The sewers go on and on.
Every once in a while, white creatures lift their snake-like necks out of the repulsively viscous sewage and stare at me. They make me uneasy, these snake-like things that look like solidified smoke. They move eerily like living beings, causing the splishing sound of water to echo.
I don’t want to see such unsettling, slippery things, even in my dreams. They have such a fishy stench, causing a feeling of visceral unpleasantness to rise from my gut. I’d be just fine if all things with that kind of flesh and texture just disappeared.
I do my best to walk by without looking at those white things. Parallel to the flow of water in the sewer, directly next to it. Even though I don’t want to see it, something corporeal is always following.
Hair and nails grow. Fecal matter is discharged after one has a bowel movement. It’s nasty.
Finally, my field of view is clear. I seem to be outside. Several enormous buildings tower over me, directly next to the narrow pathway. That’s why it still feels just as claustrophobic here.
Even if one doesn’t want it to, the body continues to grow. Troublesome flesh clinging to you as you avert your eyes. One’s weight increases, even if you don’t want it to.
The buildings look like they could be hospitals, or perhaps school buildings. White and unblemished, dull and cold.
We may empathize with the physical aspects of ourselves, but we cannot run from these social things either. Rules. Common sense. Tradition. Human relations...... Those symbolic buildings cause a feeling of entrapment in me, like someone is pressing lead down upon my chest. I don’t want to look at them.
Human history goes back eight million years. During that time, cracks have emerged in these giant buildings we call common sense. They’ve deteriorated, and graffiti has been slapped onto them like meat on a cutting board.
They’ve been sullied.
Must I hold my breath and keep living, with all this stuff shoved into my head?
I rush along, as if I can escape everything.
On and on.
Finally, I arrive at a dead end.
At some point, I end up back inside, the layout transposed like a concave grotto — or the dried-up eye socket of a corpse.
It looks like a naturally constructed cavern, yet unnaturally, there are waste receptacles here and there. Trash cans. There are several of these pointless waste receptacles covered with damp cloth, like the type of bins used to preserve corpses.
What stands out even more are the washbasins. For some reason there are several of them, with rusted faucets that draw attention to them. I look at one every day when I go to wash my face. It’s so commonplace that the image sticks in my mind. Sullied by hair and dirt, it’s where I flush away the filth from within......
Things like hatred, anger, and resentment born from one’s heart but left unresolved are stored here. That’s how it feels. That’s why, as if smelling something stinky, I avert my eyes.
Cleaning the bathroom would be a punishment for anyone. No one wants to see something like that, let alone clean it. Anyone would rather push the chore onto someone else.
Sewage flows out into some place like a reservoir.
That place fills with filthy, muddy sewage water.
It gets so full and swollen that it seems like it might overflow, and beneath the water’s surface something wriggles around. Something is attempting to be born from within the filth, surely something accursed.
Standing next to that reservoir is you.
It’s a dead end, with no further side roads.
You jump to your feet, as if being given a new path.
I’ve caught up with you. Relieved, I rush over to your side.
But suddenly, my steps come to a complete halt.
Something’s moving around next to you. It looks like a human soul. Pure white, floating about in the air, like something not of this world. It rotates about as if coiled around you, swimming within the air as if pulled by its white tail.
I begin to feel something indescribably unpleasant.
I want you to stay unaware of it. I don’t want you to follow it around.
I shout at the white thing gamboling about next to you.
“Stop! Stay away from her!”
As I speak, I trip over a toppled trash can, but still I desperately rush to your side.
“No, you can’t go!” I call out in a shrill voice, but at least it seems to have reached you, as you turn around.
I suck in my breath.
You’ve become a nopperabou — a faceless ghost. No eyes, no nose, no mouth. Like they all fell off somewhere.
I hold my head in my hands. What was your face like before? I think I must know. What kind of face did you — who were you again? I falter, falling back on my rear and trembling.
During that time, you pass by me, completely ignoring me.
I reach out my hand in a panic, but the white thing passes in front of me and, unable to stand the nausea any longer, I start coughing.
I lift my face after vomiting to see that you’re already making your way down the path. There’s an open hole along the way, and you squeeze your whole body into it.
“W-Wait!” I muster my willpower and stand up. My body feels heavy, like it’s being permeated by carbon monoxide or poison gas. Moving causes a horrific pain throughout my entire body, making it feel as if it is being ripped apart.
Sometime after you go down the hole, I slide my body into it. Tumbling down, it feels as if I’m going to land face-up. I cover my nose and mouth with my hand and lift my face.
Tears well up in my eyes.