Chapter 7 (1/2)
This is the 7th chapter of a story I am translating t.i.tled “House Ephemera” (蜉蝣の家) by Hatasu s.h.i.+kis.h.i.+ma (識島果).
Thanks to Sherayuki for helping proofread this chapter.
You can read the full j.a.panese text of this chapter .
See which contains a brief synopsis and links to other chapters (as they are posted).
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Chapter 7: Hurt by a friend
After boarding the train, I remembered my smartphone had been turned off. There was a large number of missed calls again. I skimmed the first three emails in my inbox and deleted the rest without reading them.
My mother's compulsive worrying began the day it happened.
The day of my father's suicide.
Less than half a year after I entered medical school and started living on my own, my father nonchalantly bid goodbye to this world. It was all so terribly sudden. I had been drinking cheap liquor at a cla.s.smate's house when my mother discovered my father's body, hanging from a beam in his study.
I jumped on a train heading to the country, and by the time I reached home my father's body had been already taken down and laid out. My mother clung tightly to me, but I didn't return her embrace.
To this day, I sometimes imagine my father's stiff body hanging in midair.
A pair of legs dangling down.
The dead silence of the study.
Light pa.s.sing through wide open curtains onto my father's back.
A shadow cast onto the floor.
My father in his study, completely still, like a piece of furniture.
The rope, hanging straight down, soundlessly supporting my dad's body as if it was a weight.
Each time I imagined my father's dead body-a sight that I had not actually witnessed-it was rendered in even greater detail with a deeper level of realism, gradually becoming increasingly like a real memory.
Why had my father chosen to hang himself? I couldn't help thinking about that. His bloated, purplish face. Bloodshot conjunctiva. Why would he have chosen a death which left his corpse in such an unsightly state? More importantly, why had he chosen death at all, something he never mentioned to his son or wife? No suicide note surfaced from a search of the well-organized study. My father's death was completely unexpected. It happened far too easily-like someone simply flipping a switch.
In doing this, my father had taught my mother and I only one thing: people are apt to suddenly disappear without warning. All of us walked amongst a countless number of dark, bottomless pits, which anyone might fall into, at any time. Ever since that day, my mother started to fear that I too would disappear from before her very eyes, just like my father.
Once the short holiday weekend was over, as you might expect my life got busy again, but strangely enough, I came to realize that the busier I was, the more I tended to seek out Ricardo. That day, after finis.h.i.+ng medical training I found myself heading for his hotel.
He was generally reading a book in some corner of the lobby or in a seat in the 24-hour cafe. As to what he was doing the rest of the time and what brought him to this area, I had no idea. I had never tried asking him. He seemed to dislike being questioned about details of his private life. He never told me directly to stop prying, but I got the feeling he wouldn't appreciate those types of questions.
Tonight I found Ricardo sitting once again in a corner of the lobby. He was in the middle of drinking a watered-down complimentary coffee. He bid me good evening with a smile.
Ricardo often smiled, but there was always something dark hiding behind it. He always seemed to be in a state of mourning, although I actually took fondly to this aspect of him. There was something akin to a thick, invisible mist surrounding him, perceptible even from a distance away. That mist prevented anyone from knowing the truth about him, and seemed to obstruct prying hands from coming in direct contact with him. Soft words and silence were the only ways to get through to this man.
There was something different about that night: he summoned me to his room. I didn't know if there was any particular reason. But it made me feel as if the distance between us was instantly reduced, and that very much pleased me.
”Shall we order some room service?”
Ricardo withdrew his vintage pocket watch and checked the time, making the offer to me as if he'd just realized something. I declined; I wasn't particularly hungry nor did I want anyone interfering with our time together. He responded by standing up and pulling a mini bottle of Johnnie Walker from the minibar.
”That's fine with me,” I quickly reversed my decision. ”But who is going to pay?”
”You're a student, right?” he stated matter-of-factly.
”Although if you drank through the entire stock here that would be a problem…”
Something about this seemed wrong. I just couldn't see Ricardo as a person who subscribed to the common societal belief that students should pay for the drinks.
My hands fumbled to prepare two gla.s.ses. Ricardo poured the alcohol. The surface of the liquid, amber like his eyes, reflected the lights in the room. The unfamiliar whiskey had an equally unfamiliar burnt flavor to it, yet it had a calming effect, as if writing over my memories of the electric scalpel's terrible smell.
I put down my gla.s.s, withdrew Kokoro from my backpack, and placed it on the table. Ricardo gazed at me, eyes smiling.
”I thought about what you said. It took me a little while, though.”
”Please share.”
”A long time ago when I first read that book…I thought betrayal had caused K's death. The older man had taken away the only person K loved, and he, betrayed and heartbroken, died after giving up all hope on life.”
”So you thought it was betrayal that drove him to commit suicide?”
”Yes,” I concurred.
”But, something is not quite right-that's what you thought after rereading the story.”
”Well…”
”You thought it might actually be guilt.”
Ricardo raised his well-formed eyebrows and urged me to continue.