I Wonder What Human Flesh Tastes Like Page 14

  The editor arrived with an assistant in tow. Neither of them looked like what Chris had expected; both wore tightly-fitting grey suits and resembled young lawyers. Daichi began the meeting by insulting them: this, he had told Chris, was an infallible way of getting attention. When the editor tried to ask a question, Daichi held up his finger and continued speaking, detailing the various problems with Somatic’s layout. Despite how serious these problems were, he explained, they were nowhere near as bad as the content itself. The editor was obviously out of his depth in the contemporary art scene, but he, Daichi, could help.

  While they talked, Chris played with the laptop, bringing up Minesweeper and Solitaire. When lunch arrived — coffee and sandwiches — Daichi introduced him as ‘Mr. Lau, a Chinese-American translator, fluent in English and French.’ Chris glanced up and nodded politely.

  The meeting lasted twenty minutes. When it was over, the editor and his assistant stood, smiled, and excused themselves. Daichi remained in his seat, flipping dismissively through a copy of the magazine.

  —How did it go? Chris asked.

  —Perfect, Daichi said. We can’t let them think we’re no one, right? We have to show them what level we’re on. Their magazine is basically shit, look at the layout, look at all the English errors they have. We can do better than this.

  The meeting’s success put the group in an excellent mood. But they were all still hungry, so they went to a ramen place, where Daichi paid for everyone. After that they moved to a bar and continued drinking until late afternoon. Dusk had fallen by the time they returned to the street.

  —It’s almost time for dinner. Where should we go? asked a senior member from the Circle whose name Chris could never remember.

  —An izakaya, Daichi said. I’ll call Emi and Daisuke too, they should be off work by now.

  He turned to Chris.

  —Who’s that old man who comes around sometimes?

  —Takeshi?

  —Yeah, you should invite him too, see what he’s doing.

  Chris saw no reason not to. He took out his phone and called Takeshi, who answered on the first ring. He was working now, but would be free in another hour. To Chris this still seemed too early for a normal company job to finish, but Takeshi insisted he would come.

  They went to Doma-Doma and waited outside for a free table. After twenty minutes they were shown inside and ordered drinks, plates of sushi and yakitori, daikon salad and fried chicken skin. Soon Emi and Daisuke arrived, a couple who had already graduated from W--- and were working together at an architectural firm.

  When Takeshi arrived, everyone greeted him with applause. He was wearing a frayed-looking beige suit and looked tired, but he smiled as he took a seat and accepted a glass of beer.

  After some general conversation and rehashing of the day’s meeting for the new arrivals, Daichi began telling of his recent overseas trips. His stories took implausible turns, but his expression remained the same as always, and there was no outward sign that he was making anything up. Earlier in the year, he claimed, he had visited New York and become involved in gang warfare, and on a recent tour of Indonesia he had impregnated a Balinese girl, for which the girl’s father had put a death contract on him.

  —But I didn’t tell her my real name, he said. So there’s nothing to worry about.

  After that Takeshi recounted stories from his past. They were mostly pointless anecdotes, almost studiedly banal, but everyone laughed at the end.

  —I wish I could be in university again, Takeshi said. I didn’t have any worries then.

  —I thought you said you didn’t have any worries now? Chris said.

  —I don’t. But I had even less then.

  In the group’s drunken state this seemed a great witticism, and they broke into laughter again.

  —Are you coming to the Design meeting next week? Daichi asked Chris at one point.

  —Yeah. I’m still going after the president.

  —Norika?

  —Yeah.

  —Yeah, well... she likes to fuck.

  They went on drinking into the early morning.

  •

  Although Chris continued to mail Norika, he received no response, and after another week he gave up, fearing to be thought desperate. Although he attended the Circle meetings each week, she never made any effort to talk to him. But he was not troubled; his earlier actions had been rash, he supposed, but he had succeeded in letting her know his feelings. All that remained was to wait for the right time. Perhaps she thought he had no interest in the Circle itself: if so, he would dispel this impression by attending each meeting and doing his best to participate. Without even trying he grew closer to some of the other members, and he bought a number of magazines and art books they recommended to him. The more he learned, the more his admiration for Norika increased.

  A month passed, and he received word of a party Daichi was holding, a collaboration between Vee Vee Records and the Circle members. It would be held at Bar Edge, a small venue in the area. Daichi encouraged him to invite all the exchange students, which he did, although only Séverine expressed interest.

  Edge was neither a bar nor a club, but an unsatisfying hybrid of both. There were few spaces to sit, and the dance floor extended into the main bar area, so that no one could dance without feeling that they would bump into the patrons standing and drinking. When Chris arrived he was surprised at the number of people present; apart from inviting his friends and the Circle members, Daichi, who was generally interested in foreigners, had promoted the event at various international parties held around the city. A group of blonde German students stood drinking at the bar, and Chris noticed two Chinese men who, on the basis of their clothing, he judged to be from Hong Kong. A tall African-American girl walked by. The Circle members, who had arrived early, occupied a group of chairs off in a corner. Norika leaned against the wall, flanked by two senior members. Despite the cramped nature of the venue, everyone remained in small groups. Only Daichi made an effort to speak to them all. Wandering the room with a glass of Corona, he handed out information sheets about his various projects and flyers for events organized by his friends.

  Chris and Séverine ordered drinks and leaned against the bar, watching as a group of girls stepped tentatively onto the dance floor. One of Daichi’s friends stood behind the decks, cutting multiple genres into a dense mixture of sound, flashes of hard trance and breakcore interrupting long stretches of industrial rhythm and atonal noise. As he watched the group start to dance, Chris felt someone tap his shoulder. He turned. It was Takeshi, wearing a suit that looked well-worn around the edges. The vest was a curious shade of light blue that Chris rarely saw used; it suggested something from a few decades earlier, something that had been forgotten when other clothing of its era had been revived. Takeshi’s thin shoulders seemed lost inside it. He was wearing heavy black shoes.

  —Takeshi? How did you find out about this...?

  —Daichi told me.

  Séverine, who knew Takeshi from his visits to their apartment complex, gave him a hug. In response, the old man mumbled a greeting in garbled French. Séverine laughed.

  —More people here than I expected, Takeshi said.

  —Yeah, I’m surprised too.

  Takeshi ordered a beer and stood next to them. He seemed to be in an even better mood than usual, and Chris had no doubt he had been drinking by himself before coming.

  After an hour the music stopped and a man and a girl moved to the head of the dance floor. Chris had seen this couple enter and knew they were a body painting performance team Daichi had hired. The girl wore a long red robe, which she took off as soon as the performance started. Underneath she wore a plain white shirt and leggings. The man produced a pair of scissors and, while the girl remained still, held up her arm and began cutting off her sleeve. When he had exposed her bare flesh he took a brush and applied fluorescent paints to it, tracing a constellation of crimson stars down the length of her arm. After removing her other sleeve he
began cutting holes all over her shirt. Using an airbrush and a paint brush for detail, he filled in smiling faces, fantastical creatures, graffiti slogans, elaborate kanji and geometrical patterns. On her stomach he recreated an ukiyo-e print of a serpent with a woman’s head, its thick coils winding around the girl’s hip, the scales glowing a vivid green under the overhead lights. Eventually the girl stood nearly nude with only fragments of her shirt hanging off her, a living sketchbook crowded with designs. Chris watched intently, although he couldn’t help but notice that the girl was overweight.

  He turned. The tall African-American girl — Chris had overheard her name as Lauren — had moved next to him and was watching the performance skeptically.

  —I don’t know, she said. Is this supposed to be art?

  —Something like that.

  When the man finished, the girl opened her eyes and at last began to move, the designs on her skin seeming to shift and merge with each motion.

  Chris looked around the room. He was on his sixth beer, and had begun to feel the effects of the alcohol. He moved away from the bar and circled the room, greeting everyone he knew. Séverine, usually reserved, was dancing with the group of Germans. Takeshi stood by the wall, talking to two W--- students. As Chris watched the old man, he remembered a conversation he had had about him with Kumi. He had noticed that the two seemed aloof from each other, which occurred to him as strange given Takeshi’s disposition. There was no open hostility, but neither had they seemed especially close, as he had supposed a single father and his daughter must be.

  —Do you fight with him a lot? he had asked her. He couldn’t imagine Takeshi becoming angry.

  —No, it’s nothing like that. We just do our own thing...

  —He doesn’t seem like he’d be that distant. I mean...

  —You don’t know him that well, Kumi had said, and changed the topic.

  This conversation had remained with him, and as they spent more time together he sometimes felt that he knew Takeshi better than Kumi did. But, there was no way to tell.

  He looked over at the corner where the Circle members were sitting. As the two senior members flanking her carried on a conversation, Norika finished a gin tonic and lit a cigarette, nodding her head to the beat. There was nothing to prevent him from talking to her, but an unusual nervousness came over him. He stood at the edge of the dance floor and smoked several cigarettes. He made to approach her, then turned away and ordered another drink, which he finished quickly. Eventually he felt his confidence return. One of the senior members left for the dance floor, and he walked over and sat in his seat next to Norika. The music had become a gnarled forest of noise, low-end thuds and shrieking feedback drowning out the irregular beat.

  —This is pretty dissonant, he said.

  Norika turned to him and smiled.

  —Yeah, I like it though. I can fall asleep to music like this.

  —Yeah?

  —Yeah. I feel like I have better dreams when I listen to this kind of music.

  —You can fall asleep to it?

  —Yeah. My house was always really noisy, and I couldn’t sleep if I could hear my parents talking. But if I listened to really loud music on headphones I could fall asleep. I don’t know why.

  He looked at her. She seemed relaxed, and her mood put him at ease; he felt no anxiety or pressure as he talked to her.

  —What have you been doing recently? he asked.

  —Pretty much the same things as you... reading, music... all the things you said you were into, right?

  Now that she had said this so plainly, it seemed to him that the perfect circumstances had arrived, and he reached over and took her hand. She smiled at him and held his gaze as she crushed out her cigarette in the ashtray. The volume of the music blurred his senses, merging with the weight of the alcohol and the lightness of her hand in his. A great length of time seemed to pass. At last he became aware of someone sitting next to him, and when he turned he saw that it was Takeshi.

  —I’ve met just about everyone here now, but I haven’t met you before, Takeshi said, addressing Norika.

  —Takeshi... this is Norika, the Design Circle president...

  Norika introduced herself, although her words were barely audible over the music. Takeshi leaned forward and said something that Chris couldn’t hear, then sat up straight and began to laugh. Chris laughed too, although he found it difficult to concentrate. He told Norika he would be right back, then stood and walked to the bathroom.

  When he returned, Norika and Takeshi were gone. He looked for them on the dance floor, then at the bar, but couldn’t see them anywhere. Perhaps they had gone to the bathroom too, he thought — but then, he would have seen Takeshi on the way out. He saw Daichi talking to the bartender and went over to him.

  —Have you seen Norika and Takeshi? he asked.

  —I think they went out to get some air, Daichi said.

  Chris went outside and looked over the railing at the street below. It was not overly crowded, and he made out two figures that he recognized as Norika and Takeshi walking towards an intersection. He dashed down the two flights of stairs to street level and hurried after them. He knew this area well and had some idea of where they were going.

  A wind had picked up, but other than that the night was not excessively cold. Takeshi and Norika were walking slowly, and he caught up to them easily enough. He could have made his presence known, but something held him back. Instead he followed them from a distance, not looking directly ahead in case either of them turned around. As he had expected, they turned off at the intersection and began walking down the path that led to the public park bordering the Kanda River.

  When they crossed into the park grounds, Norika slowed down and leaned against Takeshi’s shoulder, and he placed his arm around her. A row of cherry trees bordered the river, and benches had been placed beneath them at spaced intervals. Moonlight filtered through the bare branches and fell on the surface of the river. The electric lights of houses and an all-night bar flickered on the other side of the water, but here only the faint glow of a vending machine stood out against the darkness covering the main expanse of the park. The closest building was a public restroom, and Chris hid behind its wall, watching as Takeshi led Norika into the darkness beneath the cherry trees.

  A breeze passed through the branches. Norika and Takeshi’s heads moved together, and then she raised her arms in the air as he pulled off her shirt. Chris caught a glimpse of her pale, flattened breasts as Takeshi’s head moved down to them. Norika’s gaze strayed in his direction, but she didn’t see him, and in fact seemed to be looking at nothing, her eyes unfocused. After a few moments they closed. Takeshi unbuttoned her pants and slipped them down to her feet.

  All he had to do was call out and he could disrupt the situation, could prevent Takeshi from doing anything to her. But he felt incapable of movement. Everything seemed to be unfolding before him like a dream, and he could do nothing but watch. A sense of impossibility filled him. How had this ridiculous old man taken her from him?

  A strange feeling came over him. Even as he watched the figures beneath the trees drop to the ground, obscuring his vision so that he could see only the back of Takeshi’s head and the awkward splay of Norika’s legs, he did not feel like a mere observer. Instead it seemed as if he himself was Takeshi and, in a sense, Norika. He felt as if he were moving inside Norika, and then he felt his own movements echoing through her body, carried back to him in the faint tremor of her hands, in her tightly shut eyes and open mouth. But how was it possible to be in two places at once?

  At once he understood. Norika’s youth and beauty had absorbed the old man’s absurdity and ugliness, and from this collision of extremes, a peaceful neutrality fell over his thoughts like thick, artificial snow. His desires no longer pressed him, but neither did he feel that he had failed. If this could happen then so could anything else; he did not always need to win or lose.

  A bird sounded in the darkness. For a long time he di
d not move. He looked at the trees and the pale outline of Norika’s face. He felt that he was involved in life.

  I Wonder What Human Flesh Tastes Like Etc.

  Ayano and Ayako grew up in a family of strict vegetarians. From an early age they were fed on whole-grain bread, white and brown rice, pickles, tofu, fresh fruits, soy cheese, dairy-free ice cream and egg-free pasta, mixed salads and nutritional yeast. Their mother sent them to school with lunchboxes containing vegetable soup, rice balls, cheese sandwiches, pretzels, popcorn and granola bars. The young girls were instructed that their diet was not only for the benefit of their health, but also a moral response to the corrupt and wasteful industries that sustained most food production. But since they had no other experience to compare with, this rhetoric was mostly lost on them, and they accepted their diet as they accepted most everything their parents taught them.

  Not that they were obedient to a fault — as long as they made a show of politeness and consistency, they were left to do as they pleased; their parents had little reason to discipline them excessively. Ayano was a diligent student, and Ayako was a kind girl, quiet and softhearted. Whenever a relative or a friend of their parents’ came to visit, they always remarked on the girls’ excellent manners.

  But they were both ugly, that much was agreed. Ayano was thin and pustular, too tall for her age, with tiny eyes and a flattened nose. Ayako was soft, squat and shapeless, her crooked teeth unimproved by braces. Their mother was beautiful, but neither of them looked anything like her, and their father, a policeman, had wanted sons. He regarded his daughters as being no different from his chair, or desk, or bed: something he expected to find when he came home, but not anything worth troubling himself over. At school the girls had few friends, preferring to spend their time with each other. As children they had made up stories and songs and imaginary countries to play in, and this closeness persisted as they approached the end of high school: they often wore matching clothes; they sometimes held hands as they walked; until a few years ago they’d slept in the same bed. But their peculiarities weren’t enough to draw the attention of their classmates: since the sisters were quiet and unathletic, they were mostly ignored. And this, for the most part, suited them fine.