It’s my day off from work, and I’m walking down the same familiar street. There’s a feeling of calm in the air, like everything is at peace on this warm October afternoon. With a thin scarf loosely wrapped around my neck, I feel myself starting to sweat a little bit.
Even on a weekday around noon, the people I pass on the street walk at a leisurely pace and so do I. And from time to time, we come to a stop and disappear silently into one of the many bookshops along the way like we’ve been swallowed up.
The Jimbocho neighborhood is a little unusual for Tokyo because most of the stores there are bookshops. Each of the used bookshops has its own particular specialty: some carry art books, or play scripts, or philosophy texts; others handle rare items like old maps and traditionally bound Japanese books. Altogether, there are more than a hundred seventy stores. It’s impressive to see all those bookshops lined up one after the other down the street.
If you cross the avenue, you’ll find yourself in an area of offices, surrounded by tall buildings, but within its borders the neighborhood has done a good job keeping the rest of the city at bay. Only here are there rows of picturesque buildings. It’s like the neighborhood exists in a different time, enveloped in its own quiet little world. Which may be why when you’re walking around here, going wherever your fancy takes you, you look up and suddenly realize how much time has passed.
The place where I’m headed is on this corner. If you pass the street with the row of secondhand bookshops and turn onto the side street a little ahead, you’ll be able to see it.
It’s a used bookstore called the Morisaki Bookshop and it specializes in modern Japanese literature.
Once I turn the corner, I hear someone eagerly calling my name.
“Hey, Takako, come here!”
I look over and see a small middle-aged man looking my way, waving me over enthusiastically.
I hurry over to him and whisper my objection. “Didn’t I tell you on the phone that you didn’t need to wait for me? I’m not a little kid.”
He’s always like this, treating me like a child even though I’m a twenty-eight-year-old woman. It’s obviously embarrassing, as you can imagine, to have someone shouting my name like that in the middle of the street.
“Well, it was taking you so long to get here. I got to worrying that you might’ve gotten lost.”
“That’s why I told you, you didn’t need to wait for me in front of the shop. I’ve been here dozens of times. How could I possibly get lost?”
“Sure, I guess, but you know you can be a little bit absent-minded sometimes.”
“You mean you can, don’t you? Take a good look in the mirror sometime. You’ll find a very absent-minded man staring back at you.”
This is Satoru Morisaki, my uncle on my mother’s side, and the third-generation proprietor of the Morisaki Bookshop. The original store, started by my great-grandfather back in the Taishō era, no longer exists. The current store was built almost forty years ago.
At first glance, my uncle Satoru might seem a little sketchy. He’s always dressed in threadbare clothes, with slip-on sandals on his feet, and his shaggy hair makes you wonder if he’s ever had a proper haircut in his life. And on top of all that, he’s always saying off-the-wall things, and he ends up blurting out whatever he’s thinking like a child. He is, in short, a tough man to figure out.
And yet, in this peculiar neighborhood, his odd personality and unusual appearance strangely seem to work in his favor: he’s surprisingly well liked. It would be difficult to find someone around here who doesn’t know my uncle.
His Morisaki Bookshop is an old-fashioned store, in a two-floor wooden building untouched by time, every bit the image of a vintage bookshop. The inside is cramped. You could get five people in there, but just barely. There’s never enough space on the shelves; the books are piled on top, and along the walls, and even behind the counter where the cash register is. And the intense, musty smell particular to old bookshops penetrates everything. For the most part, the books on the shelves are cheap, running from around a hundred to five hundred yen, but the store also sells rarer things like first editions of famous writers.
The number of people looking for secondhand books like these has dropped since my grandfather’s generation. From what I’ve heard, there were some extremely difficult times. It’s only thanks to the customers who love the shop and have kept coming back over the years that it’s still in business.
I first came to the shop more than three years ago.
Back then, my uncle let me come live on the second floor, and told me I could stay as long as I liked.
I can still vividly recall the days I lived here. At that time in my life, I was feeling desperate although the cause now seems insignificant when I look back on it. At first, I often lashed out at my uncle and locked myself in my room like some tragic heroine, crying all alone. Yet he patiently endured it all and offered me kind words and caring instead. As time went on, he taught me how thrilling reading can be, and how crucial in life it is to not hide from your emotions but to face them.
Naturally, my uncle was the one who introduced me to Jimbocho. At first, I was confused to look down the street and see just one bookstore after another.
“The great writers have always loved this place too,” my uncle said, sounding like he was boasting about himself. “It’s the best neighborhood of bookshops in the whole world.” To be honest, I didn’t get what he was talking about then. I couldn’t see what there was to boast about.
But as time passed, I came to understand what he meant.
Jimbocho is brimming with charm and excitement. There’s no other place like it in the world.
My uncle and I are still bickering back and forth in front of the shop when I hear a loud voice shout from inside, “Hey, what are you two doing?” When I peek in, I see a woman with a short, stylish haircut sitting at the counter, staring at us, with an irritated look on her face. That’s Momoko.
“Quit dawdling out there and come in already, will you?”
She waved us in impatiently. She didn’t seem to enjoy waiting in the shop for us by herself.
Momoko is Uncle Satoru’s wife. You’d think she wouldn’t be so different in age and appearance from my uncle, but she has such a straightforward and candid way about her that she seems much younger. My uncle is no match for her. Whenever she’s around, he’s always on his best behavior, like a little lapdog. It’s only when she’s there that you ever see that side of him.
Actually, Momoko lived apart from my uncle for almost five years, as a result of some unfortunate circumstances, but about a month ago she returned home safe and sound. Since then, she and my uncle have been running the shop together.
“So, Takako, what’s new with you?” Momoko asks with a smile. She has such fine, straight posture that she somehow looks elegant even wearing just a sweater and a long skirt. I don’t think I ever want to become someone who fills a room the way she does, but I do wish a little bit that I could have some of her grace.
“Things are good. Peaceful and calm. Work’s going well. How are you?”
“I’m doing great,” she says, flexing her arms to show off her biceps, like she’s doing her Popeye impersonation.
“That’s good to hear,” I say, feeling a sense of relief. Years ago, Momoko had had a serious illness, and we’re still watching her prognosis. My uncle is always very careful about Momoko’s health, but it seems like his constant concern ends up irritating her.
“I’ve got some sweet daifuku mochi with me. Shall we have some?”
“Oh, maybe we should.”
My uncle checks that Momoko has gone to the back and then complains to me in a whisper. “It’s awfully cramped with Momoko here with me at the shop, but that’s how it goes, I guess. It’s just so much easier to work alone.”
“But weren’t you lonely when you were actually left all by yourself?” I’m only trying to tease him, but he gets all worked up and argues with me like a little kid.
“That’s nonsense! I mean when she’s back behind the counter, where am I supposed to go? These days, I’m just pacing back and forth by the entrance like a guard dog.”
“Is that by any chance why you were standing out in front today?”
“Take a guess.” He confesses this pitiful fact with a straight face, then leans forward like he’s going to whisper in my ear. “But I’ve got more important things to tell you, Takako,” he says.
“Like what?”
“The other day I got some pretty good stuff at auction. I haven’t put it on sale yet at the shop, but for you I’ll make an exception and let you have a little look.”
He might’ve tried to sound reluctant, but I know there is no way he isn’t going to show me those books. Yet I’ve been so thoroughly converted that I’m excited to see them. I almost wonder if this love of books is hereditary. I sometimes think that might be why I’m still coming so often to the shop on my days off from work.
“Show me!” I shout without meaning to. “I’ve got to see them!”
“Hey, I just made tea for you two.” Momoko looks at us dumbfounded, with the teapot in her hands.
“This is a bookshop,” my uncle says bluntly. “How are we not going to look at books? Right, Takako?”
“Right,” I agree with a laugh.
My aunt gives us an annoyed look and grumbles, “You two are the worst.”
This is my beloved Morisaki Bookshop. It’s been an inseparable part of my life since the days I lived here.
In its own modest way, it’s a place that holds so many little stories within its walls. Maybe that’s the reason I keep coming back.