Crazy Noise

Chapter 25 — Sex in public

THE THAI girl urged her customer down the street, alternately pulling and pushing.  Her heels sank in asphalt only now beginning to cool.  He grabbed her ass and she pointed to the lights of the White Rose.  Sweat slid down her neck and ran into her breasts.  The heat had sucked out most of her strength.  Men turned to stare, their careless eyes stealing the rest.  She sighed, longing to lie on a beach under a cooler moon.
    A voice drifted over the rooftops.  She checked her watch. It was only nine.  If she hurried she could sneak away and meet her girlfriends.  But she had to fuck this guy first.  At least one a night, that was the rule.  The bar’s manager had made that clear, just after pocketing her passport so she could never run away.

    May grabbed Kiyomi’s hand and headed for the door.
    “Don’t talk to strangers,” Sam yelled from behind the bar.
    “Stop worrying, I’ll be right back.  It’s only a couple of blocks.”
    Sam shrugged as the girls left the club.  He did worry.  May walked Kiyomi home every night after the show, and every night he worried.
    Manny washed a beer mug and set it in the rack.  “Take it easy.”
    “Yeah, but—”
    Helen slid onto a stool as the last customers said good night and filed out.  “Manny’s right.  She’ll be fine.  The streets are safe, that bosozoku kid is dead and Nakazono’s, uhh...”
    She looked at Manny.  “You seem to know everything that’s going on around here.  Where the hell is that slime ball?” 
    Manny shook his head.  “I don’t know.  It’s been over a week since they dragged him out of the station.  I don’t think anybody’s seen him since.  It’s like he just disappeared.  They say the yakuza are after him.  He’s probably as far away from Asakusa as he can get.”
      “You see?”  She smiled and punched Sam in the shoulder.  “Now, why don’t you do something useful.”
    “Like what?”
    “Like take me to dinner.  Manny can look after May until we get back.”
    Helen was still in the astonishing blue dress May had picked out.  As much of her as would fit, that is.  Precarious breasts, and long legs dangling.  Sam didn’t know how much more he could take.
    Watching her mount the stage each night—her short black boots, the backs of her knees.  And higher.  It wasn’t his fault, the heat made him look.  At least he didn’t crane his neck or slink slyly to the floor.  For a better look, higher and higher.  But he wanted to.  And much more.
    He smelled her in his dreams, day and night, until he grew larger and larger.  Spending a lot of time behind the bar so strangers couldn’t see—see how huge he became.  Listening to her body bend and whisper.  Her voice, wild and throaty.  Teasing offering, begging.
    “Right now?” he asked.  It was too much to hope for.
    She laughed.  “I can’t go anywhere like this.  I’ve got to change first.”
    He nodded, not at all embarrassed that Helen could read his mind.  That’s just the way it was.

    “Christ, how long does it take to put on a pair of jeans and a T-shirt,” Sam grumbled, as he turned off the lights in the club.  May had already returned and bounced upstairs with Manny.
    A hint of perfume announced her arrival and turned his head.  Moonlight slid through the windows to help her across the floor.  Her heels tapped urgently, her thighs brushed.  Sam stood up.  He’d waited thirty minutes for Helen; a century would not have been too long.
    She was wearing a dress identical to the first, the only difference was color.  It seemed her mood had shifted from blue to red.  She stood before him, gift-wrapped in scarlet, too hot to touch, her skin flushed and pink.  He took her hand and led her toward the door.
    Helen snaked her arm around his back.  “Sorry I took so long.  I couldn’t find some stuff.”
    “Stuff?” he asked, still trying to breathe.  “What stuff?”
    She whispered in his ear, “Secret stuff.  Stuff you’ll like.”
    It was dark in the cab and the radio loud.  But not too dark, not too loud.  He could see—as she settled in for the ride—her skirt riding up.  He could hear—as she slowly crossed her legs—nylon scratching over lace.
    Helen smiled in the half-light.  “So what do you want to do?”  Her voice was cheerful, without suggestion, but her eyes were merciless.  They kept up the pressure, raising the temperature in the cab.
    “I WANT TO FUCK!” Sam screamed.  The windows exploded, showering the street with glass.  The taxi driver slumped over dead from a stroke and blood trickled from Helen’s lips.
    She leaned closer, her hand soft on his wrist.  Sam shook his head—a bumpy landing.  The windows were back in place and the driver safe.  He answered her question again, and this time she heard him.
    “It doesn’t matter,” he lied.  “Whatever you want to do is fine.”

    Helen leaned over to scoop up a bit more lasagna.  Sam’s fork froze in mid-air.  His eyes overruled any objection.  They dragged his head forward; they stared unabashed down the front of her dress.
    The air in the restaurant glittered.  Sam’s fork fell through the sparks in slow motion.  He tried to jerk his eyes away.  They fought back and leered at her swelling breasts.  Her nipples reared above a flimsy bra, midnight lace and dusky rose.
    Helen, breathing deep and fast, held her pose, his excitement feeding hers.  Until his fork crashed into the plate, alerting diners and alarming waiters.  She straightened up, releasing him.
    “See anything you like?” she asked, moistening her lips with a delicate tongue.
    Sam nearly choked on his wine.  He could manage a smile but not an answer.  She leaned forward again and this time he concentrated on her eyes, seeking a clue.
    “Don’t get too carried away,” she admonished.  “We’re just friends, remember?”
    He sat speechless, unable to believe.  Until she leaned closer and closer, until he could see the lie and the love.
    Helen sat back, purring softly with happiness.  But she had to be careful.  If she pushed him any further he was going to run screaming into the night or fuck her right there under the table.  She stared into Sam’s eyes and marveled at the depth of his desire and how vulnerable it made him.  She stroked his cheek.  He closed his eyes and lifted her palm to his lips.

    Mari Okamoto stood by the register and wished she could sit down, just for a few minutes.  Her feet were killing her and she still had an hour to go.  Like a lot of coffee shops in Ginza, hers stayed open until early in the morning.  Despite the clinical decor—white smoke-stained walls and furniture better suited to a cafeteria—it was a popular spot.  Tonight was no exception.  Most of the tables were jammed with beer-drinking college kids and office girls.  Their excited conversations broke like waves over isolated salarymen, sitting at tables alone and lonely.  Pillars divided the room and provided privacy here and there.
    Again, Mari sought out the gaijins.  There were sitting close, deep in the corner.  She could see their faces clearly, under lights high and bright.  Seeing their smiles, watching them touch, she forgot about her feet and her apartment waiting empty on the other side of town.  It looked like they might like another beer.  And if not, she could ask.  It would give her an excuse to get closer, to feel their warmth, at least for a moment.
    A little wine, a little beer.  For Sam and Helen, modest drinkers, it added up.  They sat shoulder-to-shoulder, slumped in deep chairs against the back wall.  They stretched their legs, their feet pointing at a pillar rising to the ceiling.  It blocked the gaze of all in the room except for a solitary salaryman.  He sat a few feet away, head bent over a beer, eyes surprised at the length of Helen’s legs.
    Helen knew she was a little drunk and enjoyed the sensation.  Not too much, she cautioned, not too much.  I want to remember everything.  She wiggled her chair around and Sam did the same, until they sat facing each other, their knees just inches apart.
    “It’s getting late,” Sam said.  “Do you want to get going?”  He didn’t care about the time, in fact, had no clear idea of what time it was.  But he sought a taxi’s darkness or the softness of Helen’s bed.
    She leaned forward and stretched, thin wrists and hands rising up and over her head.  She massaged her pale neck, lifting her breasts.  Eyes half-closed, she looked Sam in the eye, watching him watch.  “I feel too good to move,” she sighed, sliding deeper in her chair.  “Just let me sit here for awhile, OK?”
    Something brushed Sam’s cheek, an idea.  “Sure, we’ve got plenty of time.  Just lay back and relax,” he urged.
    Helen took his advice.  Her eyes slid closed, her hands fell loose at her sides.  Their chairs were too close, their knees bumped.  First to the left, and then the right, she angled her legs.  No good, not comfortable yet.  Helen grumbled softly and tried again, placing her knees on the outside of Sam’s.
    Sam shifted in his seat, his jeans pinching his cock.  He sat stiffly, hands in his lap.  His face was flushed, his palms wet.  Slowly, Helen’s legs slipped apart.  He leaned forward.
    Her eyelashes fluttered and he looked up from between her legs.  Just a slit, her eyes were dark, open and locked on his.  He smiled and Helen dropped her gaze, as if too shy.  Her hands, so quiet in her lap, came to life.  A finger twitched and then another.  She watched, fascinated, as a long pink nail slid over her dress and hooked the hem of her skirt.
    Up came her eyes, beckoning to Sam.  All her fingers joined in.  They reached down and pulled her skirt over her thighs, to her hips, and higher, nearly to her belly.  Helen’s legs fell wide open and her eyes, surprised at such exposure, registered both excitement and dismay.
    Her hands weren’t satisfied and Helen surrendered, letting them have their way with her.  They caressed the inside her thighs from the dark tops of her stockings to her transparent panties.  They snapped the black strap of her garter belt.  It hurt and she whimpered, “Secret stuff.”
    Sam rubbed his cock through his jeans.  He leaned down to lick her knee.  Helen’s fingers snaked into her panties and began to move.
    “Excuse me, would you like another beer?”
    Helen’s eyes flew open.  “Whoops!”  She shoved her dress down and sat up straight.  “Uhh, I don’t know.  Uhh, Sam, what do you think, ehh?  Another beer?  Gee, maybe we should be go—”
    Sam came to his senses as Helen blithered.  “Sure, thanks.  Two more please.”
    Mari wrote down the order and smiled.  Sorry to interrupt but that was too good to resist.  Her gaijins were great, they’d made her night, and probably the whole week.  She zipped back to her station to get the beer, her tired feet not even a memory.
    “Holy shit,” Sam said.  “That was quite a performance.  I didn’t know you had it in you.”
    Helen smiled.  “I did.  I always knew.  You bring out the best in me.”
    Sam laughed.  “Well, you certainly had my full attention.”
    “You’re not the only one.  That guy behind you was deeply interested.”
    Sam looked back.  A middle-aged businessman was sitting on the edge of his seat.  His eyes were glazed and his hands shook as he tried to get his beer to his lips.
    Sam turned back and slid his hand up her leg.  He hurt, from his balls up through his stomach.
    Helen pushed his hand away.  “Stop.  That’s enough for now.”  She stood and grabbed her purse.  “I’ll be back in a minute and we can go.”
    Five minutes.  Ten minutes.  At fifteen, Sam got up and went to look for Helen.  He threaded his way between the tables and walked through the door leading to the toilets.  The men’s room was to the left, the women’s to the right.  Between the two was a communal sink.  Helen stood in front of a large mirror putting on lipstick.  “It’s about time,” she said, without turning.
    He watched as she leaned forward, the hem of her dress slipping up.  Her ass began to sway slightly, in time to a tune drifting through the door.  She reached back and slowly eased the hem higher.  Her garter belt peeked, her panties winked. Black lace and see-through blue, Sam moaned and locked the door behind him.
    Watching her eyes in the mirror, he gently pushed her down—until her cheek rested on the counter.  One hand in her bra, the other in her panties, he pinched her nipples and teased her pussy.  The beat of her heart, her rasping breath.  Both were deafening—Sam couldn’t hear an impatient knock on the door.
    Two hands, simply not enough, he longed for three or even four as he pulled her breasts from the cups of her bra.  Helen rose up and arched her back, pushing her breasts into his palms.  He positioned himself and reached for his zipper.
    “No,” she said.
    The heat in his cock, the roaring in his head, they batted her protest aside.  He shoved down his jeans.
    “No, I said.”  She struggled in his grasp.
    The words registered and he stepped back, dazed and stumbling.
    Helen shook her head as if to clear it and crouched before him.  She caressed her nipples with one hand and pulled out his cock with the other.
    “I thought no meant no?” he groaned.
    “It means whatever I want it to mean,” she whispered.  “In this case, it means I want to suck your cock.”  She took him in her mouth.
    And later.  He lifted her up and kissed her.  Her lips, her cheeks, her eyes.  Helen sat on the counter and took his cock deep inside her.  In and out, licking and sweating—she screamed and bit and scratched.  He grabbed her hair and yanked back her head, to see her eyes.  She bared her teeth as he lifted her again, off the counter and into the air.  She wrapped her legs around him as he turned and ran her into the door.
    Bang bang bang.   Come come come.
    Knock...knock...knock.
    The door handle rattled as Helen and Sam descended, floating through a warm liquid haze.
    Mari Okamoto laughed as the gaijins came out of the bathroom.  Their sheepish grins, their tangled clothes, she couldn’t help herself.  The manager was complaining loudly but she paid him no mind.  They thanked her with their dreamy eyes as she led them to the door.  Hand in hand, they disappeared into the darkness.  She sighed and carefully folded her apron.  The hot night was over and now she could go home.



Chapter 26 — Kids, slowly dying

IT WAS the hottest summer in twenty-five years.  Daytime temperatures soared past one-hundred degrees.  The sun was relentless, it hung over Shikoku island and refused to budge.  Darkness brought no relief.  The moon was white-hot and restless.
    Palm trees on the city’s broad avenues bowed their heads in submission.  They waited for clouds and rain.  Day after day, none came.  Conversation with their neighbors waned as their fronds turned brown and brittle.  Craftiness displaced camaraderie.  They competed like coquettes for the attention of once-scorned dogs.
    Kochi was a wild, semi-tropical town and home to more drunks per capita than any city on the planet.  Beer consumption soared as the heat wave continued.  Gangsters cursed and shot each other in a snit.  Old people dropped under the curved eaves of temples.  They expired gracefully, felled by the heat or drilled by stray bullets.

    “Come on, don’t be chicken,” the girl said.
    Twelve-year-old Kenji backed away shaking his head.  “No.  If Tokunaga-sensei catches us we’ll get in a lot of trouble.”
    “What a baby,” the girl laughed.  She took a cigarette from the pack of Mild Sevens and lit it.
    “Put that out,” Kenji demanded.  “You’re going to get me in trouble, too.”
    She inhaled deeply and squatted down to scratch an old sow behind the ears.
    “Leave her alone,” Kenji said, nearly shouting in frustration.
    The girl looked at him as if he had lost his mind.  “What?”
    “The pig, the pig.  She’s mine.”
    “Yours?”
    Kenji wished he’d kept quiet.  He’d learned long ago never to let them inside, to let them see you cared about anything at all.  “Uhh, I didn’t mean she’s mine like I own her or anything, all I meant, uhh, was that she’s my friend.”  My only friend.
    The sow pulled herself to her feet and nudged Kenji in the leg with her snout.
    “See?” he exclaimed.  “She likes me.”
    The girl took another drag on the cigarette and glared at the boy.  She didn’t give a shit about pigs, friendly or not.
    Kenji started for the door and the pig followed.
    “Come back here.”  Her voice was sharp and threatening.  “Or I’ll beat you up.  You know I can do it.”
    Kenji stopped.  That was his problem.  Everybody wanted to beat him up.  He never did anything to make them angry, just the opposite, he did all he could to please.  It never worked.  The girl had been just like all the rest.  She’d punched him in the stomach thirty minutes after arriving at the school that morning.  She’d laughed at his diminutive size and made fun of his long eyelashes and big ears.  At sixteen, she was four year’s older and nearly twice his size.  He turned and walked back into the barn’s gloom and shadows.  She held out the cigarette.  “Smoke.”
    Kenji took a shallow puff and coughed.
    “Again.”
    This time he only pretended to inhale and managed not to cough.  The girl was pleased.  “That’s better, baby.  It just takes practice.”  She lit a second cigarette from the butt of the first.  “How long you been here?”
    “Two weeks,” he whispered, looking over his shoulder at the barn door.  “My parents are coming to get me tomorrow.”
    “Where’s all the other kids?”
    He shook his head.  “There aren’t any.  Just you and me.  There were two boys but they went home last week.”
    “I guess business ain’t so hot, huh?” she grinned.
    “I don’t know.  I just want to go home.  I hate it here.  Tokunaga-sensei is mean.”
    “Ahh, it ain’t so bad.”  She held up the Mild Sevens.  “Pretty lucky finding these, don’t you think?”
    Kenji nodded but he wasn’t so sure.  Who would leave a full pack and a lighter in plain sight in the barn.  Besides Tokunaga, there was only the cook, old Tada-san, and she didn’t even smoke.  He took another puff and tried to smile, hoping the girl would like him.
    “You’re cute,” she said.  “I’m sorry I hit you.”
    “That’s OK.  It didn’t hurt much.”
    “Where is Tokunaga, anyway?” she asked.  “I thought he’d watch us all the time.”
    “He usually does.  This is the first time he hasn’t been around while we did our evening chores.  It’s strange.”
    The girl looked down at the cigarette suspiciously.  They’d been so easy to find, such a temptation, almost like a gift.  “Maybe not so strange.  Put that out, hurry up.”

    Kenji’s father and mother stood in the barnyard, sweating and listening to Tokunaga-sensei with embarrassment.
    “I was as surprised at yesterday’s smoking incident as you are.  Kenji was making excellent progress.  No one wanted to see him graduate more than I.  I never keep my students one minute longer than necessary.”
    “What do you mean?” the mother asked, alarmed.  “Isn’t he coming home today?”
    Tokunaga shook his head sadly.  “I don’t think that would be wise.  His problem is still clearly unresolved.  If he were to leave now he would soon revert to his old behavior.”
    “Are you sure?” the father asked, his voice wavering.  Implying that a teacher, any teacher, could make an error was a tremendous breach of etiquette.
    Tokunaga stiffened inside his camouflage fatigues and worked to control his temper.  He despised these spineless parents as much as their spawn.  Only the thought of an extra two-weeks tuition salvaged the moment.
    “I am absolutely certain.  Little Kenji is a typical school-refuser.  I’ve worked with many boys and girls just like him.  They always blame the other children when the real problem is their arrogance and inability to try and fit in.  Don’t you agree?”
    The mother looked to her husband for support.  “I don’t know.  Kenji is so quiet.  I can’t understand how he couldn’t fit in.  Most people don’t even notice him.”
    Tokunaga nodded.  “Silence is the most common ploy of the school-refuser.  Another is lying.  I’ll bet Kenji claims the other students tease him.  Am I right?”
    “Well, yes...”
    “Of course I am.  And he even goes so far as to say they beat him?”
    “He’s come home with bruises—”
    Tokunaga held up his hand.  “Self-inflicted.  Believe me, the true school-refuser will stop at nothing.”  He pulled an olive green towel from around his neck and mopped his face.  It was too hot to argue and he had a plane to catch.  “Kenji has to stay another two weeks.  It’s the only way.  Now, if you’ll step over to the office, we’ll take care of the financial...”  His eyes widened, he shook his head and scanned the cloudless sky.  “It’s the money,” he sighed.  “That’s why you’re so reluctant.”
    The father murmured an objection and a reassurance.
    “There are cheaper schools,” Tokunaga continued.  “But if you want what’s best for your boy...”
    “It’s not the money,” Kenji’s mother cried.  “We’ll do anything, we’ll pay anything.”
    Tokunaga opened the door to a small prefab building.  It resembled a temporary office at a construction site.  “Please accept my apologies.  I realize it’s hard to understand, but there are some parents that just aren’t interested in their children’s welfare.”
    “Can I see him?” the mother begged.  “Just for a minute?”
    “That’s out of the question, I’m afraid.  We can’t interrupt his, uhh, schooling, can we?”

    A railway freight container sat behind the barn on a pair of truncated roofing beams.  Made of heavy gauge steel, painted baby blue and white, it was a small version of cargo containers transported by ships across the Pacific.
    Over time, weeds had grown up around the bottom.  They were like the earth below, bleached of life and color.  A pig rolled in the dust nearby, a hen crouched under the container, seeking shade from the afternoon sun.
    The container rocked slightly on the beams.  The hen ruffled her feathers and cocked her head in alarm.  The trembling subsided and she settled back in the dust.  Her head sagged on her breast.  She began to doze, lulled into ever deeper sleep by a low keening from inside the metal box.

    At a few minutes past midnight, the roof of the container was still too hot to touch.  Temperatures inside had reached one-hundred and forty degrees that afternoon.  Rational thought had abandoned Kenji some hours before.  His existence had narrowed to involuntary reflex and terror.  He lay naked, face down on the floor of the discipline cell.  There were deep gouges scoring his cheeks and arms.  He could no longer cry out for help.  His tongue had swollen in his mouth.
    Reiko had given him her share of the single can of grape soda Tada-san had delivered that morning.  Kenji had wanted to refuse but she’d insisted, saying Tokunaga would have to let them out before it got too hot.  He’d cried at her generosity and had promised to take her along when his parents came to take him away.
    Reiko had tracked the passing day through three small air holes punched in the side of the container.  Sometime in the morning she’d whispered, “Is that you’re mother and father?”  Kenji had pushed her out of the way to get a look.  “Yes, yes,” he’d cried with relief, watching his mom and dad talking with Tokunaga by the side of the barn.  And then they’d walked out of his line of sight.  Kenji had scooted over to the door of the container, expecting to be released any second.
    “I don’t think we’re getting out of here,” Reiko had whispered hours later, long after the grape soda was gone.  Kenji had cried at the thought.  She’d held him in her arms as long as she could, until they were driven apart by the rising heat.
    Reiko had gone mad sometime in the late afternoon.  She’d shrieked and shrieked, her cries filling every inch of the box.  Kenji had crawled into a corner and squeezed his eyes shut.  Wild, crazy moans had escaped her throat; the sound of her nails breaking on steel had forced his hands to his ears.
    Beating back the fear, he’d opened his eyes, seeing things no one should ever see.  Reiko throwing herself against the walls of the box—smack, crack.  Reiko licking at urine running down her legs.
    Brave little boy, he’d reached through the darkness to pull her down.  He’d held fast as she’d ripped at his face and arms with broken bleeding nails.  And then she’d calmed, feeling his hands stroke her burning cheeks.
    The air had been like fire in his throat, he’d whispered his parents could still save them.  Try to believe.  Stay with me, I can’t do this alone.  Hold on.  But Reiko-chan was leaving.  Her thoughts had turned to blue-sky smiles and mothers gone away.
    They’d remained side by side all day.  A couple of kids so slowly dying, the heat so cruel it swallowed their tears.

Chapter 27 — May in danger!

TOKUNAGA EASED the van to the curb in front of a shuttered fish shop.  He turned off the engine and climbed out.  A man and a woman walked hand in hand halfway down the block; a taxi turned the corner and drove past.  He slid open the van’s sidewalk-side door and smiled.  The flight from Kochi had landed on schedule and he’d had plenty of time to pick up the rental at Haneda and drive to Asakusa.
    It had taken three trips to figure out and confirm her routine.  The two girls had walked right past him a week before.  Chattering and laughing, neither had seen him standing in the shadows.  She’d returned by the same route a few minutes later.
    Her aunt and uncle had promised a few million yen for the job.  He laughed softly.  He’d get a good deal more than that by the time he was finished.  Those idiots didn’t understand even the basics of blackmail and extortion and it would be his pleasure to give them a lesson or two.  But first he had to grab the kid.  He checked his watch, looked down the street and grinned.
    May quickened her pace, anxious to get home.  A week before she’d trapped Sam in Helen’s apartment at seven in the morning.  Their embarrassment had been cute and had only added to her pleasure.  She wanted to get back to the club to be with them.
    Try as she might, she couldn’t imagine being happier.  She felt safe and easy, her steps as light as cotton candy.  Sister Helen, Brother Sam.  A family, a real family.  She laughed at herself, adolescent cynicism spying on emotions that felt suspiciously dumb and squishy.
    “I don’t care!” she yelled, and pointed a finger at the night sky drifting warm over Asakusa.  She stood in place and jumped up and down.  “Brother Sam, Sister Helen!”  She laughed again.  “Grandfather Manny and Sister Kiyomi!”
    Tokunaga looked around in panic as the kid began to shout.  Half the neighborhood was going to be on the street in a second if she didn’t shut up.  He swore at her aunt and uncle.  They hadn’t said anything about her being crazy.  He jumped back in the van.  Maybe another time.  Fuck it, maybe never.
    She calmed down just as he was putting the van in gear.  After the yelling, the silence was spooky.  He watched in the mirror as she approached the van.
    “Excuse me,”
    May stopped, startled by a man stepping onto the sidewalk in front of her.
    “Excuse me,” he repeated.  “I’m trying to get to Sensoji temple.  Do you know the way?  I’m sorry to bother you.”
    She stepped back.  Creep or not, it was hard to tell in the dark.  He was tall and his head looked too small.  Creep, she decided.  But he’d been polite and she should be, too.
    “It’s that way,” she pointed, and explained the route.
    “Thanks,” he said, taking a step forward and smiling.
    Too late she wondered why anyone would want to visit the temple at ten at night, too late she noticed the half-open door on the van.
    One scream, that was all she managed.  It chased after shouts of joy still echoing over the rooftops.  Tokunaga clamped a hand over her mouth and forced her into the van.  The door slammed and the van sped away.

    The agent glanced at the boarding passes.  Everything seemed OK—a father and daughter flying economy to Kochi.  “Wait.”  She held up her hand as they started for the gate.  “Is she sick?”
    The girl was wearing blue jeans and a yellow T-shirt.  Her eyes were closed, her head lay on the man’s shoulder.  His arm was wrapped around her waist.  She looked like she would fall if he let go.
    “She’s just tired.  She’ll be fine as soon as we get home.”
    His smile faded as she angled her head to force him to look her in the eye.  Passengers in line grumbled at the delay.  The girl wasn’t just tired, she was sick.  Her face was pale, her eyelids fluttered beneath auburn bangs.
    Tokunaga leaned toward the agent, a movement designed to remind her of exactly how small she was.  He flexed his muscles beneath a blue jogging suit.  The agent was twenty-six and frail.  The top of her head barely reached the middle of his chest.
    She sighed.  It was one of those nights.  Sometimes, about once a week, it seemed as if every jerk in the country showed up at her gate.  Just an hour before, she’d had a remarkably unpleasant encounter with a group of slovenly housewives.  They’d towed their husbands up to the gate like carry-on luggage and demanded new seat assignments.
    Very politely, but with a wicked gleam in her eye, she’d told them to get on the plane or get lost.  Their bleating had ceased almost instantly.  Recognizing superior toughness, they’d filed past her like a flock of dumpy lambs.
    And now this.  She was deathly tired of men trying to push her around.  A lot of other girls let themselves be intimidated but not her.  It was humiliating and just led to even worse behavior.  “Your daughter looks sick to me,” she insisted.  “Has she seen a doctor?”
    “She’s all right,” Tokunaga snapped.  He started to drag May to the gate.  The agent took a step and blocked his path.  The other passengers complained louder.  A supervisor rushed over from an adjacent gate and took charge.  He listened with concern to Tokunaga’s indignant accusations.  May’s condition became a secondary issue, the agent’s rudeness of paramount importance.  He escorted Tokunaga through the gate to the waiting jet with ingratiating clucking noises.
    The last passengers boarded the flight to Shikoku island and the supervisor winked as a pretty stewardess sealed the plane.  He was still smiling as he returned to the gate.  The agent’s independence had always been an irritant.  Yelling at her would be good.  It would make the shift go faster.
    A shoe hit him in the face as he turned the corner.  He felt blood trickle from his nose.  She was on him before he could speak, wagging a finger in his face.  “One of her shoes fell off as that guy dragged her down the tube.  That doesn’t sound right to me.  How about you?  Just how stupid are you?”

    May kicked and punched as Tokunaga dragged her through the darkness behind the barn.  He cursed and smacked her in the face again.  The drug had worn off sooner than expected and he’d nearly crashed on the way back from the airport.  It had been stupid not to tie her.  She’d nearly bit his ear off and split his lip before he’d been able to beat her into submission.
    She didn’t want to go into the box.  Something fetid crawled out the open door.  Stay out, it warned, if you want to live.  She fought harder.  An arm and then a leg hung up outside the container.  Tokunaga howled as she kicked him in the crotch.  He stepped back and charged, driving her forward with his shoulder.  A bone snapped and May popped into the box.
    Old Tada-san shuffled up in bathrobe and slippers as Tokunaga slammed the heavy door and locked it.  He nodded at the box.  “You gave ‘em food and water, right?”
    She nodded, thoughts dulled by sleep and age.
    Tokunaga grunted and headed for his office.  There was a first-aid kit in his desk.  “OK.  Make sure you give ‘em some more first thing in the morning.”
    “Who’s the new kid?” Tada-san asked.
    “Don’t worry about it.  She’ll be gone in a day or so.”
    Tada-san slowly made her way back to her quarters, trying to remember exactly what she’d put in the box.  Cokes for sure, early in the morning.  No, that wasn’t right.  It had been grape sodas.  She remembered because Tokunaga had gotten a special deal on the stuff from a shop in town.  The food and water must have come later in the morning before she’d gotten busy with her soap operas.  That she couldn’t recall the exact details didn’t trouble her.  She forgot a lot these days.

    The door swung open.  A square of light, still gray and feeble, hit her in the eyes.  May had been dreaming, lost and falling, confused and frightened.  A hand reached in and dropped something inside.  She leaped for the light.
    “No,” she screamed.  The door crashed shut on her shoulder and bounced her back into the box.  Her arm exploded and something huge kicked her in the stomach.  She vomited down the front of her T-shirt and into her lap.
    May lay on her side, her arm snapped, her spirit broken.  Down, down, pounded down, she fell.  Down a shaft of pain and despair.  Her hands flew to her face.  Too small, too weak, to block the heat, like a hammer—the smell of death given life.

    Lift and push, lift and push.  Tears ran down her cheeks as she rolled the body away from the door.  Stiff and heavy, it fought against her, hanging up on frozen arms and legs.  Slow work with only one arm.  The smell of shit and fear.  Lift and push—she’d looked at the girl’s face once and never again.
    “Reiko?” the boy called.
    A steel sliver pierced her knee.  She ignored the hurt, just one of many.  Lift and push.  And one last shove.  The girl flopped into the corner, face against the wall.
    She dragged the boy underneath the air holes in the front of the box.  Beams of light, thinner her than her little finger, crisscrossed his face.  He moaned once and was silent.  She picked up the last can of grape soda tenderly.  Less than a third was left.  Three cans had seemed like a lot at dawn.
    May lifted the boy’s head into her lap.  “You’ve got to drink,” she whispered, and poured a little soda between his lips.  He coughed and the liquid ran down his cheek.  She watched it soak into his T-shirt.
    “You’re wasting it,” she cried, frustrated and angry.  “Try again.”
    This time the boy kept a little down.  May shook the can.  There were only a few swallows remaining.
    “Reiko,” he moaned again.
    She shouted, “May, May, May!  Why can’t you remember?  I’ve told you a hundred times.”  She pressed her face close to let him see more clearly.
    “Please try to remember,” she begged.  “My name is May.  Reiko is sleeping now.”
    The boy gagged and a bubble of blood formed on his lips.  She wiped it away.  Drop by drop, she poured the last of the soda into his mouth.  A small voice in her head pleaded for her to stop, to drink it herself.
    His eyes cleared for the first time.  “May?” he whispered.
    “Yes, yes,” she cried, joyful that he could see, that he could speak her name.  It seemed very, very important.
    “And who are you?” she asked, stroking his cheek.
    He tried to lift his head to answer.  May held him tight and put her ear close to his lips.
    “Did you say Kenji?”
    He nodded.
    “You’re going to be OK, Kenji,” she promised.  “Just lay back and don’t try to move.  I’ll take care of you.”
    For an instant all the pain and terror washed away.  He was the cute little boy with the big ears again.  He felt his mother’s cool hands on his face and chest.  He smiled.  And then he died.
    May fell across Kenji’s body.  Her sobs were poor diminished things.  At last she fainted.  It was a mercy, a blessing.  At 10 a.m., the sun was still rising, the heat still building.

Chapter 28 — Mad flight to Shikoku

THE PHONE rang a few minutes after Kenji died.  Sam’s heart jumped.  After searching the neighborhood, he’d gone to the police.  They’d ordered him to go home and wait by the telephone.  Manny and Helen had continued the search, calling in frequently, hoping to hear May had turned up.
    He picked up the phone.  It was May’s aunt.  Just after ten in the morning, she was already drunk.  She hurled incoherent, long-distance abuse.  Sam held the phone away from his ear and waited until she ran out of breath.
    “May has disappeared,” he said.
    “I know that, you bastard,” she shouted.  “The cops were here at the crack of dawn looking for her.  They accused us of doing something to the kid.  What the fuck’s wrong with you?  We’re her relatives for Christ’s sake.”
    The police had asked if anyone had a grudge against him.  Aside from Nakazono, the aunt and uncle had been the only other possibility.  Sam didn’t see any need to apologize but he wanted to get off the phone.
    “Yeah, OK.  Sorry for the inconvenience.  I gotta go, May might try to call.”
    “I wouldn’t hold your breath, if I were you,” she snarled.
    “What’s that supposed to mean?”
    “Well, buddy.  Just ‘cause I ain’t got your precious little sister don’t mean I don’t know where she is.  You get my drift?”
    “Where is she?”
    Drunk and petulant.  “That’s for me to know and you to find out.”
    “If you’ve hurt her I promise I will—”
    “Calm down, she’s OK, and if you want her back you better do exactly what I say.  You listening?”
    “Yes.”
    “Good.  Now, you get your ass down here.  I got the transfer papers all drawn up.  You sign that fucking building over to me and I hand over the kid.  It’s as simple as pie.”
    “All right, I’ll catch the first plane and—”
    “And no more cops.  You call the cops again and you’ll never see that brat again, I promise.”

    Weekend travelers had jammed up all domestic flights.  Sam didn’t touch down on Shikoku until a little after two.  He rented a Nissan at the airport and drove into the city.  The air conditioning controls were too cryptic to understand.  Sweat ran off his face as he steered along ever-narrowing streets into the oldest section of Kochi.  The shop was difficult to find and parking impossible.
    A grandfather fanned himself on the balcony of a sagging wooden house.  He chuckled as the stranger abandoned the car in a no-parking zone.  “They might tow you away,” he warned.
    Sam looked up and smiled.  “It ain’t mine.”
    The old man laughed.  “That’s the spirit.”
    It took thirty minutes to track down the shop.  It was tucked in an alley so narrow his shoulders brushed the sides of the ramshackle wooden shops and houses.  Rickety balconies blocked the sun.  They hung at weird angles, like afterthoughts tacked on by men unfamiliar with tools.
    The alley was crowded with women in bright, stained polyester.  They squatted in the shade of their men’s handiwork and did laundry in wide tin buckets.  Little girls watched their mothers obediently; their brothers tried to slip away.
    Dark eyes tracked his progress, murmurs of surprise floated out from open windows.  He slowly weaved his way between the women.  Three small boys began to bray and poke each other as he approached.  They pointed fingers and exclaimed, “Gaijin!  Gaijin da!”  The biggest loudest child dropped a clear plastic bag on the ground.  The goldfish inside died of shock.
    Sam rubbed dust off a small blue and white number plate.  The address was correct but the shop appeared deserted.  He peered through a window lettered with faded gold characters.  The shop sold general merchandise—many things of little value and less interest.  Shelves always in shadow and gloom were crammed with old-fashioned toys and stale candy.  Off-brand cans of tuna and okra rusted and waited for the next most desperate shopper.
    He rapped on the glass and slid open the door.  A small brown rat backed out of a burlap bag of grain on the highest shelf.  It stared down at Sam with cherry eyes, twitched its whiskers, and burrowed back into the bag.  A dented ice cream freezer hummed near the door.  He walked toward the back of the shop, his footsteps lifting dust into the air.  It smelled centuries old and clung to the sweat on his face and arms.  Claws skittered in the shadows and something ran over his boots.  He fell back, knocking a jar of mayonnaise off a shelf.  It shattered on the concrete floor with a loud pop.
    Sam turned to leave, intending to find a telephone.  He heard noises overhead.  Footsteps, voices growing louder and finally the creak of rusty hinges.  A shaft of light spilled into the shop.  He stood transfixed, like a deer frightened on a nighttime highway.
    His heart banged against his ribs.  He looked up amazed and speechless.  May’s aunt was hanging upside down from the ceiling.  Her mouth and nose were inverted, her gray hair dangled dirty and free.
    “Awww, it’s not a robber, you fool,” she shouted.  “It’s the brat’s brother.”  She pierced him with a pair of upside-down eyes.  “You used the wrong door, dummy.”
    The outline of a trapdoor came into focus.  Sam shook his head and demanded to see May.
    “Shit,” she muttered.  A rope ladder with wooden rungs clattered through the hole in the ceiling.  It grazed Sam’s head as he jumped to the side.
    “Watch out,” she laughed.
    The trapdoor led into a squalid kitchen.  Black iron pots and pans hung from hooks over a sink jammed with dishes left to mold.  Sam followed her into the parlor.  It was a six-mat tatami room.  A 29-inch television set was the centerpiece.  Purple and white zabuton cushions lay beneath a low wooden table.  An ancient black fan buzzed in the corner.  Clogged with dust, it did little to cool the room.  Sliding paper-and-wood shoji opened on a narrow balcony.
    “Turn that off,” the old lady snapped.
    Her husband was hunched behind the table watching a ball game between the Carp and the Dragons.  He wore a formal black kimono, apparently to mark the solemnity of the occasion.  Clean and starched, it only drew attention to a ring of dirt around his neck and a fiery boil erupting in the corner of his forehead.  He petulantly zapped the TV, climbed to his feet and bowed.  While he mumbled a greeting, his wife clucked about, kicking fat comic books and beer cans into corners.
    Sam smiled.  Though kidnappers and extortionists, the aunt and uncle were still captives of obligation.  A guest was a guest.  Muttering in the incomprehensible Kochi dialect, she yanked a spare zabuton from beneath a pile of dirty laundry and skimmed it across the tatami.
    “Clean off the table,” she ordered, and disappeared into the kitchen.
    The uncle looked at the table uncertainly.  It was covered with leavings from lunch—mismatched dishes, beer bottles, rice bowls and a TV guide.  His eyes were watery from too much beer and the acidic stench of a nearby squat toilet.  He shrugged, swept his arm over the table and knocked everything to the tatami.  The TV guide refused to budge.  It lay glued to the table in a puddle of spilled beer.  The old man grinned at Sam, unpeeled it page by page and tossed it over the balcony to the alley below.
    May’s aunt returned with a tray.  Badgering her husband into a kimono had sapped all her strength.  Her own kimono lay on a pile of futons in the bedroom.  She’d struggled for twenty minutes to tie the obi and had given up.
    Sam stepped out on the balcony and watched as she bent to set a teapot and cups on the table.  Her black lace slip fell away to expose small wrinkled breasts; her bald spot seemed more pronounced than ever.
    “Sit,” she commanded, pointing at a zabuton by her side.  Sam knelt on the cushion and waited impatiently as she poured the tea.  He considered violence.  While it could speed up negotiations, it could just as easily set off a chain of events he couldn’t control.
    He sipped his tea and wished she’d served beer.  There must be plenty of it around.  The room was terribly hot.  An old-fashioned thermometer hung on the wall.  The mercury hovered above 100 degrees.  He wiped at sweat pouring off his face and watched the uncle crawl across the tatami and retrieve a sheaf of papers from a low bureau.  He placed it on the table and bowed from the waist.
    The aunt wasn’t as polite.  She poked him in the ribs with her elbow and growled, “Sign it or you ain’t ever gonna see that kid again.”
    The document had been drawn up by a local attorney and seemed to have all the stamps and seals in the proper places.  He flipped it back on the table.  “This is worthless.  You know that, don’t you?”
    “I told you, I told you,” the uncle whined.
    “Shut up.  It ain’t worthless.  The lawyer said it’s legal, didn’t he?”
    “Yeah, but—”
    Sam let the pair squabble until he tired of their voices.  He held up his hand.  “Wait.  Let’s try to be reasonable.  That contract is only legal as long as I don’t contest it.  If I do, the courts will declare it invalid.  No judge is going to hold me to a contract signed under duress.  That’s a guarantee.”
    “Duress?  What duress,” the aunt objected.  “I served you tea, didn’t I?”
    “Kidnapping is usually considered duress.”
    “She’s my niece—”
    “And it’s also a serious crime.  You both could go to jail.”
    The old man squirmed.  “Jail?”
    “However,” Sam said, “I think we can reach an agreement.  I’ll give you three million yen if you return May to me today and relinquish all further claims to my property.”
    “I don’t know...”  The uncle hesitated and fumbled for a cigarette.
    Sam pushed a pink disposable lighter across the table.  “How about it, uncle?  That’ll buy a lot of sushi and beer.”
    “OK, sounds good to me.”
    The aunt exploded.  “Not OK!  Not OK!”  She jumped to her feet.  “Never!  I’ll let that brat rot first.”
    Sam turned and stared.  She was hopping from one foot to the other.  Neither seemed able to support her weight.
    “Arrgh,” she howled, both feet fast asleep.  She jerked across the floor and fell flat on her ass.
    The old man laughed and slapped his thighs in pleasure.  Sam shook his head in pure wonderment.  He wished Helen had come with him.  She’d have enjoyed this.  The sight of his wife was too much for the uncle.  He coughed, he drooled, he fell over on his side.
    Sam got to his feet.  “That’s enough.  I’ve been more than patient with you crazy assholes.”  He picked the old woman up by an ankle and carried her upside down into the kitchen.  Her screaming threatened to shatter dishes in the sink as he lowered her head-first through the trapdoor.  “Tell me where my sister is or I let go.”
    “Do something,” she screamed at her husband.
    The uncle stopped laughing, wiped his mouth on his sleeve and crossed the room.  He squatted next to the trapdoor and looked over the side.
    “I’m going to count to three and then drop her,” Sam warned.
    “Do you think it’ll kill her?” the old man asked wistfully.  He stood and pulled a beer from the refrigerator.  “Is it far enough?  I mean she’ll land on her head but—”
    May’s aunt kicked and screamed.  “I’m gonna rip your lungs out, you old bastard.  I’m gonna make you miserable for the rest of your fucking life.”
    “Shit,” he muttered, taking a swig on a can of Sapporo.  “I guess I can’t take the chance.”  The can clattered to the floor and he disappeared back into the parlor.
    Sam was trying to think of a new plan when he returned.  He had a gun in his hand.  It was a fat black Nambu revolver, a relic favored by the Imperial Army during the Pacific War.  He looked depressed.  “I guess the three-million-yen deal ain’t ever gonna work.  I gotta live with her every day.  You got no idea what it’s like.”
    “All right, fine,” Sam whispered.  “Just put the gun down.  I’ll sign your paper.”
    “Shoot him, shoot him,” May’s aunt shrieked, still dangling from Sam’s fist.  “Kill him and we get everything.  Do it.  Do it, now!”
    Her husband nodded.  At least it would shut her up.  He didn’t much care what happened after that.
    “Wait, you idiot!  Get me out of here first.”
    Too late.  He closed his eyes, pointed the pistol at Sam’s chest and pulled the trigger.

Chapter 29 — A softer, safer sleep

SAM JUMPED for the gun.  He never had a chance.  The hammer on the Nambu was faster.  It struck the cartridge.
    Click.
    Adrenalin slammed his head back, he never heard the misfire.  The gun was still in his face.  He slapped out and it skittered across the kitchen floor.  It bounced off a table leg and came to rest beside a wooden crate of brown beer bottles.  A single bullet lay in the Nambu’s rusting chambers.  Not quite as old as the uncle, it was just as impotent.
    Sam watched the old man collapse in the corner and heard a distant sound.  His brain struggled to put the pieces in place.  He looked down.  A woman hung upside down from his fist.  Her eyes bulged, her mouth opened and closed.
    May’s aunt didn’t stop screaming until Sam pulled her out of the trapdoor and slapped her.  He pushed the pair through the parlor into the bedroom.  They stumbled and fell on a pile of futons and quilts in the center of the room.  The fight had gone out of them.  They huddled together, eyes wide with fear, and waited for retribution.
    He watched silently, until he trusted himself to speak.  “Tell me where my sister is or I kill you both right now.”
    The aunt recovered slightly.  Her mouth opened to argue.  She gagged on the truth in his eyes.  He wasn’t kidding, it wasn’t just a threat.
    “She’s at the Tokunaga School,” her husband blurted out.
    “How do I get there?”
    The uncle tried to give directions.  Too frightened, he babbled.  The third time through Sam knew he could find the school.  He looked around and found a purple obi, the belt for the old woman’s kimono, discarded on the tatami.  She regained her voice as he tied her hands and feet.  A strip of cloth torn from a futon cover served as a gag.  The uncle received similar treatment.
    The rental was where he’d left it, unmolested by traffic police.  He drove as fast as he could, knuckles white on the wheel, through snarling city traffic.  Until buildings dropped away, replaced by paddy fields and low hills.  At the turnoff described by the uncle, he pulled into a gas station to use the phone.  The cop made him repeat himself over and over but finally agreed to send a car.
    A rutted dirt road led to the school.  He parked under the only tree large enough to provide shade from the searing heat.  A few ill-tended buildings were surrounded by fields lying fallow.  He saw no children, heard no voices.  The only indication that it was a school at all was a small sign, easy to overlook.  It was made of plastic and tacked on the side of a metal prefab office adjacent to an old farm house.
    A man in camouflage fatigues with an olive green towel draped over his neck sat behind a desk.  He set down a bottle of beer as Sam walked in, turned down the play-by-play on a mini-TV, and stood up.
    “Good afternoon,” he smiled, wiping his face with the towel.  “Welcome to the Tokunaga School.  I’m—”
    “I don’t give a fuck who you are,” Sam said.  “Where’s my sister?”
    Tokunaga looked as if he’d been slapped.  His face reddened, his eyes registered shock and then anger.  Whether parent or guardian, brother or sister, no one had ever dared to talk to him in such a manner.  He was a sensei, for Christ’s sake.  His response was predictable.  He leaned forward and roared mindlessly.
    Sam had met dozens of Tokunagas in his life.  He grabbed the teacher by the collar and dragged him across the desk.
    “You weren’t listening, asshole.  I asked you where my sister is.”  He lifted Tokunaga’s head and smashed it into the metal desk.  Blood spurted from a broken nose and splashed across the TV screen.
    “Where is she?” Sam shouted.
    “Stop,” Tokunaga gasped, trying to stem the flow of blood from his nose with the towel.  “She’s here.  I’ll take you to her.”  He nodded at the door and made a gesture for Sam to go first.  Sam opened the door and stepped into the sunlight.  It was sharp and blinding, almost painful.
    Tokunaga snarled and smashed the beer bottle into Sam’s head.  He crumpled and fell motionless into the dirt at the base of the steps.  The ex-soldier leaped down and kicked him experimentally in the side.  Satisfied Sam was out, he started dragging him feet-first across the yard.
    The old sow noticed the activity, ambled over and nudged Sam with its snout.  Tokunaga lashed out with his foot and the pig wandered away.  He pulled Sam into the barn and grabbed a coil of rope hanging on a peg.
    “Can I kill you?” Tokunaga growled, as he bent over Sam’s body and reached down to tie his feet.  “Can I get away with it?”
    Sam’s boot caught Tokunaga square in the face, driving him back.  More blood escaped his nose as he sagged and fell to his knees.  He stared at Sam in confusion and disbelief.  Both men slowly climbed to their feet.  They stood in the gloom of the barn facing each other on shaky legs.
    Sam could feel blood dripping down his neck, soaking into his T-shirt.  He was afraid he might pass out again.  “Where is she?” he demanded, staggering forward.
    Tokunaga grunted and charged.  Most of his strength was gone.  They came together—a tangle of arms and legs, curses and threats—and rolled through the dust, out the barn door and into the yard.
    “Stop!” voices commanded, “Stop!”  Hands reached down and pulled them apart.
    Sam fought to get at Tokunaga.  Until he saw the police cruiser parked in the yard.  He stopped struggling and started yelling at a cop in plain clothes.  Tokunaga, restrained a few yards away by a uniformed patrolman, yelled louder.
    Inspector Arakawa sighed—it really is too hot for all this commotion—and slipped out of his suit jacket.  He carefully set it on the hood of the cruiser and looked at Sam.  “Are you the one that reported a kidnapping?”
    Arakawa was an amiable man of middle height.  His tone, as quiet and reasonable as his smile, carried an unmistakable undercurrent.  It demanded Sam be quiet and reasonable, too.
    The patrolman led Tokunaga away to get his statement as Sam began to explain.

    So far she had fallen, so far to return.  Easier to suffer the world of nightmares than to relive the heat, the thirst and the children, lying dead inches away.
    Only Sam’s voice could lift her up.  She rose slowly, against her will—each scrape, bruise and break crying out as she surfaced.  May coughed and rubbed her eyes; she tried to vomit but there was nothing left, just a little drool that ran down her chin.
    Almost conscious, almost believing, she crawled across the burning steel and pressed her eye to an air hole.  A tentative tear escaped and ran down her cheek.  It wasn’t a trick or a dream.  A second tear, more hopeful, followed the first.  It was Sam.  She could just see past the barn, into the yard.  He was standing next to a car, a police car, talking to a man in a suit.
    She wanted to scream but her voice was gone.  Even if she could, he was too far away to hear.  “Come on, Sam,” she urged.  “I’m right over here.  What are you waiting for?”
    He turned his head, seemed to look straight at her.  “Please, brother,” she whispered.  “There really isn’t very much time left, you know.”

    Inspector Arakawa raised his hand, stopping Sam in mid-sentence.  “I understand the situation.”
    “Then let’s start looking.”  Sam bit down on his anger and impatience, working hard to keep his voice under control.
    Arakawa looked over at Tokunaga.  The housekeeper Tada, was standing a few feet away wringing her hands and looking confused.  “This is private property,” he said.  “We can’t conduct a search without a warrant.  Basically, it’s your word against his.”
    And I believe everything you’ve told me.  He’d never been introduced to Tokunaga but had seen him around.  After nearly twenty years on the force he could recognize a bad guy when he saw one.  There’d been rumors about this school of his but no formal complaints.  But scum like Tokunaga always made a mistake, it was as inevitable as the monsoon.  Arakawa had filed away the rumors and had waited patiently.  Today was the day.
    “You need to have your head looked at,” Arakawa said quietly.  “You’re still bleeding.”
    “What?”  Sam reached up and touched the back of his head.  His fingers came away smeared with blood.  He’d forgotten the wound.  It was of no importance.
    Arakawa reached a decision.  He didn’t like the delay it would require but he had no choice.  “I’m going to take you and Tokunaga to the hospital and then I’m going to get a warrant.  It shouldn’t take more than an hour.  The patrolman will stay to make sure the old lady doesn’t move your sister if she’s here.  I’m sorry, it’s the best I can do.”
    “What about the aunt and uncle?”
    “I’ll radio in and have them picked up.  Now, if you’ll get in the car.  The sooner we leave, the sooner we’ll be back.”
    Sam started to argue.  A look from the cop stopped him.  He was only going to make things worse.  Arakawa pointed to the back seat and Sam opened the door and got in.  After a word with the patrolman, Arakawa shoved Tokunaga in the front seat and started the engine.

    May’s eyes fell shut as Sam got in the car.  She didn’t have the strength to open them again.  She didn’t scream or even cry, she simply lay down on her side and curled up in a ball.  He was leaving and she didn’t understand why.  Hope, like a mirage, shimmered and was gone.  She knew it wouldn’t come back.  Not in time, not for her.
    May apologized again and again.  For giving up so easy, for not trying harder.  But she couldn’t go on any longer.  From beyond the terrible darkness, she heard a gentle voice, she saw a cool friendly light.  “Goodbye, Sam,” she whispered, slipping away.  “Goodbye, goodbye.  I’ll always love you.”

    Inspector Arakawa’s eyes never left Tokunaga as he radioed in his report.  Sweat poured down Tokunaga’s face, his eyes were everywhere, bouncing around the barnyard, never resting.
    Tokunaga could feel the cop staring at him.  He tried to relax, to make his mind go blank.  He looked at the farm house, he looked at the office.  Not once did he glance at the freight container, just visible around the corner of the barn.  He closed his eyes and began to tell himself hopeful lies—I can still get out of this—about a hopeless future.  He began to feel better and started to smile.
    A rooster crowed behind the barn.  Arakawa glanced toward the sound.  A hen cackled angrily and fluttered up out of the weeds.  The sun bounced into his eyes, glinting off metal blue and white.  He blinked.  A pig stood on its hind legs, pawing at an old freight container.  He shifted his gaze back to Tokunaga and now it was his turn to smile.
    “So what’s in the box?”
    Tokunaga was still trying to wipe the shock and fear off his face as Sam bolted from the car and began to run.  Arakawa made no effort to stop him.  Tokunaga’s expression was all the warrant he needed.  The heat in the car was intense, it seemed hot enough to melt the plastic dash.  He looked again at the metal box and casually backhanded Tokunaga across the face.  He picked up the radio and called for an ambulance.
    Sam burned his hand opening the steel door.  The stench brought tears to his eyes and drove him back.  He reached inside and lifted May out of the box.
    The patrolman was yelling in his ear, gesturing.  Sam couldn’t understand the words.  He stroked May’s forehead and refused to let her go.  Her face was terribly flushed, hot and dry.  He knew his tears weren’t enough but he couldn’t think, he didn’t know what else to do.
    Arakawa pulled the little girl from her brother’s arms and set her in the dust.  He saw a broken arm, he saw heat stroke—he saw she wasn’t breathing.  He didn’t think she was going to make it.
    Sam knelt and tried to help the cop with CPR.  When the inspector shook his head, Sam tried harder.  The cop didn’t know May—she would never give up.

    Arakawa watched the ambulance pull out of the yard with its lights flashing.  He prayed a little for the kid and then retrieved Tokunaga, standing forgotten, handcuffed to the door of the cruiser.
    He cuffed Tokunaga’s hands behind his back and dragged him over to the box.  Two bodies, one small, one smaller, lay beside the freight container.  He shooed the sow away from the children and forced Tokunaga to look.  “You did this,” was all he would allow himself to say.
    They stood together as the bodies were loaded into ambulances and driven away, this time without lights or siren.  Arakawa ordered the patrolman to take the housekeeper to the station in the cruiser.  “But how will you get back?” the patrolman asked.  Arakawa said he would call for a car.  The young cop did as ordered.  He looked worried and uncertain as he drove away.
    The sun was down, the yard in dark shadow.  The pig glanced at the two men and strolled into the barn.  “Get in the box,” Arakawa ordered.  He pointed a pistol at Tokunaga’s head, giving him a choice.
    “Please...” was all Tokunaga could manage.  He tried to climb inside but the heat and the smell nearly brought him to his knees.  “Please...”
    Arakawa assisted Tokunaga into the box and shut and latched the door.  He shrugged and walked out of the yard.  A small breeze lifted his spirits a little as he walked down the dirt road.  The smell of alfalfa, strong and sweet, filled the deepening gloom.  The inspector suddenly felt very tired.  He stepped off the road and sat down under a small tree.  Soft sounds, near and far—Arakawa listened with eyes closed.  He heard it all.  The rustle of palm fronds, the call of earth and sea.  He listened to voices gone forever and wished for a moment’s silence, nothing more.

    The connection was bad, his voice a whisper over wires stretched to breaking, heart to heart.  She wanted to ask him to speak louder but was afraid.  Evening shadows crept across the walls.  Can you fly down?  Tonight?  She promised and gently set down the phone.  A cry of sadness escaped her throat.
    There were things she needed to do, arrangements to be made.  Minutes passed.  She sat, her head at an angle, staring at the wall.  Street noises receded and were gone.  The light grew soft.  It slid out the door, cascading off the balcony to the street below.  She felt a coolness on her cheeks as a summer wind touched her tears.
    Helen stepped out on the balcony.  Remembering her first days in Tokyo, she felt all alone under a decorated sky.  A new arrival—the city had been master, she apprentice.  It had taught her the shape-changing art.  An import, too big to fit, she’d been forced to shrink.  Painful reminders had been administered when needed.  She’d thought it natural, a cultural adaptation.  And if others had commented on her silence, only she’d known of a growing bitterness.
    Excessive love had proven a distractive palliative.  She’d conjured emotions as ethereal as the sunset and called them real.  And then May had miraculously come into her life.  A little sorceress, she’d cast charming spells, visions of past and possible Helens.  Sam had followed and she’d grown even more, expanding to reach for his love.
    She looked at the temple below.  Awed by sharp angles and shiny surfaces, she’d gotten lost somehow, forgotten where she was.  Now she remembered.  She’d nearly disappeared just to survive, a believer in shades of gray.  She shook her head.  Not all differences were neutral—ask Kiyomi, ask May—children trimmed to fit like bonsai.

    The hospital was quiet and dark with nurses dozing at their stations.  Sam sat outside May’s room resting his head in his hands.  He prayed she live one minute longer.  The hand on the clock ticked over and he repeated his prayer.  The door opened and a nurse hurried past without a glance.
    He’d grown used to the footsteps of the doctors and nurses.  They moved between darkness and light on crepe soles that only whispered of their approach.  Sam raised his head to a different sound, loud and urgent.
    Helen was out of breath from running.  “I got here as fast as I could.  How is she?”
    Sam shrugged.  “Not good, I guess...hell, I don’t know...the doctors won’t tell me anything.”
    “But she’s hanging in there, isn’t she?”
    “Yes.  One of the nurses said every minute is important.  The longer she lasts...”   
    “When can we see her?”
    “I don’t know.  They kicked me out an hour ago.”
    Helen took his hand. “All right, we’ll wait.  She’s going to be OK.  Trust me.”
    Sam tried to smile.  “That’s my line.”
    “Not any more, it’s mine now.  Come on, if she can make it this far she can make it the rest of the way.  Have a little faith.  She’ll come back to us.”
    Deep into the night, the doctors relented.  Sam and Helen sat silently at May’s bedside, listening to her breathing.  It was a weak sound that struggled to be heard in a room loud with despair.  Sam held May’s hand, Helen held Sam’s.  Doctors and nurses came and went, their footsteps and whispers punctuating a history undecided.
    Sam leaned down and encouraged May once more.  His words and tears joined with Helen’s.  They fell gently, one by one, over the little girl.
    May’s eyelids fluttered just before dawn.  She lifted a hand to rub her eyes.  “Why’s my face all wet?” she complained.  Sam smiled, Helen whispered thank you and May fell into a softer, safer sleep.

Chapter 30 — Nakazono sets a trap

PATROLMAN TAKAHASHI listened to the river as he walked along the flood control wall.  The movement of the water lapping against the concrete offered at least an illusion of coolness.  In no hurry to get home, he walked very slowly.
    He’d finished his shift at midnight and clocked out of the station.  He usually took the last train three miles north to Minami-Senju and walked five minutes to his place.  But tonight, like every night this week, he walked.  It took well over an hour but he didn’t mind; he really didn’t want to go home at all.
    He reached a very large cardboard box and paused for a moment.  A loud snore escaped through a small door cut in the side.  Behind the box, shirt and trousers were drying on hangers on the river wall.  A week before, Takahashi had seen an old man washing clothes in the river.  He’d reminded him of a native in some far away, foreign village.
    He kept walking, passing many more boxes.  Just like a village, he thought.  The well-off villagers had the best places and their box homes were covered with plastic sheets to keep out the rain.  The poor villagers had smaller boxes and less protection against the elements.
    But all were the neatest of villagers.  No old tires or bicycle frames littered their yards; no chickens or goats foraged for food on their doorsteps.  He’d seen a dog or two, once or twice.  Maybe they would get the chickens and goats later when the village got bigger.  He wondered if there was a law against the river people keeping chickens and shrugged.  Cleaning the station toilets and helping Nakazono was his job, others could worry about the chickens.  All he knew was the police had been ordered to pretend they couldn’t see the boxes or the bums.
    Near Sakurabashi bridge, small tugs worked under spotlights, pushing fireworks barges into position along the banks of the Sumidagawa.  Takahashi grinned at the sight and stopped to watch and rest.  The night was still very warm and he took a handkerchief out of his uniform cap and wiped his bald head.
    Two fire department launches raced past the tugs, their wakes rocking the ungainly work boats and barges.  One of the tugs whistled angrily at the intruders.  A firefighter on the bow of the lead launch fired his water cannon in the direction of the tug and laughed.
    Takahashi laughed, too, and waved his cap at the fireboats as they disappeared around a bend.  On loan from the Nihombashi fire department, the boats would be stationed beneath Azumabashi bridge in Asakusa for tomorrow night’s fireworks festival.
    He replaced his cap and left the river wall, heading north up Edodori toward his home.  The streets became darker as he traveled farther and farther from Asakusa.  He liked it that way.  There was less to see in the dark, less to be afraid of.  Not that there was anything real that scared him, he just felt safer in the dark.
    He knew he was a dumb person.  Gosh, he’d been told often enough.  Still, he wondered if other people were afraid the same way he was.  Afraid of everything, but nothing he could ever touch.  Maybe smarter people knew what scared them, he never did.  If they knew, they could run away.  But what if they were like him and didn’t know?  What did they do to make themselves feel better?
    “Bad things, I bet,” he whispered, as he neared his home.  Takahashi wasn’t used to thinking, Nakazono always did it for him.  The idea was so startling he froze in the middle of the street.  “They do bad things ‘cause they’re scared.”
    Stuck in the center of the road, Takahashi didn’t see the car.  The driver stopped right behind him and leaned on the horn.  The patrolman jumped out of the way and pointed his finger at the driver.  “You’re scared!” he shouted.  “You’re scared just like me!”  The woman drove away with a look, perhaps, of fear on her face.
    His home was one of six shed-like structures.  Small, single-story and wooden, they clustered on a dirt lot.  When Takahashi placed his hand on his front door, he could reach out and touch the opposite shed.  Laundry hung on lines stretched between roofs, broken toys and candy wrappers littered failed plots of carrots and onions.
    Takahashi whistled softly as he took a key out of his pocket.  His hands shook as he turned it in the lock.  He’d tried so hard not to think about it, but it was true.  He finally had something real to be afraid of.

    May had slept with Helen for a week after her release from the hospital.  On the eighth day she stood in the center of the living room and announced she would sleep in her own bed that night.
    Sam turned down the sound on the TV and Helen set down her book.  “Good,” he said, “but are you sure you’re ready?  There’s no hurry, you know.”
    May picked at a cast on her left arm and smiled.  “I’m ready now.  I’m not a baby you know.”
    “OK, OK, don’t get excited.  I was just asking.”
    Helen smiled.  “I think this is May’s way of announcing she’s fully recovered.  Isn’t that right, May?”
    May hesitated and then waved the cast, making sure it was seen and not forgotten.  “Well, I wouldn’t put it that way exactly.”  She was still enjoying her convalescence and all the attention it entailed but it was placing a burden on her social life.  “But I’m, uhh, almost fully recovered.”
    Helen and Sam smiled at each other, nodded agreeably at May, and returned to book and TV.
    “Hey,” May exclaimed.  “Is that all you’re going to say?”  She stepped to the side to ensure that Sam couldn’t see the TV at all.
    “What am I supposed to say?” he asked.
    “You’re supposed to say that since she’s now feeling OK, she can watch the fireworks tomorrow night,” Helen said, without looking up from her book.
    “I thought we were all going together?”  Sam appeared puzzled.  “What’s the problem?”
    “I want to go with Kiyomi.”
    “Fine, she can go with us.”
    May hadn’t been out of Sam’s or Helen’s sight since coming home.  She was starting to feel trapped.  She couldn’t have any serious fun with them watching her every second of every day.
    “We want to go by ourselves.”
    “Why?”  Sam didn’t want her going anywhere by herself, ever again.  He knew he wasn’t being realistic but logic didn’t help.  He tried to smile.  “What’s wrong?  Are we boring?”
    May shook her head but didn’t answer.
    He turned to Helen.  “Don’t you think it’s a little early for her to be going out alone?”
    “No, I don’t,” Helen gasped, as May jumped into her lap.  “I think she’ll be fine.”  She laughed as May tickled her stomach.
    May nodded.  “Yeah, and we’re only going to be a couple of blocks away and—”
    “Get off me.”  Helen shoved and May fell on the carpet.  “Like you said, you’re not a baby anymore.  You’re way too heavy.”
    “Awww...”
    Sam knew this was an argument he couldn't and probably shouldn’t win.  “All right,” he agreed.  “But don’t talk to anybody weird and don’t leave the neighborhood without calling.”
    Helen leaped off the couch and pinned May to the floor.  They laughed and tickled and hugged and shouted.  Sam watched the two women for a moment, shrugged, and went back to watching the ball game.  He felt slightly old, a bit stodgy, and quite protective.  It wasn’t a bad feeling at all.

    Takahashi held his breath as he took off his shoes and tiptoed down the hall.  All was quiet, it looked like Nakazono had gone to bed.  He winced as he stepped into the living room.  The lieutenant was sitting in the dark on the tatami staring right at him.
    “Why tomorrow?” Nakazono asked.
    Takahashi eased himself past his boss, slid open the shoji leading to the bedroom and gently closed it behind him.  His hands were still shaking as he pulled off his trousers and shirt.
    Nakazono’s voice penetrated the shoji.  “You’re right, the temple’s probably the best.”
    Forgetting to remove his cap, Takahashi dragged a sheet up to his chin and covered his head with a pillow.  An hour later he was still awake.  It was too hot to sleep.  On a desk, on the other side of the room, was an electric fan.  He sobbed with frustration, imagining the coolness and the nice white noise it would make.
    “Do I kill her before or after,” Nakazono asked, his voice thick with anticipation.
    Takahashi rolled over, entangled in the sheet.  It was wet with sweat.  He whimpered and bit his lip, afraid the slightest sound would disturb Nakazono and the other one.  He pulled his knees up to his chin and decided to run away the next day.

    “How about some coffee?”
    Takahashi blinked and opened his eyes.  It was late, almost noon, judging from the light slanting in the window.  The lieutenant was squatting at the edge of his futon holding out a cup.  Takahashi took the coffee and whispered thank you.
    “What’s the matter, Takahashi-kun?” Nakazono asked, smiling broadly.  “You don’t like my coffee?”
    “No, no, it’s great.”  He floundered about for something to say.  “Uhh, you feeling good this morning, huh, boss?”
    Nakazono stood up and stretched.  He walked to the window, letting the sun warm his face.  “I feel great,” he shouted.  He was wearing a summer yukata of blue and white.  Takahashi had bought it for him when he’d fled his apartment weeks before.  It had hung loosely on his beaten, frightened frame.  Now it stretched tight across his broad back and tighter still across his expanding belly.  Takahashi wasn’t really surprised—he’d done nothing but eat, exercise and fuck dial-a-hookers during his confinement—but still the transformation was nothing short of miraculous.
    Takahashi remembered he was supposed to run away today.  It wouldn’t be hard, the boss sent him on errands almost constantly.  Whatever he wanted, it was his job to run and fetch.  He followed the boss into the living room.  Nakazono flicked on the TV and flopped down on the tatami.  He zapped the set a couple of times, pausing when he found the afternoon cartoons.  “How about this?”
    Takahashi nodded, confused but happy.  He couldn’t decide what to do.  Sometimes the boss terrified him, sometimes he was like his old self again.  If he ran away, where would he go?  And who would take care of him?  Maybe the other one, the one the boss talked to in the middle of the night, was finally gone.
    Ten minutes later, the middle-aged patrolman was sitting three feet from the TV screen laughing happily.  He munched on an onigiri as schoolgirl hero Sailor Moon flushed prettily.  Her precipitous cartoon breasts heaved against the thin fabric of her jumper and Takahashi sighed.  His plan to run away was completely forgotten.
    After the cartoons and a couple of daytime dramas, Takahashi went to buy dinner.  At a Seven-Eleven around the corner, he grabbed a dozen beers and after some indecision, two tonkatsu and spaghetti bentos.
    Nakazono burped and tossed the last beer can at the garbage pail.  It missed and bounced across the linoleum.  “Good job, patrolman,” he said, snapping off a mock salute, as Takahashi retrieved the can and placed it in the garbage.  “I’ve always liked Seven-Eleven for dinner.”
    Sarcasm was wasted on Takahashi.  He nearly glowed with pleasure.  “Thanks, boss.  We can have it again tomorrow night, if you want.”
    Nakazono grunted.  “Yeah, sure, whatever.  But I got another job for you before that.”
    “What?”
    “You’re gonna make a phone call for me.”
    “You want me to call another one of them broads for ya, boss?” Takahashi giggled.  “You want some more pussy?”
    Nakazono grabbed Takahashi and slammed him into wall.  “This ain’t no joke, you fucking moron.  Now, listen and listen good.  You’re gonna say exactly what I tell you and if you fuck up I’ll kill you before you hang up the phone.”
    The sun was nearly down before Takahashi was calm enough to make the call.  Nakazono dialed the number and handed him the receiver.  His hands were slippery and he dropped it in his lap.  “It’s OK, it’s OK,” he mumbled, and put it to his ear before Nakazono could smack him in the face.
    “Hello?”
    “Uhh, is this Miss Lang?”
    “Yes, who’s this?”
    “You don’t know me,” he stuttered, “but I’m with the Asakusa police department.  My name is, uhh, Akamoto.”
    “I see.  What do you want?”
    Takahashi lifted a piece of paper from the table and carefully read the first sentence.  “I have some information about the murder of Elena Takagi.  Are you interested?”
    “Why are you calling me?  What about her son?”
    He ignored her question and moved down the paper to the second sentence.  “This is very dangerous for me.”
    “OK.  Where and when do you want to meet?”
    “If they knew I was talking to, uhh...”  Takahashi nearly panicked.  He was still on No. 3 and she was way down the list.  “Uhh, meet?  Where?”
    Nakazono reached over his shoulder and pointed at No. 7.  “Meet me at Sensoji temple in one hour and come alone.”
    “I can’t meet you tonight—”
    He relaxed a little and read off No. 8.  “It’s either tonight or forget it.  It’s your choice.”
    “All right, I’ll be there.”
    Takahashi replaced the receiver and slumped in his chair.  “She went for it, boss.”

Chapter 31 — On the river

THE BELLS were ringing, the July sun lingered, over Asakusa heated breathless.  In deep shadow, one million, two million—more—faces in street.  Cops everywhere, shouted, directed, sweated, manned the barricades.  The crowd shuffled, not enough room to lift its feet.
    Casual—jeans and T-shirts, shorts.  Girly-men (salaryboys) in suits here and there, and there—yukata tarts in blue and white.  Tottering on wooden geta, sipping beer from cans.  Wet lipstick laughs tagged after perty breasts pushing rude against the flow.
    Across the street, a gaijin, dressed the same, no lipstick.  Clackety-clack awkward on geta and a look-at-me grin.  Head above the crowd—a fresh-off-the-boat sucker with a paper fan stuck in his obi.
    Islands in the sea.  Mothers held children’s hands on blankets laid down hours before.  They ordered men off to buy yakitori and Cokes from vendors.  Past dusk now, almost dark.  They sighed as the first rocket exploded overhead—a slash and a clap.  The kids wiggled their fingers at the purple sky.  Delighted, the sky grew expansive, blushing gold, faster than light.  The kids squealed as their fathers returned, grins on their faces, beers in their hands.
    On the river, stout hawsers tied barges to banks.  On board, venerated wizards eyed shifty-looking apprentices.  The wizards sniffed approvingly, cordite and smoke; they glared at the apprentices racing to reload big-mouth mortars.
    Helen waited at the top of the steps leading to the temple’s main hall.  It bulked large behind her, rising in sharp outline under cold spotlight.  Full dark now, she watched rockets light the sky.  On the edges, where the spots could not reach, the temple was blood-red and black.  To her right, the five-story pagoda loomed above an unruly mass of temple-goers.  They lapped over the steps, pushed past Helen and grabbed at the bell rope.
    She held her ground with difficulty, growing angry at the pushing and at herself.  Crazy to agree, to meet the cop—what cop?  She’d never heard of him.  And tonight of all nights.  A waste of time, nothing good would come of this.  Sam and May had been out shopping—she’d left a note.  They would worry.  Stupid idea, stupid, stupid.
    A college boy banged her, an old woman stepped on her toes.  She shoved them away and started down the steps.  Supposed to meet Sam.  If she hurried there might be time.
    A hand on her shoulder, urged her around, not gently.  She flinched from the craziest eyes she’d ever seen.

    “Well, what are you two waiting for?  I thought you wanted to watch the fireworks by yourselves,” Sam asked.
    Kiyomi and May stood half-in, half-out the door.  “But what about Helen?” May asked.
    “I already told you.  I’m going to meet her right now.”
    “Why do look so worried?”
    “I’m not worried.  Everything’s fine.  Go have fun.”
    Kiyomi crossed her arms over her chest and May shook her head.  “No, something’s wrong and we’re going with you.”
    Sam had to get to the temple and he didn’t have time to argue.  He nodded to Manny sitting, listening, in a booth.  “Keep and eye on these two.  Make sure they don’t follow me.”
    Despite his reassurances, Sam was worried.  Somebody had to be, she wasn’t afraid of anything.  The note, cryptic, just a few words—the temple, a cop, his mother.  He moved slowly through the crowd, pushing when pushed, shoving when shoved.
    The sky was crashing, the temple crowd thinning, drawn to the river for the fireworks.  He checked the front, the back, the sides.  No Helen.  Retracing his steps, to Mr. Donuts, her meeting place.  Back in the crowd, crushed front and back.
    A fist in the spine—impatient knuckles, sharp, designed to hurt.  Sam turned and dropped a middle-aged man where he stood.  Matsuya department store.  Across the street, the donut shop.  Again no Helen, not inside, not on the sidewalk.  He wedged himself into a slice of space and leaned against the wall.  Kids laughing...a noisy sky...too humid...sweat slid down his face...where the hell is she?

    A little resistance.  He stuck the gun in her back; she stared at his eyes, and then again.  Nakazono and not, whoever.  He promised to shoot and would.  No doubt, no resistance.
    “Witch, witch,” he whispered.  She was wearing jeans.  Convenient for him.  Just grab the belt, push and pull.  Helen went this way, Helen went that way.  Too hot, sweat, with Nakazono holding on, dragging him through the crowd like a caboose.  The sky looked cool blue and black, willows weeping silver.  She wanted reach out, to fly.
    A flash, A-bomb bright, lit the crowd.  Her face grim, locked up tight.  Only the eyes moved, seeking, begging.  And the gun, visible.  A man saw her plea, a woman the gun—and looked away.  Didn’t see, didn’t want to see.  Too dark, again, to see.
    Clearly mad, mad as a hatter.  Whispering whispering—witch bitch. Gonna fuck ya, gona kill ya.  And on and on and on.  The words hurt her ears, made her knees weak.  What he was going to do—to her, to Sam, to people she’d never heard of.
    She looked around.  Two million witnesses.  Nakazono read her mind.  “Go ahead, scream.”  His gun pressed hard into her kidneys.  “What are ya waiting for?  Go ahead, you bitch.  Shit, there ain’t even enough room to fall.  I’ll be gone before you hit the ground.”
    “Over there,” he nodded at a subway entrance.  “Get going.”
    Steps leading to the underground were jammed up.  Arriving trains dumped thousands of passengers into the crowd.  They poured out the exit, shouting and pushing.  Helen hesitated, Nakazono shoved.  She tried to buck the tide and was pushed back.  Just yards away, a cop’s whistle.  He waved her off—no departing trains, not for hours.  Nakazono stabbed the gun into her back, yanked her into the center of the street.  Bodies bounced off, swirled past.  A rooftop drum boomed as a wavering sheet, magenta and smoke-gray, tumbled down and curtained the night.  Star shells pierced the curtain and burst silver-blue.
    Helen glared at Nakazono.  “Now what, asshole?”
    “It was your idea,” he growled, looking at her.  No, through her.
    Her idea?  What the fuck?  His eerie little eyes bounced around in his head.  No, not her idea, somebody else’s.  He let go of the belt and pulled her closer, an arm wrapped around her waist.  In the other hand, the gun, still in her back.
    She held her breath.  It was all coming down, right now, right here in the middle of the street.  She could feel his panic, his muscles jumping in his chest, his thighs twitching.  He whispered and talked and argued and moaned.  Yeah, shit, he was going to do it, right now, shoot and run.  His fear, it stank; it fell on her neck like acid rain.

    Back against the wall, Sam scanned the faces.  He drank a beer, wanted another.  Nervous.  Not like Helen, not at all.  Dependable.  A cop?  Cops.  Nakazono unaccounted for, still out there.
    On the river, on the barges, the wizards warmed to their task.  Waving their arms, casting their spells.  A rocket, larger than the rest, streaked from a barge.  A wizard shrieked in anger, an apprentice cringed.  The rocket twisted out of control.  The sky recoiled, trying to get out of the way; the crowd held its breath.  Trailing sparks yards wide, it fell past a block of buildings and exploded over the street.  Heads thrown back, mouths agape, the crowd stared into a metal-white flash.
    And there she was, her face pale in rocket relief.  And fuck, Nakazono, too.  Pushing her down a side street leading to the river.  Sam jumped forward, banged into a group of kids and screamed.
    Sam!  Helen turned, trying to spot him in the crowd.  Impossible, just a mass of faces, smiling, laughing, having fun.
    “Move, witch!”  Nakazono hit her in the side of the head with the gun.  She screamed Sam’s name and dug in her heels.  If he was going to shoot, let him, she was going no further.  He hit her again, harder.  She sagged in his arms, unconscious.
    The plan was unraveling.  Nakazono hit her again in frustration.  Obscenities, objections, complaints poured from his mouth.  The crowd fell away.  He ran down the street, dragging Helen until he was blocked by the river.
    Looking left, looking right.  People shouting for help, gawking, pointing; their faces reflected the fiery sky.  He heard a siren; it was loud red and painful.
    Sam shouted and ran, knocking people to the ground.  He closed the distance to twenty yards.  Helen’s blonde hair flickered in the darkness.  He burst through the crowd at the base of Azumabashi bridge.  Helen and Nakazono were gone.
    “Where?” he screamed into the face of teenage boy.  The kid pointed under the bridge.  “Down there.”
    Nakazono shoved Helen through a gate and dragged her down a steep flight of stairs leading to the water.  Under the bridge, tied to steel camels, floated Edo-style excursion boats.  Too big, too slow.  Nakazono heard powerful engines rumble, smelled diesel.  He looked again.  Nested outboard, a pair of red and white fireboats, engines running.  Helen groaned as he crossed the last excursion boat.  The firemen looked up with smiles on their faces and beers in their hands.  Nakazono fired over their heads and the firemen went over the side, swimming for their lives.
    Gunshots, mere pops, beneath rockets thundering.  Sam skidded through the gate and took the stairs three at a time.  In the water—heads bobbing, voices shouting, telling him to stop.  He let go the bow and stern lines and jumped into the second fireboat.  Twin screws, very fast.  The boat leaped from under the bridge.  Nakazono was three hundred yards ahead, no running lights, charging up river.  Sam cursed and slammed the throttles forward.

Chapter 32 — The explosion, the end

A LORD of the river, a broad-beamed ferry, whistled as the small boat crossed her bow.  Nakazono spun the wheel to avoid a collision.  The fireboat hit the ferry’s wake and bounced out of the water.  Her twin screws shrieked as they tore the air under the keel.
    Nakazono braced himself and kept the boat headed up river toward Minami-Senju.  Again, he felt his brain flop over in his skull.  Keep going, keep going, they’ll never catch you.  Promises, promises, hot and lewd—get the witch back to the apartment—rip and rend.
    Grainy snapshots in black and white.  The dark canal, one of dozens, leading off the river.  A big man drags a woman off a boat.  An invulnerable man scuttles a boat, sinks it in the river.  The bedroom of an apartment two blocks away.  Hot and humid—handcuffs, breasts and blood—the righteous, vengeful man.
    A delicate flower, a pink rose, illuminated the sky.  Nakazono glanced over his shoulder.  There she was, face down on the deck.  He touched himself through his trousers.  Spray wet his face, the boat rocked under his feet.  He shouted in the darkness; he wept with joy under the rocket-bright sky.  We’re so clever, so very clever.
    Helen drifted, fell.  She slammed into the ground and opened her eyes.  She saw something black and wet under her cheek.  Blood, she decided and remembered.  She lifted her head.  It hurt as she turned it side to side.  Her vision was limited.  Left and right—the sides of the boat.  Dead ahead, a dark shape, Nakazono, leaning over the wheel.  She pulled herself to her knees.  Water splashed her face, helped clear her head.  The boat pitched forward, back; it rolled to port, to starboard.  Helen looked back, past the glowing wake, down the black river.  Many lights on the water—green, red, blue and white—but nothing near.  She heard no sirens, felt no urgency.  No rescue.
    A fresh salvo of fireworks lit the boat.  She scanned the deck.  Sailors’ tools—yellow braided line, a galvanized shackle, a rusting turnbuckle—nothing useful.  And firemen’s tools—a fire extinguisher, coiled canvas hoses—a fire ax clipped to the port gunwale.
    Quietly, quietly, Helen freed the ax from its clips.  She tried to stand, slipped on the wet deck and nearly fell.  She steadied herself, got to her feet and raised the ax.  It was heavy in her hands.  One step forward, two—send him straight to hell.
    Nakazono spun the wheel to port to follow a bend in the river.  Helen yelled as the deck tilted under her feet.  The ax slammed into his shoulder, hit bone and bounced.  It jumped out of her hands and hit the deck.  Nakazono fell away from the wheel, roaring in pain.  Flailing, turning, reaching for the wound, trying to stop the blood.
    The fireboat circled, helm unattended, and headed back down river.  Helen dived, grabbing for the ax.  Nakazono kicked her in the side.  She rolled away, trying to protect her face from his feet and fists.  He lifted her up, tossed her against the side of the boat.  His hands were covered with blood.  They painted Helen’s neck red as they closed around her throat.

    Activity on the barges was frenzied, a crescendo of running feet, curses and commands.  Across the river wall, two million were on their feet.  They stood on tiptoes, craning their necks, oohing and aahing.  Black smoke billowed from the barges and lay inert, dead on the water.
    The boat slipped, bounced over a heavy chop.  Sam blinked through the spray.  Nakazono was turning, heading back down river.  He spun the wheel, plotting a new course.  Not much of a sailor, his calculations were approximate at best.
    The wizards battled on.  One sent a silver whale swimming across the sky.  Another unleashed a whale-eating green dragon.  The crowd cheered and pointed, knowing the best was yet to come.
    The boats raced side by side.  Sam shouted.  No one at the wheel.  Dark figures, obscured by smoke, tangled on the stern.  The sky flashed.  Nakazono bending over Helen, her blonde hair trailing in the water.  Sam wrenched the wheel to starboard.  The boats collided.  He leaped, aiming for the center of the boat but landed on the bow, his head missing the blade of an anchor by half an inch.  He bounced into the windscreen, shattered his left wrist, and bounced again.
    He came to rest in the bottom of the boat.  No pain, not from the wrist, not from a dozen cuts.  He grabbed Nakazono and dragged him off Helen.  The boat rolled and her body slid quietly over the side.
    Pinned under Nakazono, Sam watched helplessly as she disappeared under the water.  He roared and smashed a forearm into the cop’s throat.  Nakazono fell away fighting to breathe.  Sam scrabbled desperately across the stern deck, searching for Helen.
    “You bastard,” he screamed, turning.  The cop was sitting on his ass in the bottom of the boat, blood leaking out.  He laughed.  “Fuck you, gaijin.  I finally got your bitch.”  He leveled a pistol at Sam’s heart.  “And now I'm gonna get you.”  Sam took a step forward.  A bullet brushed his cheek.
    “Shut up and don’t move,” Nakazono ordered.  “I gotta think.”  He sat motionless, his eyes a universe away.  Sam glanced over the side.  The boat was running parallel to the river bank.  Too close, getting closer.
    “You know I did your mother, don’t you?” the cop said, his voice just audible over the engines.  “Not that it was my fault.  It was an accident and anyway, she asked for it.”
    He grinned.  “Guess what I’m gonna do after I kill you?  What, no ideas?  Come on, give it a shot.  Oh, all right, I’ll tell you.  I’m gonna pay your sister a visit.”
    Sam charged.  A bullet tore through his shoulder, in and out.  He kept going, driving forward, slamming Nakazono onto his back.  The gun skittered across the deck.  Sam rolled away, reaching.  Nakazono clutched at his leg, missed and sprawled face down.
    Sam pressed the muzzle to his head.  “Stand up asshole.”
    Nakazono stood, hands raised over his head.  He backed into the wheel and stopped.  “You gonna shoot me?”
    Sam hesitated.
    “Shit, I knew you didn’t have the balls.  Come on, hand it
over.  I’ll make it quick.”  He smiled and held out his hand for the gun.
    Sam rocked back the hammer.  Something huge loomed up out of the spray and smoke.  He had the balls but not the time.  He leaped over the side.

    The apprentices, always a step ahead of disaster, abandoned ship with alacrity.  Their stubborn masters held their ground and were consequently sent to join their ancestors.  Nakazono exploded with the barge and became a lost soul, an expanding point of light.
    The concussion broke windows and bent trees in Sumida park.  The crowd cheered and slapped each other on the back.  The best ever, they shouted.  The best, the best, they exclaimed.  Japanese fireworks are the very best!

    Helen was thinking no such thing.  She’d watched the earth rear up and touch the sky.  She’d watched him die.  She rolled over on her back and let the current carry her.  The salt water burned her eyes; she cried.  To float away, to fall into the darkness and never rise again.  She thought of May and began to swim to shore.  She reached the bank and pulled herself up.  She forced herself to walk, head up, bones like smoke.

    Helen sat on a stone bench atop the river wall.  She shivered and hesitating hands placed a jacket over her shoulders.  She lifted her head and saw a shadow slipping away.  Above, the stars had reclaimed the sky and shone with perpetual grace.  Below, lights were spinning red through the trees of Sumida Park.  Police and firefighters ran and stumbled.  Orders were given and countermanded.
    A helicopter passed low over the river, its spotlight searching the water.  A TV chopper dived toward the park and hovered.  A spotlight punched through the trees, illuminating fire trucks and rescue crews.  The light passed over Helen.  S