by trapping them in appropriate nightmares. ‘I know what you’re thinking, lad,’ Buntaro says, putting down the receiver. ‘Kodai isn’t even born yet. But these places have waiting lists longer than Grateful Dead guitar solos. Get into the right kindergarten, and the conveyor belt goes all the way up to the right university.’ He shakes his head, sighing. ‘Listen to me. Education Papa. How was your day? You look like you had your bone marrow sucked out.’ Buntaro offers me a cigarette and strikes himself off my list of suspects. Unlikely as it seems, the sole remaining candidate is now the likeliest: my father. What are we up to now? Plan E.
On Thursday lunch-time I go back to the same branch of the same bank to try out the ATM again. The same woman is on duty – she avoids eye contact the moment she recognizes me. I insert my card, type in my PIN, and the virtual bank teller bows. Look! ‘What dark room has no exits, but only entrances into rooms darker than the one before? Father waits for your answer.’ I search for meaning – is this some sort of warning? I look around for Minnie Mouse, but Captain Smug has been lying in wait for me. ‘Another inexplicable message, sir?’
‘If this isn’t an inexplicable message’ – you sarcastic bastard; I rap the screen with my knuckles – ‘then give me another name for it.’
‘Oh dear, sir, not exactly Bill Gates, are we? Perhaps the message was telling you that you lack the funds necessary to complete your transaction?’ Of course, the screen has returned to normal: my pitiful bank balance. I look around – is somebody watching? Erasing the message when a witness comes up? How? ‘I know this looks weird,’ I begin, not sure how to continue. Captain Smug just raises his eyebrows. ‘But somebody is using your ATM to mess your customers around.’ Captain Smug waits for me to go on. ‘Shouldn’t that worry you?’ Captain Smug folds his arms and tilts his head at an I-went-to-a-top-Tokyo-university angle. I storm off without another word. I cycle back to the lost property office, as suspicious of parked cars and half-open windows as yesterday. My father was influential enough to have his name left off my and Anju’s birth certificates, but surely this is in another league. I spend the rest of the afternoon attaching labels to forgotten umbrellas, and weeding out the ones we have held for twenty-eight days for destruction. Might my stepmother be somehow trying to intimidate me? If it is my father, why is he playing these pranks instead of just calling me? Nothing makes sense.
Friday is pay-day for us probationary employees recruited in the middle of the year. The bank is packed – I have to wait several minutes to get to a machine. Captain Smug hovers in the wings. I pull my baseball cap down low. A woman with ostrich feathers in her hat keeps sneezing over me, and groaning. I insert my card and ask for 14,000 yen. The virtual bank teller smiles, bows, and asks me to wait. So far so normal. ‘Father warns you that your breathing space is all used up.’ I am expecting this: from under the visor of my cap I study the queue of impatient people. Who? No clue, no idea. The machine shuttles my money. The virtual bank teller bows again. ‘Father is coming for you.’ Come on, then! What else do you think I am in the city for? I drum the the virtual teller with the bases of my fists. ‘You aren’t from Tokyo, are you, sir?’ Captain Smug is at my shoulder. ‘I can tell because our Tokyo customers usually have the manners to refrain from assaulting our machines.’ ‘Look at this! Look!’ I show him the screen and curse. What did I expect? ‘Please take your money and remove your card.’ It beeps. I know if I say anything to Captain Smug, or even look at the guy, I will be seized by an urgent desire to make him hurt, and I don’t think my cranium could take another head-butt less than seven days since the last. I ignore his vexed sigh, take my money, card and receipt, and walk around the bank lobby for a while, trying to meet stares. Queues, marble floors, number chimes. Nobody looks at anyone in banks. Then I notice Captain Smug talking to a security man, and glancing in my direction. I