Choji hurriedly came to the front door, as if he could hear Mitsuhiro’s inner voice telling him to get the hell out. He pressed himself against the wall to make room for Mitsuhiro as he took off his shoes and stepped out of the entryway and into the condo. Once Mitsuhiro was done, Choji swiftly reached for the door handle.
“Take care of yourself. And Miyoko, too.”
He left without waiting for Mitsuhiro’s reply and closed the door behind him.
“Ran away with his tail between his legs,” his father said, smiling in the hallway. Mitsuhiro chuckled a bit as he locked the door.
“That’s the first time I’ve ever seen him like that. I owe you one, Dad.”
“You got me on your side, okay, son? Now go get cleaned up.”
“Thanks, Dad.”
Mitsuhiro went to the kitchen, put his bag on the floor, and drank some water. He was so thirsty that he really did want to drink directly from the faucet. After rehydrating, he took a deep breath, went to the bathroom, looked in the mirror, and sighed again. His face was covered in ash, and some blood was seeping out of his nose. He didn’t even notice the bleeding until now. Dried blood was stuck around his mouth, too.
He looked terrible. No wonder he scared people off on the train and shocked his father-in-law.
He took his phone out of his jacket pocket and placed it on the sink. Once he turned it on, he’d undoubtedly see an avalanche of missed calls from Sae, Miyoko, and Choji. But he didn’t feel like contacting Miyoko quite yet. He wanted to at least clean himself up first, or he might wind up yelling at her out of frustration. His father would probably say that he ought to do just that, to teach her discipline or whatnot, but he wanted to avoid antagonizing his wife when he had so much hard work to do.
Mitsuhiro took off his clothes, being careful not to scatter the ashes and dirt around, and nearly put them in the laundry basket before he thought better of it. Everything was so dirty and smelly that he put all of it, including his underwear, straight into the washing machine, added detergent, and turned it on. He didn’t want Miyoko to nag him about the smell later.
As he showered, he felt a sense of joy, as if the difficult day had all been worth it. It was frustrating how little Miyoko and Choji understood him despite all the work he had. When he thought about it, he felt less angry and more resigned to his fate. And why not? People like them couldn’t possibly understand what it was like so far beneath the ground.
Exactly. You can’t understand what that hole is like unless you’ve been inside it. Mitsuhiro thought he heard his father’s voice outside the bathroom. You wouldn’t understand that the hole gets bigger as more ash comes out, and then it starts wanting even more. No one understands how important your work is. But that doesn’t mean you should fold, all right? Keep going.
Yeah. Thanks, Dad.
After washing himself thoroughly under the warm, clean, inviting water, Mitsuhiro left the shower. As he was drying himself, his phone rang on the sink. The screen showed it was from Miyoko. He picked it up.
“Hello? Miyoko?”
“What are you doing? Why didn’t you answer?”
Miyoko’s voice was quiet, but her tone was harsh. She must have been calling from her hospital room.
“I couldn’t help it. I was at work until just now. I just finished showering and changing. I’ll call you back in five minutes.”
“Can you explain what you were doing?”
“I will. Just give me a minute.”
Mitsuhiro hung up the phone, put on a shirt, underwear, and pants, and used the hair dryer for a minute or two. He was concerned that the white powder might sprinkle off him like dandruff, but his hair was perfectly clean.
He put his phone in his pants pocket, left the bathroom, and went to check on Sae. Quietly opening the door to her room, he listened carefully. Once he heard her peaceful breathing, he left her alone.
He then went to the kitchen and picked up his bag from the floor. Sure enough, there was gray dirt on it. He used some paper towels to wipe it clean so that Miyoko wouldn’t complain later. Then he took a plastic bottle of sparkling water from the refrigerator, sat down on a chair in the dining room, and placed the bag on the floor.
He opened the bottle, took a sip straight from it, and took a deep breath. Now that he was more relaxed—in the right mindset, he was sure—he picked up his phone and called Miyoko back.
“Hello?”
“It’s me.”
“Why’d you leave Sae out of nowhere?”
“I got a call from someone I was looking for. I had to go see him right away.”
“You were looking for someone?”
“Yeah. Someone involved with that ritual stuff Tamai Construction is doing in the East Wing basement. I needed to confirm the man wasn’t engaged in forced labor down there, but he didn’t have a fixed address, so…”
“Oh, he’s homeless?”
“He sold his house to put his wife in a memory-care facility. He developed dementia, too, not long after, and his wife didn’t even know where he was.”
“I see…”
“Yeah. So, I managed to find him. I asked him some questions, took him to the site, and then I tried to hand him over to a Tamai Construction employee, but he started fighting me out of nowhere, and then he ran off.”
“What? Fighting you? Why?”
“I don’t know. Maybe his illness was making him imagine something. He clocked me good with his helmet.”
“Oh no. Are you okay?”
Miyoko’s tone was now completely sympathetic toward Mitsuhiro.
He smiled at this, satisfied. He wanted everyone who’d avoided him on the train to hear this conversation. He was doing a job that deserved people’s sympathy and appreciation, and he couldn’t have been prouder of it.
“Yeah, it’s no big deal. But I’m sorry for what I did to you and Sae. And to your father, too.”
“That’s okay. Dad just sits around watching TV every night anyway. But…he called me earlier. He said you were acting strange.”
“I’m sorry. You know, I was just exhausted. I was trying to help someone, and he beat me up.”
“You said something about your dead father watching over Sae?”
“It was just a figure of speech. I didn’t know what else to do. I didn’t think I’d be away from home for so long.”
“You should have called me! I could have asked Mom or Dad to look after her.”
“You were in the hospital. I thought you were already asleep. Sorry, it was all so sudden, and I was tired, so I wasn’t thinking straight. I just wanted to finish my work.”
“I understand, but…Sae was crying really hard, you know. I don’t want her to get so worried that she has trouble sleeping. When she wakes up, give her some attention, all right?”
“Yeah, I should have left a note for her in case she woke up.”
“And pick up your phone, too!”
“I couldn’t get reception down below. I’m sorry.”
Miyoko sighed. “Well,” she said, her tone lighter, “I’m not exactly able to help, myself, so I know it’s no use blaming you. But these are the times when Sae gets bad dreams and wakes up.”
“She had a bad dream? Did she say that?”
“If she still remembers it tomorrow, try to comfort her, okay? Because it was scary even for me.”
“What’d she dream about?”
“Ohhh…”
Miyoko let out a groaning sort of sound, implying she didn’t want to talk about it.
“She said someone took her away and threw her into a hole—this square hole—and she couldn’t get out. She was crying about it.”
The scene vividly played itself in Mitsuhiro’s mind—Sae being abducted and thrown into that hole. Sae chained up, crying at the bottom of the hole. White ash falling on Sae’s face and body.
—Quit being stupid. How could something like that happen?
But his arms were covered with goose bumps. A rush ran up his spine, and he was overcome by the vague feeling that the hole really was capable of that. But he quickly pushed the thought away.
“That sure is a scary dream.”
“Yeah. So take the time to listen to her, all right?”
“Sure. Are you going to be discharged?”
“Yeah. They said there’s nothing wrong with me, so I should be able to come home tomorrow afternoon.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t answer your phone call.”
“No, it’s fine. The doctor’s about to make his rounds, so I should hang up.”
“Okay. Good night.”
“Good night.”
Mitsuhiro put his phone on the table and looked at his arms, still covered in goose bumps. He tried to drink some sparkling water, but his hands were shaking so much, he almost dropped the bottle.
Falling into a large, dark square hole, unable to get out.
—Calm down. You won’t let Sae go through that. You won’t let that happen.
Mitsuhiro took a few heavy breaths. When his hands stopped shaking, he grabbed the bottle with both hands and gulped the water down.
—It’ll be fine. I’ll get the amulet.
That thought came to him with the sensation of the carbonation.
—Then I’ll have a god or two on my side. I’ll have an amulet worth two hundred thousand yen protecting my family.
But as he took the bottle away from his mouth and stared at the fizzing bubbles inside, he wondered if that would be enough. Would having some tiny little god on hand really guarantee an escape from that hole? What if he needed more? Would he have to ask Araki or Tamai Construction to get something else for him?
—The same people who charge ten million yen for a tiny shrine?
Could it be him in a metaphorical hole right now? Was he being dragged down, step by step, into something he could never escape from?
Because he had freed Yoshikazu Hara?
The man had volunteered to be a human sacrifice, but then his dementia made him forget all about it and he fled. So now Mitsuhiro was being called to that hole instead? It was an absurd thought, but he couldn’t dismiss it as such. In fact, it seemed supremely logical to him.
Mitsuhiro stared at the bubbles popping in the bottle and finally admitted it to himself. He was in a serious predicament, one he had no real explanation for. He shivered.