17

The Fitting Room

* A Successor Nutmeg knew nothing about the women who came to her. None of them offered information about herself, and Nutmeg never asked. The names with which they made their appointments were obviously made up. But around them lingered that special smell produced by the combination of power and money. The women themselves never made a show of it, but Nutmeg could tell from the style and fit of their clothes that they came from backgrounds of privilege.

She rented space in an office building in Akasaka-an inconspicuous building in an inconspicuous place, out of respect for her clients hyperactive concern for their privacy.

After careful consideration, she decided to make it a fashion design studio. She had, in fact, been a fashion designer, and no one would have found it suspicious for a variety of women to be coming to see her in substantial numbers. Her clients were all women in their thirties to fifties of a sort that could be expected to wear expensive, tailor-made clothes. She stocked the room with clothing and design sketches and fashion magazines, brought in the tools and workbenches and mannequins needed for fashion design, and even went so far as to design a few outfits to give the place an air of authenticity. The smaller of the two rooms she designated as the fitting room. Her clients would be shown to this fitting room, and on the sofa they would be fitted by Nutmeg.

Her client list was compiled by the wife of the owner of a major department store. The woman had chosen a very carefully limited number of trustworthy candidates from among her wide circle of friends, convinced that in order to avoid any possibility of scandal, she would have to make this a club with an exclusive membership. Otherwise, news of the arrangement would be sure to spread quickly. The women chosen to become members were warned never to reveal anything about their fitting to outsiders. Not only were they women of great discretion, but they knew that if they broke their promise they would be permanently expelled from the club.

Each client would telephone to make an appointment for a fitting and show up at the designated time, knowing that she need not fear encountering any other client, that her privacy would be protected absolutely. Honoraria were paid on the spot, in cash, their size having been determined by the department store owners wife-at a level much higher than Nutmeg would have imagined, though this never became an obstacle. Any woman who had been fitted by Nutmeg always called for another appointment, without exception. You dont have to let the money be a burden to you, the department store owners wife explained to Nutmeg. The more they pay, the more assured these women feel. Nutmeg would go to her office three days a week and do one fitting a day. That was her limit.

Cinnamon became his mothers assistant when he turned sixteen. By then, it had become difficult for Nutmeg to handle all the clerical tasks herself, but she had been reluctant to hire a complete stranger. When, after much deliberation, she asked him to help her with her work, he agreed immediately without even asking what kind of work it was she did. He would go to the office each morning at ten oclock by cab (unable to bear being with others on buses or subway trains), clean and dust, put everything where it belonged, fill the vases with fresh flowers, make coffee, do whatever shopping was needed, put classical music on the cassette player at low volume, and keep the books.

Before long, Cinnamon had made himself an indispensable presence at the office. Whether clients were due that day or not, he would put on a suit and tie and take up his position at the waiting room desk. None of the clients complained about his not speaking. It never caused them any inconvenience, and if anything, they preferred it that way. He was the one who took their calls when they made appointments. They would state their preferred time and date, and he would knock on the desktop in response: once for no and twice for yes. The women liked this concision. He was a young man of such classic features that he could have been turned into a sculpture and displayed in a museum, and unlike so many other handsome young men, he never undercut his image when he opened his mouth. The women would talk to him on their way in and out, and he would respond with a smile and a nod. These conversations relaxed them, relieving the tensions they had brought with them from the outer world and reducing the awkwardness they felt after their fittings. Nor did Cinnamon himself, who ordinarily disliked contact with strangers, appear to find it painful to interact with the women.

At eighteen, Cinnamon got his drivers license. Nutmeg found a kindly driving instructor to give him private lessons, but Cinnamon himself had already been through every available instruction book and absorbed the details. All he needed was the practical know-how that couldnt be obtained from books, and this he mastered in a few days at the wheel. Once he had his license, he pored over the used-car books and bought himself a Porsche Carrera, using as a down payment all the money he had saved working for his mother (none of which he ever had to use for living expenses). He made the engine shine, bought all new parts through mail order, put new tires on, and generally brought the cars condition to racing level. All he ever did with it, though, was drive it over the same short, jam-packed route every day from his home in Hiroo to the office in Akasaka, rarely exceeding forty miles an hour. This made it one of the rarer Porsche 911's in the world.

Nutmeg continued her work for more than seven years, during which time she lost three clients: the first was killed in an automobile accident; the second suffered permanent expulsion for a minor infraction; and the third went far away in connection with her husbands work. These were replaced by four new clients, all the same sort of fascinating middle-aged women who wore expensive clothing and used aliases. The work itself did not change during the seven years. She went on fitting her clients, and Cinnamon went on cleaning the office, keeping the books, and driving the Porsche. There was no progress, no retrogression, only the gradual aging of everyone involved. Nutmeg was nearing fifty, and Cinnamon turned twenty. Cinnamon seemed to enjoy his work, but Nutmeg was gradually overcome by a sense of powerlessness. Over the years, she went on fitting the something that each of her clients carried within. She never fully understood what it was that she did for them, but she continued to do her best. The somethings, meanwhile, were never cured. She could never make them go away; all that her curative powers could do was reduce their activity somewhat for a time. Within a few days (usually, from three to ten days), each something would start up again, advancing and retreating over the short span but growing unmistakably larger over time-like cancer cells. Nutmeg could feel them growing in her hands. They would tell her: Youre wasting your time; no matter what you do, we are going to win in the end. And they were right. She had no hope of victory. All she could do was slow their progress somewhat, to give her clients a few days of peace.

Nutmeg would often ask herself, Is it not just these women? Do all the women of the world carry this kind of something inside them? And why are the ones who come here all middle-aged women? Do I have a something inside me as well?

But Nutmeg did not really want to know the answers to her questions. All she could be sure of was that circumstances had somehow conspired to confine her in her fitting room.

People needed her, and as long as they went on needing her, she could not get out. Sometimes her sense of powerlessness would be deep and terrible, and she would feel like an empty shell.

She was being worn down, disappearing into a dark nothingness. At times like this, she would open herself to her quiet son, and Cinnamon would nod as he listened intently to his mothers words. He never said anything, but speaking to him like this enabled her to attain an odd kind of peace. She was not entirely alone, she felt, and not entirely powerless. How strange, she thought: I heal others, and Cinnamon heals me. But who heals Cinnamon? Is he like a black hole, absorbing all pain and loneliness by himself? One time-and only that once-she tried to search inside him by placing her hand on his forehead the way she did to her clients when she was fitting them. But she could feel nothing.

Before long, Nutmeg felt that she wanted to leave her work. I dont have much strength left. If I keep this up, I will burn out completely. Ill have nothing left at all. But people continued to have an intense need for her fitting. She could not bring herself to abandon her clients just to suit her own convenience.

Nutmeg found a successor during the summer of that year. The moment she saw the mark on the cheek of the young man who was sitting in front of a building in Shinjuku, she knew.