Koimonogatari Page 2

  Senshogahara.

  Who the hell is that? Or rather, where the hell is that?

  Up north in Tohoku, if I recall correctly─I went there once when I was working a tourism scam. Nice place. Or no, maybe I didn’t go there. Maybe I didn’t work a scam.

  Either way, her rejoinder worked its magic on me.

  I let down my guard, and now I had to listen to what she had to say.

  Well, if I really hated working on holidays, then I could turn off my cell phone, smash it, destroy the SIM card, and toss them both away to be trampled by the bustling crowds─or I could just not answer the damn thing. But I did, so maybe I intended to take the job all along.

  Regardless of who the client might have been.

  I had answered the phone based on some kind of premonition─or that’s what I told myself, anyway, acting for all the world like I had been waiting for a call from her all along.

  “Suzuki,” she said.

  “She” being this unknown Senshogahara woman─though age-wise, she seemed like more of a girl than a woman. Not that I knew anything about her, of course.

  “There’s a person I want you to deceive. I’d prefer to talk about it face to face, so where can we do that? Where are you right now?”

  “Okinawa,” I replied immediately.

  I’m not sure why.

  “In a coffee shop in Naha, having a continental breakfast.”

  Earlier I said something about it not mattering where in the world you thought I was, but let’s say that was a lie─the truth is that I was in Okinawa.

  Okinawa, the pride of Japan’s tourist industry.

  Not a chance, sorry. Okinawa was the one place in the world I was definitely not.

  It was a spur-of-the-moment lie.

  Maybe I haven’t mentioned this, but I lie with astonishing frequency.

  An occupational hazard, or maybe I should call it an occupational vice. I lie in response to questions at least fifty percent of the time.

  That’d be an excellent average for a batter, but maybe a little too hot for a swindler.

  But let’s say that this time it wasn’t because of that hazard or vice, let’s say it was a strategic lie.

  A little show I put on for this Senshogahara person.

  If I said “Okinawa,” even a scary woman on the other end of the line might give up, what with a new sweetheart and a new leaf she might have turned over.

  Surprisingly, what breaks a person’s spirit most of the time is simply the sense that something is going to be a hassle.

  Break, come on, break!

  This time, however, my calculations were sadly incorrect, and Senjogahara, I mean Senshogahara, unhesitatingly replied, “Got it. Okinawa. I’ll leave right away. I’ve already got my shoes on. Call you when I land.”

  She was apparently prepared to go to Okinawa as if it were just a local park down the street. I wondered if maybe she was in the vicinity of Naha anyway on a family outing to celebrate the holidays, but knowing the present state of her family’s finances, I didn’t think they had the means─and yet.

  And yet she didn’t hesitate for a moment in agreeing to go to Okinawa, which paradoxically demonstrated to me how desperate her situation was.

  Not that I had any idea who or where she was, of course.

  The daughter of that household I had fleeced way back when certainly had no money, but sure, maybe this Senshogahara was some nouveau riche kid with a pied-à-terre in Okinawa.

  “Make sure you keep your phone on. If I can’t get through, even if it’s because you don’t have service, I’ll murder you.”

  With those hostile parting words, she hung up.

  I can but express my gratitude that her call miraculously managed to reach my cell phone amidst the teeming hordes, tens-of-thousands strong, who were crowded into the grounds of that shrine for the New Year’s celebration.

  This world is built on miracles.

  Inconsequential miracles, for the most part.

  Strictly speaking, I’m pretty sure Senshogahara said something else before she hung up, before her parting threat.

  Something.

  If I heard her correctly, that mumbled something might have been, “Thanks, I owe you one.”

  I owe you one.

  I.

  Owe you one.

  For that young lady to utter those words to me, the person she probably hated most in the world… It was hard to believe. Well, leaving aside what kind of a young lady that young lady might be, her back was clearly against the wall.

  Anyway.

  Because of my own stupid lie, I ended up having to rush off to Okinawa.

  004

  That being said, my travel costs amounted to no more than bus fare to the airport (not that bus fare should be taken lightly, mind you)─because I am the proud possessor of an All Nippon Airways Premium Pass.

  After an initial payment of three million yen, the Premium Pass, or more precisely, the Premium Pass 300, can be used up to three hundred times within a period of one year, from the beginning of October to the end of September, and allows the bearer to book any seat on any domestic flight at any time they choose. Or to put it in much simpler and less highfalutin terms, it’s something like a coupon book on steroids.

  That means that every ticket works out to ten thousand yen, even a flight from Hokkaido to Okinawa, which makes the card a really excellent value─then again, there are no direct flights from Hokkaido to Okinawa, so you’d have to get a connecting flight and therefore use the card twice.

  And a year is only 365 days to begin with, so there’s also the question of how to actually fly three hundred times within that period. Is a lifestyle that involves flying almost every day really feasible? Even a vagabond like me probably couldn’t make full use of the card.

  So calculating that each flight costs ten thousand yen doesn’t really make sense─but using the card only a hundred times would still be an excellent return on my investment, so I’m very pleased with my purchase.

  I like buying things, and I particularly enjoy buying luxurious, stylish, yet streamlined things─so I feel great about the purchase of this Premium Pass, which checks all those boxes.

  Incidentally, these cards are also limited to three hundred per year. When I think to myself that there are probably two hundred and ninety-nine other people out there with inclinations similar to my own, I can’t deny that I get a little thrill, but in all likelihood the majority of those two hundred and ninety-nine people are elite businessmen who would thoroughly despise a swindler like me, so I shouldn’t give it too much thought. It all begins to seem questionable.

  At any rate, my status doesn’t allow me to own a credit card, and I wasn’t carrying much cash (I really splurged at the end of the year, and most ATMs are closed on New Year’s Day), but thanks to the pass a trip to Okinawa was no big deal, provided there was an available seat.

  Fortunately there were plenty.

  Departing Kansai International Airport Arriving Naha Airport─may or may not have been the itinerary, but that doesn’t matter. At any rate, Departing Nearest Airport Arriving Naha Airport.

  While it may have been the holidays, there didn’t seem to be many people making spur-of-the-moment trips to Okinawa on New Year’s Day─the question was whether or not I could get to Okinawa before Senjogahara, I mean Senshogahara, but in that regard there was nothing I could do but consign my fate to the heavens.

  The heavens through which I was flying…

  She had said “make sure you keep your phone on,” but I had to turn it off once I was on the plane─even I abide by that rule.

  Though they seem to have revised it recently.

  In the past, it was a hard and fast rule that once you were inside the plane, you had to turn off not just cell phones but any devices that emit electronic waves (Walkmen, laptops, video games). Now, though, you don’t have to turn them off until the airplane doors are closed (in other words it’s okay to make phone calls until then), and once
the plane is on the ground and the doors are open, which is to say while you’re still on the plane but haven’t yet disembarked, you can turn them back on.

  Did they change the rule because it wouldn’t actually be a problem for the instruments to go haywire on a plane that isn’t moving? I don’t thoroughly understand the mechanisms in question, but that would seem to make sense.

  I have to say it seems unlikely that the electronic waves from a cell phone could even have an effect on the instruments of an airplane (enough of an effect to be a problem anyway), but that’s neither here nor there.

  What I’m trying to say is that these rules change relatively often without our even knowing it.

  The Road Traffic Act was recently revised so that it isn’t technically a violation to ride your bicycle on the sidewalk anymore, but I doubt even bicycle-loving Koyomi Araragi knows that.

  He pedals along in blissful ignorance.

  Well, in an age when even the theory of relativity has been refuted, mere human laws are bound to change─not that it’s any fun to go along with it, of course.

  But while we’re on the subject of arbitrary rules, despite having to switch off all sorts of electronic devices, using portable cassette or CD players in the cabin during takeoff and landing is apparently fine.

  I guess they don’t count as electronic devices.

  It’s not like I still use a Walkman, so I don’t particularly care, but it’s part of my job to find those “exceptions to the rule.”

  So bear this in mind.

  Never forget to think.

  To doubt.

  Abiding by rules is not the same as believing in them.

  Think, think, think.

  In a sense, you could say that the cabin of an airplane is the most suitable place for doing some thinking─once your seat belt is securely fastened, there’s not much left to do but think.

  And naturally the thing I needed to be thinking about just then was not the utility of electronic devices inside an aircraft, but, naturally, the job I was about to undertake.

  Well, I wasn’t necessarily going to undertake it.

  I might refuse.

  All I had agreed to do thus far was listen to what she had to say─and even that decision could be easily overturned. Decide, then reverse the decision. From Naha Airport, maybe I would just fly off to some other airport.

  But, that said, I prize my life─not above all else, it runs a close second to money, but that doesn’t mean I don’t also hold it dear─so it was unlikely that I would break my promise in the face of Senjogahara’s, no, Senshogahara’s threats, given that if I did so she really was liable to “murder” me… But, well, the point I’m trying to make is that I harbor doubt even when it comes to my own decisions.

  Anyway, this job of Senshogahara’s.

  This unknown job for this unknown woman.

  Would it actually be profitable?

  Whether her name was Senjogahara or Senshogahara, the one thing I could be certain of was that she was a high school senior─and it was hard to believe that someone like that would have much money to throw around.

  Times change, maybe now there are high school seniors running their own companies with billions in liquid assets, but someone like that wouldn’t hire a shady guy like me─much less hire him for a con.

  A deception.

  “There’s a person I want you to deceive.”

  What did that mean?

  Maybe it didn’t mean anything. Maybe she just said that because she knew it would pique my interest─not just meaningless, but a deception in itself. It wasn’t out of the question that a squad of police or a street gang she had deployed would be waiting for me upon my arrival into Okinawa.

  Hmmm.

  Now that I thought about it, it seemed pretty likely, even.

  But I’m a pro, being trapped like a rat doesn’t scare me one bit. That wouldn’t even constitute a sticky situation for me. At most it’d make for some decent exercise.

  We all need a shot in the arm sometimes.

  And if she turned out to have become that predictable, then I could finally stop looking over my shoulder─and live out the rest of my life free from the paranoid fear that she might appear one day and stab me to death.

  So the possibility that it did mean something─that the words “there’s a person I want you to deceive” did mean something, that she indeed had a formal job to offer me─would be much more of a pain in the ass.

  That might really be a sticky situation.

  Something to be afraid of.

  At the very least it wasn’t going to be as free and easy as “some decent exercise.”

  I’ve trained myself so that my emotions don’t register on my face, but that’s not the same as being able to completely control them.

  I feel fear just like everyone else.

  I get scared, I experience trepidation.

  Once you stop feeling those things, you’re done for─I’ve also heard people say that once you’re on the grift it’s all over anyway, but I like to pretend I haven’t.

  Just as I can be afraid of things, though, I can also be interested in them. So, stimulated by curiosity, I decided to proceed with my ponderings.

  To push them forward.

  Undaunted by fear, I would press on.

  Who could she, that unknown young lady, possibly want to deceive? How could someone who had been the victim of a con, who’d had such a terrible time of it, want to inflict the same fate on someone else?

  Fascinating.

  I couldn’t help but be curious.

  I’ve never personally been swindled so I can’t say for sure, but from what I’ve heard it seems much more usual for victims to remain victims than to become perpetrators themselves.

  I bet it’s related to the way someone who’s been swindled once falls prey to one further swindle after another.

  That girl─I had no idea who she was, but in any case, that girl─wanted me to be her partner in crime. Which was pretty much unthinkable─on that score, I felt nothing but apprehension.

  To put it another way, I had a bad feeling about it.

  A bad feeling.

  An awful feeling.

  No good could come of it.

  Some people might say no good could ever come of any con…but this bad feeling went well beyond that.

  On that particular flight I was assigned a premium seat so all the alcohol was free, but I decided to hold off. I didn’t know what Senjogahara, no, Senshogahara had in store for me, and had to keep my wits about me.

  005

  We landed at Naha Airport, and my phone rang the second the doors of the plane were open, as if she’d been watching like a hawk, checking her watch, and watching for me like a watchdog.

  There weren’t many people who even knew my phone number─and there was no reason for Senshogahara to have it, even if she was Senjogahara.

  That is, she herself had destroyed the number of mine that she’d known─well, strictly speaking, it was the cell phone she destroyed, and I was able to transfer the number to a new phone, but deciding it was too dangerous to continue using a number she knew, I’d canceled my contract immediately thereafter.

  …I guess the young lady could get her hands on my contact info if she tried. Whoever she was, in fact, whoever you are, you can obtain a fair amount of info with a modicum of effort.

  Not that you can know everything, like a senpai of mine.

  But you can find out a fair amount.

  If you have the motivation─which most people lack.

  People are lazy.

  And being lazy is worse than being stupid.

  Forget being “bored to death”─it isn’t boredom that kills people, it’s apathy.

  “Kaiki? I’m here.”

  “Who’s Kaiki? My name is Suzuki, Miss Senshogahara.”

  “Drop the act. Please, stop behaving like a kid. Where should I meet you?” asked Senshogahara, uncouth in the face of my feigned ignorance─like she was te
lling me, playtime’s over.

  “Miss Senshogahara,” I continued my act, my childish behavior─a lie, in a way.

  In other words, out of habit─a bad habit.

  “Actually, I’ve come to the airport to greet you,” I said.

  “Oh really.”