Chapter 9
“Dr. Kisaragi, there’s a call for you on line one. Someone called Mr. Kanesaki. Can I transfer him to you?” The soft voice of the clinic receptionist reached his ears.
“Sure,” Kisaragi replied simply. He pressed the flashing button and leaned back slowly in his seat.
“Doctor, it’s me,” a slightly raspy voice reached his ear. “I know I promised we would meet up, but I can’t do tonight,” he said, before Kisaragi could open his mouth. “Believe it or not, I’m sick. Me, out of all people. I haven’t been feeling too well.”
This was Kisaragi’s first time hearing anything close to weak-willed from the man.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
“Maybe it’s food poisoning. My stomach hurts. I’m throwing up. It’s unbearable.” The man’s voice indeed sounded unusually listless.
“Do you have a fever?”
“I’m not sure. My whole body aches.”
Kisaragi deduced that the man likely did have a temperature. “Did you go to a doctor?”
“No. I just took some medicine I bought from Matsumoto Kiyoshi, but I threw up again.”
Kisaragi checked his watch. It was six-thirty. The clinic closed at seven.
“Hang in there for thirty more minutes. I’ll come and do a house call.”
“Really?” Kanesaki groaned. “I’ll send someone to pick you up, then.”
Someone arrived at five minutes before seven, but it wasn’t the usual driver. It was a man with tightly permed hair who looked like the stereotypical yakuza. Although many of those types gathered in Shinjuku, where the clinic was located, the clinic itself was nevertheless a high-end one; the likes of yakuza had never stepped through its doors. Naturally, the receptionist and nurses were visibly disturbed at the sight of the man.
“Sorry fer the trouble, doctor,” the man said with the characteristic yakuza twang, bowing his head deeply as soon as he entered the director’s office. “Let me take yer bag.”
Kisaragi shed his lab coat and put it away in his locker before following after the man.
Kanesaki was lying uncovered on the bed in his bedroom. He was lying on his side, hugging his knees in a fetal position. His stomach must hurt a lot, Kisaragi thought as he approached. He spotted the soles of the man’s bare feet that showed from the trouser legs of his pyjamas.
What…?
The man’s soles were covered in scars that looked like broken skin. They looked like old wounds. But never mind that - I have to focus on what’s at hand. Kisaragi approached the man’s bedside and took out a stethoscope.
“Can you roll onto your back?”
“Hey… doctor.” Kanesaki greeted him lethargically as he obeyed and rolled over. His cheeks were sunken and his lips were dry. When Kisaragi laid a hand on his forehead, it was hot. The man was worse off than he had imagined.
Once he unbuttoned the front of the man’s pyjamas, Kisaragi was met with another unexpected sight. There was a large scar running from his armpit to his stomach and numerous other abrasions.
I see. These scars were not the kind that resulted from a typical fight, especially scars on the soles of the feet and the arches. The same could be said for the scars that spanned the back of the man’s hands to his palms. Kisaragi shrank back for a moment in fear, but put the stethoscope on anyway and felt the man’s belly.
“How does it feel here?”
“It hurts a bit.”
“How about here?”
“It feels fine.”
They exchanged a bare minimum of words until, before long, Kisaragi was finished his examination.
“I think you have the stomach flu. You’re severely dehydrated, so we should get you an IV drip. I’ll also run you through some blood tests.”
“I’ll leave it to you.”
Kisaragi asked for the wooden coat rack to be brought over as an IV stand. He determined the route with an angiogram, took a blood sample, and hooked Kanesaki up to a bag of Ringer’s solution. He directed the yakuza who had shown him here to go out to buy some ice.
“Buy a set of top-class sushi while you’re at it,” barked Kanesaki at the man as he hastily made his way out. Kisaragi widened his eyes in disbelief.
“What are you thinking?”
“It’s not for me, idiot. It’s for you.”
Once they were alone together, Kisaragi moved his chair to Kanesaki’s bedside and sat down. He picked up the towel that had been left there and wiped the man’s forehead. Kanesaki closed his eyes and let Kisaragi do as he pleased. Some moments later, he opened his mouth.
“Doctor, were you surprised at my body?” he murmured.
“I wasn’t surprised. I’d heard over the phone that you weren’t feeling well.”
“No, I meant the scars.”
“Oh,” Kisaragi said, pausing in the midst of wiping the man down. “I’m a doctor, so scars don’t disgust or scare me. But I was surprised.”
“Sounds exactly like something you’d say.” Kanesaki opened his eyes a sliver and slightly raised the corners of his mouth.
Kanesaki’s voice regained some energy once he was nearly finished receiving his second 500 cc bag of infusion. Kisaragi lowered the infusion rate slightly and hooked him up to a third bag.
The yakuza subordinate had diligently remained to replenish the container of ice according to Kisaragi’s directions, but Kisaragi let him leave once Kanesaki’s fever abated.
“Hope you feel better soon, Mr. Kanesaki,” the man said. “The Young Boss says he’d come by to see how you’re doing tomorrow or so.” The yakuza bowed so low that he was almost full bent over before leaving the room. Kisaragi sighed.
“Not a fan of yakuza?” Kanesaki asked.
“Of course not,” Kisaragi answered. Kanesaki laughed out loud.