A Cop's Eyes (11 page)

Miu's eyes moistened heavily at the pointed question. It was clear that he was doing his damned best to choke back sobs.

“Let it go … Men cry, too.”

Then wailing filled the interrogation room.

What time are you coming home today?

It was as he left the company that the message came from Ryuta.

Atsuro Yoshizawa slowed his pace. Today, together with his subordinate Hattori, he had to entertain important clients. He would probably be out late.

“Let me send a reply real quick,” he told Hattori, who was walking next to him, before typing on his phone,
I'll be late entertaining guests, so eat ahead of me. Your veggies too
.

Just a handful of seconds after he sent it, the reply came in three English letters:
YES
.

Rather curt—

“Your son?” Hattori asked, to which Yoshizawa nodded. “How old was he again?”

“Fourteen—second year of middle school.”

“You must be close if you're texting each other.”

“You think?”

“Around that age, don't they usually rebel?”

The rebellious age—for now, Ryuta wasn't showing any symptoms.

“Well, I guess my son is beyond that,” Yoshizawa answered with some pride as they headed to the station.

That day's entertainment ended much earlier than he thought.

After parting ways with Hattori at Iidabashi station, Yoshizawa
got on the subway.

He mixed in with the salaried workers heading home on the train just after ten o'clock. Holding on to a grab handle, he thought over the day's achievements.

The person he'd entertained that day was in charge of stocking a supermarket chain of over forty stores in the metropolitan area. Sounding out the client's opinion of the new snack that would be sold next month, Yoshizawa saw that it was going over well.

The reflection of his face in the window caught his eye. He looked tired. He would be. Since he'd been promoted to sales manager four months ago, he'd barely taken any time off.

I shouldn't be complaining, not in these times
, he chided himself, drawing back a sigh.

He looked around the carriage. It wasn't just him. Most of the other passengers were also working their heads off for their families. For their families …

Hattori's words came back to him:
Around that age, don't they usually rebel?

Ryuta wouldn't. He was a good kid who didn't cause his father trouble, perhaps partly because he'd lost his mother early.

Ryuta's mother Akiko had succumbed to breast cancer seven years ago, when the boy was in his first year of elementary school. He was alone often, so there had to be times when he felt lonely, but he never complained or whined to Yoshizawa. It seemed like Ryuta had come by some of his father's grit. He even had good grades, put energy into club activities, and did all of his chores.

But lately, Yoshizawa had noticed that they weren't conversing as much.

He'd always called home if he was going to be late at work while Ryuta was still in elementary school. They were just ten-minute conversations, tops, but he used to listen to his son go on about school and his friends. Then they switched to cellphones,
and at some point, to texting.

He arrived at Oizumi Gakuen station before eleven. His condominium was about a ten-minute walk from there.

Lately, he'd been coming home past midnight more often than not and couldn't have real conversations with his son, but Ryuta might still be awake at that hour.

Yoshizawa walked homeward across the dim residential district at a brisk pace.

A white minivan idled at the park near his condominium. His march slowed when he saw someone getting out of the vehicle; he recognized the boy. Wasn't it was one of Ryuta's classmates—Jumpei Higuchi?

What could he be doing this late at night?

Yoshizawa thought of calling out to him, but when a second silhouette emerged from the car, he froze.

Ryuta?
He gawked at the boy, who was wearing a sweatshirt and a backpack. There was no doubt. It was Ryuta—

A young man who'd come out from the driver's side and was saying something to Ryuta pulled some bills out of his wallet and handed them to him.

Ryuta took the money and walked off toward the condominium with Jumpei.

After the two boys' forms receded, Yoshizawa approached the minivan, slowly.

The young man who'd given Ryuta money was smoking a cigarette outside the car and cackling. There was another guy inside. They seemed to be twenty, give or take. Their tank tops left several tattoos exposed between them.

Passing by the minivan's side, Yoshizawa cast a glance through the open door as if he didn't really mean to. The interior was loaded with what looked like steel wire or bundles of cable.

The men might have been doing some sort of construction work, but why were they with Ryuta and Jumpei?

Part time work
, he thought for a moment, but doubting that was the case, he dismissed the idea. There was no chance that they'd hire middle schoolers.

What
was
it?

He wanted to sprint right away to Ryuta and ask, but couldn't.

The look he'd just seen on his son's face was burned into his mind. The Ryuta who'd taken the money wore a dark, brooding expression that Yoshizawa had never seen on him until now.

Suddenly, he was walking faster. The path to his condominium seemed terribly long.

When he reached his unit, he struggled over whether to ring the bell or to unlock the door himself. In the end, he went for his keys.

“I'm home—”

When he opened the door, Ryuta was right near the entrance. Yoshizawa seemed to have caught his son as he was heading to his own room. Meeting Yoshizawa's eyes, Ryuta looked surprised for a moment.

“You're early …” he muttered, averting his eyes ever so slightly.

“Yeah …”

Yoshizawa wanted to question his son there and then, but his rehearsed words would not come out. Taking off his shoes and stepping up from the alcove, he pulled a snack from his briefcase.

“Our next new product … Wanna try it with me in the living room?”

“I'll pass for today. I have school tomorrow,” Ryuta replied, his eyes turned away, and went into his room.

At a loss, Yoshizawa stood stock-still staring at the closed door.

The next morning, he woke up half an hour earlier than usual.

Hoping to bring the conversation around to it in the morning, he'd wound back the alarm by thirty minutes.

This shouldn't be too hard, should it? He just needed to say he'd seen his son the night before in the park. Just ask him: what connection did he have with those guys. It had to be something trivial. Despite the said guys' outward appearances, considering youth fashion nowadays, it didn't necessarily mean they were bad people. You even saw many musicians and athletes with tattoos on TV. He wasn't going to judge people by their appearances. There was no way Ryuta would associate with that kind of crowd in the first place—

He had ended up tossing and turning in bed until dawn thinking such thoughts.

Since he'd only dozed off for an hour, his head felt heavy, but he got up and left his bedroom. Ryuta wasn't in the living room. Always going out to school by the time his father woke up. Before, Yoshizawa would rise at the same hour and have breakfast together, but these days he was just too tired and slept right up to the last moment.

Usually, Ryuta would be having breakfast around now. Thinking he might still be asleep, Yoshizawa stepped toward his son's room, but saw that Ryuta's shoes were missing from the alcove. Maybe he'd left quietly so his father wouldn't notice.

Was he being considerate, or …

Thwarted, Yoshizawa took the newspaper from the letter slot and returned to the living room. He poured himself some coffee and sat on the sofa to skim the paper. An article in the corner of the local news section almost made him spit out his coffee.

Metal cables were disappearing from construction sites around the capital with alarming frequency.

It couldn't be … Uh-uh, not possible. What was he thinking? No way Ryuta was part of a gang of thieves.

He gave Ryuta money for food and allowances every day. He
made sure his son had enough.

But … could he be absolutely certain? How well did he really know Ryuta now?

Anxiety began to thrust up from deep in his heart.

For about the past month, he'd barely seen Ryuta. They hadn't talked, either. He didn't not even know what his son was doing with his time while his father was out of the house. Because they relied on texts, he didn't even know where Ryuta was messaging from.

Unable to contain himself any longer, he headed to Ryuta's room.

When he reached the door, however, he hesitated. Believing that trust was golden in a parent-child relationship, up until now he hadn't gone into his son's room without permission. But he couldn't afford that luxury at the moment. He wanted to hurry and find something to negate his anxiety.

He opened the door and entered. The first thing that came to his attention was the desk. Six crumpled five-thousand-yen bills were scattered over the top.

It was probably the cash Ryuta had taken from that guy yesterday.

Yoshizawa looked into the corner and his palpitations grew worse. A pair of blackened gloves and pliers lay on the sweatshirt Ryuta had worn the day before.

Yoshizawa left the office shortly after 6:30 p.m.

How long had it been since he'd wrapped up so early? He'd gotten into the habit of working overtime night after night even when he didn't have to entertain. Yet today, he hadn't been able to focus at all.

Given his state, there was no sense in him staying, and he had something to do as a father. He understood that, but he was scared of going straight home.

If he did and Ryuta wasn't there—well, he'd spend anxious hours alone, his imagination running wild. If Ryuta was home, on the other hand, he wasn't sure what to say to him face to face.

What a pitiful father.

Until now, he'd never been caught up in worries like these. He'd never even imagined being troubled by such matters when it came to his Ryuta. What was he going to do? He couldn't possibly consult anyone about this, either.

Suddenly, a certain man's face floated into his mind.

He
would be able to dispense sound advice.

Though Yoshizawa didn't doubt that, he was also reluctant to contact the man, and not because he'd be laying bare his own pitifulness. The man was his one close friend to whom he could show his shabbiest worst. But these days, his friend was …

Yoshizawa looked at his cellphone and faltered.

As he drank his second draft beer, he heard the establishment's entrance swing open.

“It's been a while.”

When Yoshizawa turned around, Nobuhito Natsume, who'd come into the pub, casually raised his hand.

“Boss, can I get a draft beer, a skewer assortment, a sashimi appetizer … and fried tofu and edamame,” Natsume ordered from the chef at the counter before taking his seat at Yoshizawa's table. “Did I make you wait?” he asked with a smile.

“No, I'm just on my second glass. Sorry to borrow your time out of the blue like this …”

He'd called Natsume's cell after considerable hesitation. The man worked in twenty-four-hour shifts, so if he couldn't make the time, Yoshizawa was ready to give up. But Natsume had just completed one, and they'd arranged to meet at this familiar
izakaya
.

He was a close friend from high school back north in Aomori,
and they'd both come to Tokyo after graduating. They'd continued to meet up while attending different colleges. Yoshizawa joined the confectionary company he still worked for right upon obtaining his bachelor's degree. Meanwhile, Natsume, who'd wanted to become a teacher since high school and who, Yoshizawa assumed, would continue on the path, instead enrolled in the graduate program in psychology and became a “judiciary technical officer,” which involved interviewing offending youths at juvie and stuff.

Yoshizawa thought that Natsume, considering his experience with boys who'd committed crimes, might have solid advice about the matter at hand. At the same time, he was afraid to broach the subject. Natsume had switched jobs and was now a cop; his current occupation was precisely to catch anyone who'd run afoul of the law.

When Natsume's beer came, they toasted to start off.

“How's work?” asked Natsume.

“Ah … I made manager the other day, and I've been pretty busy …”

“Really? Congratulations.”

“What about you?”

Natsume served with the East Ikebukuro precinct. Some time ago, when Yoshizawa had been drinking in Ikebukuro, he'd been bemused to witness a uniformed Natsume coping with a drunkard at a police box.

“I was assigned to the detective section,” Natsume said. Yoshizawa thought his friend's eyes gave off a glint.

Yoshizawa couldn't quite manage to say congratulations, though Natsume must have wanted the job. “Is that right …”

“Is Ryuta doing fine?”

Yoshizawa started a little at his son abruptly being brought up, but nodded and replied with a choked “Yeah …”

“What grade was he again now?”

“Second year of middle school.”

“Right … he was already that age,” Natsume said wistfully.

Yoshizawa could guess what was on his friend's mind. Natsume's daughter Emi was the same age as Ryuta. When their kids were little, their families often visited each other, but that had come to an end ten years ago.

“Extracurriculars?” Natsume asked.

“He's in the kendo club.”

“Just like his dad.”

Yoshizawa had played kendo from elementary school to high school, and he was the one who had recommended the martial sport to Ryuta.