Hear the Wind Sing Read Free Page A

be.’
    “‘But it doesn’t look like there’s any islands. What’s more, if we just float here drinking beer, an airplane will definitely come to rescue us,’ I say. But she goes off swimming by herself.”
    The Rat pauses to catch his breath and drink beer.
    “For two days and two nights, the girl struggles to make her way to some island. I stay there, drunk for two days, and I’m rescued by an airplane. Some years later, at some bar on the Yamanote, we happen to meet again.”
    “And then the two of you drink beer together once again?”
    “Sad, don’t you think?”
    “Sure,” I said.
    6
    The Rat’s stories always follow two rules: first, there are no sex scenes, and second, not one person dies. Even if you don’t acknowledge it, people die, and guys sleep with girls. That’s just how it is.
    * * *
    “Do you think I’m wrong?” she asked.
    The Rat took a sip of beer and shook his head deliberately. “I’ll just come right out and say it, everybody’s wrong.”
    “What makes you think so?”
    “Hm,” the Rat grunted and licked his upper lip. He made no effort to respond.
    “I thought my arms were going to fall off with how hard I swam to get to that island. It hurt so much I thought I was going to die. Over and over I kept thinking about it. If I’m wrong, then you must be right. I struggled so hard, so why were you able to just float on the ocean’s surface ding nothing?”
    When she said this, she laughed a little, looking depressed with her eyes crinkling at the corners. The Rat bashfully dug around randomly in his pocket. For the last three years he’d wanted so much to smoke a cigarette.
    “You’d rather I died?”
    “Heh, a little.”
    “Really? Only a little?”
    “I forget.”
    The two of them were silent for a moment. The Rat felt compelled to say something.
    “Well, some people are just born unlucky.”
    “Who said that?”
    “John F. Kennedy.”
    7
    When I was little, I was a terribly quiet child. My parents were worried, so they took me to the house of a psychiatrist they knew.
    The psychiatrist’s house was on a plateau overlooking the sea, and while I sat on the waiting room sofa, a well-built middle-aged woman brought me orange juice and two donuts. I ate half a donut, carefully, as if trying not to spill sugar on my knees, and I drank the entire glass of orange juice.
    “Do you want some more to drink?” the psychiatrist asked me, and I shook my head. We sat facing each other, just the two of us.
    From the wall in front of me, a portrait of Mozart glared at me reproachfully, like a timid cat.
    “Once upon a time, there was a kind-hearted goat.”
    It was a spectacular way to start a story. I closed my eyes and imagined a kind-hearted goat.
    “This goat always had a heavy gold watch hanging around his neck, and he always walked around panting heavily. What’s more, this watch was not only heavy, but it was also broken. One time, his friend the rabbit comes along and says, ‘Hey goat, why are you always lugging around that broken watch? It looks so heavy, don’t you think it’s useless?’
    ‘It really is heavy,’ said the goat. ‘But, you know, I’ve gotten used to it. Even though it’s heavy, even though it’s broken.’
    The psychiatrist paused and took a sip of his own orange juice, then looked at me, grinning. I said nothing, waiting for him to continue his story.
    “So one day, it’s the goat’s birthday, and the rabbit brings a small box with a pretty ribbon as a present. It was a shiny, glittering, very light, and yet stillworking new watch. The goat was incredibly happy and hung it around his neck, then went around showing it to everyone.”
    The story suddenly ended there.
    “You’re the sheep, I’m the rabbit, and the watch is your soul.”
    Feeling tricked, all I could do was nod. Once a week, on Sunday afternoon, I rode a train and then a bus to the psychiatrist’s house, eating coffee rolls and apple pies and pancakes and croissants topped