Chapter 186

Chapter 3—A Very High Place Filled with Light “I’m trying to figure out what kind of chocolate I should make for Valentine’s Day. Do you prefer chocolate that’s not too sweet? You don’t hate it if there’s dried fruit in it, right? If you have any requests, let me know.” “No, I like dried fruit. I’ll eat anything.” When Kotobuki started talking to me excitedly in class the next morning, I answered halfheartedly. My mind was taken up by Tohko’s visit the night before and Ryuto’s phone call. Tohko was going to disappear? What did that mean? Ryuto said he was going to become the writer—what was he planning to do? “Inoue? Are you listening?” “Huh?” I snapped out of it and saw Kotobuki glaring at me, her lips pursed. “Oh, sorry. We were talking about chocolate. Anything’s fine with me.” “Argh! Telling me anything is fine makes me do more work than anything else you could say.” Her lips pursed even more. “Um, well, I guess I like bitter chocolate better. Something simple without nuts or anything in it.” She gave me an instantaneous, excited smile. “O-okay. Some simple, bitter chocolate. I can do that.” The number of people in the room was increasing and it was getting louder. Ordinarily she would suddenly start acting gruff and hurry to get away from me, but today she didn’t budge from my desk. She kept on standing there, her cheekbones flushed in embarrassment. “Mornin’, Nanase! Mornin’, Inoue!” Mori called out to us chipperly. “What’s going on? You guys talking about Valentine’s Day? It’s pretty early in the morning for things to get so steamy.” “M-Mori! Let’s go over there.” Kotobuki put an arm around Mori and tried to pull her away from me. “Y’know, if you guys are planning things out, you might be able to swing trying Nanase’s chocolate cake at her house, fresh out of the oven,” Mori said brightly as she was being dragged away. “Mori!” “You visit the boyfriend’s house, then next is the invitation to the girlfriend’s house, right? Valentine’s Day is the perfect chance to take the next step in your relationship. You should use any move you’ve got.” “L-let’s see if we got the same answers on our homework, Mori.” Her face scarlet, Kotobuki yanked Mori away. Once I was alone, I sank back into thought. About Tohko… about Ryuto… About how Ryuto had mentioned Juliette and Jerome and Alissa… “Juliette got shredded and went crazy. Jerome took poison. And Alissa went through the narrow gate alone!” What had he meant by that? Was Juliette the one from Shakespeare? But what about Jerome? And Alissa? “Konoha?” Someone called my name and I jumped. I turned around and saw Takeda sticking her head in the back door, waving at me to come over. When I’d hurried out to the hall, she handed me a book with a library sticker on it. I saw the title The Narrow Gate and my heart leaped into my throat. Alissa went through the narrow gate! Was this—? Takeda beamed at me like an innocent puppy. “I’m bringing a message from Ryu. He asked me to give you this book.” “Takeda, what is Ryuto thinking?” “I don’t know. I’m just a tool for him,” she answered, all smiles. “Oh, but I’m using Ryu, too, so I guess it’s fair.” “Using him?” “ ’Cos Ryu asked me to go out with him even though he knows what I’m really like. I can relax and I have fun when I’m with him. He lets me pretend to be his girlfriend.” “Doesn’t that mean you’re starting to like him?” The smile slipped from Takeda’s face and she became a blank. “… I… don’t think so. Besides, there’s someone else Ryu likes.” “What?!” Takeda’s voice was filled with such certainty that I was drawn in despite myself. She put her mask back on and laughed innocently. “Not any of the girls he messes around with. He’s definitely got someone special who he actually, honestly likes, but he can’t tell her how he feels. And since he can’t have her, he’s looking for a girl who’ll love him and him alone. Everybody is just a replacement for her.” My heart rate sped up and my brain grew hotter. Was she talking about Amemiya? No. Ryuto had said that Amemiya “might have become someone special.” So then the person Ryuto truly loved was— With a shock like a slap in the face, I remembered Ryuto gazing glowingly at Tohko. He would make breezy excuses to Tohko, who pouted and scolded him every time he flirted with girls, and when he got smacked on the head yet again, he seemed to be enjoying it. The two of them had grown up together, and they still lived in the same house. Could it be that Tohko was the one Ryuto loved? “I’m going to head off now, okay? Homeroom’s about to start.” Takeda’s voice was bright before she drew her face close to my ear and whispered, “Ryu can be scary when he gets serious about something. So please be careful.” The bell chimed overhead. I was staring blankly after Takeda as she pattered off like a puppy when someone grabbed my shoulder from behind. “What’s up, Inoue? Didn’t you hear the bell?” “Akutagawa…” “Did something happen?” Seeing my absentminded state, Akutagawa furrowed his brows. “No, it’s nothing. I was up late last night and didn’t sleep much.” “All right, but…” I couldn’t even talk to Akutagawa about Tohko. “The teacher’s coming. Let’s get back to the room.” “Yeah…” I started to walk, Akutagawa pushing at my back. His face was pinched with concern. Before we sat down, he glanced down at the book in my hand and murmured, “Strait Is the Gate… that’s by Gide, right?” “I got this sudden urge to read it. I asked Takeda about it and she brought it up here for me.” Akutagawa’s eyebrows drew together slightly again, and his expression turned thoughtful, as if something had caught his curiosity. “Why did you want to read that book?” “I dunno, just an urge.” “I see… then I guess it’s just a coincidence.” I couldn’t hear the last part of what he said very well. The teacher came in and Akutagawa went back to his desk. I was in no mood to pay attention to the class. I hid the book Takeda had given me behind my textbook and immersed myself in reading it, holding my breath. The author was André Gide. He was a French author who had won a Nobel Prize. The main character who narrated the story was named Jerome. The heroine was named Alissa. Juliette was the name of Alissa’s younger sister. Raised in a wealthy family, Jerome had loved his cousin Alissa, who was two years older than him, ever since childhood. Alissa was a taciturn woman with a strong religious bent. She implored Jerome to become an honorable man who drew closer to God. She refused his offer of marriage in order to accomplish that. Juliette was the exact opposite of her sister, a cheerful little girl who secretly loved Jerome. But when she found out that her older sister suspected how she felt and wanted to get her to marry Jerome, she decided to step aside and became the wife of a merchant who wasn’t exactly young. Even so, Alissa made no move to accept Jerome. The narrow gate came from a verse in the Bible that says, “Make every effort to enter through the narrow gate.” It continued like so. “Wide is the gate, which leads to destruction, and broad is its road, and great are the numbers who enter thereby. Narrow is the gate which leads to life and close its road, and few are they who discover it.” Because the gate that leads to God is so narrow that two people cannot pass through it together, Alissa tells Jerome he must go on by himself. She breathes her last alone, leaving behind a diary in which she writes her true feelings for Jerome. I continued to read Strait Is the Gate through the break and the next class period, as well. Why did Ryuto have this book delivered to me? He had told me that Juliette got shredded and had gone crazy. But although the Juliette in the book enters a loveless marriage with a homely, vulgar man, the man she marries is good and generous, and he loved her. She bears many children and winds up happy. After her sister’s death, she gives her daughter her name, Alissa. Plus Jerome never takes any poison. He suffers over his unrequited feelings for Alissa and feels conflicted, but he doesn’t try to stop Alissa from pulling away, and he simply accepts the fact that she doesn’t love him as well, that’s her answer. So what about Alissa? Lacking any religious inclinations, I couldn’t begin to understand why Alissa so stubbornly refused Jerome. I suppose you could say that she was forced to leave him in order to turn him toward God, and she passed through the narrow gate alone. But how did that relate to me or Tohko? What was Ryuto trying to tell me? Once I finished the book, I flipped back through it several times to read parts again, but it only increased my questions. I’d been reading the book so long that Akutagawa cautioned me mildly, “You oughta stop reading for lunch, at least.” “Oh, sorry.” “I mean, if you’re enjoying it, great, but…” He trailed off. Then he asked me again, “You’re sure nothing’s bothering you?” “Y-yeah, I’ll… tell you later,” I murmured vaguely, and so of course Akutagawa watched me with furrowed brows as I ate the lunch my mother had packed for me. “You were reading all day today, Inoue,” Kotobuki mentioned worriedly, drawing near me during cleanup after school. It had probably seemed unusual to her, too, that I was turning the pages so voraciously. “You were reading Strait is the Gate… right? Maybe I should read it, too.” “It’s just another old book. I only got sucked into it so much ’cos I was bored.” “Oh?” Kotobuki murmured, sounding unconvinced. “We said we were going to go somewhere today after school, remember?” My stomach clenched tightly. Could I really go out somewhere with Kotobuki when I felt this unstable? But Kotobuki’s cheeks were slightly flushed and she looked excited. “Where should we go?” I couldn’t say that something had come up and I was going home by myself. “Mori will see us if we leave the classroom together, so would you mind if we meet up at the library like usual?” “… Okay.” I couldn’t find a good excuse to avoid hurting Kotobuki’s feelings, so I nodded, feeling weighed down. After we finished with homeroom and before I went to meet Kotobuki at the library, my feet carried me to the book club room. It was cold and empty. Tohko wasn’t there. Tohko—whose braids had come unraveled and blown around wildly, who had gripped my arm, whose eyes had been filled with anguish, who had screamed at me and trembled. When I recalled her pale face or her voice as she asked me, “Why?!” a scarring pain ran through my chest and my breath choked off. “Why…?” As soon as I’d spoken the word, my throat closed up, my nostrils flared, and my eyelids burned. “… Why, Tohko…?” No—Kotobuki was waiting for me. I had to go right now. I gritted my teeth and closed the door. Just then, I sensed someone behind me. “Inoue?” I turned around and saw a young woman standing there wearing a coat trimmed with fur at the collar and cuffs. She was a striking beauty with perfect makeup, but I didn’t recognize her. “Who are you?” “Oh, it really is you! I’m so glad I found you. You weren’t in your classroom, so I thought you’d gone home.” “Um…” “Could I borrow your cell phone?” “What?” “Hurry.” When she persisted, I held it out. She slipped it into her hand with a “thanks” and winked at me. “Well, shall we go?” “Hold on! Where are you—” I watched her turn around and start to walk away, shocked. “You’ll find out when we get there.” “I’m sorry, I have plans! Can you give me back my cell phone?” “Ha-ha-ha, not yet.” That was how we reached the school gates. What should I do? Kotobuki was waiting for me. The woman stopped a taxi, then slid into the backseat with seductive poise. “Get in. Ryu asked me to come and get you.” My brain felt like it had been set on fire. So she was someone Ryuto knew! If this was a scene Ryuto had orchestrated, I wasn’t getting in that car! I had to get back to Kotobuki! And yet my feet moved forward. As if there was nothing else they could have done— When the door slammed shut, a vibrant smile came over her face and she gave the driver the name of a luxury hotel in the city. Ryu was a good boy and waited for you again today, Kana. He and Tohko play together as if they really were brother and sister. Ryu toddles after Tohko, his cheeks all rosy, calling, “Cousin Tooohko, cousin Tooohko,” just like a freshly hatched duckling. It’s adorable. Earlier, Tohko was tearing up Kästner’s Emil and the Detectives to eat and he must have thought that was so interesting. He ripped Emil up, too, and put it in his mouth. After he’d chewed on it for a bit, he spat it out and made a face. “That doesn’t taste like cinnamon doughnuts at aaaall!” “I’ll make you some different doughnuts, Ryu. So don’t eat Tohko’s books anymore.” When I told him that, he nodded firmly. “Okay, Aunt Yui, I won’t.” Even so, when Tohko started eating the food I’d written for her for dinner, he watched her intently, sucking on his fingers. “You’re so cool, Tohko. I wish I could eat Aunt Yui’s stories,” he said enviously. “But you can eat the rice omelet and hamburger Mommy made you. This is for me, and you can’t have it,” Tohko told him meanly and hugged the paper to her chest. He looked a little crestfallen, then grinned and said, “You’re right! That’s okay, ’cos Aunt Yui’s rice omelet is really good. “When I grow up, I’m gonna marry Aunt Yui! Then I can eat her food forever and ever and ever!” When he said that, I suddenly wanted to hug him tight and stroke his cheek. Ryu is so good and cheerful and absolutely adorable. Are you busy at work, Kana? Fumiharu didn’t come home again today. Is he with you by any chance? I don’t mind watching Ryu a little longer, but you ought to think about him a little more. When you and Fumiharu get absorbed in your work, you lose sight of everything around you, so I worry. When we got out of the taxi, the woman went through a revolving glass door and into a building, then left her coat at the front desk. “Please give me back my cell phone.” “Nooot yeeet.” She told me to take my jacket off, too, then handed it to the clerk at the front desk along with my schoolbag. She accepted the ticket to pick them up again, then slipped it into a pocket of her suit. “Urk. Where’s Ryuto? Just let me see him already.” The lobby was spacious and its white pillars glowed in the lamplight. The carpet underfoot was so soft it felt like we were sinking into it. I was overcome by the luxurious atmosphere, so strikingly different from the places I ordinarily spent my time. I felt like I was being swallowed up in it. I regretted coming to a place like this. I wondered if Kotobuki had gone home yet. She was probably angry at getting stood up. The woman took an escalator to the lower floors and walked down a hallway decorated with flowers and paintings. “Please give me my phone. I’m going to talk to Ryuto myself!” She didn’t turn around. Her pace showed how confident she was that I was following. She opened a door covered in red velvet, then calmly entered the room beyond. I chased after her, annoyed. Instantly a buzz of voices closed around me. People— Light— Voices—sounds— Every flash melded together in a crush. It was different from the clamoring noise when you walk through the bustle of the city. It was vibrant and gorgeous and solemn—as if I’d been lost in a world utterly separate from everyday life. The huge, almost panoramic hall was filled with adults. The men were diverse in expensive-looking suits or casual sweaters, and the women were dressed up in brightly colored suits or lustrous dresses. There were people in traditional kimono, too. Everyone held a sparkling glass in their hand and walked around leisurely, greeting one another or chatting in clumps of a few people. Party food like terrine and caviar was arranged in the center of the room as well as at its edges. There was a huge vase of flowers on the stage at the front of the room, and a rainbow of flowers spilled out of it like a fountain. Taking a glass from a waiter, the woman wove through gaps in the crowd. “W-wait for me!” I declined a glass of my own and chased after her. I thought I might lose her in the people surging around like gaudy waves, and my feeling of panic heightened. Suddenly the lights in the room went dark. My sight was stolen from me and my heart shrank in on itself. A blinding light came on over the stage, and several men and women ascended and lined up next to one another. A man who looked like an office worker in his midthirties and wearing a suit. A woman in her early forties clothed in a brown dress that held her body rigid. A man in his late twenties wearing a shirt with leather pants who looked like a freelancer—his eyes were moving around nervously, too. What was this? What was about to happen? The thrumming anxiety running down the back of my neck turned instantly to terror, as if I’d been splashed in cold water, as soon as I saw the name SUMMER’S BREEZE PUBLISHING decorating the stage alongside the words ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATION and AWARDS CEREMONY. This was a party for a publishing company! And the company I’d won the prize with three years ago, at that! The people standing onstage were the prizewinners, and everyone in the room was either an author or had something to do with the publishing company! The shock went through my heart and raised cold goose bumps on my skin. I had the sensation that the dance floor on which I was rooted had split in two and was falling away backward. It turned my mind pure white. A thick sweat covered me, then chilled instantaneously. I was convulsed with chills that made me almost nauseous. My vision lurched, my legs grew weak and refused to move. How had I gotten to a place like this?! I had nothing to do with these people! They introduced the winners; then the man who looked like an office worker, who had won the grand prize, stepped up to the microphone and gave a speech. “Since I was a child, it has been a dream of mine to be an author. I would like to thank my family for their support, which allowed me to win this award. I’ll do my best to continue writing books you’ll enjoy.” The winner’s excited words ran over my chest like a blade and my heart trembled. No—I don’t want to be here! I hate this! I hate it! My terror and loathing blended and raged within me like a black storm. My feet were unsteady, my throat closed up, and I thought I might succumb to suffocation when I heard a murmur in my ear. “Is it true that Miu Inoue’s at this party?” I thought my heart might stop. The voices came at me one after another, like bad hallucinations. “Didn’t Miu quit being an author?” “People say she might start writing again.” “Didn’t she sell more than five million hardcovers and paperbacks combined? No way the company would let her go.” “I wonder which one is her.” I realized that I was in my school’s uniform and how much I must stick out in this room full of adults. A greater shudder than ever went through me. It was a terror that made every hair on my body stand on end and my heart freeze. For the moment, I was still hidden by the shadows. But once the room lit up— I wouldn’t be able to avoid everyone’s curious eyes turning on me. They might figure out that I was Miu Inoue. Why hadn’t I turned back at the door? How could I get to an exit through these waves of people? I turned my back to the stage, and in my heart I was ordering my cowardly legs to move when— A regal voice rang out in the hall. “I believe being an author is a lonely line of work that asks you to pass through a narrow gate quite alone.” It was a cold voice, as thoroughly transparent as ice created from the purest water. I was drawn in by the charming voice that seemed to reverberate directly into my soul; it was impossible to fight. When I looked up at the stage, a slender woman was standing at the microphone. Her hair was cut crisply short, her gaze was penetrating, her throat slender. Her royal-blue dress flowed along the lines of her body. This gorgeous woman, a single flower standing nobly awash in the clear light, was someone I had met before. Yes, I’m positive… “I doubt you’ll manage to survive as an author by relying on family or friends or with a naive nature that curries favor with your readers.” Smirks broke out around me at this stringent declaration that refuted the winner’s words right to his face. “There goes Kanako again.” “Hah. What does she know about being an author? She only sells with her looks and scandals. Her stuff is nothing but shameless exposés. I wouldn’t call that a novel.” It was outside Ryuto’s house! I’d had an attack and was brought to the house where Tohko was boarding, and on my way home I’d passed a woman getting out of a cab at the front gate. “I’m Tohko’s underclassman. My name is Inoue.” She had looked at me for an instant when I greeted her, then had turned her eyes away and gone silently into the house. Tohko had explained that the woman was Ryuto’s mother. The name I heard all around me: Kanako. And Ryuto’s last name was Sakurai—when those two things locked together, I realized who the woman onstage actually was and I felt as if I’d been walloped in the head. Kanako Sakurai! She was famous, a best-selling author, and when Miu Inoue had won the grand prize, she’d been one of the judges! The cold voice I’d just now heard reawakened the review she’d given the prizewinning story at the time. “The author is still immature and this work contains a spark we see only in adolescence; it is written with a forthright sensitivity and there’s good reason to read it. However, there is some question as to whether this author will be capable of producing another piece.” The room brightened and I gasped. There was no longer anyone onstage. I instantly recalled the situation I was in, and the terror I had forgotten swelled up in me with a shudder. “Hey, that kid’s wearing a uniform. I wonder who he is?” The words came to my ears and a chill went up my spine. I had to get out of here, quick. I ducked my head and moved through the waves of people desperately, my feet tangling over each other. I felt like people all over the room were looking at me, and my brain grew hotter and my vision blurred. Just a little farther, only a little bit more, and I could go out to the lobby. I panicked and tried to force my way through, which made me collide with the man in front of me. “I-I’m sorry.” “Oh, excuse me. Hey—are you in high school?” His eyes went wide. “That’s amazing. Are you working at your age? Are you an author, too? I’m writing novels.” The man brought out a business card. Other people started to gather around us in interest. “Do you know this kid, Horibe?” “I was wondering about him, too. You should introduce us.” “Hey, kid, what’s wrong? Why so quiet? Are you nervous?”