Kafka on the Shore (40 page)

But you know, she's right. Every single day, each time I see her face, see her, it's utterly precious.

For a man his age Colonel Sanders was light on his feet, and so fast that he resembled a veteran speed walker. And he seemed to know every nook and cranny of the city. He took short cuts up dark, narrow staircases, turning sideways to squeeze through the narrow passages between houses. He leaped over a ditch, hushing a barking dog behind a hedge with a short command. Like some restless spirit searching for its home, his small white-suited figure raced through the back alleys of the town. It was all Hoshino could do to keep up. He was soon out of breath, his armpits soaked. Colonel Sanders never once looked back to see if he was following.

"Hey, are we almost there?" Hoshino finally called out impatiently.

"What are you talking about, young fellow? I wouldn't even call this a walk,"

Colonel Sanders replied, still not turning around.

"Yeah, but I'm a customer, remember? What's going to happen to my sex drive if I'm all pooped out?"

"What a disgrace! And you call yourself a man? If a little walk's going to kill your desire, you might as well not have any from the beginning."

"Jeez," Hoshino muttered.

Colonel Sanders cut across another side street, crossed a main road, oblivious to the traffic light, and continued walking. He strode over a bridge and ducked into a shrine.

A fairly big shrine, by the looks of it, but it was late and no one else was around.

Colonel Sanders pointed to a bench in front of the shrine office, indicating that Hoshino should take a seat. A mercury lamp was next to the bench, and everything was as bright as day. Hoshino did as he was told, and Colonel Sanders sat down next to him.

"You're not going to make me do it here, are you?" Hoshino asked worriedly.

"Don't be an idiot. We're not like those deer that hang around the famous shrines and go at it. I'm not about to have you do it in a shrine. Who do you think I am, anyway?" Then he extracted a silver cell phone from his pocket and punched in a three-digit number. "Yeah, it's me," he said when the other person answered. "The usual place.

The shrine. I've got a young man named Hoshino here with me. That's right... the same as usual. Yes, I got it. Just get here as soon as you can." He switched off the phone and slipped it back into the pocket of his white suit.

"Do you always call up the girls from this shrine?" Hoshino asked.

"Anything wrong with that?"

"No, not really. I was just thinking there's got to be a better place. Someplace more... normal? A coffee shop, or maybe have me wait in a hotel room?"

"A shrine's quiet. And the air's crisp and clean."

"True, but waiting for a girl on a bench in front of a shrine office—it's hard to relax. I feel like I'm going to fall under the spell of one of those fox spirits or something."

"What are you talking about? You're not making fun of Shikoku now, are you? Takamatsu's a proper city—the prefectural capital, in fact. Not some hick town. We don't have any foxes here."

"Okay, okay, just kidding.... But you're in the service industry, so I was just thinking you'd better worry more about creating an atmosphere, you know what I'm saying? Something luxurious, to get you in the mood. I don't know, maybe it's none of my business."

"You're right. It isn't," Colonel Sanders intoned. "Now about that stone..."

"Right! The stone... Tell me about it."

"After you do the deed. Then we talk."

"Doing the deed's important, huh?"

Colonel Sanders nodded gravely a couple of times, and tugged at his goatee.

"That's right. It's a formality you have to go through. Then we'll talk about the stone. I know you're going to like this girl. She's our top girl. Luscious breasts, skin like silk. A nice, curvy waist, hot and wet right where you like it, a regular sex machine. To use a car metaphor, she's four-wheel drive in bed, turbocharged desire, step on the gas, the surging gearshift in her hands, you round the corner, she shifts gears ecstatically, you race out in the passing lane, and bang! You're there—Hoshino's dead and gone to heaven."

"You're quite a character, you know that?" Hoshino said admiringly.

"Like I said, I'm not in this business for my health."

Fifteen minutes later the girl arrived, and Colonel Sanders was right—she was a knockout. Tight miniskirt, black high heels, a small black-enamel shoulder bag. She could easily have been a model. Generous breasts, too, spilling out of her low-cut top.

"Will she do?" Colonel Sanders asked.

Hoshino was too stunned to reply, and just nodded.

"A veritable sex machine, Hoshino. Have yourself a ball," Colonel Sanders said, smiling for the first time. He gave Hoshino a pinch on the rump.

The girl took Hoshino to a nearby love hotel, where she filled up the bathtub, quickly slipped out of her clothes, and then undressed him. She washed him carefully all over, then commenced to lick him, sliding into a totally artistic act of fellatio, doing things to him he'd never seen or heard of in his life. He couldn't think of anything else but coming, and come he did.

"Man alive, that was fantastic. I've never felt like that," Hoshino said, languidly sinking back in the hot tub.

"That's just the beginning," the girl said. "Wait till you see what's next."

"Yeah, but man that was good."

"How good?"

"Like there's no past or future anymore."

"The pure present is an ungraspable advance of the past devouring the future. In truth, all sensation is already memory."

Hoshino looked up, mouth half open, and gazed at her face. "What's that?"

"Henri Bergson," she replied, licking the semen from the tip of his penis. "Mame mo memelay."

"I'm sorry?"

"Matter and Memory. You ever read it?"

"I don't think so," Hoshino replied after a moment's thought. Except for the special SDF driver's manual he was forced to study—and the books on Shikoku history he'd just gone through at the library—he couldn't remember reading anything except manga.

"Have you read it?"

The girl nodded. "I had to. I'm majoring in philosophy in college, and we have exams coming up."

"You don't say," Hoshino said. "So this is a part-time job?"

"To help pay tuition."

She took him over to the bed, stroked him all over with her fingertips and tongue, getting another erection out of him. A firm hard-on, a Tower of Pisa at carnival time.

"See, you're ready to go again," the girl remarked, slowly segueing into her next set of motions. "Any special requests? Something you'd like me to do? Mr. Sanders asked me to make sure you got everything you want."

"I can't think of anything special, but could you quote some more of that philosophy stuff? I don't know why, but it might keep me from coming so quick. Otherwise I'll lose it pretty fast."

"Let's see.... This is pretty old, but how about some Hegel?"

"Whatever."

"I recommend Hegel. He's sort of out of date, but definitely an oldie but goodie."

"Sounds good to me."

"At the same time that 'I' am the content of a relation, 'I' am also that which does the relating."

"Hmm..."

"Hegel believed that a person is not merely conscious of self and object as separate entities, but through the projection of the self via the mediation of the object is volitionally able to gain a deeper understanding of the self. All of which constitutes self-consciousness."

"I don't know what the heck you're talking about."

"Well, think of what I'm doing to you right now. For me I'm the self, and you're the object. For you, of course, it's the exact opposite—you're the self to you and I'm the object. And by exchanging self and object, we can project ourselves onto the other and gain self-consciousness. Volitionally."

"I still don't get it, but it sure feels good."

"That's the whole idea," the girl said.

Afterward he said good-bye to the girl and returned to the shrine, where Colonel Sanders was sitting on the bench just as he'd left him.

"You been waiting here the whole time?" Hoshino asked.

Colonel Sanders shook his head irritably. "Don't be a moron. Do I really look like I have that much time on my hands? While you were sailing off to heaven, I was working the back alleys again. She called me when you finished, and I rushed over. So, how was our little sex machine? Pretty good, I'll bet."

"She was great. No complaints by me. I got off three times. Volitionally speaking. I must've lost five pounds."

"Glad to hear it. Now, about the stone..."

"Right, that's what I came here for."

"Actually, the stone's in the woods right here in this shrine."

"We're talking about the entrance stone?"

"That's right. The entrance stone."

"Are you sure you're not just making this up?"

Colonel Sanders's head shot up. "What are you talking about, you dingbat? Have I ever lied to you? Do I just make up things? I told you I'd get you a supple young sex machine, and I kept my end of the bargain. At a bargain-basement price, too—only $120, and you were brazen enough to shoot off three times, no less. All that and you still doubt me?"

"Don't blow a fuse! Of course I believe you. It's just that when things are going along a little too smoothly, I get a bit suspicious, that's all. I mean, think about it—I'm walking along and a guy in a funny getup calls out to me, tells me he knows where to find the stone, then I go with him and get off with this drop-dead-gorgeous babe."

"Three times, you mean."

"Whatever. So I get off three times, and then you tell me the stone I'm looking for is right over there? That would confuse anybody."

"You still don't get it, do you? We're talking about a revelation here," Colonel Sanders said, clicking his tongue. "A revelation leaps over the borders of the everyday. A life without revelation is no life at all. What you need to do is move from reason that observes to reason that acts. That's what's critical. Do you have any idea what I'm talking about, you gold-plated whale of a dunce?"

"The projection and exchange between self and object...?" Hoshino timidly began.

"Good. I'm glad you know that much at least. That's the point. Follow me, and you can pay your respects to your precious stone. A special package deal, just for you."

I call up Sakura from the public phone in the library. I realize I haven't been in touch once since that night at her place—just a short note and that was it. I'm kind of embarrassed about the way I said good-bye. After I left her apartment I went right to the library, Oshima drove me up to the cabin for a few days, well out of range of any phone.

Then I came to live and work at the library, encountering Miss Saeki's living spirit—or something like it—every night. And I've fallen head over heels for that fifteen-year-old girl. A ton of things happened, one after another—enough to keep anybody busy. Not that that's any excuse.

It's around nine p. m. when I call, and she answers after six rings.

"Where in the world have you been?" Sakura asks in a hard voice.

"I'm still in Takamatsu."

She doesn't say anything for a while. In the background I hear a music program on TV.

"Somehow I've survived," I add.

Silence, then a kind of resigned sigh.

"What did you mean by disappearing like that? I was worried about you, so I came home a little early that day. Even did some shopping for us."

"I know it was wrong. I do. But I had to leave. My mind was all messed up and I had to get away to think things out, try to get back on my feet. Being with you was—I don't know—I can't put it into words."

"Overstimulating?"

"Yeah. I've never been near a girl like that before."

"No kidding?"

"You know, the scent of a girl. All kinds of things..."

"Pretty rough being young, huh?"

"I guess," I say. "So how's your job going?"

"It's been a madhouse. But I wanted to work and save up some money, so I shouldn't complain."

I pause, then tell her about the police looking for me.

She's silent for a while, then cautiously says, "All that business with the blood?"

I decide to hold back on telling the truth. "No, that's not it. Nothing about the blood. They're after me because I'm a runaway. They want to catch me and ship me back to Tokyo, that's all. So the cops might get in touch with you. The other day, the night I stayed over, I called your cell phone using mine, and they traced the phone records and found I was here in Takamatsu."

"Don't worry," she says. "It's a prepaid phone, so there's no way they can trace the owner."

"That's a relief," I say. "I didn't want to cause you any more trouble than I already have."

"You're so sweet you're going to make me cry, you know that?"

"No, that's how I really feel."

"I know," she says like she'd rather not admit it. "So where's our little runaway staying these days?"

"Somebody I know is letting me stay over."

"Since when do you know anybody here?"

How could I possibly summarize everything that's happened to me in the past few days? "It's a long story," I say.

"With you it's always long stories."

"I don't why, but it always turns out that way."

"Sort of a tendency of yours?"

"I guess so," I reply. "I'll tell you all about it someday when I have the time. It's not like I'm hiding anything. I just can't explain it well over the phone."

"That's okay. I just hope you're not into anything you shouldn't be."

"No, nothing like that. I'm okay, don't worry."

She sighs again. "I can understand wanting to be out on your own, but just don't get mixed up with anything illegal, okay? It isn't worth it. I don't want to see you die some miserable teenage death like Billy the Kid."

"Billy the Kid didn't die in his teens," I correct her. "He killed twenty-one people and died when he was twenty-one."

"If you say so.... Anyway, was there something you wanted?"

"I just wanted to thank you. I feel bad about leaving like that after you were so nice."