4.01 Shotgun

Sunday morning came faster than I would have liked. After tossing and turning all night, I pushed got up and took a long shower, letting the cool water run over my numb body.

*

I met Yuri and two other friends, Nobu and Mika, at Small Spaces the night before after unsuccessfully trying to contact my cousin for god knows how many times. It goes without saying that I wasn’t in much of a partying mood, but tried to give Yuri a proper shoving off all the same.

Saddling up to the counter, I ordered a shotgun for the four of us. The bartender, nodded and went about throwing the drink together--dropping hand-crushed ice into a crystal tub, then adding a few shots of a 192-proof vodka from Poland called Spirytus Rektyfikowany, Specht Pampelmuse grapefruit liqueur, freshly squeezed lemon and grapefruit juices, and soda. After giving the concoction a good stir, he placed tub before us and four shot glasses. I poured Yuri, Nobu, Mika and then myself a shot.

“Yuri,” I said, raising my shot glass, “when you get to Tokyo, don’t forget us country bumpkins stuck here in Fukuoka. Kampai!”

“Kampai!”

I had known Yuri--and Nobu, too, come to think of it--a good five, six years. Long enough for the two of them to have unwitting bystanders of the collapse of my marriage, my descent into drug use and subsequent recovery, the separation and divorce from Yuko, the financial straits that had followed and rebound, and so much more. They had been with me through all of it, and yet didn’t know diddlysquat about what I had gone through. Talk about poker-faced discretion!

“Why the long face,” Mika asked as she poured me another shot.

“He lost his phone,” Yuri answered for me.

“Yeah, it’s my phone. Good grief, what a hassle,” I said, knocking back the shot. “Speaking of ‘long faces’, Mika, you’ve reminded me of a pretty good joke. It doesn’t translate well, so I’ll tell it to you in English: A horse walks into a bar. The bartender asks, ‘Why the long face?’”

Silence.

There was plenty to be depressed about, the possibility of going jail and jokes falling flat, notwithstanding. So many people I counted among my friends were moving away. My ex-wife had remarried and was now in Tokyo. After being together for more than ten years, her absence was like the sooty shadow on the wall from a painting that went missing. Jean, who had been in my life for nearly as long, was leaving Japan in a matter of months for destinations unknown. And now, Yuri was being transferred to Tokyo. Nobu, too, would be moving to Nagoya next spring, leaving only Mika. The youngest among us, Mika would, by and by, get knocked up by her boyfriend and fade away as young mothers do. I might have sought recourse in that old gang of expats I had once hung out with before Jean if attrition, marriage and kids hadn’t thinned them out. My circle of friends and acquaintances was shrinking faster than a drop of water on a hot skillet.

*

When I emerged from the shower, Azami, who had slept over, grinding her teeth all night, was in the kitchen preparing a breakfast of rice balls with pickled plums, miso soup, tamagomaki, slices of smoked ham and a simple salad. It looked and tasted lovely, but with my stomach full of butterflies, I had little room for food. Azami insisted that I eat up. Twelve years my junior, a full generation of the Chinese calendar, the girl still managed to act like my mother.

What in the world does this girl see in me, I wondered as I nibbled on a rice ball. There’s got to be better men out there. Men who are more handsome, more reliable, more loving, more faithful . . .

Having been told to meet Ozawa at his office in Hakata at nine-thirty, I left at a quarter past eight to give myself plenty of time. 

Azami kissed me good-bye at the door and wished me good luck. With a heavy sigh, I headed for the Akasaka station. 

Had it been a weekday the train would have been packed, shoulder-to-shoulder, with bleary-eyed salarimen, reeking of cigarettes and last night's shochu. There would have been office ladies preening themselves, and school girls in their pressed sailor uniforms thumbing out messages on their cell phones, oblivious to the men who craned their necks to get a better gander at their panties. Today being Sunday, the train was mostly empty, each car carrying a few lifeless passengers, like half-deflated Dutch wives.

Down the entire length of the railcar hanging from clips in the ceiling like laundry drying in the sun were posters, called tsurikôkoku, which advertised the newshinkansen line connecting Kagoshima with Hakata. Each poster showed a famous spot in the Kagoshima prefecture: the sand spas of Ibusuki with the dormant volcano Mt. Kaimon rising like a mossy cone in the distance, the ornate Kirishima Jingu shrine surrounded by autumn hews of maples, Mount Sakurajima, on the other side of Kinko Bay, burping a plume of smoke from its caldera. Each poster featured a sleek white bullet train racing across the bottom and the alluring actress Hitomi Kuroki, dressed in an elegant kimono making bedroom eyes. 

"Next stop Nakasu Kawabata. Nakasu Kawabata," a sugary female voice announced.

I was seized by the urge to bolt the country. I had the cash, not a lot, but enough. I could take the shinkansen all the way to Kagoshima where I could catch a ferry to Amami Oshima, then another ferry to Okinawa. From there, I could sail on to the southern-most island of Yonaguni. It would take two days, possibly more to get that far, a long time considering it was only two and a half hours' flight away. But there'd be no records, no ID checks if I went by ship. I could vanish. 

My friend on Yonaguni could put me up for a few nights. Two or three days would give me more than enough time to think. Then, if I did decide to flee Japan, well, I supposed a fishing boat could take me to Taiwan. It’s only a hundred kilometers away. I could use my Lebanese passport to enter the country and fly out of Taipei, making my way to Lebanon. I could deal with the cops from there. I was still a free man; after all, they hadn't arrest me. 

The screws may have been tightened, but I could still wiggle. If the cops really had anything on me, they would have carted me away with my computers and pee and other flimsy evidence Thursday morning. 

"Next stop Gion. Gion," the woman's voice reminded me. 

Only one more stop, my heartbeat quickened. I still had time to turn around and head back to my apartment where I could call Ozawa and make up some excuse or another, tell him I overslept and would be there by ten-thirty. Better yet, I could tell him that I was talking to my lawyer and that I'd be there at noon. And before Ozawa knew what happened, I'd be on the shinkansen to Kagoshima bulleting my way through the mountains of Kyushu at 300 km/h.

But what would happen if I did manage to escape? Would I be able to return to Japan? Would I have to give up everything I’ve suffered so long to achieve: my home, my permanent residence status, my career--if you could call it one--the few friends I still had and my ex-wife's family? Despite the divorce, they had stayed by my side, magnanimity I did not deserve. Would I ever be able to see them again? What about my rabbit, Pyon? Who’d care for him? And Azami? I know she’d be better off without a loser like me in her life, but would I? 

"Next stop, Hakata. All passengers transferring to the JR Kagoshima main line  . . . "

The train stopped, bells chimed, the doors hissed open.

It was five past eight-thirty in the morning. I had a little under an hour to kill, an hour to fill my head with silly ideas about lamming it.

I still have time to call Ozawa, tell him I was feeling ill, but would be there at eleven. No, tell him I’d be there at noon. That would give me over three hours. Enough time to pack my bags and empty my bank accounts and . . . I could take a taxi back to the station, catch the first Shinkansen to Kagoshima . . . ride it all the way to Kagoshima . . . just me, and Hitomi Kuroki in her kimono, and freedom. All I have to do walk to the other side of the platform and board the train going the other way. All I have to do is take the train back to Akasaka. Back to Akasaka . . .

To read the first installment of No.6, please go here.

To read the remainder of No.6, please visit here.

© Aonghas Crowe, 2010. All rights reserved. No unauthorized duplication of any kind.

注意：この作品はフィクションです。登場人物、団体等、実在のモノとは一切関係ありません。

All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

No. 6 is now available on Kindle.