But Takeru was wrong. The big thing didn’t have to be in a mother (though of course it could be), and it wasn’t always necessarily linked to a church. You could say it was connected in a way to the jizo shrines, but also unconnected. Takeru would realize all this after he went to live with Mitsuko in the village by the sea. Mitsuko’s beliefs in God or Buddha were no stronger than anyone else’s, but this thing was always with her.
In fact, the little village was full of it. So why had Takeru’s mother said she hated the place? Why had she wanted to get away as soon as she could?
And the big thing wasn’t only in this narrow stretch of land by the sea. No. It was everywhere. If it wasn’t, why had Sasaki and Joel helped Takeru and his brother? Why, simply living next door, did they reach out their hands—those hands so different in shape, color, and size, yet, in the care they showed to defenseless things, identical? Maybe this thing was not just in the atmosphere, wrapping itself around people—perhaps it could come and go freely in people’s hearts. It was surely this that had made Haruka’s mother notice Takeru and his brother. It was this that had brought to Joel’s attention the apartment in the next-door building, the clear signs of habitation there, even though the lights were never on, even at night. It wasn’t by chance that Joel and the boy saw each other that day. After getting off work early Joel had spent time watching the open window next door, as though waiting for little animals to come out of their burrow. He had bread, drinks, and fruit—not much, but some. Maybe for him it was like feeding animals. Or maybe it wasn’t.
Did Takeru realize that Joel watched over them?
One late afternoon, Takeru was sitting on a broken bench in the overgrown backyard of the apartment block. He was reading a magazine he’d found lying around somewhere. He looked up. The sky above the orchard to the west was tinted orange. He noticed a shiny black car pull up on the road by the orchard fence. Normally he didn’t pay attention to what cars were parked nearby, but this time he did. He felt a kind of premonition. Maybe the big thing was telling him something. The moment the man got out of the car, Takeru’s blood froze. He felt cold sweat streaming down his back.
It was him.
Takeru’s mother called him Kazuhiro—and sometimes “Kazuhiroh,” extending the final syllable in a wheedling, girlish voice. Takeru would think of this nightmare of a man when, in the village by the sea, he first heard the cry of a deer, kani-hiro-. It was like his mother’s voice when she called Kazuhiroh. According to Mitsuko, though, the cry was that of a buck calling to a doe, not the other way around.
Kazuhiro didn’t look frightening in the least. In fact he almost looked kind. He was slim and muscular, with narrow hips. He had short spikey hair, and his eyebrows were neatly plucked and trimmed, his eyes deep-set. Sometimes there were Band-Aids around his eyes. Takeru remembered him—or was it his mother?—telling him that he boxed or something. He had a gold necklace, a large black shiny watch, and bracelets. He wore chunky rings on his fingers.
He was always very neatly dressed. If he came inside their apartment in Momono he’d immediately start to look uncomfortable, checking the bottoms of his socks.
If he saw any dirt or dust he’d click his tongue. “It’s filthy in here,” he’d say. “And it stinks of garbage. Do some cleaning!” “Sorry Kazuhiroh!” Takeru’s mother would say. Or “I know, I’ll do it properly next time!” But she’d never done it properly before. And she wouldn’t now.
One day, Kazuhiro’s patience snapped. His eyes flashed with rage. He leaned down and picked up a wooden hanger from a pile of laundry that had been lying unfolded on the floor for days.
“How can I get it into your head? I told you to clean up, so clean the fuck up! How many times do I have to say it, you stupid whore?”
He spat out the words in a fury and then, as Takeru’s mother wearily pushed the laundry together with her foot, he brought the wooden hanger down on her head with a crack. The boys were right there. Takeru saw it. Did his brother? Did he understand what he saw?
Takeru’s head swam. He didn’t know if his brother was tense. He can’t recall what expression was on his mother’s face, but then he doesn’t remember her face at all. He does remember her sinking silently to the floor though, her hands clasped to her head, crimson oozing from the gaps between her fingers. Did Takeru hurl himself at Kazuhiro to protect his mother? He couldn’t move. His knees were shaking. He was petrified. He imagined the hanger being brought down on his own head. He felt he was about to pee. Maybe he did pee. With Takeru in such a state, wouldn’t it have been reasonable for his brother to cry out? Wouldn’t it have been reasonable, with spittle still dribbling from his mouth, for him miraculously to face up to the man who’d injured his mother? But of course that is a miracle that didn’t happen.
The violence continued. Takeru’s mother was hit by a glass and an ashtray thrown across the room. She was punched by a thick-ringed fist. She was kicked in the belly and back as she cowered on the floor, unable to speak out of fear and pain. Even then no miracle happened. Maybe Takeru wanted to punish her. Why? Because whenever this storm of a young man came or left, it was as though their sudden fights had never happened. She would nestle up to him. “Kazuhiroh,” she’d say in that wheedling voice—a doe calling to a buck. She spent hours happily making herself up for him, putting on her favorite clothes. There was no space to walk on the floor; it was always strewn with crumpled tissues and tester packets of makeup, so many that he wondered where they came from. There were bottles of mascara and nail polish; tubes and jars and powdery brushes both big and small; clothes she’d ultimately decided not to wear, coils of discarded tights. Sometimes she wore big showy sunglasses, like locust eyes, to hide her bruises. She’d leave a thousand-yen note by the door, telling Takeru to get some prepackaged meals at the convenience store, and then she’d run downstairs to meet the man waiting outside in his fancy foreign car. The low hum of its engine welled up from the depths of the earth, making the air tremble. The thousand-yen note stank of her perfume, though it had only been in his mother’s hand for a moment. The smell spread to Takeru’s fingers and he put them under his brother’s nose. Did his nostrils flinch? Was there a change in his eyes? Any flicker of happiness or disgust?
He would think of his brother’s eyes the day Hii-chan took him out to fish on the floating quay that stretched a hundred meters out into the bay.
“There’re some sea turtles in there,” said Hii-chan, pointing down into the fish pen. “Someone caught ’em.”
Takeru looked excitedly into the fish pen, but the water was dark and he couldn’t see to the bottom. He couldn’t sense any movement, but as though trying to convince himself that he could, he pointed to the corner of the pen.
“Looks like there’s something over there,” he said to Hii-chan.
The water wasn’t showing him what he wanted to see. It’s my brother’s eyes, he thought. It reflected the sky and hills, and along with them the quay, the boats, and Takeru himself. Yes, his brother was staring up at him, seeing him as part of this land—the land his mother hated, detested.