week. For four of those I just walked from my closet-sized apartment through the park to the Tom and Mary. But every Wednesday, after Akiko’s lesson, I’d catch the 8:03 train back to Kichijoji.
That was how I met the Woman on the Train.