5

Hooked on Lemon Drops

* Flightless Bird and Waterless Well After doing the breakfast dishes, I rode my bike to the cleaners by the station. The owner- a thin man in his late forties, with deep wrinkles in his forehead-was listening to a tape of the Percy Faith orchestra on a boom box that had been set on a shelf. It was a large JVC, with some kind of extra woofers attached and a. mound of cassette tapes standing by. The orchestra was performing Taras Theme, making the most of its lush string section. The owner himself was in the back of the shop, whistling along with the music as he ran a steam iron over a shirt, his movements sharp and energetic. I approached the counter and announced with suitable apologies that I had brought a necktie in late last year and forgotten to pick it up. To his peaceful little world at nine-thirty in the morning, this must have been tantamount to the arrival of a messenger bearing terrible news in a Greek tragedy.

No ticket, either, I suppose, he said, in a strangely distant voice. He was talking not to me but to the calendar on the wall by the counter. The photo for June showed the Alps-a green valley, cows grazing, a hard-edged white cloud floating against Mont Blanc or the Matterhorn or something. Then he looked at me with an expression on his face that all but said, If you were going to forget the damned thing, you should have forgotten it! It was a direct and eloquent look.

End of the year, huh? Thats a toughie. Were talkin more than six months ago. All right, Ill have a look, but dont expect me to find it.

He switched off his iron, set it on the ironing board, and, whistling along with the theme from A Summer Place, started to rummage through the shelves in the back room.

Back in high school, I had taken my girlfriend to see A Summer Place. It starred Troy Donahue and Sandra Dee. We saw it in a revival theater on a double bill with Connie Franciss Follow the Boys. It had been pretty bad, as far as I could remember, but hearing the music now in a cleaners, thirteen years later, I could bring back only good memories from that time.

That was a blue polka-dot necktie? asked the owner. Name Okada? Thats it, I said. Youre in luck.

As soon as I got home, I phoned Kumiko at work. They had the tie, I said. Incredible, she said. Good for you! It sounded artificial, like praise for a son bringing home good grades. This made me feel uneasy. I should have waited until her lunch break to phone. Im so relieved, she said. But Ive got someone on hold right now. Sorry. Could you call me back at noon? That I will, I said. After hanging up, I went out to the veranda with the morning paper. As always, I lay on my stomach with the want ads spread out before me, taking all the time I needed to read them from one end to the other, the columns filled with incomprehensible codes and clues. The variety of professions in this world was amazing, each assigned its place amid the papers neat rows, as on a new graveyard map.

As happened each morning, I heard the wind-up bird winding its spring in a treetop somewhere. I closed the paper, sat up with my back against a post, and looked at the garden. Soon the bird gave its rasping cry once more, a long creaking sort of sound that came from the top of the neighbors pine tree. I strained to see through the branches, but there was no sign of the bird, only its cry. As always. And so the world had its spring wound for the day. Just before ten, it started to rain. Not a heavy rain. You couldnt really be sure it was raining, the drops were so fine, but if you looked hard, you could tell. The world existed in two states, raining and nonraining, and there should be a line of demarcation between the two. I remained seated on the veranda for a while, staring at the line that was supposed to be there.

What should I do with the time until lunch? Go for a swim at the nearby ward pool or to the alley to look for the cat? Leaning against the veranda post, watching the rain fall in the garden, I went back and forth between the two. Pool. Cat.

The cat won. Malta Kano had said that the cat was no longer in the neighborhood. But that morning I had an indefinable urge to go out and look for it. Cat hunting had become a part of my daily routine. And besides, Kumiko might be cheered somewhat to learn that I had given it a try. I put on my light raincoat. I decided not to take an umbrella. I put on my tennis shoes and left the house with the key and a few lemon drops in my coat pocket. I cut across the yard, but just as I set one hand on the cinder-block wall, a phone rang. I stood still, straining my ears, but I couldnt tell whether it was our phone or a neighbors. The minute you leave your house, all phones sound alike. I gave up and climbed over the wall.

I could feel the soft grass through the thin soles of my tennis shoes. The alley was quieter than usual. I stood still for a while, holding my breath and listening, but I couldnt hear a thing. The phone had stopped ringing. I heard no bird cries or street noises. The sky was painted over, a perfect uniform gray. On days like this the clouds probably absorbed the sounds from the surface of the earth. And not just sounds. All kinds of things. Perceptions, for example.

Hands shoved into the pockets of my raincoat, I slipped down the narrow alley. Where clothes-drying poles jutted out into the lane, I squeezed sideways between the walls. I passed directly beneath the eaves of other houses. In this way I made my silent way down this passage reminiscent of an abandoned canal. My tennis shoes on the grass made no noise at all. The only real sound I heard on my brief journey was that of a radio playing in one house. It was tuned to a talk show discussing callers problems. A middle-aged man was complaining to the host about his mother-in-law. From the snatches I caught, the woman was sixty-eight and crazy about horse racing. Once I was past the house, the sound of the radio began to fade until there was nothing left, as if what had gradually faded into nothingness was not only the sound of the radio but the middle-aged man and his horse-obsessed mother-in-law, both of whom must exist somewhere in the world.

I finally reached the vacant house. It stood there, hushed as ever.

(Against the background of gray, low-hanging clouds, its second-story storm shutters nailed shut, the house loomed as a dark, shadowy presence. It could have been a huge freighter caught on a reef one stormy night long ago and left to rot. If it hadnt been for the increased height of the grass since my last visit, I might have believed that time had stopped in this one particular place. Thanks to the long days of rain, the blades of grass glowed with a deep-green luster, and they gave off the smell of wild-ness unique to things that sink their roots into the earth. In the exact center of this sea of grass stood the bird sculpture, in the very same pose I had seen it in before, with its wings spread, ready to take off. This was one bird that could never take off, of course. I knew that, and the bird knew that. It would go on waiting where it had been set until the day it was carted off or smashed to pieces. No other possibilities existed for it to leave this garden. The only thing moving in there was a small white butterfly, fluttering across the grass some weeks behind season. It made uncertain progress, like a searcher who has forgotten what he was searching for. After five minutes of this fruitless hunt, the butterfly went off somewhere.

Sucking on a lemon drop, I leaned against the chain-link fence and looked at the garden. There was no sign of the cat. There was no sign of anything. The place looked like a still, stagnant pool in which some enormous force had blocked the natural flow.

I felt the presence of someone behind me and whirled around. But there was no one. There was only the fence on the other side of the alley, and the small gate in the fence, the gate in which the girl had stood. But it was closed now, and in the yard was no trace of anyone. Everything was damp and silent. And there were the smells: Grass. Rain. My raincoat. The lemon drop under my tongue, half melted. They all came together in a single deep breath. I turned to survey my surroundings once more, but there was no one. Listening hard, I caught the muffled chop of a distant helicopter. People were up there, flying above the clouds. But even that sound drew off into the distance, and silence descended once again.

The chain-link fence surrounding the vacant house had a gate, also of chain link, not surprisingly. I gave it a tentative push. It opened with almost disappointing ease, as if it were urging me to come in. No problem, it seemed to be telling me. Just walk right in. I didnt have to rely on the detailed knowledge of the law that I had acquired over eight long years to know that it could be a very serious problem indeed. If a neighbor spotted me in the vacant house and reported me to the police, they would show up and question me. I would say I was looking for my cat; it had disappeared, and I was looking for it all over the neighborhood. They would demand to know my address and occupation. I would have to tell them I was out of work. That would make them all the more suspicious. They were probably nervous about left-wing terrorists or something, convinced that left-wing terrorists were on the move all over Tokyo, with hidden arsenals of guns and homemade bombs. Theyd call Kumiko at her office to verify my story. Shed be upset.

Oh, what the hell. I went in, pulling the gate closed behind me. If something was going to happen, let it happen. If something wanted to happen, let it happen.

I crossed the garden, scanning the area. My tennis shoes on the grass were as soundless as ever. There were several low fruit trees, the names of which I did not know, and a generous stretch of lawn. It was all overgrown now, hiding everything. Ugly maypop vines had crawled all over two of the fruit trees, which looked as if they had been strangled to death. The row of osmanthus along the fence had been turned a ghastly white from a coating of insects eggs. A stubborn little fly kept buzzing by my ear for a time.

Passing the stone statue, I walked over to a nested pile of white plastic lawn chairs under the eaves. The topmost chair was filthy, but the next one down was not bad. I dusted it off with my hand and sat on it. The overgrown weeds between here and the fence made it impossible for me to be seen from the alley, and the eaves sheltered me from the rain. I sat and whistled and watched the garden receiving its bounty of fine raindrops. At first I was unaware of what tune I was whistling, but then I realized it was the overture to Rossinis Thieving Magpie, the same tune I had been whistling when the strange woman called as I was cooking spaghetti.

Sitting here in the garden like this, with no other people around, looking at the grass and the stone bird, whistling a tune (badly), I had the feeling that I had returned to my childhood. I was in a secret place where no one could see me. This put me in a quiet mood. I felt like throwing a stone-a small stone would be OK-at some target. The stone bird would be a good one. Id hit it just hard enough to make a little clunk. I used to play by myself a lot like that when I was a kid. Id set up an empty can, back way off, and throw rocks until the can filled up. I could do it for hours. Just now, though, I didnt have any rocks at my feet. Oh, well. No place has everything you need.

I pulled up my feet, bent my knees, and rested my chin on my hand. Then I closed my eyes. Still no sounds. The darkness behind my closed eyelids was like the cloud-covered sky, but the gray was somewhat deeper. Every few minutes, someone would come and paint over the gray with a different-textured gray-one with a touch of gold or green or red. I was impressed with the variety of grays that existed. Human beings were so strange. All you had to do was sit still for ten minutes, and you could see this amazing variety of grays. Browsing through my book of gray color samples, I started whistling again, without a thought in my head. Hey, said someone. I snapped my eyes open. Leaning to the side, I stretched to see the gate above the weed tops. It was open. Wide open. Someone had followed me inside. My heart started pounding. Hey, the someone said again. A womans voice. She stepped out from behind the statue and started toward me. It was the girl who had been sunbathing in the yard across the alley. She wore the same light-blue Adidas T-shirt and short pants. Again she walked with a slight limp. The one thing different from before was that she had taken off her sunglasses.

What are you doing here? she asked. Looking for the cat, I said. Are you sure? It doesnt look that way to me. Youre just sitting there and whistling with your eyes closed. Itd be kinda hard to find much of anything that way, dont you think? I felt myself blushing. It doesnt bother me, she went on, but somebody who doesnt know you might think you were some kind of pervert. She paused. Youre not a pervert, are you? Probably not, I said. She approached me and undertook a careful study of the nested lawn chairs, choosing one without too much dirt on it and doing one more close inspection before setting it on the ground and lowering herself into it.

And your whistlings terrible, she said. I dont know the tune, but it had no melody at all. Youre not gay, are you?

Probably not, I said. Why? Somebody told me gays are lousy whistlers. Is that true?

Who knows? Its probably nonsense. Anyway, I dont care even if you are gay or a pervert or anything. By the way, whats your name? I dont know what to call you. Toru Okada, I said. She repeated my name to herself several times. Not much of a name, is it? she said. Maybe not, I said. Ive always thought it sounded kind of like some prewar foreign minister: Toru Okada. See? That doesnt mean anything to me. I hate history. Its my worst subject. Anyhow, never mind. Havent you got a nickname? Something easier than Toru Okada? I couldnt recall ever having had a nickname. Never once in my life. Why was that? No nickname, I said. Nothing? Bear? Or Frog? Nothing. Gee, she said. Think of something.

Wind-up bird, I said. Wind-up bird? she asked, looking at me with her mouth open. What is that? The bird that winds the spring, I said. Every morning. In the tree-tops. It winds the worlds spring. Creeeak. She went on staring at me. I sighed. It just popped into my head, I said. And theres more. The bird comes over by my place every day and goes Creeeak in the neighbors tree. But nobodys ever seen it. Thats neat, I guess. So anyhow, youll be Mr. Wind-Up Bird. Thats not very easy to say, either, but its way better than Toru Okada. Thank you very much.

She pulled her feet up into the chair and put her chin on her knees. How about your name? I asked.

May Kasahara. May ... like the month of May. Were you born in May? Do you have to ask? Can you imagine the confusion if somebody born in June was named May? I guess youre right, I said. I suppose youre still out of school?

I was watching you for a long time, she said, ignoring my question.

From my room. With my binoculars. I saw you go in through the gate. I keep a little pair of binoculars handy, for watching what goes on in the alley. All kinds of people go through there. Ill bet you didnt know that.

And not just people. Animals too. What were you doing here by yourself all that time? Spacing out, I said. Thinking about the old days. Whistling. May Kasahara bit a thumbnail. Youre kinda weird, she said. Im not weird. People do it all the time.

Maybe so, but they dont do it in a neighbors vacant house. You can stay in your own yard if all you want to do is space out and think about the old days and whistle. She had a point there.

Anyhow, I guess Noboru Wataya never came home, huh? I shook my head. And I guess you never saw him, either, after that? I asked.

No, and I was on the lookout for him, too: a brown-striped tiger cat. Tail slightly bent at the tip. Right?

From the pocket of her short pants she took a box of Hope regulars land lit up with a match. After a few puffs, she stared right at me and said, Your hairs thinning a little, isnt it?

My hand moved automatically to the back of my head.

Not there, silly, she said. Your front hairline. Its higher than it should be, dont you think?

I never really noticed.

Well, I did, she said. Thats where youre going to go bald. Your hairlines going to move up and up like this. She grabbed a handful of her own hair in the front and thrust her bare forehead in my face. Youd better be careful.

I touched my hairline. Maybe she was right. Maybe it had receded somewhat. Or was it my imagination? Something new to worry about.

What do you mean? I asked. How can I be careful?

You cant, I guess. Theres nothing you can do. Theres no way to prevent baldness. Guys who are going to go bald go bald. When their time comes, thats it: they just go bald. Theres nothing you can do to stop it. They tell you you can keep from going bald with proper hair care, but thats bullshit. Look at the bums who sleep in Shinjuku Station. Theyve all got great heads of hair. You think theyre washing it every day with Clinique or Vidal Sassoon or rubbing Lotion X into it? Thats what the cosmetics makers will tell you, to get your money.

Im sure youre right, I said, impressed. But how do you know so much about baldness?

Ive been working part time for a wig company. Quite a while now. You know I dont go to school, and Ive got all this time to kill. Ive been doing surveys and questionnaires, that kind of stuff. So I know all about men losing their hair. Im just loaded with information.

Gee, I said.

But you know, she said, dropping her cigarette butt on the ground and stepping on it, in the company I work for, they wont let you say anybodys bald. You have to say men with a thinning problem. Bald is discriminatory language. I was joking around once and suggested gentlemen who are follically challenged, and boy, did they get mad! This is no laughing matter, young lady, they said. Theyre so damned seeerious. Did you know that? Everybody in the whole damned world is so damned serious.

I took out my lemon drops, popped one in my mouth, and offered one to May Kasahara. She shook her head and took out a cigarette.

Come to think of it, Mr. Wind-Up Bird, she said, you were unemployed. Are you still?

Sure am. Are you serious about working? Sure am. No sooner had the words left my mouth than I began to wonder how true they were. Actually, Im not so sure, I said. I think I need time. Time to think. Im not sure myself what I need. Its hard to explain.

Chewing on a nail, May Kasahara looked at me for a while. Tell you what, Mr. Wind-Up Bird, she said. Why dont you come to work with me one day? At the wig company. They dont pay much, but the works easy, and you can set your own hours. What do you say? Dont think about it too much, just do it. For a change of pace. It might help you figure out all kinds of things.

She had a point there. Youve got a point there, I said.

Great! she said. Next time I go, Ill come and get you. Now, where did you say your house is?

Hmm, thats a tough one. Or maybe not. You just keep going and going down the alley, taking all the turns. On the left youll see a house with a red Honda Civic parked in back. Its got one of those bumper stickers Let There Be Peace for All the Peoples of the World. Ours is the next house, but theres no gate opening on the alley. Its just a cinder-block wall, and you have to climb over it. Its about chin height on me.

Dont worry. I can get over a wall that high, no problem. Your leg doesnt hurt anymore? She exhaled smoke with a little sighing kind of sound and said, Dont worry. Its nothing. I limp when my parents are around because I dont want to go to school. Im faking. It just sort of turned into a habit. I do it even when nobodys looking, when Im in my room all by myself. Im a perfectionist. What is it they say-Fool yourself to fool others? But any- how, Mr. Wind-Up Bird, tell me, have you got guts?

Not really, no. Never had em? No, I was never one for guts. Not likely to change, either. How about curiosity? Curiositys another matter. Ive got some of that. Well, dont you think guts and curiosity are kind of similar? said May Kasahara.

Where theres guts theres curiosity, and where theres curiosity theres guts. No? Hmm, maybe they are kind of similar, I said. Maybe youre right. Maybe they do overlap at times. Times like when you sneak into somebodys backyard, say. Yeah, like that, I said, rolling a lemon drop on my tongue. When you sneak into somebodys backyard, it does seem that guts and curiosity are working together. Curiosity can bring guts out of hiding at times, maybe even get them going. But curiosity usually evaporates. Guts have to go for the long haul. Curiositys like a fun friend you cant really trust. It turns you on and then it leaves you to make it on your own-with whatever guts you can muster.

She thought this over for a time. I guess so, she said. I guess thats one way to look at it. She stood up and brushed off the dirt clinging to the seat of her short pants. Then she looked down at me. Tell me, Mr. Wind-Up Bird, would you like to see the well?

The well? I asked. The well? Theres a dried-up well here. I like it. Kind of. Want to see it?

We cut through the yard and walked around to the side of the house. It was a round well, maybe four and a half feet in diameter. Thick planking, cut to shape and size, had been used to cap the well, and two concrete blocks had been set on the round wooden cap to keep it in place. The well curb stood perhaps three feet high, and close by grew a single old tree, as if standing guard. It was a fruit tree, but I couldnt tell what kind.

Like most everything else connected with this house, the well looked as though it had been abandoned long before. Something about it felt as if it should be called overwhelming numbness. Maybe when people take their eyes off them, inanimate objects become even more inanimate.

Close inspection revealed that the well was in fact far older than the objects that surrounded it. It had been made in another age, long before the house was built. Even the wooden cap was an antique. The well curb had been coated with a thick layer of concrete, almost certainly to strengthen a structure that had been built long before. The nearby tree seemed to boast of having stood there far longer than any other tree in the area.

I lowered a concrete block to the ground and removed one of the two half-moons that constituted the wooden cap. Hands on the edge of the well, I leaned over and looked down, but I could not see to the bottom. It was obviously a deep well, its lower half swallowed in darkness. I took a sniff. It had a slightly moldy smell.

It doesnt have any water, said May Kasahara.

A well without water. A bird that cant fly. An alley with no exit. And- May picked up a chunk of brick from the ground and threw it into the well. A moment later came a small, dry thud. Nothing more. The sound was utterly dry, desiccated, as if you could crumble it in your hands. I straightened up and looked at May Kasahara. I wonder why it hasnt got any water. Did it dry up? Did somebody fill it in?

She shrugged. When people fill in a well, dont they fill it all the way to the top? Thered be no point in leaving a dry hole like this. Somebody could fall in and get hurt. Dont you think?

I think youre right, I said. Something probably made the water dry up.

I suddenly recalled Mr. Hondas words from long before. When youre supposed to go up, find the highest tower and climb to the top. When youre supposed to go down, find the deepest well and go down to the bottom. So now I had a well if I needed one.

I leaned over the edge again and looked down into the darkness, anticipating nothing in particular. So, I thought, in a place like this, in the middle of the day like this, there existed a darkness as deep as this. I cleared my throat and swallowed. The sound echoed in the darkness, as if someone else had cleared his throat. My saliva still tasted like lemon drops.

I put the cover back on the well and set the block atop it. Then I looked at my watch.

Almost eleven-thirty. Time to call Kumiko during her lunch break.

Id better go home, I said.

May Kasahara gave a little frown. Go right ahead, Mr. Wind-Up Bird, she said. You fly on home.

When we crossed the yard, the stone bird was still glaring at the sky with its dry eyes. The sky itself was still filled with its unbroken covering of gray clouds, but at least the rain had stopped. May Kasahara tore off a fistful of grass and threw it toward the sky. With no wind to carry them, the blades of grass dropped to her feet.

Think of all the hours left between now and the time the sun goes down, she said, without looking at me.

True, I said. Lots of hours.