I Called Him Necktie by Milena Michiko Flašar Read Free Book Online

with the first lie. You plant it. Into the system. It puts down roots. In this first stage of its growth a tug would be enough to pull it up. There follows the second lie. The roots grip deeper. The third, the fourth, the fifthlie. Now it would need a shovel. The sixth. The seventh. It would take an excavator. The root system has branched widely. An underground web. You don’t see it. Only if you tried to lift it out, you would see it from the hole left behind. The eighth, the ninth, the tenth lie. At some point the system is completely undermined. If you attempted to dig the roots out of the ground, the whole surface would crack open.
    Hashimoto is still cruising. Just recently I ran into him in a store. I asked: How are you? He said: No cracks! His laugh was unworried. He had preserved his youthful vigor. And your wife? There she is, over there. He pointed to a group of women rummaging through items on a table. The one with the scarf. I was shocked. A face destroyed. She was a hundred, no, several hundred years old. What happened? He laughed, showing his white teeth: Life! Man! Life! A fraction too loud. I watched them as they disappeared up the escalator, he upright, she bent, a mismatched pair. Their backs turned to each other, each in their own world.
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    What I’d like to say. The lie takes its toll. Once you’ve lied you find yourself in a different place. You live under one roof, stay in the same rooms, sleep in the same bed, turn over under one blanket. Yet the lie eats right through the middle. It’s a moat. Unbridgeable. It causes one home to break into two. And who knows whether it does the same to the truth?
    I, who have never betrayed Kyōko, feel as though I have a lover. Her name is Pretense. She is not beautiful, but she’s pretty enough. Long legs. Red lips. Wavy hair. I’m crazy about her. Although I don’t want to start a new life withher, I am building castles in the air with her. I take her to the most expensive restaurants in town. I feed her. I rent an apartment. I support her. No matter the cost. She satisfies me and my masculinity. By her side I am young and strong again. She murmurs: The world is at your feet. She believes in me and my abilities, and I believe in her belief and allow myself to be surrounded by this flattery. I am a contented adventurer.
    At home I float in a bubble. It is so thin that one touch would puncture it. So I take care not to be touched. I sit in front of the television and watch the news. If Kyōko asks me what it was like at work, or why I haven’t done any overtime recently, or whether I have spoken to the boss about this or that, I say: Shh. Not now. She repeats the question. Fainter now. I say: Later. Please. She shrugs her shoulders. I dare to breathe out. The bubble in which I float barely vibrates with the expulsion of breath.
    It is a decision.
    And with that he unpacks his bento box. Rice with salmon and pickled vegetables again. I had resolved to behave as if. For that was my promise: That everyday life, our everyday life, would become our refuge. It has to be preserved. To the end.
    Finally he looked at me. Winked: Kyōko’s bento boxes simply taste too good for me to miss.
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    Do you have any children?
    No. He slumped a little. No. Why?
    I was just thinking, you would be a good father.
    Me?
    Yes, you.
    What makes you think that?
    Because you sometimes look like a child yourself. When you eat, for instance. You do it like a child who is not aware of anything but what he is doing at the time.
    And that would make me a good father?
    Well, let’s say: a real father.
    He bit back a word.
    That girl there, for instance. Do you see her? She’s moving her finger through the puddle all the time. She’s drawing something in it. Sees the picture, how it disappears. Starts again from the beginning. Paints nothing but pictures that disappear. An aimless game, yet a happy one. The girl is constantly laughing. I often ask myself why we can’t do that anymore, be