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

aimlessly happy. Why, when you are big, you sit in narrow, low-ceilinged rooms, wherever you are, at most you go from one room to another, but as a child you were in a room without walls. For that’s how I remember it: When I was small, I took refuge in life in the moment. Neither the past nor the present could affect me in any way, and how lovely if that were so now. If you could work, not for the sake of the result, but work as an offering, without effort.
    Again he bit his lips white.
    I sighed, anticipating his sigh.
    He agreed and said: That would be really lovely.
49
    For me the train has left anyway, and I’m glad it has set off without me. As far back as I can think, I never had a desire to achieve any particular aim. Not for myself, I mean. The good grades were not for me but for my parents, who thought I would become something respectable one day. It was their ambition, not mine. It was their image of a life of advancement.
    I’ve still got the school uniform. It’s hanging in the darkest corner of my room, a garment without content. It looks like one of those figures you encounter in a dream. You don’t know them but are aware of a strange relationship. On closer examination it emerges that it’s your shadow.
    If I put on the uniform today I would hardly fill it. It would be an absurd sight, as absurd as I felt then, when I wore it. A person dressed as a schoolboy, who pretends to be learning something, but in reality is forgetting what’s important. That’s also a reason why I am a hikikomori. Because I want to learn how to look at things again. From my bed I look at the crack I punched into the wall out of rage at myself. I’ve looked at it so long I’ve almost disappeared into it. Time has wrinkles, this is one of them. I look into it, to remind myself of the many moments when I looked away.
50
    I was fourteen. An average student. My grades were good,but not too good, and my survival depended on maintaining this averageness, this much I had already learned. The thing was to be normal. Under no circumstances anything other than normal. For whoever stands out attracts the ill will of those who, bored by their own normality, have nothing better to do than torment him, the one who is different. And who wants that? Who exposes himself willingly to torture? So you fit in and are grateful that you’re among the inconspicuous.
    Takeshi, though. He stood out. Kobayashi Takeshi.
    He had grown up in America, just come back. When he said New York or Chicago or San Francisco, he said it as if it were just over there, around the corner. His English flowed, I couldn’t hear enough of it. He said Hi. And Thank you. And Bye. The words came from his mouth in a whirlwind. Too fast thought some, and were ready to pounce on him. The next day he was missing a tooth. He lisped: I fell. The tooth was replaced, the lisp remained. And worse still. He began to make mistakes. When the teacher asked him to pronounce something, he mispronounced it. If he was asked to read out loud, he misread it. Bit by bit he lost the ability to get the words out of his mouth, the language he had grown up with, which had once been his home. He even went so far as to imitate our accent. He said San Furanshisuko and it was gone, far far away. It was ghastly to listen to it. How he forced himself to do it. Before each word he spoke, he paused and mourned to see it go.
    The dreadful thing was: I could have been him. But I was spared. Nevertheless I was the observer, and it took someone like me, who looked and then looked away. I remained average simply by behaving as if I hadn’t seen anything. And the paradox was: I was a master at it. Atfourteen I was already achieved mastery in studiously ignoring the pain of others. My sympathy was limited to being the silent witness.
    Hm.
    And Hm again.
    He hummed a song. Took a puff of his cigarette. Hummed some more. A little pile of ash fell on his chest, a gentle breeze wafted it away. A bicycle bell rang.