The Elephant Vanishes Part 6

YOU SEE, it's like this: Sometimes, when I think about ent.i.ties-like in "separate ent.i.ties"-it gets mighty grim. I start thinking, and I nearly go to pieces....

For instance, say you're riding on the subway. And there are dozens of people in the car. Mere "pa.s.sengers" you'd have to call them, as a rule. "Pa.s.sengers" being conveyed from Aoyama One-chome to Akasakamitsuke. Sometimes, though, it'll strike you that each and every one of those pa.s.sengers is a distinct individual ent.i.ty. Like, what does this one do? Or why on earth do you suppose that one's riding the Ginza Line? Or whatever. By then it's too late. You let it get to you and you're a goner.

Looks like that businessman's hairline is receding, or the girl over there's got such hairy legs I bet she shaves at least once a week, or why is that young guy sitting across the aisle wearing that awful tie? Little things like that. Until finally you've got the shakes and you want to jump out of the car then and there. Why, just the other day-I know you're going to laugh, but-I was on the verge of pressing the emergency-brake b.u.t.ton by the door.

I admit it. But that doesn't mean you should go thinking I'm hypersensitive or on edge all the time. I'm really a regular sort of guy, your everyday ordinary workaday type, gainfully employed in the product-control section of a department store. And I've got nothing against the subway.

Nor do I have any problem s.e.xually. There's a woman I'm seeing-I guess you could call her my girlfriend-been sleeping with her twice a week for maybe a year now. And she and I, we're both pretty satisfied. Only I try not to take her too seriously. I have no intention of marrying her. If I thought about getting married, I'm sure I'd begin taking her seriously, and I'd lose all confidence that I could carry on from that point. I mean, that's how it is. You live with a girl and these things start to get to you-her teeth aren't exactly straight, the shape of her fingernails-how can you expect to go on like that?

LET ME SAY a little more about myself. a little more about myself.

No knocking this time.

If you've listened this far, you might as well hear me out.

Just a second. I need a smoke.

[Rattle, rattle]

Up to now, I've hardly said a word about myself. Like, there's really not that much to say. And even if I did, probably n.o.body would find it terribly interesting.

So why am I telling you all this?

I think I already told you, it's because now my sights are set on the n.o.bility of Imperfection.

And what touched off this n.o.bility of Imperfection idea?

Your letter and four kangaroos.

Yes, kangaroos.

Kangaroos are such fascinating creatures, I can look at them for hours on end. What can kangaroos possibly have to think about? The whole lot of them, jumping around in their cage all day long, digging holes now and again. And then what do they do with these holes? Nothing. They dig them and that's it. Ha, ha, ha.

Kangaroos give birth to only one baby at a time. So as soon as one baby is born, the female gets pregnant again. Otherwise the kangaroo population would never sustain itself. This means the female kangaroo spends her entire life either pregnant or nursing babies. If she's not pregnant, she's nursing babies; if she's not nursing babies, she's pregnant. You could say she exists just to ensure the continuance of the species. The kangaroo species wouldn't survive if there weren't any kangaroos, and if their purpose wasn't to go on existing, kangaroos wouldn't be around in the first place.

Funny about that.

BUT I'M GETTING ahead of myself. Excuse me. ahead of myself. Excuse me.

TO TALK about myself, then. about myself, then.

Actually, I'm extremely dissatisfied with being who I am. It's nothing to do with my looks or abilities or status or any of that. It simply has to do with being me. The situation strikes me as grossly unfair.

Still, that doesn't mean you should write me off as someone with a lot of gripes. I have not one complaint about the place where I work or about my salary. The work is undeniably boring, but then, most jobs are boring. Money is not a major issue here.

Shall I put it on the line?

I want to be able to be in two places at once. That is my one and only wish. Other than that, there's not a thing I desire.

Yet being who and what I am, my singularity hampers this desire of mine. An unhappy lot, don't you think? My wish, if anything, is rather una.s.suming. I don't want to be ruler of the world, nor do I want to be an artist of genius. I merely want to exist in two places simultaneously. Got it? Not three, not four, only two two. I want to be roller-skating while I'm listening to an orchestra at a concert hall. I want to be a McDonald's Quarter Pounder and still be a clerk in the product-control section of the department store. I want to sleep with you and be sleeping with my girlfriend all the while. I want to lead a general existence and yet be a distinct, separate ent.i.ty.

ALLOW ME one more cigarette. one more cigarette.

Whoa.

Getting a little tired.

I'm not used to this, speaking so frankly about myself.

There's just one thing I'd like to get clear, though. Which is that I do not l.u.s.t after you s.e.xually as a woman. Like I told you, I am angry at the fact that I am only myself and nothing else. Being a solitary ent.i.ty is dreadfully depressing. Hence I do not seek to sleep with you, a solitary individual.

If, however, you were to divide into two, and I split into two as well, and we four all shared the same bed together, wouldn't that be something! Don't you think?

PLEASE SEND no reply. If you decide you want to write me a letter, please send it care of the company in the form of a complaint. If not a complaint, then whatever you come up with. no reply. If you decide you want to write me a letter, please send it care of the company in the form of a complaint. If not a complaint, then whatever you come up with.

That's about it.

I LISTENED LISTENED to the tape this far on playback just now. To be honest, I'm very dissatisfied with it. I feel like an aquarium trainer who's let a seal die out of negligence. It made me worry whether I should even send you this tape or not, blowing this thing all out of proportion even by my standards. to the tape this far on playback just now. To be honest, I'm very dissatisfied with it. I feel like an aquarium trainer who's let a seal die out of negligence. It made me worry whether I should even send you this tape or not, blowing this thing all out of proportion even by my standards.

And now that I've decided to send it, I'm still worried.

But what the h.e.l.l, I'm striving for imperfection, so I've got to live happily by my choice. It was you and the four kangaroos who got me into this imperfection, after all.

SIGNING OFF.

-translated by Alfred Birnbaum

ONE BEAUTIFUL APRIL MORNING, on a narrow side street in Tokyo's fas.h.i.+onable Harajuku neighborhood, I walk past the 100% perfect girl.

Tell you the truth, she's not that good-looking. She doesn't stand out in any way. Her clothes are nothing special. The back of her hair is still bent out of shape from sleep. She isn't young, either-must be near thirty, not even close to a "girl," properly speaking. But still, I know from fifty yards away: She's the 100% perfect girl for me. The moment I see her, there's a rumbling in my chest, and my mouth is as dry as a desert.

Maybe you have your own particular favorite type of girl-one with slim ankles, say, or big eyes, or graceful fingers, or you're drawn for no good reason to girls who take their time with every meal. I have my own preferences, of course. Sometimes in a restaurant I'll catch myself staring at the girl at the table next to mine because I like the shape of her nose.

But no one can insist that his 100% perfect girl correspond to some preconceived type. Much as I like noses, I can't recall the shape of hers-or even if she had one. All I can remember for sure is that she was no great beauty. It's weird.

"Yesterday on the street I pa.s.sed the 100% perfect girl," I tell someone.

"Yeah?" he says. "Good-looking?"

"Not really."

"Your favorite type, then?"

"I don't know. I can't seem to remember anything about her-the shape of her eyes or the size of her b.r.e.a.s.t.s."

"Strange."

"Yeah. Strange."

"So anyhow," he says, already bored, "what did you do? Talk to her? Follow her?"

"Nah. Just pa.s.sed her on the street."

She's walking east to west, and I west to east. It's a really nice April morning.

Wish I could talk to her. Half an hour would be plenty: just ask her about herself, tell her about myself, and-what I'd really like to do-explain to her the complexities of fate that have led to our pa.s.sing each other on a side street in Harajuku on a beautiful April morning in 1981. This was something sure to be crammed full of warm secrets, like an antique clock built when peace filled the world.

After talking, we'd have lunch somewhere, maybe see a Woody Allen movie, stop by a hotel bar for c.o.c.ktails. With any kind of luck, we might end up in bed.

Potentiality knocks on the door of my heart.

Now the distance between us has narrowed to fifteen yards.

How can I approach her? What should I say?

"Good morning, miss. Do you think you could spare half an hour for a little conversation?"

Ridiculous. I'd sound like an insurance salesman.

"Pardon me, but would you happen to know if there is an all-night cleaners in the neighborhood?"

No, this is just as ridiculous. I'm not carrying any laundry, for one thing. Who's going to buy a line like that?

Maybe the simple truth would do. "Good morning. You are the 100% perfect girl for me."

No, she wouldn't believe it. Or even if she did, she might not want to talk to me. Sorry, she could say, I might be the 100% perfect girl for you, but you're not the 100% perfect boy for me. It could happen. And if I found myself in that situation, I'd probably go to pieces. I'd never recover from the shock. I'm thirty-two, and that's what growing older is all about.

We pa.s.s in front of a flower shop. A small, warm air ma.s.s touches my skin. The asphalt is damp, and I catch the scent of roses. I can't bring myself to speak to her. She wears a white sweater, and in her right hand she holds a crisp white envelope lacking only a stamp. So: She's written somebody a letter, maybe spent the whole night writing, to judge from the sleepy look in her eyes. The envelope could contain every secret she's ever had.

I take a few more strides and turn: She's lost in the crowd.

NOW, OF COURSE, I know exactly what I should have said to her. It would have been a long speech, though, far too long for me to have delivered it properly. The ideas I come up with are never very practical.

Oh, well. It would have started "Once upon a time" and ended "A sad story, don't you think?"

ONCE UPON A TIME, there lived a boy and a girl. The boy was eighteen and the girl sixteen. He was not unusually handsome, and she was not especially beautiful. They were just an ordinary lonely boy and an ordinary lonely girl, like all the others. But they believed with their whole hearts that somewhere in the world there lived the 100% perfect boy and the 100% perfect girl for them. Yes, they believed in a miracle. And that miracle actually happened.

One day the two came upon each other on the corner of a street.

"This is amazing," he said. "I've been looking for you all my life. You may not believe this, but you're the 100% perfect girl for me."

"And you," she said to him, "are the 100% perfect boy for me, exactly as I'd pictured you in every detail. It's like a dream."

They sat on a park bench, held hands, and told each other their stories hour after hour. They were not lonely anymore. They had found and been found by their 100% perfect other. What a wonderful thing it is to find and be found by your 100% perfect other. It's a miracle, a cosmic miracle.

As they sat and talked, however, a tiny, tiny sliver of doubt took root in their hearts: Was it really all right for one's dreams to come true so easily?

And so, when there came a momentary lull in their conversation, the boy said to the girl, "Let's test ourselves-just once. If we really are each other's 100% perfect lovers, then sometime, somewhere, we will meet again without fail. And when that happens, and we know that we are the 100% perfect ones, we'll marry then and there. What do you think?"

"Yes," she said, "that is exactly what we should do."

And so they parted, she to the east, and he to the west.

The test they had agreed upon, however, was utterly unnecessary. They should never have undertaken it, because they really and truly were each other's 100% perfect lovers, and it was a miracle that they had ever met. But it was impossible for them to know this, young as they were. The cold, indifferent waves of fate proceeded to toss them unmercifully.

One winter, both the boy and the girl came down with the season's terrible influenza, and after drifting for weeks between life and death they lost all memory of their earlier years. When they awoke, their heads were as empty as the young D. H. Lawrence's piggy bank.

They were two bright, determined young people, however, and through their unremitting efforts they were able to acquire once again the knowledge and feeling that qualified them to return as full-fledged members of society. Heaven be praised, they became truly upstanding citizens who knew how to transfer from one subway line to another, who were fully capable of sending a special-delivery letter at the post office. Indeed, they even experienced love again, sometimes as much as 75% or even 85% love.

Time pa.s.sed with shocking swiftness, and soon the boy was thirty-two, the girl thirty.

One beautiful April morning, in search of a cup of coffee to start the day, the boy was walking from west to east, while the girl, intending to send a special-delivery letter, was walking from east to west, both along the same narrow street in the Harajuku neighborhood of Tokyo. They pa.s.sed each other in the very center of the street. The faintest gleam of their lost memories glimmered for the briefest moment in their hearts. Each felt a rumbling in the chest. And they knew: She is the 100% perfect girl for me.

He is the 100% perfect boy for me.

But the glow of their memories was far too weak, and their thoughts no longer had the clarity of fourteen years earlier. Without a word, they pa.s.sed each other, disappearing into the crowd. Forever.

A sad story, don't you think?

YES, THAT'S IT, that is what I should have said to her.

-translated by Jay Rubin

THIS IS MY seventeenth straight day without sleep. seventeenth straight day without sleep.

I'm not talking about insomnia. I know what insomnia is. I had something like it in college-"something like it" because I'm not sure that what I had then was exactly the same as what people refer to as insomnia. I suppose a doctor could have told me. But I didn't see a doctor. I knew it wouldn't do any good. Not that I had any reason to think so. Call it woman's intuition-I just felt they couldn't help me. So I didn't see a doctor, and I didn't say anything to my parents or friends, because I knew that that was exactly what they would tell me to do.

Back then, my "something like insomnia" went on for a month. I never really got to sleep that entire time. I'd go to bed at night and say to myself, "All right now, time for some sleep." That was all it took to wake me up. It was instantaneous-like a conditioned reflex. The harder I worked at sleeping, the wider awake I became. I tried alcohol, I tried sleeping pills, but they had absolutely no effect.

Finally, as the sky began to grow light in the morning, I'd feel that I might be drifting off. But that wasn't sleep. My fingertips were just barely brus.h.i.+ng against the outermost edge of sleep. And all the while, my mind was wide awake. I would feel a hint of drowsiness, but my mind was there, in its own room, on the other side of a transparent wall, watching me. My physical self was drifting through the feeble morning light, and all the while it could feel my mind staring, breathing, close beside it. I was both a body on the verge of sleep and a mind determined to stay awake.

This incomplete drowsiness would continue on and off all day. My head was always foggy. I couldn't get an accurate fix on the things around me-their distance or ma.s.s or texture. The drowsiness would overtake me at regular, wavelike intervals: on the subway, in the cla.s.sroom, at the dinner table. My mind would slip away from my body. The world would sway soundlessly. I would drop things. My pencil or my purse or my fork would clatter to the floor. All I wanted was to throw myself down and sleep. But I couldn't. The wakefulness was always there beside me. I could feel its chilling shadow. It was the shadow of myself. Weird, I would think as the drowsiness overtook me, I'm in my own shadow. I would walk and eat and talk to people inside my drowsiness. And the strangest thing was that no one noticed. I lost fifteen pounds that month, and no one noticed. No one in my family, not one of my friends or cla.s.smates, realized that I was going through life asleep.

It was literally true: I was going through life asleep. My body had no more feeling than a drowned corpse. My very existence, my life in the world, seemed like a hallucination. A strong wind would make me think that my body was about to be blown to the end of the earth, to some land I had never seen or heard of, where my mind and body would separate forever. Hold tight, I would tell myself, but there was nothing for me to hold on to.

And then, when night came, the intense wakefulness would return. I was powerless to resist it. I was locked in its core by an enormous force. All I could do was stay awake until morning, eyes wide open in the dark. I couldn't even think. As I lay there, listening to the clock tick off the seconds, I did nothing but stare at the darkness as it slowly deepened and slowly diminished.