In response to a rambling message detailing my deteriorating state of health, Nori returned my call to state that on Wednesday, he needed to see me. ‘I want to know how you think about me.’
‘What? What do you mean?’ I asked sharply, hoping he’d be too embarrassed to repeat himself, but Nori did, word for word, and I was forced to lamely sidestep the question. ‘Um, sure. Did you say Wednesday? Yeah, okay, it would be good if I could see you Wednesday. We can go for dinner and spend some time together. That would be nice.’
‘Okay,’ Nori sighed, ‘I believe you.’
What was that supposed to mean? I didn’t say anything for him to believe.
‘But anyway,’ he said, forcing his voice into a high-spirited tone,’did I tell you? Yesterday my hostess friend from Roppongi came to Yokohama to see me. She spent the entire day at my house,’ he laughed fakely ‘and we had so much fun.’
‘That’s great,’ I said, starting to complain about my sinuses. What did Nori think? That I’d be jealous of a fabricated story because I secretly desired to be with him? God! I knew I was just the blank screen onto which he projected his foreign films of delusion, but when had the subtitles gone so outrageously wrong? ‘Hey, maybe you would know what medicine I should take,’ I rambled on. ‘I can hardly breathe during the night and ...’
‘I want you to tell me, what you think of me,’ Nori interrupted, but no, I doubted that he did, so I made up the excuse of not feeling well, said I’d talk to him later and hung up before he could protest.
Shin dials my number every two or three days. Goro does it sporadically. Nori daily, sometimes twice, but usually thrice or more. Then there’s Yoshi. He calls whenever he feels like it, and always with a certain tone, like he’s been thinking about me for eons and just can’t take it any longer. I just wanted to hear your voice, he’ll say, ma chérie.
I find the inflection of my voice changing every time I answer the phone. It’s the same automatic adjustment that happens every time I sit down next to someone in the club. You start adapting. Gauging the distance between his hip and yours. Anticipating reactions. Manipulating outcomes. But let me specify, I never flirt with the customers. I’m a conversationalist. Pure and simple.
Yet there is one exception. I still can’t force Yoshi into a box and make him stay there. No matter how hard I try to keep the lid on, he keeps busting out. I don’t think about how this affects my life most of the time, because I don’t see this as my life. My nights and days are not my own. It’s still me, but somehow not. I don’t know if I can explain it much more clearly than that. There are too many questions, with too many variables. Most of the time I just leave them unanswered. Yet there is one question I know the answer to without even having to ask. If I were a single woman and Yoshi was his same self, would I consider it? Yes. There. I said it.
This is the kind of shit that is running around in my brain. I know I shouldn’t, but I trust what Yoshi says to be true, no matter how illogical that is. I really think he might love me. Who knows why? Maybe it’s just my own inflated ego. And that scares me. I know all the consequences. I know all the outcomes. But the demons. The demons are not easily quelled.
I was only a few pages into A History of Japan when the phone rang. I knew it was Yoshi even before I saw his number — but it was just another uneventful call from the office wherein he schmoozed and I laughed inconsequentially. As Yoshi hung up and I threw the phone aside, it suddenly struck me that I didn’t even know his last name. Not his company, his profession, his age, nothing, and yet I’d gone to Kyoto with him with only $40 in my pocket. I’d done coke with him on two separate occasions when it was just me, him and a hotel. If you asked me the number for the police in Japan, I’d stare at you blankly. Silly girl. It should have been something to think about if I wasn’t overwhelmed by the need to sleep.
I set the alarm to 7.15 pm and crawled back under the covers. When I pulled them to my chin in the artificial darkness, my lip jutted out involuntarily, but I closed my eyes before the tears could come. I am so depressed at times during the day. Raw, exhausted and overexposed.
This is how I feel.