A Woman's Nails by Aonghas Crowe Read Free Book Online

like one of her many sheep.
    Once at the boutique, Mayu introduces me to her co-workers, all of whom are dressed in similarly ludicrous outfits. They wear eerily pleasant smiles on their faces.
    “You don’t always dress this way, do you?” I ask warily.
    “Oh, if only I could,” Mayu gushes. “But these outfits are far too expensive for me.”
    I take a look at one of the price tags and I’ll be damned if my eyeballs don’t pop out. The petticoats alone cost a thousand dollars.
    The co-workers nudge each other and giggle. They think Mayu and I make a nice couple.
    These women are all insane .
     
    7
     
    “Call me Lisa,” Risa tells me.
    Whatever .
    Risa is disappointed when we meet because I am not black. I have so immersed myself in this culture that I find myself unconsciously apologizing for being white.
    “I’m sorry, Risa, er, Lisa , for giving you that impression.”
    I spoke to so many women in the past week, I don’t know to whom I told what, but I can safely assume that I did not tell her, or anyone else for that matter, that I was of African decent. I mean, why on earth would I?
    I go through the filthy hamper of a brain I have, sifting through the unwashed laundry trying to remember what I may have said that led her to believe that I am a brother. Did she misinterpret something I said? This is highly probable; even the most fluent English speakers I know misunderstand much of what I tell them. Perhaps, I told her I was the black sheep of the family--which is true, that I blacked out last weekend from the drink--also true, that black was my favorite color, that I preferred black tea to green, that . . .
    “You said you were black.”
    “I said I was Irish. Irish-Amer . . .”
    “Yes, and then I said, ‘Do you have o range hair and freckles . . .”
    I see, said the blind man as he pissed into the wind, it all comes back to me.
    And suddenly I remembered! “I said, ‘No, I’m black Irish.’”
    “So, so, so, so. You said you were black.”
    See what I mean?
    Risa-call-me-Lisa takes me to a monjayaki restaurant that she says is the best. Outside the restaurant we look at the display case, which features uncannily realistic wax representations of the dishes served.
    “Which one do you want?” she asks.
    There are a dozen plates of what looks like vomit. I can’t imagine anyone looking at this display and thinking, Mm that looks yummy! I’ll have the puke with bits of bacon, please . I’ve seen more appetizing piles of regurgitated ramen on the sidewalk.
    “I don’t know. They all look the same to me.”
    She laughs. “You’re a funny man, Mister Peador-san.”
    So I am. So I am .
    Risa-call-me-Lisa is going to have the seafood barf with squid, shrimp and bits of octopus, and I order the standard mixed monjayaki called, believe it or not, The Orthodox . We sit at the counter before a large teppan grill where the cooks prepare the vomit with the seriousness of funeral directors. I can’t help but chuckle.
    Risa unzips the silver down jacket she’s wearing to reveal the skimpiest of outfits. She hasn’t got the greatest body in the world, but she certainly knows how to present it, how to put it into a small enough package that it gives me a personal boner. Even the cooks can’t help but take their eyes off the teppan griddle to sneak a peek.
    She asks me if I like what she’s wearing.
    “I do.”
    She tells me she got it in Tokyo where all the girls are wearing t his kind of thing.
    I should have moved to Tokyo .
    “Have you ever been to Tokyo?” she asks.
    “No, not yet.”
    “Let’s go with me!” she says.
    “Okay, let’s!”
    “I’m serious.”
    “So am I.”
    She asks if I want to drink.
    “Is the Pope Catholic?”
    “The Pope?”
    “Risa, er, Lisa . I’m dying for a drink.”
    “Beer? You want a nama ?”
    “Draught? Yeah, I’ll have a nama .”
    She orders two nama s which we put away easily before our food is served, so she orders two more. During our meal of