They'd left the showy shopping district behind and the road grew more deserted, but still the streetlights were strung with banners announcing Christmas sales. A pathetic scene, drained of all color and life.

Yoshino was silent until she spit out the gum and wrapped it in a tissue. She didn't tell him she wanted to go back. He kept missing opportunities to pull off, and so they continued south along Route 263 toward the pass.

Up until they started to climb to the pass, they saw hardly any other cars coming in the opposite direction. In the rearview mirror Keigo occasionally caught a glimpse of the light of a car far behind them, but no cars ahead. Their headlights palely lit up the cold asphalt of the road over the mountain pass. Every time they rounded a curve their lights shone on the woods and the complex patterns of the bark on the trunks.

Yoshino continued to chatter, but Keigo ignored her and focused on his driving. Yoshino had pulled a CD out of the case without asking-"Oh, I love this song!" she'd said-and played a sugary ballad over and over.

As she was hitting the repeat button for the umpteenth time Keigo suddenly was struck by a thought: This is the kind of girl who's going to get murdered by a guy someday. What This is the kind of girl who's going to get murdered by a guy someday. What kind of girl he meant he couldn't say, exactly. But he was convinced that she was the sort of girl who could enrage a man so much he'd strike her down. kind of girl he meant he couldn't say, exactly. But he was convinced that she was the sort of girl who could enrage a man so much he'd strike her down.

As Keigo maneuvered around the increasingly sharp curves, he thought about this girl beside him, happily humming along to the insipid ballad, and what the future held for her.

She'd work as an insurance saleswoman, save up a tidy sum of money, enjoy her days off, gazing at herself in the mirror of some brand-name stores. Who I really am ... Who I really am ... Who I really am ... Who I really am ... would become her pet phrase, but after working for three years, she'd finally realize that the image she'd created of herself wasn't who she really was at all. She'd give up on carving out a life on her own, and somehow find a man and pour all her problems out on him. Which would only put the man in a bind. would become her pet phrase, but after working for three years, she'd finally realize that the image she'd created of herself wasn't who she really was at all. She'd give up on carving out a life on her own, and somehow find a man and pour all her problems out on him. Which would only put the man in a bind. What are you going to do with my life, now that you've ruined it? What are you going to do with my life, now that you've ruined it? This would become her new pet phrase, and her hopes for her children would swell in inverse proportion to her frustration with her husband. She'd compete with the other mothers at the park, eventually forming a neat little clique that would gossip and bad-mouth others. She wouldn't realize it, but as her little clique grew tighter, she'd bad-mouth those outside her group exactly the way she did back in junior high, high school, and junior college. This would become her new pet phrase, and her hopes for her children would swell in inverse proportion to her frustration with her husband. She'd compete with the other mothers at the park, eventually forming a neat little clique that would gossip and bad-mouth others. She wouldn't realize it, but as her little clique grew tighter, she'd bad-mouth those outside her group exactly the way she did back in junior high, high school, and junior college.

"So how far are we gonna drive?"

"Hm?" Keigo said curtly to this sudden question. The ballad had finally ended, replaced by a strangely cheerful tune.

"Are you really going over the pass? There's nothing beyond here. During the day there's a good curry shop, and a bakery, but not this time of night.... Oh, you know that noodle place we passed? It's closed now, but have you ever been there? It's supposed to be really good. One of my friends said so.... What's the matter? How come you're so quiet?"

The words spilled out of her, as if in time to the cheerful music. She really does think we're on a date She really does think we're on a date, Keigo thought.

"Your family runs a really nice inn in Yufuin, right? And a big hotel in Beppu? So your mother must be the mistress of the places, huh? I bet that's a lot of responsibility."

"Yeah, my mother is the mistress of the place, but that's nothing for you to worry about," Keigo said. He surprised himself at how cold his voice was. Yoshino looked puzzled.

"The two of you are different types."

"Huh?" Yoshino asked, still confused.

"My mother and you are different types of people. You're more the maid type, don't you think? If you were working in our inn, I mean."

Keigo suddenly slammed on the brakes. Yoshino pitched forward.

When he'd spied the entrance to the tunnel, Keigo had instinctively turned off onto the older mountain road. Now they were almost at the summit of the pass.

"I want you to get out. I can't stand having you in my car anymore."

Keigo stared right into her eyes, but Yoshino was still stunned and his words didn't register.

The upbeat song played on. Your love makes me strong Your love makes me strong, the lousy singer belted out, in a voice as appealing as fingernails scraping across glass.

"I want you to get out," Keigo repeated, his voice flat, face expressionless.

"What are you talking about?"

In the dark car Yoshino's eyes went wide. She tried to smile, hoping against hope that this was Keigo's idea of testing her courage.

"You're kind of a slut, you know that?"

"What?"

"How can you just jump into a guy's car like this, without even thinking? Somebody you don't even know? Most girls would refuse. The kind of girl who leaps at an invitation to go for a drive in the middle of the night isn't my type. So just get out. Or do I have to kick you out?"

Keigo pushed her. She finally seemed to understand that this was no joke.

"But ... if I get out here ..."

"If you stand over there, somebody will stop and give you a ride. You'll ride with anyone, right?"

Unsure what she should do, Yoshino clutched her handbag in her lap.

Ignoring her, Keigo reached over her and opened the passenger-side door. He gave it too hard a shove, and it swung open and banged against the guardrail. He could smell the cold soil outside, and the freezing mountains beyond.

"Get out!" Keigo commanded, giving Yoshino's thin shoulder a shove.

Yoshino twisted aside, and his hand slipped off her shoulder and dug into her neck.

"Stop it!"

"I mean it! Get out!"

Keigo kept on pushing her resisting body, almost as if strangling her. He felt the warmth of her skin, which only made him more irritated. His thumb dug deep into her neck.

"All right! I get it," Yoshino said, and unfastened her seat belt. Perhaps out of fear, her voice sounded strangely defiant. Keigo lifted one leg from under the steering wheel and, muttering, kicked Yoshino hard in the back.

"Ow!" Yoshino fell out and hit her head on the guardrail. The clang rang out, echoing down the guardrail and out into the pass.

To me, the name Mia fits her more than Yoshino Ishibashi. So is it okay if I call her that? Mia-chan?

I teach elementary school kids at an after-hours juku juku, so I'm used to hearing names like that that don't sound exactly Japanese, the kind of names that are trendy now. In the class I teach, there's a boy named Raymond, and girls named Sheru and Tiara. It's enough to make a teacher pull out his hair.

As I've told you a couple of times already, I don't have any interest in little kids. I just happen to be a juku juku teacher.... teacher....

But anyhow, kids' names these days sound kind of, you know, like the fake names girls use on dating Web sites. It's like there's an imbalance between the person and his name, and I remember when I first took roll call I felt sorry for them. They talk about gender-identity disorder, right? Pretty soon I think we're going to see people with name- name-identity disorder.

So what I was saying was, other than Mia-chan I must have met about ten other girls on online dating sites. Mia-chan would have been the second, or maybe the third one I met. Her face and body weren't exactly my type, but when I think about it, now I can see she was a kind, gentle sort of girl. When she showed up for our date and immediately asked me to reimburse her for the taxi it did upset me a little, I'll admit it, but still there was something, I don't know, sort of kind about her.

I mean, take a look at me. I'm fat and hairy, and look like a bulldog. No way I'm going to be popular with the ladies, and I'm not. But even a guy like me, if a girl says one nice thing it makes me feel like I'm not completely hopeless. Mia-chan was good at making a guy feel like that. But I could be wrong.

We were in the hotel, just after we'd done it, and I was about to pay her. All of a sudden she goes, "I wonder if we hadn't met in the dating site if we would have hooked up."

"You never would have given me the time of day," I said, laughing, but Mia-chan, with this sort of sad look on her face, said, "I wonder. There is the age-difference thing, but when I was in junior high, I really liked my biology teacher and he was kind of chubby, too."

Yeah, I know it was just an empty compliment. I was handing over the money to her, and threw in an extra two thousand yen. But Miachan seemed like she really meant it. She had this look on her face like, Yeah, maybe if we had just run across each other on the street, we might have gotten together Yeah, maybe if we had just run across each other on the street, we might have gotten together.

Men are idiots and we never forget words like that. Oh, well, guys who are popular would forget it right away, but for someone like me who has worried about how to talk to girls ever since college, even a transparent, empty compliment stays with you. It gives you more confidence. This was a long time ago, but back when I was in college one of the older girls in the tennis club I was in said, "Hayashi-kun, you understand people right away. When I'm with you, I feel like you see right through me." It's weird, but after that I came to rely on what she said. Whenever I wondered what kind of man I was, I always remembered what that girl told me.... She told me later she had no memory of ever having said that, but to me these were truly important words. It might be a bit of an exaggeration, but over the past twenty years those words have helped keep me going as a man.

You must think this is pretty stupid, right? That I'm a real loser. But a guy like me needs a woman like that. It doesn't matter if it's just transparent flattery. Without that, I'd be left with nothing.

Mia-chan was the kind of girl who said those things. Maybe not consciously, but she's the sort of girl who might say something that a guy like me would cling to for twenty years.

When I heard that she'd been murdered, it made me sad. She's just a girl I met online and saw only once, but I'll never forget her. "The guys I respect the most," she told me when I took her to an Italian restaurant, "are the ones who know good food."

After he'd finished breakfast on Saturday, Yuichi went out without telling anyone where he was going. Fusae thought he was going out for a drive as usual and would be back for dinner, so she made meatballs, one of his favorites. But Yuichi never came back, so she went ahead and ate the slightly too sweet meatballs herself.

On Sunday morning he still hadn't come home. Yuichi often went out, aimlessly, on weekends and spent the night away, but for Fusae, being alone in the house only brought back unpleasant memories. Memories of Dr. Tsutsumishita-the man who held those health seminars at the community center-and being surrounded by rough young men who'd forced her to buy that expensive herbal medicine. It was such a frightening experience that she remained upset and shaky.

In the afternoon she called Yuichi's cell phone. He picked up right away.

"What d'you want?" he said, like he couldn't be bothered.

"Where are you?" Fusae asked.

"Saga."

"What are you doing in Saga?"

Fusae had expected that he would be driving and would hang up right away, but when he didn't she asked him this.

Yuichi didn't respond. "What d'you want?" he repeated.

Fusae asked him when he would be back. Again Yuichi evaded her question, merely saying, "I won't be needing dinner," and hung up.

After this, Fusae went to the hospital in Nagasaki to see Katsuji. She listened to his usual complaints about the nurses for a good half hour, then she thanked the nurses and left.

In the bus on the way back the voices of those men forcing her to buy the herbal medicine came back to her in a rush.

"What d'you mean you're not going to buy the medicine!"

"Just who the hell do you think you're dealing with, old woman?"

"I don't care if you don't sign, we're still gonna come to your place every single day!"

The men's voices pulled her back to that place and time, and seated on the special Silver Seat reserved for the elderly in the bus, she began to shake uncontrollably.

Yuichi finally came back home after eleven that night. As she heard the front door open, Fusae, in bed, felt relieved and called out, "I'm glad you're back! You want to take a bath?" she went on. She hesitated to get up out of bed, which was just getting warm.

"Nah, I already took one," she heard Yuichi say from beyond the sliding paper door.

Fusae eventually left her bedroom and followed after Yuichi into the kitchen. Her bare feet on the hallway floor were ice cold. Yuichi had taken some sausages out of the refrigerator.

"You must be hungry," Fusae said.

"Not really," Yuichi said, but he ripped open the plastic package with his teeth and crammed a sausage into his mouth.

"You want me to make something?"

"No. I already had dinner."

Fusae called out to Yuichi as he was exiting the kitchen.

"What?" Yuichi said, annoyed, as he continued to gnaw on the sausage.

Fusae felt oppressed by the look on his face and she sank limply to a chair. She hadn't planned to tell him, but the words just spurted out.

"The other day on the way back from the hospital ... You remember the man who held the seminar at the community center? ... The one about herbal medicine?"

This was her own house, and this was Yuichi with her, so she was safe, but still she was on edge, as if she would start shaking again at any moment. Just putting that experience into words frightened her. She had to force herself to breathe.

But just as she was going to continue, the cell phone in Yuichi's pocket rang. Without a word to her, Yuichi answered.

"Hello? ... Ah, yeah. Yeah, I just got back.... Tomorrow? ... I have to get up at five, but it's okay.... Yeah, me, too."

As he turned the doorknob, Yuichi looked happy.

"Yeah, okay. I'll call you tomorrow.... Huh? ... Yeah, I know. Okay, then.... What? I told you it's okay...."

Fusae sat there eavesdropping. Just when the conversation seemed about over, it started up again. Yuichi took his hand off the doorknob, ran his fingers along the pillar, and turned over a page on the calendar that was pasted to the wall.

It had to be a girl on the other end, probably the person he spent the weekend with. Fusae had never seen Yuichi look so happy. Well, maybe he was happy at other times, but secretly, somewhere Fusae was unaware of. In the twenty years since she'd taken Yuichi in, she'd never seen him with such a look of utter bliss.

CHAPTER 4.

WHO DID HE HAPPEN TO MEET?.

Toward evening several groups of customers came in all at once. Mitsuyo took care of two men in their midtwenties. As they pawed through the racks of suits, their banter was like a comedy routine; from what Mitsuyo heard, she gathered that the shorter of the two had just had a successful interview for a new job and had dragged his friend along with him.

"I've always worn work clothes, so I'm kind of lost when it comes to choosing a suit."

"Yeah, but usually when guys buy suits they bring their wives along."

"Don't be an idiot. If I bring her with me, she's going to choose the cheapest possible outfit, from the suit to the shirts and ties."

"So what? You're planning to buy the top-of-the-line brand?"

"No, not really. Just something in the middle, you know?"

They went on, grabbing one suit after another from the rack and holding it up to see how it looked.