South of the Border, West of the Sun Page 0,47
and she wouldn’t like it. It’s true you borrowed money from Father, but that has nothing to do with this, Yukiko would no doubt say. You’re paying it back, with interest right? But the situation wasn’t quite that simple.
My younger daughter was fast asleep in her room. When I finished my coffee, I enticed Yukiko into bed. We stripped naked and held each other tight there in the glare of the sun. I took my time warming her body up, then entered her. But all the time I was inside her, it was Shimamoto I saw. I closed my eyes and felt I was holding Shimamoto. And I came violently.
I took a shower, then went back to bed, to sleep for a while. Yukiko was already dressed, but after I slipped into bed, she got under the covers and put her lips against my back. I lay silent, with eyes closed. I’d had sex with her, all the while thinking of another woman, and the guilt was getting to me. I lay there, silent eyes closed.
“You know, I really do love you,” Yukiko said.
“We’ve been married seven years, we have two kids,” I said. “‘Bout time for you to get tired of me, don’t you think?”
“Perhaps. But I still love you.”
I held her close. And began to undress her. I pulled off her sweater and skirt, her underwear.
“Whoa! You’re not planning what I think you’re planning, are you?” she asked in surprise.
“Of course,” I said.
“Special-entry time for my diary today,” she said.
This time I tried hard not to think of Shimamoto. I held Yukiko’s body, looking at her face and concentrating only on her. I kissed her lips, her neck, her breasts. And I came inside of her. Afterward, I held her for a long time.
“Are you all right?” she asked, her eyes on me. “Did something happen today with you and Father?”
“Nothing happened,” I replied. “Not a thing. I just feel like staying like this for a while.”
“Be my guest,” she said. And she held me tight, with me still inside her. I closed my eyes and pulled her hard against my body, as though, if I didn’t, I would fly off into the void.
As I held her, I remembered the attempted suicide her father had told me about. I was sure she wouldn’t make it. She’s a goner, I figured. If things had taken even the slightest of wrong turns, I wouldn’t be holding her body like this. Gently I touched her shoulder, her hair and breasts. They were real—warm and soft. Beneath my palm I could feel her life. No one could say how long that life would last. Whatever has form can disappear in an instant. Yukiko. This room. These walls, this ceiling, this window. They might all be gone before we knew it. Suddenly Izumi came to mind. That man had hurt Yukiko deeply, and I had done the same to Izumi. Yukiko happened to meet me after that, but Izumi was all alone.
I kissed Yukiko’s soft neck.
“I’m going to sleep for a while,” I said. “And then I’ll go to the nursery school to pick her up.”
“Sleep well,” she told me.
I slept for just a short time. When I opened my eyes, it was past three p.m. From the bedroom window I could see the Aoyama Cemetery. I sat down in a chair by the window and stared at it for a long time. So many things looked different now, now that Shimamoto had shown up in my life again. I could hear Yukiko preparing dinner in the kitchen. The sounds rang hollowly in my ears, like those transmitted down a pipe from a world terribly far away.
I got the BMW out of the underground garage and headed for the nursery school to pick up my daughter. They had some special program at the school that day, so it was almost four when she appeared at the school gate. You could always count on a line of shiny, expensive cars there—Saabs, Jaguars, even the occasional Alfa Romeo. Young mothers in expensive-looking coats got out of the cars, collected their children, deposited them in the cars, and took off. My daughter was the only child whose father came to pick her up. When I saw her, I called out her name and waved. She waved her tiny hand and came toward me. Then she saw a little girl sitting in a blue Mercedes 260E and ran over to her, yelling out something. The girl had