HE REACHES THE TOWN’S VANTAGE POINT and, wrinkling his brow behind his sunglasses, he turns in a slow circle.
He looks south, toward the invisible city of Tokyo. He looks west, where the mountains are shining. North, where weeds have overrun the fallow fields and the high-voltage cables dwindle toward the nuclear power plant at Fukushima. Watanabe tries to imagine that energy moving back and forth, its fiery course. Then, finally looking east, he searches for the sea.
He descends the steps leading from the hilltop to the beach. He does so with great care, taking pains not to trip on the stones. No doubt it would have been a lot easier to drive down, but he knows full well that when he has a steering wheel between his hands, his natural impulse is to leave. And right now, he still has a mission to complete. If his math is correct, there should be at least two or three inhabitants left to see.
He pauses at the foot of the steps to enjoy the ocean, seeping in between the rocks with the sound of rolling dice. His nostrils fill with its scent, a scent that seems like the very first to have existed on earth.
As he walks toward the water’s edge, for once he is unconcerned about his shoes. The sun spreads a sail over the waves. Mr. Watanabe half closes his eyes and extends his arms. What exactly he is trying to embrace, he isn’t quite sure.
Then he recalls the divers of Mie, in the Kansai region, who would plunge underwater bare-chested in search of mollusks and algae. He would like nothing more than to see one of those legendary figures emerge in this instant.
By chance, a silhouette glitters at the water’s edge. He runs toward it.
It is neither a young diver nor a mysterious mermaid. It is a small elderly man with a slight paunch, who declares how pleased he is to meet a stranger at last. He says he is Dr. Nagai, a retired radiologist, at his service. A pen and a thermometer protrude from his shirt pocket.
They converse without looking at each other, facing the lightened sea, as though reading subtitles on its watery screen.
Watanabe isn’t surprised to hear that Dr. Nagai is the only remaining medic in town. For that reason he cannot leave. If he went, he argues, who would look after the locals? His grandchildren live far away and he has convinced his wife to visit them. He is spending some time alone, as alone as one can be beside the sea, he adds. Even the authorities, after advising people to evacuate the village, have left. The council offices have relocated to the southwest, away from the danger zones.
So we are now a zombie community, he says.
The two men exchange lighthearted comments about the eccentricities of some of the locals. Dr. Nagai relates various anecdotes. When he mentions Yuma and her compulsive housebreaking, Watanabe interrupts him. He asks if he is referring to the old lady who was forcing open the door to her neighbor’s house. The doctor says he doesn’t know which door it was this time, but that she does the same to all of them. She’s been behaving like this ever since the evacuation. Watanabe suggests she may simply be hungry.
Yuma, hungry? says the doctor. I doubt it. At first, my wife and I used to invite her over for lunch. As soon as the meal was finished, she would rise from the table and thank us very politely. Shortly after, we’d see her breaking into other houses.
They continue to chat as they stroll along the beach. Mr. Watanabe notices that his shoes are sodden. He takes them off and walks with them hooked on his fingers. The bag on his other shoulder is starting to feel heavy and he switches the items around. Observing his gesture, Dr. Nagai inquires about the state of his scapulae and its customary stiffness. Watanabe describes his aches and pains. The doctor nods with the vehemence of one who is a sufferer as well as an expert.
After a certain age, he says, we don’t know whether to complain more about engine failure or the holes in the bodywork.
Watanabe asks him if he has noticed any changes in the health of his neighbors since March. The doctor observes that, in strictly physical terms, no one appears worse than they were. In fact, he admits, some patients seem healthier than before, or at least a little more active.
It’s not easy to tell one thing from the other, he says. My patients have to struggle now to meet their daily needs. Perhaps that effort keeps them alert. Maybe they feel they are surviving danger. In short, they’ve had no choice but to start again from scratch.
You can’t imagine how much I sympathize with them, replies Mr. Watanabe.
They walk back up the beach and stop next to a black car. The doctor tells him that his previous cars had all been white, the color of ambulances. And that he thought a change would do him good.
Exhausted from the walk, his shoes still soaking and his shoulder throbbing, Watanabe accepts the doctor’s offer to return together.
On the way back, Dr. Nagai proposes to examine him. A routine checkup, he explains, just to be on the safe side. Watanabe replies that there’s no need, that he feels fine. Accelerating slightly, the doctor asks—implores, almost—if he’s sure.
Just an examination with the stethoscope, he insists as he parks in the town center. A blood pressure check. An eye scan, at least.
Watanabe thanks the doctor, tells him perhaps tomorrow, and escapes from the car.
Close to the hostel, in an alleyway he has not walked down before, he passes the entrance to a kindergarten. He turns around and walks back. He rereads the sign: NAGAE’S GARDEN.
He knocks on the door. Tries unsuccessfully to push it open. He peers in through the windows. He can just make out some toys lined up along the edge of a table, nearly leaping into the void.
He goes to ask for help from Mr. Satō, who doesn’t understand why he is so interested in the nursery school. Apart from the obvious coincidence with his little sister’s name, Watanabe finds it hard to explain even to himself. All he knows is that he wants to go inside.
Always ready to please his customers, or in this case his only customer, the guesthouse owner ends up calling Mrs. Takahoshi, an old friend who worked for many years as a teacher at Nagae’s Garden.
From what Watanabe can glean from his tone, Mr. Satō and she seem to enjoy something more than friendship. The final, melodious whispers appear to confirm his theory.
Mr. Satō informs him that his friend still possesses a set of keys and that the kindergarten principal, who has left town, had asked that she pop in from time to time to look after the plants in the playground.
You’re in luck, says Mr. Satō.
That depends, he replies.
With a speed almost verging on the impossible (which makes Watanabe suspect she was already in the guesthouse), Mrs. Takahoshi appears in reception.
Without asking any questions or waiting for any explanation, she leads him to Nagae’s Garden. She walks ahead of him, as if she were on her own. The swiftness and detachment of her gait make her seem taller than she is. Mr. Watanabe thinks to himself that under different circumstances, he would have liked to ask her out to dinner. That he would even have liked to hear her refusal.
The door creaks as it opens, like wood that has lost the habit. She opens the shutters and switches on several lights.
Nothing is out of place and yet somehow this orderliness merely underlines the desolation: everything is there, but no one is there.
There’s a distinctive sound, he thinks, a kind of hum where people ought to be but aren’t. In places meant for children it is even more deafening. An empty cot can be more terrifying than an occupied coffin.
They walk through classrooms papered with drawings. They weave around desks covered in a fine skin of dust. They brush past colorful, alien objects.
Mrs. Takahoshi steps out into the playground to examine the state of the plants. With a disapproving look, she goes off to fetch a trowel and some scissors. Then she bends down, tugging the hem of her dress, partly so as not to crease it and possibly because she feels observed.
Mr. Watanabe follows her movements carefully, and then decides to speak.
Who is Nagae? he asks.
She turns around, looks at him in surprise, and immediately recovers her air of aloofness.
The name was the former principal’s idea, says Mrs. Takahoshi. We worked here together until she retired. It was her first granddaughter’s name.
Watanabe stoops and passes her the scissors.
And how is Nagae? he asks, smiling. What is she doing now?
She takes the scissors and cuts off a leaf.
The girl was never born, Mrs. Takahoshi replies. That’s why she named the kindergarten after her. She said that this way her granddaughter, wherever she might be, would be able to play.
They finish seeing to the plants and wash their hands.
Watanabe hasn’t spoken again. Mrs. Takahoshi appears to sense the effect her last reply has had on him and, in an attempt at conversation so forced it seems like ventriloquism, she begins to tell him stories about the school.
He is moved by his guide’s sudden exertions and friendliness. He is tempted to misinterpret them.
In my day, she says, we taught forty children or more. By the time I retired there were twenty at most. More recently I think this dwindled to fifteen. After Fukushima, only five were left. They didn’t go onto the playground and they brought their own water. The authorities told us that it wasn’t a problem for the children to go outside, but that it was better they didn’t. That it was all right for the children to drink running water. But better that they didn’t.
Recovering his voice, and with it his attention to Mrs. Takahoshi’s ankles, he asks whether they still drink the water at her house.
I do, she replies. I’m a widow.
Like Mr. Satō, he says, unable to repress his impertinence.
Like half the town, she corrects him.
Watanabe nods, lowers his head, and retreats into silence.
Mrs. Takahoshi perches on a desk. The posture takes years off her: it’s easy to imagine her among children. She asks if he is from Tokyo. He falters in his reply. He says yes, then no, and then partly. At last he finds an answer that satisfies him.
I’m partly from many parts, he replies.
Mrs. Takahoshi slaps her thighs, perhaps a common gesture in her days as a teacher.
They install the power plants here, she says, sighing, and the electricity and the money go to Tokyo. As soon as there’s a disaster, the problem is ours, of course. I used to think that at least it would create jobs, but look at this place.
I’m not much of a Tokyoite either, he says, perusing the shelves.
Did you know that in this area they charge us less for electricity? she goes on. That discount is an insult. It’s as if they’re admitting there are reasons for them to compensate us.
Suddenly, on one of the shelves, forgotten among the toys, Watanabe discovers a lithium battery shining like a coin. He slides it out with one finger and lets it drop into his other hand. Without quite knowing why, he slips it into his leather bag.
Mrs. Takahoshi starts to close the shutters. He asks her permission to use the bathroom.
When he comes out, he notices she has switched off all the lights except for the one at the entrance. He gives a deep bow (which strains his back slightly) and thanks her for the tour. She replies that it has been a pleasure talking to him. Then, as her hand grasps the handle of the front door (a broad, firm hand that seems to belong to someone else), she asks him his opinion of salvation.
Caught off guard, Mr. Watanabe clumsily articulates a couple of ideas. He has always thought there are certain kinds of deeply held convictions that are impossible to express. To allay her disappointment, he adds a phrase that sounds sincere as he improvises it.
As we get older, we lose opinions about things. That is to say, we gain ideas.
Mrs. Takahoshi relaxes her grip, lets go of the door handle, and looks at him.
I hadn’t thought of it that way, she says. I still change my opinions. Regarding salvation, for example. It’s been a long time since I lost hope in any external power. And lately, I’m not even sure about our inner powers. I’d be happy now with a tiny light inside my head.
He can’t help but look up at the old lantern spreading a halo around her hair.
I think people are too keen to control their departure, she continues. To decide how, where, who with. To me, all that seems pointless. I’d go so far as to say it’s counterproductive. The circumstances are random. The only thing that we can control is what goes on inside our heads, before the moment comes.
Watanabe can feel his eyes growing moist. He feels an urge to ask Mrs. Takahoshi to fly to Tokyo with him. He contemplates her worn face, the wrinkles on her brow, her dry lips.
We should go, she says, yanking the door open.
The dusk weaves among the alleyways.
Mrs. Takahoshi smiles at him, blinks a few times, and vanishes amid an echo of footsteps.
It takes a while for Watanabe to move. Something besides his legs is weighing him down.
Instead of returning to the guesthouse, he heads in the opposite direction. He notices a slight burning sensation in his throat. He rummages in his bag for a piece of spearmint chewing gum, and instead feels the battery. Without thinking, he raises it to his mouth and licks it. He doesn’t stop when he realizes what he’s doing. He licks the lithium battery as if it were a frozen caramel, rolls the tip of his tongue around its smooth curves, imagines its energy awakening in the warmth of his mouth, connecting the dormant voltage with all the words yet to be said.
Then he slowly spits it out into the palm of his hand.