Dance Dance Dance (15 page)

She was Kiki. I'm Mei, the other girl's Mami. Everyone's four letters or less. It's our cover. Private life is out-of-bounds. We don't know and we don't ask. Manners, you know. We're all real friendly and we go out together some-times. But it's not really us. We don't actually know each other. Mei, Kiki. These names don't have real lives. We're all image. Signs tacked up in empty air. That's why we respect each other's illusions. Does that make sense?"

"Perfect sense," I said.

"Some of our customers take pity on us. But we don't do this just for the money. Me, for example, I do it 'cause it's fun. And because the club is strictly for members only, we don't have to worry about crazies, and everyone wants to have fun with us. After all, we're all in this made-up world together."

"Shoveling snow for the fun of it," I threw in.

"Right, shoveling snow for fun," she laughed. Then putting her lips to my chest, "Sometimes even snowball fights."

"Mei." I said her name over again. "I once knew a girl whose name really was Mei. She worked as a receptionist at the dentist's next to my office. From a farming family up in Hokkaido. Skinny, dark. Everyone called her Mei the Goat Girl."

"Mei the Goat Girl," she repeated. "And your name?"

"Winnie the Pooh," I said.

"Our own little fairy tale."

I drew her to me and kissed her. It was a heady kiss, a nostalgic kiss. Then we drank our umpteenth brandy-and-soda, and snuggled together while listening to the Police. Soon Mei had drifted off to sleep, no longer the beautiful dream woman, but only an ordi nary, brittle young girl. A class reunion. The clock read four o'clock and everything was still. Mei the Goat Girl and Winnie the Pooh. Images. Deductible fairy tales. What a day! Connections that almost connected but didn't. Follow the string until it snaps. I'd met Gotanda after all these years, even come to like him, really.

Through him I'd met Mei the Goat Girl. We made love. Which was wonderful. Shoveled sensual snow. But none of it led anywhere.

I made some coffee, and at half past six the others woke up. Mei had on a bathrobe. Mami came in wearing a paisley pajama top and Gotanda the bottom. I was in my jeans and T-shirt. We all took seats at the dining table and passed around the toast and marmalade. The fm station was play-ing "Baroque for You." A Henry Purcell pastoral.

"Morning at camp," I said.

Cuck-koo, sang Mei.

At seven-thirty Gotanda called a taxi for the girls. Mei kissed me good-bye. "If you find Kiki, give her my best," I said. I handed her my card and asked her to call if she learned anything.

"Hope we can meet again and shovel some more snow," she winked.

"Shovel snow?" Gotanda asked.

Gotanda and I sat down to another cup of coffee. It was like a commercial. A quiet morning, sun rising, Tokyo Tower gleaming in the distance. Tokyo begins its mornings with Nescafe.

Time for normal people to be starting their day. Not for us though. Like it or not, we two were excluded.

"Find out anything about Kiki?" asked Gotanda.

I shook my head. "Only that she'd disappeared. Just like you said. No leads, not a clue. Mei didn't even know her real name."

"I'll ask around the film company," he said. "Maybe somebody knows something."

He pouted slightly and pressed at his temple with the han-dle of his coffee spoon. He sure was good at it.

"But tell me, what do you plan to do if you find her?" he asked. "Try to win her back? Or is it just for old times?"

I told him I didn't know. I hadn't thought that far.

Gotanda saw me home in his spotless brown Maserati.

"Mind if I call you again soon?" he said. "It really was terrific seeing you. Don't know anyone else I can talk to like we did. That is, if it's okay by you."

"Of course," I said. And I thanked him again for the steak and drinks and girls and . . .

He gave a quiet shake of his head. Without a word, I understood everything he meant to say.

20

The next few days passed uneventfully. The phone rang, but the whole time I kept the answering machine on and didn't bother picking up. Nice to know that my services were still in demand, though. I cooked meals, went into Shibuya, and saw Unrequited Love every day. It was spring break, so the theater was always packed with high school students. It was like an animal house. I wanted to burn the place down.

Now that I knew what to look for, I was able to find Kiki's name, in fine type, in the opening credits.

Then after her scene, I'd leave the theater and walk my usual course. From Harajuku to the Jingu Stadium, Aoyama Cemetery, Omotesando, past the Jintan Building, back to Shibuya. Sometimes I'd stop for a coffee along the way. Spring had surely come, bringing its familiar smells. The earth persisted in its measured orbit of the sun. I always find it a cosmic mystery that spring knows when to follow win-ter. And how is it that spring always brings out the same smells? Year after year, however subtle, exactly identical.

The town was plastered with election posters. Ugly and repugnant. Trucks were making the rounds, blaring out speeches by politicians. So loud you couldn't tell what they were saying. Noise.

I walked and I thought about Kiki. And before long I noticed I'd regained my stride, a lift had come back to my step. My awareness of things around me had sharpened. I was moving forward intently, one step at a time. I had focus, a goal. Which somehow, quite naturally, lightened my step, almost gave me soft-shoe footwork. This was a good sign. Dance. Keep in step, light but steady. Freshen up, maintain the rhythm, keep things going. I had to pay careful attention where this was leading me to next. Had to make sure I stayed in this world.

The last four or five days of March passed in this way. On the surface, there was no progression at all. I'd do the shopping, make meals in the kitchen, see Unrequited, go for long walks. I'd play back the answering machine when I got home—inevitably calls about work. At night, I'd read and drink alone. Every day was a repeat of the day before.

Drinking alone at night, I fixated on sex with Mei the Goat Girl. Shoveling snow. An oddly isolated memory, unconnected to anything. Not to Gotanda, not to Kiki. But ever so real. Down to the smallest details, in some sense even more vivid than waking reality, though ultimately uncon-nected. I liked it that way. A self-bound meeting of souls. Two persons joined together respecting their illusions and images. That fine-we're-all-friends-here smile. Morning at camp. Cuck-koo.

I tried to picture Kiki and Gotanda sleeping together. Did she give him the same ultra-sexy service as Mei gave me? Were all the girls at the club drilled in such professional know-how? Or was Mei strictly her own technician? I had no idea, and I couldn't very well ask Gotanda. All the time Kiki was living with me, she was, if anything, rather passive about sex. Sure, she warmed up and responded, but she never made the first move, never had demands of her own. Not that I ever had any complaints. She was wonderful when she relaxed. Her soft inviting body, quiet easy breath, hot vagina. No, I had no complaints. I just couldn't picture her delivering professional favors to anyone—to Gotanda, for instance. Maybe I lacked the imagination.

How do prostitutes keep their private sex separate from their professional sex? Before Mei, I'd never slept with a call girl. I'd slept with Kiki. And Kiki was a call girl. But I didn't sleep with Kiki the call girl, I slept with Kiki. And conversely I'd slept with Mei the call girl, but not Mei. There probably was nothing to gain from correlating these two circum-stances. That would only make matters more complicated. And anyway, where does sex stop being a thing of the mind? Where does technique begin? How far does the real thing go, how much is acting? Was sufficient foreplay a spiritual con-cern? Did Kiki actually enjoy sex with me? Was she really acting in the movie? Were Gotanda's graceful fingers sliding down her back turning her on?

Caught in the cross hair of the real and the imaginary.

Take Gotanda. His doctor persona was all image. Yet he looked more like a real doctor than any doctor I knew. All the dependability and trust he projected.

What was my image? Did I even have one?

Dance, the Sheep Man said. Dance in tip-top form. Dance so it all keeps spinning.

Did that mean I would then have an image? And if I did, would people be impressed? Well, more than they'd be impressed by my real self, I bet.

When I awoke the following morning, it was April. As delicately rendered as a passage from Truman Capote, fleet-ing, fragile, beautiful. April, made famous by T.S. Eliot and Count Basie.

I went to Kinokuniya for some overpriced groceries and welltrained vegetables. Then I picked up two 6-packs of beer and three bottles of bargain wine.

When I got back home, there was a message from Yuki, her voice totally disinterested. She said she'd call again around twelve. Then she slammed down the receiver. A com-mon phrasing in her body language.

I dripped some coffee, then sat down with a mug and the latest 87th Precinct adventure, something I've failed to quit for ten years now. Then a little past noon, the phone rang.

"How's it going?" It was Yuki.

"Okay."

"What are you doing?" she asked.

"Thinking about lunch. Smoked salmon with pedigreed lettuce and razor-sharp slices of onion that have been soaked in ice water, brushed with horseradish and mustard, served on French butter rolls baked in the hot ovens of Kinokuniya. A sandwich made in heaven!"

"It sounds okay."

"It's not okay. It's nothing less than uplifting. And if you don't believe me, you can ask your local bee. You could also ask your friendly clover. They'll tell you—it really is great."

"What's this bee and clover stuff? What're you talking about?"

"Figure of speech."

"You know," said Yuki, "you ought to try growing up. I'm only thirteen, but even so I sometimes think you're kind of dumb."

"You mean I should become more conventional? Is that what you're telling me? Is that what growing up means?"

"I want to go for a drive," she ignored my question. "How about tonight?"

"I think I'm free," I said.

"Well, then, be here at five in Akasaka. You remember how to get here, don't you?"

"Yeah, but don't tell me you've been alone all this time?"

"Uh-huh. Nothing's happening in Hakone. I mean, the place is on top of a mountain. Who wants to go there to be alone? More fun in town."

"What about your mother? She hasn't returned?"

"Not that I know of. I can't keep track of her. I'm not her mother, you know. She hasn't called or anything, so maybe she's still in Kathmandu."

"What about money?"

"I'm okay for money. I've got a cash card that I pinched from her purse. One less card, she'll never notice. I mean, if don't look out for myself, I'll die. Mama's such a space cadet, as you know."

My turn to ignore her. "You been eating healthy?" "I'm eating. What did you think? I'd die if I didn't." "That's not what I asked. I said, are you eating healthy?" Yuki coughed. "Let's see. First there was Kentucky Fried Chicken, then McDonald's, then Dairy Queen, . . . And what else?"

"I'll be there at five," I said. "We'll go somewhere decent to eat. You can't survive on the garbage you've been putting down. An adolescent girl needs nourishment. You're at a very delicate time of life, you know. Bad diet, bad periods." "You're an idiot," she muttered.

"Now, if it's not too much to ask, would you give me your phone number?" "Why?"

"Because one-way communication isn't fair. You know my number, I don't know yours. You call me when you feel like it, I can't call you. It's one-sided. Besides, suppose some-thing came up suddenly, I wouldn't be able to reach you."

She paused, muttered some more, then gave me her num-ber.

"But don't think you can change plans anytime you feel like it," said Yuki. "Mama's so good at it already, you wouldn't stand a chance."

"I promise. I won't change plans. Cross my heart and hope to die. You can ask the cabbage moth, you can ask the alfalfa. There's not a human alive who keeps promises better than me. But sometimes the unexpected happens. It's a big, complicated world, you know. And if it happens, don't you think it'd be nice if I could get through to you? Got it?" "Unforeseeable circumstances," she said. "Out of the clear blue sky." "Nice if they didn't happen," said Yuki. "Nice if they didn't," I echoed. But of course they did.

21

They showed up a little past three in the afternoon. I was in the shower when the doorbell started ring-ing. By the time I got there, it was on ring number eight. I opened up, and there stood two men.

One in his forties, one in his thirties. The older guy was tall, with a scar on his nose. A little too well-tanned for this time of the year, a deep, tried-and-true bronze of a fisher-man, not the precious color you get from the beach or ski slope. He had stiff hair, obscenely large hands, and a gray overcoat. The younger guy was short with longish hair and narrow, intense eyes. A generation ago he might have been called bookish. The fellow at the literary journal meeting who ran his hands through his hair as he declared, "Mishima's our man." He had on a dark blue trench coat. Both guys in regulation black shoes, cheap and worn-out. The sort you wouldn't glance at twice if you saw them lying by the side of the road. Nor were the fellas the type you'd go out of your way to make friends with.

Without a word of introduction, Bookish flashed his police ID. Just like in the movies. I'd never actually seen a police ID before, but one look convinced me it was the real thing. It fit with the worn-out shoes. Something in the way he pulled it out of his pocket, he could have been selling his literary journal door-to-door.

"Akasaka precinct," Bookish announced, and asked if I was who I was.

Uh-huh.

Fisherman stood by silently, both hands in the pockets of his overcoat, nonchalantly propping the door open with his foot. Just like in the movies. Great!

Bookish filed away his ID, then gave me the once-over. Me in bathrobe and wet hair.

"We need you to come down to headquarters for ques-tioning," said Bookish.

"Questioning? About what?"

"Everything in due time," he said. "We have formal pro-cedures to follow for this sort of thing, so why don't we get going right away."

"Huh? Okay, but mind if I get into some clothes?"

"Certainly," said Bookish flatly, without the slightest change of expression. If Gotanda played a cop, he'd do a better job. That's reality for you.

The fellas waited in the doorway while I got some clothes on and turned off switches. Then I stepped into my blue top-siders, which the two cops stared at as if they were the trendiest thing on the market.

A patrol car was parked near the entrance to my building, a uniformed cop behind the wheel. Fisherman got into the backseat, then me, then Bookish. Again, like in the movies. Bookish pulled the door shut and the car took off.

The streets were congested, but did they turn on the siren? No, they made like we were going for a ride in a taxi. Sans meter. We spent more time stopped in traffic than mov-ing, which gave everybody in all the cars and on the street plenty of opportunity to stare at me. No one uttered a word. Fisherman looked straight ahead, arms folded. Bookish looked out the window, grimacing like he was laboring over a literary exercise. The school of dark-and-stormy meta-phors. Spring as concept raged in upon us, a somber tide of longing. Its advent roused the passions of those nameless multitudes fallen between the cracks of the city, sweeping them noiselessly toward the quicksands of futility.

I wanted to erase the whole passage from my head. What the hell was "spring as concept"? Just where were these "quicksands of futility"? I was sorry I started the whole dumb train of thought.

Shibuya was full of mindless junior high students dressed like clowns, same as ever. No passions, no quicksand.

At police headquarters, I was taken to an interrogation room upstairs. Barely three meters square with one tiny win-dow. Table, two steel office chairs, two vinyl-covered stools, clock on the wall. That was it. On the table, a telephone, a pen, ashtray, stack of folders. No vase with flowers. The gumshoes entered the room and offered me one of the steel office chairs. Fisherman sat down opposite me, Bookish stood off to the side, notepad open. Lots of silent communi-cation.

"So what'd you do last night?" Fisherman finally got going after a lengthy wait. Those were the first words I'd heard out of his mouth.

Last night? What was I doing? I could hardly think last night was any different from any other night. Sad but true. I told them I'd have to think about it.

"Listen," Fisherman said, coughing, "legal rigmarole takes a long time to spit out. We're asking you a simple question: From last evening until this morning what did you do? Not so hard, is it? No harm in answering, is there?"

"I told you, I have to think about it," I said.

"You can't remember without thinking? This was yester-day. We're not asking about last August, which maybe you don't remember either," Fisherman sneered.

Like I told you before, I was about to say, then I reconsid-ered. I doubted they would understand a temporary memory loss. They'd probably think I had some screws loose.

"We'll wait," said Fisherman. "Take all the time you need." He pulled a pack of cigarettes from his jacket pocket and lit up with a Bic. "Smoke?"

"No thanks," I said. According to Brutus magazine today's new urbanite doesn't smoke. Apparently these two guys didn't know about this, Fisherman with his Seven Stars, Bookish with his plain Hopes, chain-smoking.

"We'll give you five minutes," said Bookish, very dead-pan. "After that you will tell us something simple, such as, where you were last night and what you were doing there."

"Don't rush the guy. He's an intellectual," Fisherman said to Bookish. "According to his file here, this isn't his first time talking to the law. University activist, obstruction of public offices. We have his prints. Files sent to the prosecu-tor's office. He's used to our gentle questioning. Steel-rein-forced will, it says here. He doesn't seem to like the police very well. You know, I bet he knows all about his rights, as provided for in the constitution. You think he'll be calling for his lawyer next?"

"But he came downtown with us of his own volition and we merely asked him a simple question," Bookish said to Fisherman. "I haven't heard any talk of arrest, have you? I don't think there's any reason for him to call his lawyer, do you? Wouldn't make sense."

"Well, if you ask me, I think it's more than an open-and-shut case of hating cops. The gentleman has a negative psy-chological reaction to anything that resembles authority. He'd rather suffer than cooperate," Fisherman went on.

"But if he doesn't answer our questions, what can we do but wait until he answers? As soon as he answers, he can go home. No lawyer's going to come running down here just because we asked him what he was doing last night. Lawyers are busy people. An intellectual understands that."

"Well, I suppose," said Fisherman. "If the gentleman can grasp that principle, then we can save each other a lot of time. We're busy, he's busy. No point in wasting valuable time when we could be thinking deep thoughts. It gets tire-some. We don't want to wear ourselves out unnecessarily."

The duo kept up their comic routine for the allotted five minutes.

"Well, it looks like time's up," Fisherman smiled. "How about it? Did you remember anything?"

I hadn't. True, I hadn't been trying very hard. Current sit-uation aside, the fact was, I couldn't remember a thing. The block wouldn't budge. "First of all, I'd like to know what's going on," I spoke up. "Unless you tell me what's going on, I'm not saying a thing. I don't want to say anything that may prove inopportune. Besides, it's common courtesy to explain the circumstances before asking questions. It's a breach of good manners."

"He doesn't want to say anything that may prove inop-portune," Bookish mocked me. "Where is our common courtesy? We don't want to have a—what did he call it?— breach of good manners."

"I told you the gentleman was an intellectual," said Fish-erman. "He looks at everything slanted. He hates cops. He subscribes to Asahi Shimbun and reads Sekai."

"I do not subscribe to newspapers and I do not read Sekai," I broke in. Had to put my foot down somewhere. "And as long as you don't tell me why I'm here, I'm not going to feel a lot like talking. If you want to keep insulting me, go ahead. I've got as much time to sit around shooting the breeze as you guys do."

The two detectives looked at each other.

Fisherman: "Are you telling us that if we're polite and explain these circumstances to you, you'll cooperate and give us some answers?"

Me: "Probably."

Bookish, folding his arms and glancing high up the wall: "The guy's got a sense of humor."

Fisherman rubbed the horizontal scar on his nose. Proba-bly a knife gash, and fairly deep, judging from how it tugged at the surrounding flesh. "Listen," he got serious. "We're busy, and this isn't a game. We all want to finish up and go home in time to eat dinner with the family. We don't have anything against you, and we got no axes to grind. So if you'll just tell us what you did last night, there'll be no more demands. If you got a clear conscience, what's the grief in telling us? Or is it you got guilty feelings about something?"

I stared at the ashtray.

Bookish snapped his notepad shut and slipped it into his pocket. For thirty seconds, no one said a word. During which time, Fisherman lit up another Seven Stars.

"Steel-reinforced will," said Fisherman.

"Want to call the Committee on Human Rights?" asked Bookish.

"Please," Fisherman and his partner were at it again, "this is not a human rights issue. This is the duty of the citi-zen. It's written, right here in your favorite Statutes of Law, that citizens are obliged to cooperate to the fullest extent with police investigations. So what do you have against us officers of the law? We're good enough to ask for directions when you're lost, we're good enough to call if a robber breaks into your home, but we're not good enough to coop-erate with just a little bit. So let's try this again. Where were you last night and what were you doing?"

"I want to know what's going on," I repeated.

Bookish blew his nose with a loud honk. Fisherman took a plastic ruler out of the desk drawer and whacked it against the palm of his hand.

"Listen, guy," pronounced Bookish, tossing a soiled tissue into the trash, "you do realize that your position is becom-ing worse and worse?"

"This is not the sixties, you know. You can't keep carry-ing on with this antiestablishment bullshit," said Fisherman, disgruntled. "Those days are over. You and me, we're hemmed in up to here in society. There's no such thing as establishment and antiestablishment anymore. That's passé. It's all the same big-time. The system's got everything sewed up. If you don't like it, you can sit tight and wait for an earthquake. You can go dig a hole. But getting sassy with us won't get you or us anywhere. It's a dead grind. You under-stand?"

"Okay, we're beat. And maybe we've not shown you proper respect. If that's the case, I'm sorry. I apologize."

Bookish's turn again, notepad open again. "We've been working on another job and hardly even slept since yester-day. I haven't seen my kids in five days. And although you have no respect for me, I'm a public servant. I try to keep society safe. So when you refuse to answer a simple ques-tion, you can bet it rubs us the wrong way. And when I say things are looking worse for you, it's because the more tired we get, the worse our temper gets. An easy job ends up being not so easy after all. Of course you got rights, the law's on your side, but sometimes the law takes a long time to kick in and so it gets put in the hands of us poor suckers on duty. You get my drift?"

"Don't misunderstand, we're not threatening you," Fish-erman interjected. "He was just giving you a friendly warn-ing. He doesn't want anything bad to happen to you."

I kept my mouth shut and looked at the ashtray. A plain old dirty glass ashtray without markings. How many decades had it sat here on this desk?

Fisherman kept slapping his hands with the ruler. "Very well," he gave in. "I'll explain the circumstances. It's not the procedure we follow when asking questions, but since we want your respect, we'll try things your way."

He picked up a folder, removed an envelope and pro-duced three large photographs. Black-and-white site photos, without much in the way of artistry. That much was clear at a glance. The first photo showed a naked woman lying face-down on a bed. Long legs, tight ass, hair fanned out from the neck up. Her thighs were parted just enough to reveal what was between them. Her arms flung out to the sides. She could have been sleeping.

The second photo was more graphic. She was turned over, her pubic area, breasts, face exposed. Her legs and arms arranged stiffly at attention. Her eyes open wide, glassy, her mouth contorted out of shape. The woman was not sleeping. The woman was dead.

The woman was Mei.

The third photo was a close-up of Mei's face. Mei. No longer beautiful. Cold, ice cold. Chafe marks around he neck.

My mouth went dry, I couldn't swallow. My palms itched.

Mei. So full of life and sex. Now cold, dead.

I stopped myself from shaking my head, from showing any reaction. I knew the two guys were watching my every move. I restacked the three photos and casually handed them back to Fisherman. I tried to look unaffected. "Do you know this woman?" asked Fisherman. "No." I could've said yes, of course, but then I would've had to tell them about Gotanda, who was my link to Mei, and his life would be ruined if this got out to the media. True, he might have been the one who coughed up my name. But I didn't know that. I'd have to risk it. They weren't about to bring up Gotanda's name.

"Take another look," Fisherman said slowly. "This is extremely important, so do look again carefully before you answer. Have you ever seen this woman before? Don't bother lying to us. We're not babes in the woods. We catch you lying, you'll really be in trouble. Understand?"

I took a lengthy look at the three photographs. I didn't want to look at all, but that would have given me away. "I don't know her," I said. "But she's dead, right?" "Dead," Bookish repeated after me. "Very dead. Extremely dead. Completely dead. As you can see for your-self. This fox is naked and dead. Once a very fine specimen, but now that she's dead it cuts no ice. She's dead, like all dead people. You let her decay, her skin starts to crack and shrivel, the rot oozes out. And the stink! And the bugs. Ever see that?" Never, I said.