I watched his face intently. Even when facing away from people, his eyes seemed feverish. He looked like he’d never experienced pain.
Unable to go to school—much less graduate—until recently, I’d barely made enough to get by. Because I didn’t have the funds to give my mother a proper burial, her ashes still sat in my room. I’d do just about anything for the promise of money; we couldn’t possibly have been more different. He could probably spend his life doing whatever he wanted.
I couldn’t understand how this situation had come to be, but still...
I looked at the two hundred thousand yen in the envelope.
Whatever his reasons, however I felt about them, his whims brought me cold hard cash. This was the undeniable truth, frustrating as it was. Not to mention that he was saving my sorry ass.
Perhaps I had invited him because he already knew everything about me, or the guilt was eating at me, or the sheer exhaustion was draining me, or a mix of all three.
When he finished playing, I found myself asking, “Do you want to come?”
“Hmm?” As he turned around, there was no trace of doubt in his expression.
“I’ll be holding a funeral for my mom. Would you like to come?”
He was the one paying for it, after all—it only felt right to invite him. At least, that’s how I justified it to myself.
“Can I? Would that be all right?”
“Not like anyone else is coming.”
He didn’t seem surprised by the invitation; he just smiled.
“No one’s coming. I’ll be the only one there,” I reiterated.
“I’ll be there,” he said cheerfully.
It was only when I arrived at my run-down apartment that I realized that, perhaps, I felt lonely.
And I realized that I hated the thought of leaving all on my own without a word to anyone about it.
The funeral was held two weeks later. It was a mildly rainy day. In the end, I hadn’t told anyone else about the ceremony. My mother’s parents were dead, and if she’d had any friends, I didn’t know them. I didn’t know the whereabouts of my father. When I tried to call him, he never picked up or called back. I had no way of reaching him.
I woke up early in the morning and cleaned my room. It felt strange to think I had lived here with my parents at one point. The only clue to their lack of presence was the impossible amount of dust that had built up.
We never owned very much, so there wasn’t much to throw out. Still, I managed to fill a trash bag with whatever was left in the fridge, some shrunken clothes I found deep in the dresser, textbooks, notebooks, sneakers I wouldn’t wear today, and my school shoes. Everything I spotted, I would dump so that I would have no regrets never coming back.
Even so, I couldn’t throw out my mom’s things. I wanted to laugh at my lack of resolve. The responsibility of dealing with her things was supposed to be on my shoulders.
I didn’t own any clothes suitable for a funeral. I flattened out the wrinkled uniform I bought used when I started school and wore that. In one hand, I carried my mom’s ashes and in the other, two full trash bags, and I left the house. I left the bags at the trash collection spot on the way. It was Sunday, so they wouldn’t pick them up today. But tomorrow morning, they would be gone.
I headed to the funeral hall, holding my mom’s ashes close.
Walking the familiar path, I sentimentally started thinking of the past. I’d taken it countless times before, but I didn’t have many memories of my family to reflect on.
When I was in middle school, my mom’s illness had worsened, and I began tending to her while taking care of myself and my father. I struggled to summon a memory of the three of us going out together. It didn’t even have to be of a time before mom got sick.
All that came to mind was the smell of alcohol, my father’s rage, and my mother’s tears.
It felt like my mind was being squeezed. The cold air reminded me of the pain in my chest that now rested only in me, and I couldn’t share that feeling with anyone. It was a chill that froze my fingers to the bone, a constant torment. When my mother died, I think something vanished with her—something more than just her hands that had always kept me warm.
Everyone felt like a stranger to me, and I couldn’t care anymore. Not about things, not about people, not even about myself. I accepted that I was being left behind. I wasn’t particularly bothered by this.
The world always looked like winter to me. I had no reason to love it.
When I arrived at the funeral hall, my invited guest was already there, wearing a clean black suit. The car and Masudzuki-san were nowhere to be seen. Having watched me and the undertaker make preparations, he lit the first stick of incense.
With his palms pressed together, he kept his eyes closed. He remained like this for what felt like a really long time.
He couldn’t possibly have had anything to say. He had never met my mother. I watched him the entire time, imagining the silent conversation he might be having with her.
When he was finished, he naturally sat next to me.
We listened to the chanted sutras from the monk I’d hired. At its conclusion, we remained there in silence. The undertaker also stepped away, leaving the two of us sitting in the spacious hall alone. I had reserved the place for the next three hours and expected we would just stay there like that. No one else was coming.
The light rain turned into a downpour outside. I could hear its pitter-patter growing louder. As if finding the spaces between the raindrops, he eventually asked, “And your father?”
“Won’t pick up when I call. Do you know where he is?”
“Not his address, though I think I could find out. Do you want to know?”
“Not particularly. Not if he didn’t bother to show up.”
“I see” was all he said.
I wondered if my father really didn’t plan on coming. I understood he wouldn’t come to my funeral, but I thought he just might come to mom’s. He must have loved my mom at one point.
Still, I didn’t want to see him. I didn’t want him to come. Especially since he was here. I didn’t want my father to lay eyes on that guy.
I truly did not want to think of him as my father. He was never a father to me, but he was my mother’s husband. My mother loved him, and he should have loved her back.
Whether I liked it or not, half of my DNA was his.
The sound of rain filled the hall. Trying to drown it out, I asked, “Shouldn’t you be heading home?”
“I’ll stay until the end. Then we’ll go back together.”
“Go where?”
“Back to my place.”
This sounded like a firm plan already set in place. I was slowly beginning to learn that once he had made up his mind, it was difficult to diverge from that charted course.