It was already dark when they drove to the station.
‘Here, this is the lake,’ the captain said from the passenger seat, sounding a little awestruck as a deeper stretch of darkness appeared beyond the window to the right. ‘The internet really is appalling. There is a horrible website, the “Top Ten Suicide Spots” – this lake is listed there. They’ve given it an eerie name, something like the “Lake of Promise”.’
‘The “Lake of Promise”?’
‘It looks like a heart, depending on the angle. The website makes the claim that it grants you true love in the next life; the girl today, she was the fourth. We had one come all the way from Tokyo not too long ago. The press decided to run an article, and now we’ve got the TV to deal with.’
‘That’s terrible.’
‘Absolutely. It’s a disgrace, peddling articles about a suicide. If we had had time, Mikami, I would have liked to ask you for some pointers in dealing with them.’
As if he were uncomfortable with silence, the captain continued to talk. For his part, Mikami lacked the will to carry out any animated conversation. While he was thankful for the captain’s tact, his responses became increasingly terse.
It was a mistake. It wasn’t Ayumi. His thoughts were joyless all the same; no different to those on the journey out. To pray she wasn’t their daughter. He knew all too well that this was the same as wishing she was someone else’s.
Minako was perfectly still at his side. Their shoulders pressed together. Hers felt abnormally frail.
The car turned at a junction. The bright light of the train station came into view directly ahead of them. The square in front of the building was wide and spacious, strewn with a few commemorative monuments. It was almost empty of people. Mikami had heard that the building of the station was the result of political manoeuvring; no one had thought to consider actual passenger numbers.
‘There’s no need to get out, you’ll only get wet,’ Mikami said quickly. He had the rear passenger door halfway open, but the captain beat him out of the car regardless. The man’s face was flushed red.
‘Please accept my apologies for the unreliable information and the trouble you’ve taken to come here. We thought, well, from her height and the position of the mole that she might be . . . I just hope we haven’t caused you too much distress.’
‘Of course not.’
Mikami waved a hand to dismiss the idea, but the captain took hold of it.
‘This will work out. Your daughter is alive and well. We will find her. You have 260,000 friends looking for her, around the clock.’
Mikami remained in a low bow, watching the tail lights as the captain’s car pulled away. Minako’s neck was getting wet in the cold rain. He pulled her slight form close and started towards the station. The light from a police box – one of the koban – caught his eye. An old man, possibly a drunk, was sitting on the road, fending off the restraining arms of a young policeman.
260,000 friends.
There was no exaggeration in the captain’s words. District stations. Koban. Substations. Ayumi’s picture had been sent to police departments across the nation. Officers he would neither know nor recognize were keeping watch day and night for news of his daughter, as if she were their own. The police force . . . family. It inspired confidence, and he was indebted – not a single day went by in which he wasn’t thankful for being part of such a powerful and far-reaching organization. And yet . . .
Mikami bit down on the cold air. He had never imagined it. That his need for help could have become such a critical weakness.
Submission.
Now and then, his blood felt ready to boil. He could never tell Minako.
To find your missing daughter. To hold her alive in your arms. Mikami doubted there was anything a parent wouldn’t put themselves through in order to achieve such a goal.
An announcement rang out along the train platform.
Inside, the train was marked by empty seats. Mikami ushered Minako to a window seat, then whispered, ‘The captain’s right. She’s safe. She’s doing okay.’
Minako said nothing.
‘They’ll find her soon. You don’t need to worry.’
‘. . . yes.’
‘We had the calls, remember? She wants to come back. It’s just pride. You’ll see, one day soon, she’ll just turn up.’
Minako was as hollow-looking as before. Her elegant features shone in the dark window of the train. She looked worn. She had given up on make-up and hairdressers. How would she feel, though, if she realized this only served to draw attention to the natural, effortless beauty of her features?
Mikami’s face was also in the window. He saw a phantom image of Ayumi.
She had cursed the way she’d taken after him.
She had made her mother’s beauty the focus of her anger.
He slowly pulled his eyes away from the window. It was temporary. Like the measles. Sooner or later, she would come to her senses. Then she would come home with her tongue stuck out, like she had done when she made mistakes as a small girl. She couldn’t genuinely hate them, want to cause them pain, not Ayumi.
The train rocked a little. Minako was resting against his shoulder. Her irregular breathing made it hard to know if she was groaning or just asleep.
Mikami closed his eyes.
The window was still there, under his eyelids, reflecting the ill-matched husband and wife.
2
Since the morning a strong northern wind had been blowing over the plains of Prefecture D.
The lights were green up ahead, but the traffic was backed up and Mikami could do nothing but edge forwards. He took his hands off the steering wheel and lit a cigarette. Work had already begun on another cluster of high-rise apartments, gradually stealing away the outline of the mountains framed through the car window.
580,000 households. 1,820,000 citizens. Mikami remembered the numbers from a demographic survey he’d seen in the morning paper. Close to a third of that population lived or worked within the limits of City D. After a laboured and drawn-out process the city had successfully merged with the neighbouring cities, towns and villages, giving momentum to the process of centralization. Despite this, work on a universal public transport system – the very first item on the agenda – had yet to begin. With only a few trains or buses in service, most of the routes hugely impractical, the roads were overflowing with cars.