Halfway through that week I managed to cut my palm open on a piece of broken glass. I hadn't noticed that one of the glass partitions in a record shelf was cracked. I could hardly believe how much blood gushed out of me, turning the floor bright red at my feet. The shop manager found some towels and tied them tightly around the wound. Then he made a phone call to casualty. He was a pretty useless guy most of the time, but he acted with surprising efficiency. The hospital was nearby, fortunately, but by the time I got there the towels were soaked in red, and the blood they couldn't soak up had been dripping on the tarmac. People scurried out of the way for me. They seemed to think I had been injured in a fight. I felt no pain to speak of, but the blood wouldn't stop. The doctor was cool as he removed the blood-soaked towels, stopped the bleeding with a tourniquet on my wrist, disinfected the wound and sewed it up, telling me to come again the next day. Back at the record shop, the manager told me to go home: he would put me down as having worked my shift. I took a bus to the dorm and went straight to Nagasawa's room. With my nerves on edge over the cut, I wanted to talk to somebody, and I hadn't seen Nagasawa for a long time. I found him in his room, drinking a can of beer and watching a Spanish lesson on TV. "What the hell happened to you?" he asked when he saw my bandage. I said I had cut myself but that it was nothing much. He offered me a beer and I said no thanks. "Just wait. This'll be over in a minute," said Nagasawa, and he went on practising his Spanish pronunciation. I boiled some water and made myself a cup of tea with a tea bag. A Spanish woman recited example sentences: "I have never seen such terrible rain!", "Many bridges were washed away in Barcelona." Nagasawa read the text aloud in Spanish. "What awful sentences!" he said. "This kind of shit is all they ever give you." When the programme ended, he turned off the TV and took another beer from his small refrigerator. "Are you sure I'm not in the way?" I asked. "No way. I was bored out of my mind. Sure you don't want a beer?" "No, I really don't," I said. "Oh, yeah, they posted the exam results the other day. I passed!" "The Foreign Ministry exam?" "That's it. Officially, it's called the "Foreign Affairs Public Service Personnel First Class Service Examination'. What a joke!" "Congratulations!" I said and gave him my left hand to shake. "Thanks." "Of course, I'm not surprised you passed." "No, neither am I," laughed Nagasawa. "But it's nice to have it official." "Think you'll go abroad once you get in?" "Nah, first they give you a year of training. Then they send you overseas for a while." I sipped my tea, and he drank his beer with obvious satisfaction. "I'll give you this fridge if you'd like it when I get out of here," said Nagasawa. "You'd like to have it, wouldn't you? It's great for beer." "Yeah, I'd like to have it, but won't you need it? You'll be living in a flat or something." "Don't be stupid! When I get out of this place, I'm buying myself a big fridge. I'm gonna live the high life! Four years in a shithole like this is long enough. I don't want to have to look at anything I used in this place. You name it, I'll give it to you - the TV, the thermos flask, the radio. .." "I'll take anything you want to give me," I said. I picked up the Spanish textbook on his desk and stared at it. "You're starting Spanish?" "Yeah. The more languages you know the better. And I've got a knack for them. I taught myself French and it's practi cally perfect. Languages are like games. You learn the rules for one, and they all work the same way. Like women." "Ah, the reflective life!" I said with a sarcastic edge. "Anyway, let's eat out soon." "You mean cruising for women?" "No, a real dinner. You, me and Hatsumi at a good restaurant. To celebrate my new job. My old man's paying, so we'll go somewhere really expensive." "Shouldn't it just be you and Hatsumi?" "No, it'd be better with you there. I'd be more comfortable, and so would Hatsumi." Oh no, it was Kizuki, Naoko and me all over again. "I'll spend the night at Hatsumi's afterwards, so join us just for the meal." "OK, if you both really want me to," I said. "But, anyway, what are you planning to do about Hatsumi? You'll be assigned overseas when you finish your training, and you probably won't come back for years. What's going to happen to her?" "That's her problem." "I don't get it," I said. Feet on his desk, Nagasawa took a swig of beer and yawned. "Look, I'm not planning to get married. I've made that perfectly clear to Hatsumi. If she wants to marry someone, she should go ahead and do it. I won't stop her. If she wants to wait for me, let her wait. That's what I mean." "I have to hand it to you," I said. "You think I'm a shit, don't you?" "I do." "Look, the world is an inherently unfair place. I didn't write the rules. It's always been that way. I have never once deceived Hatsumi. She knows I'm a shit and that she can leave me whenever she decides she can't take it. I told her that straight from the start." Nagasawa finished his beer and lit a cigarette. "Isn't there anything about life that frightens you?" I asked. "Hey, I'm not a total idiot," said Nagasawa. "Of course life frightens me sometimes. I don't happen to take that as the premise for everything else, though. I'm going to give it 100 per cent and go as far as I can. I'll take what I want and leave what I don't want. That's how I intend to live my life, and if things go bad, I'll stop and reconsider at that point. If you think about it, an unfair society is a society that makes it possible for you to exploit your abilities to the limit." "Sounds like a pretty self-centred way to live," I said. "Perhaps, but I'm not just looking up at the sky and waiting for the fruit to drop. In my own way, I'm working hard. I'm working ten times harder than you are." "That's probably true," I said. "I look around me sometimes and I get sick to my stomach. Why the hell don't these bastards do something? I wonder. They don't do a fucking thing, and then they moan about it." Amazed at the harshness of his tone, I looked at Nagasawa. "The way I see it, people are working hard. They're working their fingers to the bone. Or am I looking at things wrong?" "That's not hard work. It's just manual labour," Nagasawa said with finality. "The "hard work' I'm talking about is more self-directed and purposeful." "You mean, like studying Spanish while everyone else is taking it easy?" "That's it. I'm going to have Spanish mastered by next spring. I've got English and German and French down pat, and I'm almost there with Italian. You think things like that happen without hard work?" Nagasawa puffed on his cigarette while I thought about Midori's father. There was one man who had probably never even thought about starting Spanish lessons on TV He had probably never thought about the difference between hard work and manual labour, either. He was probably too busy to think about such things - busy with work, and busy bringing home a daughter who had run away to Fukushima. "So, about that dinner of ours," said Nagasawa. "Would this Saturday be OK for you?" "Fine," I said. Nagasawa picked a fancy French restaurant in a quiet backstreet of Azabu. He gave his name at the door and the two of us were shown to a secluded private room. Some 15 prints hung on the walls of the small chamber. While we waited for Hatsumi to arrive, Nagasawa and I sipped a delicious wine and chatted about the novels of Joseph Conrad. He wore an expensive-looking grey suit. I had on an ordinary blue blazer. Hatsumi arrived 15 minutes later. She was carefully made up and wore gold earrings, a beautiful deep blue dress, and tasteful red court shoes. When I complimented her on the colour of her dress, she told me it was called midnight blue. "What an elegant restaurant!" she said. "My old man always eats here when he comes to Tok yo," said Nagasawa. "I came here with him once. I'm not crazy about these snooty places." "It doesn't hurt to eat in a place like this once in a while," said Hatsumi. Turning to me, she asked, "Don't you agree?" "I guess so. As long as I'm not paying." "My old man usually brings his mistress here," said Nagasawa. "He's got one in Tokyo, you know." "Really?" asked Hatsumi. I took a sip of wine, as if I had heard nothing. Eventually a waiter came and took our orders. After choosing hors d'oeuvres and soup, Nagasawa ordered duck, and Hatsumi and I ordered sea bass. The food arrived at a leisurely pace, which allowed us to enjoy the wine and conversation. Nagasawa spoke first of the Foreign Ministry exam. Most of the examinees were scum who might just as well be thrown into a bottomless pit, he said, though he supposed there were a few decent ones in the bunch. I asked if he thought the ratio of good ones to scum was higher or lower than in society at large. "It's the same," he said. "Of course." It was the same everywhere, he added: an immutable law. Nagasawa ordered a second bottle of wine and a double Scotch for himself. Hatsumi then began talking about a girl she wanted to fix me up with. This was a perpetual topic between us. She was always telling me about some "cute girl in my club", and I was always running away. "She's really nice, though, and really cute. I'll bring her along next time. You ought to talk to her. I'm sure you'll like her." "It's a waste of time, Hatsumi," I said. "I'm too poor to go out with girls from your university. I can't talk to them." "Don't be silly," she said. "This girl is simple and natural and unaffected." "Come on, Watanabe," said Nagasawa. "Just meet her. You don't have to screw her." "I should say not!" said Hatsumi. "She's a virgin." "Like you used to be," said Nagasawa. "Exactly," said Hatsumi with a bright smile. "Like I used to be. But really," she said to me, "don't give me that stuff about being "too poor'. It's got nothing to do with it. Sure, there are a few super-stuck-up girls in every year, but the rest of us are just ordinary. We all eat lunch in the school cafeteria for ?250 - " "Now wait just a minute, Hatsumi," I said, interrupting her. "In my school the cafeteria has three lunches: A, B, and C. The A Lunch is ?120, the B Lunch is ?100, and the C Lunch is ?80. Everybody gives me dirty looks when I eat the A Lunch, and anyone who can't afford the C Lunch eats ramen noodles for ?60. That's the kind of place I go to. You still think I can talk to girls from yours?" Hatsumi could barely stop laughing. "That's so cheap!" she said. "Maybe I should go there for lunch! But really, Toru, you're such a nice guy, I'm sure you'd get along with this girl. She might even like the ?120 lunch." "No way," I said with a laugh. "Nobody eats that stuff because they like it; they eat it because they can't afford anything else." "Anyway, don't judge a book by its cover. It's true we go to this hoity-toity establishment, but lots of us there are serious people who think serious thoughts about life. Not everybody is looking for a boyfriend with a sports car." "I know that much," I said. "Watanabe's got a girl. He's in love," said Nagasawa. "But he won't say a word about her. He's as tight-lipped as they come. A riddle wrapped in an enigma." "Really?" Hatsumi asked me. "Really," I said. "But there's no riddle involved here. It's just that it's complicated, and hard to talk about." "An illicit love? Ooh! You can talk to me!" I took a sip of wine to avoid answering. "See what I mean?" said Nagasawa, at work on his third whisky. "Tight-lipped. When this guy decides he's not going to talk about something, nobody can drag it out of him." "What a shame," said Hatsumi as she cut a small slice of terrine and brought it to her lips. "If you'd got on with her, we could have double-dated." "Yeah, we could've got drunk and done a little swapping," said Nagasawa. "Enough of that kind of talk," said Hatsumi. "What do you mean "that kind of talk'? Watanabe's got his eye on you," said Nagasawa. "That has nothing to do with what I'm talking about," Hatsumi murmured. "He's not that kind of person. He's sincere and caring. I can tell. That's why I've been trying to fix him up." "Oh, sure, he's sincere. Like the time we swapped women once, way back when. Remember, Watanabe?" Nagasawa said this with a blasé look on his face, then slugged back the rest of his whisky and ordered another. Hatsumi set her knife and fork down and dabbed at her mouth with her napkin. Then, looking at me, she asked, "Toru, did you really do that?" I didn't know how to answer her, and so I said nothing. "Tell her," said Nagasawa. "What the hell." The mood was turning sour. Nagasawa could get nasty when he was drunk, but tonight his nastiness was aimed at Hatsumi, not at me. Knowing that made it all the more difficult for me to go on sitting there. "I'd like to hear about that," said Hatsumi. "It sounds very interesting!" "We were drunk," I said. "That's all right, Toru. I'm not blaming you. I just want you to tell me what happened." "The two of us were drinking in a bar in Shibuya, and we got friendly with this pair of girls. They went to some college, and they were pretty plastered, too. So, anyway, we, uh, went to a hotel and slept with them. Our rooms were right next door to each other. In the middle of the night, Nagasawa knocked on my door and said we should change girls, so I went to his room and he came to mine." "Didn't the girls mind?" "No, they were drunk too." "Anyway, I had a good reason for doing it," said Nagasawa. "A good reason?" "Well, the girls were too different. One was really goodlooking, but the other one was a dog. It seemed unfair to me. I got the pretty girl, but Watanabe got stuck with the other one. That's why we swapped. Right, Watanabe?" "Yeah, I s'pose so," I said. But in fact, I had liked the not-pretty one. She was fun to talk to and a nice person. After we had sex, we were enjoying talking to each other in bed when Nagasawa showed up and suggested we change partners. I asked the girl if she minded, and she said it was OK with her if that's what we wanted. She probably thought I wanted to do it with the pretty one. "Was it fun?" Hatsumi asked me. "Swapping, you mean?" "The whole thing." "Not especially. It's just something you do. Sleeping with girls that way is not all that much fun." "So why do you do it?" "Because of me," said Nagasawa. "I'm asking Toru," Hatsumi shot back at Nagasawa. "Why do you do something like that?" "Because sometimes I have this tremendous desire to sleep with a girl." "If you're in love with someone, can't you manage one way or another with her?" Hatsumi asked after a few moments' thought. "It's complicated." Hatsumi sighed. At that point the door opened and the food was carried in. Nagasawa was presented with his roast duck, and Hatsumi and I received our sea bass. The waiters heaped freshcooked vegetables on our plates and dribbled sauce on them before withdrawing and leaving the three of us alone again. Nagasawa cut a slice of duck and ate it with gusto, followed by more whisky. I took a forkful of spinach. Hatsumi didn't touch her food. "You know, Toru," she said, "I have no idea what makes your situation so "complicated', but I do think that the kind of thing you just told me about is not right for you. You're not that kind of person. What do you think?" She placed her hands on the table and looked me in the eye. "Well," I said, "I've felt that way myself sometimes." "So why don't you stop?" "Because sometimes I have a need for human warmth," I answered honestly. "Sometimes, if I can't feel something like the warmth of a woman's skin, I get so lonely I can't stand it." "Here, let me summarize what I think it's all about," inter jected Nagasawa. "Watanabe's got this girl he likes, but for certain complicated reasons, they can't do it. So he tells himself "Sex is just sex', and he takes care of his need with somebody else. What's wrong with that? It makes perfect sense. He can't just stay locked in his room tossing off all the time, can he?" "But if you really love her, Toru, shouldn't it be possible for you to control yourself?" "Maybe so," I said, bringing a piece of sea bass in cream sauce to my mouth. "You just don't understand a man's sexual needs," said Nagasawa to Hatsumi. "Look at me, for example. I've been with you for three years, and I've slept with plenty of women in that time. But I don't remember a thing about them. I don't know their names, I don't remember their faces. I slept with each of them exactly once. Meet 'em, do it, so long. That's it. What's wrong with that?" "What I can't stand is that arrogance of yours," said Hatsumi in a soft voice. "Whether you sleep with other women or not is beside the point. I've never really been angry with you for sleeping around, have I?" "You can't even call what I do sleeping around. It's just a game. Nobody gets hurt," said Nagasawa. "I get hurt," said Hatsumi. "Why am I not enough for you?" Nagasawa kept silent for a moment and swirled the whisky in his glass. "It's not that you're not enough for me. That's another phase, another question. It's just a hunger I have inside me. If I've hurt you, I'm sorry. But it's not a question of whether or not you're enough for me. I can only live with that hunger. That's the kind of man I am. That's what makes me me. There's nothing I can do about it, don't you see?" At last Hatsumi picked up her silverware and started eating her fish. "At least you shouldn't drag Toru into your "games'." "We're a lot alike, though, Watanabe and me," said Nagasawa. "Neither of us is interested, essentially, in anything but ourselves. OK, so I'm arrogant and he's not, but neither of us is able to feel any interest in anything other than what we ourselves think or feel or do. That's why we can think about things in a way that's totally divorced from anybody else. That's what I like about him. The only difference is that he hasn't realized this about himself, and so he hesitates and feels hurt." "What human being doesn't hesitate and feel hurt?" Hatsumi demanded. "Are you trying to say that you have never felt those things?" "Of course I have, but I've disciplined myself to where I can minimize them. Even a rat will choose the least painful route if you shock him enough." "But rats don't fall in love." ""Rats don't fall in love'." Nagasawa looked at me. "That's great. We should have background music for this - a full orchestra with two harps and - " "Don't make fun of me. I'm serious." -We're eating," said Nagasawa. "And Watanabe's here. It ,night be more civil for us to confine 'serious' talk to another occasion." "I can leave," I said. "No," said Hatsumi. "Please stay. It's better with you here." "At least have dessert," said Nagasawa. "I don't mind, really." The three of us went on eating in silence for a time. I finished my fish. Hatsumi left half of hers. Nagasawa had polished off his duck long before and was now concentrating on his whisky. "That was excellent sea bass," I offered, but no one took me up on it. I might as well have thrown a rock down a deep well. The waiters took away our plates and brought lemon sherbet and espresso. Nagasawa barely touched his dessert and coffee, moving directly to a cigarette. Hatsumi ignored her sherbet. "Oh boy," I thought to myse............