TSUKUBA-KITA POLICE STATION SAT ON a lonely tract of State Road 125, in the shadow of the mountain. There was a large blue frog mascot by the parking lot. The Japanese flag fluttered on the roof. If it weren’t for the patrol cars outside, the building could easily be mistaken for a secondhand car dealership. Behind the station, green rice paddies stretched to the horizon, interrupted only by the occasional pylon.
Down in the guts of the holding cells, Kodai Kiyota cowered in a corner. He clutched his head between gnarled hands. His face was long and horselike, his cheekbones prominent. When he grimaced, he showed large, square teeth. On his temples, veins struggled to the surface like worms. Kiyota was too thin for a man of his frame.
This was his second night in the cell and he still didn’t know why. Gasping in pain, he stood, covering himself in the sodden blanket. From the barred window, he could see the roadside sign.
MOUNT TSUKUBA—IBARAKI’S MOST FAMOUS SON
He closed his eyes and tried to remember the myths his grandfather told him as a boy.
Thousands of years ago, a god descended from the heavens and asked Mount Fuji for a place to spend the night in return for blessings. With its great summit and almost perfect cone, proud Mount Fuji refused. The god then asked our own Mount Tsukuba, who humbly welcomed him as an honored guest, even offering food and water. Today, Mount Fuji is a lonely and barren place, while our mountain bursts with vegetation and the changing colors of the seasons.
Kiyota vomited violently in the toilet. Hearing this, the policemen outside slammed on his door with their nightsticks. When Kiyota was finished, he forced himself not to sob.
We told you you would end up here again.
Good to see you after all this time.
Welcome home.
* * *
The first of the day’s trams trilled through the Setagaya streets. Bakeries cast warm light on the rain-slick pavements. Umbrellas sprouted like sea anemones. Hatanaka was waiting outside Setagaya HQ, his face sullen. He caught sight of his own reflection in a puddle and looked away.
“Look who it is,” Iwata called.
Hatanaka greeted the detectives with his eyes on the floor.
“Where did you pick the girl up?” Sakai asked.
“Outside the Kaneshiro family house,” Hatanaka replied quietly. “She was spray-painting the walls. Racial insults, that kind of thing.”
Iwata and Sakai looked at each other.
“Did you get a call?” Iwata asked.
Hatanaka shook his head.
“I’ve been back to the house a few times. I was there on a whim. I guess I got lucky.”
“Where is she?” Sakai asked.
“The canteen. I didn’t want to put her in the holding cells.”
Sakai brushed past him but Iwata clapped a hand on his shoulder.
“You did good work, Hatanaka.”
Even at this early hour, the canteen was a rowdy din of clattering plates and guffawing, the ceiling blanketed in cigarette smoke. Soon to be on-duty officers drank coffee and read newspapers. None of them found it strange that a fourteen-year-old girl might be sitting among them.
In the corner, Asako Ozaki kept her eyes on the floor. She wore pink eye makeup, vivid green contact lenses, an oversized Babymetal T-shirt, and tartan knee socks. On her feet, she wore battered old Converse, the only thing about her that looked childlike and vulnerable. The rest of her was ironic cutesy. They sat on either side of her, Sakai placing a hot chocolate on the table.
“Asako.” She cleared her throat. “I know you don’t want to talk to us, so we can do one of two things. We can call your little stunt last night minimal juvenile delinquency and you can walk out of here in ten minutes. Or we can call it a ‘hate crime,’ which, as I’m sure you know, carries consequences. Up to you. But think about it. A cute, fourteen-year-old ultranationalist desecrates the home of a murdered family? If we go down that road, the news networks will be all over you. You will not enjoy it. Any secrets you ever had become public property. Believe me, Asako. I don’t want to go down that route. I want you to talk to us.”
Asako Ozaki blinked.
“About what?”
“Kodai Kiyota.”
The girl folded her arms.
“It is a risky matter to discuss a happiness that has no need of words.”
Iwata snorted.
“Quoting Mishima won’t impress us, kid. If you think shacking up with a man old enough to be your father is paradise, then fine, but you’re not protecting Kiyota by not speaking to us. You’re only hurting yourself.”
Sakai shot him a look.
“We just want to talk to him.” Sakai smiled. “Get things straight.”
Ozaki laughed bitterly.
“Sure you do. Look, I don’t know anything about any murdered family.”
“Really.” Iwata raised his eyebrows. “You don’t know the Kaneshiro family?”
“Yeah I know them. So?”
“You’re telling me you didn’t attack Tsunemasa Kaneshiro?”
Ozaki regarded Iwata scornfully.
“That fucking cockroach humiliated Kodai. That’s why he left Tokyo. Do you think I would let that go unpunished? I might not be much to look at but that Zainichi pig underestimated me. Kodai had nothing to do with it.”
Iwata shook his head.
“I’m sorry, you expect us to believe that you murdered an entire family?”
“Who said anything about murder? That’s what you’re talking about. I stabbed him, that’s all.”
“So you mean to tell me you didn’t know the Kaneshiro family were murdered? Maybe you don’t read the papers.”
Ozaki looked from Iwata to Sakai.
“I didn’t know. I figured they had finally left the house.”
“So where did you attack him? When?” Iwata pressed.
“Outside his office. A few weeks ago. Sounds like you already know that much.”
Sakai cut in.
“You said Kiyota left. Where to?”
Iwata bristled at Sakai’s shift in direction.
“Ibaraki. His parents live near Mount Tsukuba. Go find him, I don’t care. I woke up. He’ll die realizing he shouldn’t have tossed me away so easily. Hey, you know what I realized the only difference between them and us is?” Ozaki jutted her chin toward Iwata.
“We’re both assholes, it’s just that their kind spends less time feeling sorry for themselves. So fuck Kodai. I hope he falls down a well. But he didn’t kill anyone, I can tell you that much.”
Sakai chewed away a smile as she knelt down and undid the girl’s handcuffs. As Ozaki adjusted her plastic wristbands to cover the red marks, Sakai stood over her.
“If you’ve lied to me, I’ll be pissed off.”
Ozaki grinned.
“Something tells me I don’t think I’d want to see that.”
“Go on, get out of here. And quit the dumb shit.”
Asako Ozaki shuffled away as though she had just left one boring lecture, bound for another.
Sakai sipped the untouched hot chocolate.
“You’re staring at me.”
“What was that?” he asked.
“Prioritizing.”
“Not sentimentality?”
“Fuck off, Iwata. She gave us what we needed.”
“She admitted to a hatred of our victims. She admitted to trying to stab the father. She’s part of an ultranationalist group. Is graffiti the only threat she poses?”
“Fine. You tell Shindo you suspect a child, I’ll go find Kiyota.”
Iwata swore under his breath and stood up. He followed Sakai to his car, and got in on the passenger side. Ignoring Sakai’s whistling, he reclined the seat and was asleep within seconds.
* * *
After prayers, Kosuke has a free afternoon. It’s Sunday. The other boys are outside playing table tennis, or downstairs in the main hall betting on cards. Kosuke is in the dormitory, lying on his bunk, reading a book. He has been here for more than two years.
Kei walks in, hands in his pockets, whistling.
“Wanna see something?”
“What?”
“Well, do you, or not?”
Kosuke hides his book under his pillow and follows. At the perimeter, they hop over the low brick wall and they dash for the forest.
Once they get to the trees, they are safe. That’s what Kei says and Kosuke trusts him. The other boys don’t talk to Kei but it doesn’t matter to him.
He watches Kei walk deftly along a fallen log, his arms out like a tightrope walker.
“Why don’t they let you come to this forest?”
“Me?” Kei smiles over his shoulder and hops down. “You mean us, Iwata.”
“Okay, us.”
“Because of the bear. That’s what they say, anyway.”
“Bear?”
Kei shows his incisors. The thin branches above them creak under the weight of last night’s snow. The hill is carpeted in brown leaves and rocks. White breath webs out over their shoulders. Their cheeks are bright, red mushrooms. A stream gurgles nearby.
“Kei? You think there’s a bear?”
“Maybe there is.” One shoulder skips up. “But that fuckin’ nun talks about it all the time just to keep us from acting up.”
They reach the top of the hill and it’s a sheer drop down to the silver gush of the river. The height makes Kosuke feel like his legs are melting. He imagines how it would hurt to fall.
They carry on along the ridge, following the river. Kei leads, sending avalanches of dead leaves hissing down the hill. Kosuke traces the footsteps, smelling the perfume beneath the mud. The sky darkens and a light rain begins to trickle through the leaves.
“Maybe we should go back,” Kosuke calls.
Kei spins round, his hands behind his back, and he strides around in a circle. The imitation of Mr. Uesugi is crude but undeniable.
“The Lord is my light and my revelation! Whom shall I fear?’ He kicks his boots high up into the air, a crazed look on his face. “The Lord is the strength of my life! Of whom am I afraid?”
Kosuke joins in now, laughing, marching in his own little circle of righteousness.
“When the wicked came upon me to eat up my flesh, they stumbled and they fell,” he joins in gleefully.
Kei climbs a rock and looks around the forest as though it were his chapel.
“Let us not … fear the bear! For he who trusts in the Lord can never be eaten up by any heathen bear.”
Kosuke falls against a tree trunk laughing, holding his ribs.
Kei looks the proudest and highest he has ever seen someone look.
Then they huddle under an outcropping and wait in silence for the rain to pass.
By the time it’s finished, the day is almost gone.
They carry on along the ridge, which has thinned to half its width now.
Kei holds on to branches as he goes.
This deep into the forest, it’s always cold and there is never much light.
Kosuke can hear a strange sound getting louder now—a crashing sound with a murmuring underneath that.
Ug.
Ug.
Ug.
“Kei?” Kosuke calls.
Kei doesn’t look back.
“We’re almost there,” he says.
The end of the ridge is very narrow, just wide enough for them to stand side by side.
Kei stops. He points down and Kosuke looks over his shoulder.
The eye of the whirlpool is blinking up at them.
Iwata wants to run away and never come back.
Kei stares down at it, enthralled.
“Sometimes,” he whispers, “I dream about it.”
It swirls.
It swirls.
It smiles.