South of the Border, West of the Sun Page 0,57

fish-shaped silver brooch graced the collar of her jacket. The dress was simple in design, with no decorations of any kind, yet on her, you’d swear it was the world’s most expensive dress. She was more tanned than the last time I’d seen her.

“I thought you’d never come here again,” I said.

“Every time I see you, you say the same thing,” she said, laughing. As always, she sat down next to me at the bar and rested both hands on the counter. “But I did write you a note saying I wouldn’t be back for a while, didn’t I?”

“For a while is a phrase whose length can’t be measured. At least by the person who’s waiting,” I said.

“But there must be times when that word’s necessary. Situations when that’s the only possible word you can use,” she said.

“And probably is a word whose weight is incalculable.”

“You’re right,” she said, her face lit up by her usual smile, a gentle breeze blowing from somewhere far away. “I apologize. I’m not trying to excuse myself, but there was nothing I could do about it. Those were the only words I could have used.”

“No need to apologize. As I told you once, this is a bar, and you’re a customer. You come here when you want to. I’m used to it. I’m just mouthing off to myself. Pay no attention.”

She called the bartender over and ordered a cocktail. She looked closely at me, as if inspecting me. “You’re dressed pretty casually for a change.”

“I went swimming this morning and haven’t changed. I haven’t had time,” I said. “But I kind of like it. I feel this is the real me again.”

“You look younger. No one would guess you’re thirty-seven.”

“You don’t look thirty-seven, either.”

“But I don’t look twelve.”

“True enough,” I said.

Her cocktail arrived, and she took a sip. And gently closed her eyes as if listening to some far-off sound. With her eyes closed, I could once more make out the small line just above her eyelids.

“Hajime,” she said, “I’ve been thinking about your bar’s cocktails. I really wanted to have one. No matter where you go, you can never find drinks like the ones here.”

“Did you go somewhere far away?”

“Why do you say that?” she asked.

“Something about you,” I replied. “A certain air. Like you’ve been gone for some time far away.”

She looked up at me. And nodded. “Hajime, for a long time I’ve….,” she began, but fell suddenly silent as if reminded of something. I could tell she was searching inside herself for the right words. Which she couldn’t find. She bit her lip and smiled once more. “Anyhow, I’m sorry. I should have got in touch with you. But I wanted to leave certain things as they are. Preserved, so to speak. Either I come here or I don’t. When I do come here, I do. When I don’t … I’m somewhere else.”

“There’s no middle ground?”

“No middle ground,” she said. “Why? Because no middle-ground things exist there.”

“In a place where there are no middle-ground objects, no middle ground exists,” I said.

“Exactly.”

“In a place where no dogs exist, there are no doghouses, in other words.”

“Yes; no dogs, no doghouses,” Shimamoto said. And she looked at me in a funny way. “You have a strange sense of humor, do you know that?”

As it often did, the piano trio began playing “Star-Crossed Lovers.” For a while the two of us sat there, listening silently.

“Mind if I ask you one question?”

“Not at all,” I said.

“What’s the deal with you and this song?” she asked. “Every time you’re here, it seems, they play that number. A house rule of some sort?”

“No. They just know I like it.”

“It is a beautiful song.”

I nodded. “It took me a long time to figure out how complex it is, how there’s so much more to it than just a pretty melody. It takes a special kind of musician to play it right,” I said. “Duke Ellington and Billy Strayhorn wrote it a long time ago. Fifty-seven, I believe.”

“When they say ‘star-crossed,’ what do they mean?”

“You know—lovers born under an unlucky star. Unlucky lovers. Here it’s referring to Romeo and Juliet. Ellington and Strayhorn wrote it for a performance at the Ontario Shakespeare Festival. In the original recording, Johnny Hodges’ alto sax was Juliet, and Paul Gonsalves played the Romeo part on tenor sax.”

“Lovers born under an unlucky star,” she said. “Sounds like it was written for the two of us.”

“You mean we’re lovers?”

“You think we’re not?”

I looked at her. She