nothing romantic about a turd...
“We already know the story, whether you talk or not. Your pals told us everything. So now let’s hear it from you. Come on, don’t be stupid. You trying to cover up for somebody? You going to cover up for the clowns that told us they were only following your orders? Does that make you feel good or something?”
The things he was saying weren’t very different from what was going through the mind of the popsicle fan sitting opposite him. He’d mentioned Adama’s name. Adama was the only one I could trust. I had no ideological ties with the others; they were different, they were underachievers, and the only reason they’d gone ahead with the barricade was to try to boost their own feeble egos. I couldn’t bear being lumped together with dickheads like that—they made it all seem meaningless. Algeria and Vietnam were far away. This was Japan, the land of peace. Sure, we heard the roar of Phantom jets every day. An ex-classmate whiled away her time sucking black sailors’ dicks. But no blood was being spilled. No bombs were being dropped. No babies were scarred by napalm. So what was I doing here in this steaming shithole of a room at a police station in a little city on the western edge of a country like this? Was I going to change the world by holding my tongue? The radical movement was already in a shambles even at Tokyo University. I wanted something to hold on to, some grounds for opposing this wrinkled, cloudy-eyed old guy in front of me. I could say “I hate your guts!” and stick out my tongue—but that was about all I could do. The part of me that longed to be sucking on a popsicle kept asking questions: Why did you barricade the school? You’re not an Algerian rebel or a Viet Cong or one of Che’s guerrillas. What are you doing here? I knew damn well I’d done what I’d done because I wanted Kazuko Matsui to like me, but somehow it was hard to respect that as a motive now.
Sasaki shifted in his seat. He sat up straight and gave me a dour look.
“You hoping to become a bum, Yazaki? I’ve seen a lot of ’em, you know. Homeless guys that just wander around with nowhere to go. Maybe you were cut out to be one of them— you seem to like that free and footloose way of life, right? I know a lot of people who’ve gone that way. Yeah, you remind me of some of them. You know, there aren’t many stupid beggars. ’Course, once they become beggars they start losing their marbles, but most of them planned at one time to go on to some good university—Tokyo, Kyoto, that kind of place. Yeah... it’s just that something goes wrong, some little thing, they make one little mistake and the next thing they know they’re living on the street. They stink something awful, you know, those people.”
I drank some barley tea. Then I threw in the sponge.
It was past eleven that night when I got home. Popsicles were the last thing on my mind. My parents didn’t say anything at all for quite a while, but my little sister got out of bed in a cute pair of piggy-print pajamas to welcome me back. “You were out late, weren’t you?” she said. “There’s an Alain Delon movie I want to see. Will you take me?” Either she didn’t know anything or she was just trying to brighten up the atmosphere. “Yeah, sure, I’ll take you,” I said, forcing a smile, which got me an “Oh, goody!” and a kiss on the cheek.
When she was back in bed again, my father muttered, “Alain Delon, eh?” He had his arms crossed and was peering at the ceiling. “What was that movie with Alain Delon and Jean Gabin? You and I and your mother went to see it together a few years back.”
“ Melodie en Sous-Sol ,” my mother said. You could still see where tears had run down her cheeks.
“Right, right.”
My father fell silent again for several long minutes. At times like this, the ticking of a clock is as loud as a drum. An odd little thought popped into my head: no matter what sort of shit is
“We already know the story, whether you talk or not. Your pals told us everything. So now let’s hear it from you. Come on, don’t be stupid. You trying to cover up for somebody? You going to cover up for the clowns that told us they were only following your orders? Does that make you feel good or something?”
The things he was saying weren’t very different from what was going through the mind of the popsicle fan sitting opposite him. He’d mentioned Adama’s name. Adama was the only one I could trust. I had no ideological ties with the others; they were different, they were underachievers, and the only reason they’d gone ahead with the barricade was to try to boost their own feeble egos. I couldn’t bear being lumped together with dickheads like that—they made it all seem meaningless. Algeria and Vietnam were far away. This was Japan, the land of peace. Sure, we heard the roar of Phantom jets every day. An ex-classmate whiled away her time sucking black sailors’ dicks. But no blood was being spilled. No bombs were being dropped. No babies were scarred by napalm. So what was I doing here in this steaming shithole of a room at a police station in a little city on the western edge of a country like this? Was I going to change the world by holding my tongue? The radical movement was already in a shambles even at Tokyo University. I wanted something to hold on to, some grounds for opposing this wrinkled, cloudy-eyed old guy in front of me. I could say “I hate your guts!” and stick out my tongue—but that was about all I could do. The part of me that longed to be sucking on a popsicle kept asking questions: Why did you barricade the school? You’re not an Algerian rebel or a Viet Cong or one of Che’s guerrillas. What are you doing here? I knew damn well I’d done what I’d done because I wanted Kazuko Matsui to like me, but somehow it was hard to respect that as a motive now.
Sasaki shifted in his seat. He sat up straight and gave me a dour look.
“You hoping to become a bum, Yazaki? I’ve seen a lot of ’em, you know. Homeless guys that just wander around with nowhere to go. Maybe you were cut out to be one of them— you seem to like that free and footloose way of life, right? I know a lot of people who’ve gone that way. Yeah, you remind me of some of them. You know, there aren’t many stupid beggars. ’Course, once they become beggars they start losing their marbles, but most of them planned at one time to go on to some good university—Tokyo, Kyoto, that kind of place. Yeah... it’s just that something goes wrong, some little thing, they make one little mistake and the next thing they know they’re living on the street. They stink something awful, you know, those people.”
I drank some barley tea. Then I threw in the sponge.
It was past eleven that night when I got home. Popsicles were the last thing on my mind. My parents didn’t say anything at all for quite a while, but my little sister got out of bed in a cute pair of piggy-print pajamas to welcome me back. “You were out late, weren’t you?” she said. “There’s an Alain Delon movie I want to see. Will you take me?” Either she didn’t know anything or she was just trying to brighten up the atmosphere. “Yeah, sure, I’ll take you,” I said, forcing a smile, which got me an “Oh, goody!” and a kiss on the cheek.
When she was back in bed again, my father muttered, “Alain Delon, eh?” He had his arms crossed and was peering at the ceiling. “What was that movie with Alain Delon and Jean Gabin? You and I and your mother went to see it together a few years back.”
“ Melodie en Sous-Sol ,” my mother said. You could still see where tears had run down her cheeks.
“Right, right.”
My father fell silent again for several long minutes. At times like this, the ticking of a clock is as loud as a drum. An odd little thought popped into my head: no matter what sort of shit is
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