Ghostwritten by David Mitchell Read Free Book Online Page B

barely leave the ground.
    The door opened, and I smelt air rainwashed clean. Four high school girls came in, but one of them was completely, completely different. She pulsed, invisibly, like a quasar. I know that sounds stupid, but she did.
    The three bubbleheads flounced up to the counter. They were pretty, I guess, but they were all clones of the same ova. Their hair was the same length, their lipstick the same colour, their bodies curving in the same way beneath their same uniform. Their leader demanded in a voice cutesy and spoilt the newest hit by the latest teen dwoob.
    But I didn’t bother hearing them. I can’t describe women, not like Takeshi or Koji. But if you know Duke Pearson’s ‘After the Rain’, well, she was as beautiful and pure as that.
    Standing by the window, and looking out. What was out there? She was embarrassed by her classmates. And so she should have been! She was so real, the others were cardboard cut-outs beside her. Real things had happened to her to make her how she was, and I wanted to know them, and read them, like a book. It was the strangest feeling. I just kept thinking, well, I’m not sure what I was thinking. I’m not sure if I was thinking of anything.
    She was listening to the music! She was afraid she’d scare the music away if she moved.
    ‘Well, have you got it or haven’t you?’ One of the cut-out girls squawked. It must take a long time to train your voice to be so annoying.
    Another giggled.
    The leader’s pocket phone trilled and she got it out.
    I was angry with them for making me look away from her.
    ‘This is a disc collector’s shop. There’s a toyshop in the shopping mall by the metro station that sells the kind of thing you’re looking for.’
    Rich Shibuya girls are truffle-fed pooches. The girls at Mama-san’s, they have all had to learn how to survive. They have to keep their patrons, keep their looks, keep their integrity, and they get scarred. But they respect themselves, and they let it show. They respect each other. I respect them. They are real people.
    But these magazine girls have nothing real about them. They have magazine expressions, speak magazine words and carry magazine fashion accessories. They’ve chosen to become this. I don’t know whether or not to blame them. Getting scarred isn’t nice. But look! As shallow, and glossy, and identical, and throwaway, as magazines.
    ‘You’re a bit uptight aren’t you? Been dumped by your girlfriend?’ The leader leaned on the counter and swayed, just a few inches away from my face. I imagined her using that face in bars, in cars, in love hotels.
    Her friend shrieked with laughter and pulled her away before I could think of a witty retort. They flocked back towards the door. ‘Told you!’ one of them said. The third was still speaking into her pocket phone. ‘I dunno where we are. Some crappy place behind some crappy building. Where are you?’
    ‘You coming?’ The leader said to the one still staring into space, listening to Mal.
    No, I thought with all my might, Say no, and stay with me in my space.
    ‘I said,’ said the leader, ‘are – you – coming?’
    Was she deaf?
    ‘I guess so,’ she said, in a real voice. A beautiful, real voice.
    Look at me , I willed. Look at me. Please. Just once, look straight at me.
    As she left, she looked at me over her shoulder, my heart trampolined, and she followed the others into the street.

    The cherry trees were budding. Maroon tips sprouted and swelled through the sealed bark. Pigeons ruffled and prilled. I wish I knew more about pigeons. Were they strutting about like that for mating purposes, or just because they were strutty birds? That would be useful knowledge for school syllabuses. None of this capital of Mongolia stuff. The air outside was warmer and damp. Being outside was like being in a tent. A jackhammer was pounding into concrete a few doors down. Takeshi said that yet another surf and ski shop was opening up. How many surfers and