Shiki Novel Translations 3.15.6

[sinnesspiel]

As usual, Takemura was the gathering spot for the elderly. The topic was the Ohkawa Liquor Store's funeral from just the day before, now the hot topic of the town.

"It's the first time I'd ever seen such a ridiculous funeral." Yaeko said in shock. Takeko likewise wrinkled her nose at the base and let her disgust show plainly.

"Really. I have my doubts if Namie-san hasn't just snapped. If it were me, if it were my son being put through that blunder of a funeral, if I why, I think I would be taking a few swings at people, myself!"

"It's because the temple's too busy, isn't it?" Tatsu said, her mouth twisted in a frown. "After all, they had the Ozaki's funeral."

"That's true but still," Takeko frowned. "Even so, that wasn't the way to go. That was just disgraceful."

Too right, said Takeko with a nod, as Oitarou approached with his arms folded. Just when it looked like he was going to go past Takemura completely, Yaeko called out to him and caused him to come to a flustered stop.

"What's got you thinking so deep?"

"Ah---" Oitarou blinked, tilting his head and taking a seat on one of the stools. "Say, what would you think of it if you heard sounds from a house where nobody lives anymore?"

"What kind of question is that?" Takeko asked as Oitarou tilted his head further.

"No, it's just, next door. There hasn't been anyone in that house for a while now. Ever since Old Man Yamase died, his wife left to live with her son. Fukushima carpentry rented the space to use for a warehouse but Fukushima's father died the year before and they shut down, so it'd been left unused like that."

Ah, Tatsu nodded.

"But then, just here lately it's felt like there was someone there. See, their house is connected to the same wall as my bathroom. In the night I went to take a leak and could hear something on the other side of the wall."

"Isn't it your imagination? Or else, Oitarou-san, maybe you're finally going senile." Yaeko laughed.

"It's not funny. I'm certain it sounded like there was something over there. And it didn't sound like a mouse or something like that. It sounded like the rusting of a person. I thought someone had moved in but there are no other signs of it, and when I went to look in the daytime, there wasn't any sign of anybody there."

"Maybe it was a sound from behind the house.," Takeko said. Oitarou tilted his head and nodded.

"Maybe that was it. I heard a sound, but for the life of me, I can't be sure I could tell right where it was coming from. That's right. Might've been behind the house."

"That's it. It must be."

"Still feels unsettling. I'm getting on in years myself. Don't know how to put it but I'm getting tense at the smallest little thing. It's not just next door, a lot of things are creeping me out."

"That's your age talking," Takeko laughed out loudly, though Tatsu secretly gave a nod.

Tatsu had something lately that she couldn't help worrying over. The count of the cars didn't match up.

Cars she was sure she had never seen before in her life were coming in, but not coming out. Or on the other hand, ones she never remembered coming in were going out. Lately, Tatsu had moved her bedroom to the second story on the same side as the road. She closed the windows but the storm door always had one panel open. She couldn't help her thoughts about who was coming or going at night. And yet the car counts never matched up. While the daytime traffic was in sharp decline, only the night time traffic was spiking, and she didn't like it one bit.

"Speaking of creepy," Yaeko began in a lowered voice. "Shimo Sotoba's Matsuos are gone now too."

"What, the manager?"

"Not them. The branch family. At the base of the mountain. Where the old man and the old woman were."

"Ah."

"I'm saying, they're gone. And they left their furniture and everything behind. Their valuables are and sure are gone, it doesn't look like the house was ransacked or anything, so there's talk that they're another one that have left like the rest."

Hmm, Takeko and Oitarou both intoned uneasily. While Yaeko had some of that same unease herself, she didn't understand herself why it was that she should have to feel so put off by it, not the way she saw it. "But it's nothing special. Moving isn't that rare...."

Yaeko spoke as if to convince herself. "....Oh gracious, I wonder if I might have caught something from Oitarou-san."


Tamo Yukiko was washing the rice bowls from dinner when she idly looked towards the front of the house and saw that the light was on across the street at the San-Yasus.

"How... Why?" Yukiko murmured. Her daughter in law who was wiping the table asked if something happened. Yukiko pointed across the balcony. "The lights are on. They've come back."

"My, I can't believe it."

"I'm going to go have a look."

Yukiko took off her apron and rolled it up, abandoning it there. Yukiko's house was at the outskirts of Naka Sotoba, surrounded by momi firs. If not for the San-Yasus they were out almost as if on a deserted island, so when the San-Yasus had become vacant, it had left her forlorn. When she hurried across to that place, several of th storm doors were open, and she saw there on the front room porch was a girl cleaning up.

"Oh my---you're Hina-chan."

Hinako looked up and stopped cleaning when she noticed Yukiko. The light from the room was behind her, but she could tell Hinako was smiling.

"Good evening. It's been a while."

" 'It's been a while'?" Yukiko asked with wide eyes. Hinako was supposed to have eloped in late August. And then after that for some reason the San-Yasu household said they were called by Hinako to come live with her and they moved. It was altogether such a strange move. "---You, what happened. You came back?"

That's right, Hinako laughed, ringing out the washcloth over the buket. "It's been empty for a long time so there's a lot of cleaning to do."

"I'm sure there is. ....And the others?"

"They're back too," Hinako said. Yukiko casually peered at the condition inside of the house. There were no signs of anybody in the living room but it did sound like beyond that there was somebody moving. From the second floor it also sounded like somebody was using a vacuum cleaner.

"Yoneko-san?"

Following Yukiko's gaze, Hinako smiled. "Kou-chan."

"Oh. ---You'd left so suddenly, I didn't know what to thing. What on earth happened?"

"There were some complications that came up," Hinako said, peering at Yukiko's face. "What about at your place, has anything changed? Is everyone well?"

"Ah... Yes?"

"I want to see them. There's a lot to talk about too, so do you think we could drop in some time?"

Well, that's... Yukiko nodded.

"That's great. I'm glad," Hinako said with a truly happy smile. "In the mean time, we're focusing on the clean up. If we don't at least vacuum, we won't have anywhere to sleep."

"Ah... That must be true. Shall I help?"

"It's okay. Once things calm down, we'll come say hello."

Right, Yukiko nodded, turnig back. What a surprise, she had thought. The circumstances under which they had moved out were abnormal but when they returned, there wasn't anything off at all. What on earth had happened?

She thought this as she entered her house's entryway, turning to look back at the San-Yasus. The pitch black house was lit up with lights here and there. From the second story window, she could see one man's figure, lining up and striking two zabuton together outside to shake the dust off. That's Kou-chan, Yukiko thought, tilting her head. --Had Kouji always had a build like that? He had been less sturdy, more gaunt.

The man took the two zabuton inside. When the light shined on his profile, she could better see his face.

"...That's!"

As she stood stunned, the man disappeared further into the room, then reappeared to close the window. This time, too, for an instant before the light became a backlight, she got a good look at his face.

--It was not Kouji.

(Is there something wrong with my eyes?)

Without thinking, Yukiko rubbed at her eyes. That was not Kouji; she had seen a different man entirely. Not only that, it was a face she had seen before. Yukiko's cousin had married into a family in Shimo Sotoba. Across from there house was the Ohtsuka saw mill, and when Yukiko had gone to visit her cousin, she often saw that man from just now at the mill.

(Wasn't that... The Ohtsuka's son....)

It was't as if she knew him, so she couldn't be absolutely sure. ---But.

(But that just couldn't be.)

It shouldn't be. Hinako herself had said that it was Kouji on the second story. And to begin with, hadn't she heard from her cousin that the Ohtsuka sawmill's son died?

"Oh dear me, are my eyes going bad, I wonder?"

Yukiko laughed at herself. In her chest, an unease that she couldn't easily put into words rose up and stagnated.

(I'll know soon enough.)

Yes--when Hinako came over, she would simply ask her about it then.


The night spread out evenly. Lights separating the paddy fields could be seen coming on. For a time, Tanaka gazed at them. Two days had passed since Megumi had enticed him to attack his family.

last night, Tanaka followed Megumi, had come down from Yamairi into the village but to no surprise he could not work up the conviction to attack a villager. When he came close to the house, he saw the lights on. Of course he didn't have the nerve to attack his family. And tonight, coming as far he did the night before, Tanaka was tormented by his hunger.

The name of his suffering was starvation. A hunger that was searing him to shreds. And to escape that pain, the only thing he could do was hunt. It greatly influenced the scales that measured good and evil within his chest. But because he knew that, it was all the more reason he could not return to his home. He gasped in the throes of his starvation, and the only one who would have sympathy for his plight, who might forgive him if he undertook some horrific deed in order to stave off the misery of starvation, would be family. No stranger would forgive him, surely. They would point a finger at him and demand that he starve, if it meant to have to attack a person otherwise.

He was afraid to step into sin. Whether it was fear of that sin itself, or whether it was fear of the punishment of that sin, Tanaka himself was uncertain. In either case, if it was family, the terror was reduced, he was certain of that much.

At the same time, he wondered what his wife and children would do from now on. His wife wouldn't likely turn to her own family. Tanaka's own parents had already passed, and while he had siblings in distant places, none of them were well off enough to take on the support of anybody else. And what of his children? They would be going into high school soon. And if they decided on further schooling still, it would be all too much of a tragedy for them to be forced to give up on that for economic purposes. --Indeed, if he brought them to Yamairi, he wouldn't have to worry about how their lives would proceed. There would be no worry for their futures.

But at the same time Tanaka had suffered from a deep sense of isolation since his revival. He didn't know why. He felt himself alone and forlorn. He felt himself long separated from anything that might ever relieve that feeling, and unable to ever return to it. It was that feeling that drew Tanaka back to his house. But the gate was closed tightly, and looking inside of the building where the warm light shone, that sense of solitude permeated his being. His own home, the place where the family gathered, and himself, standing there before it and unable to enter.

He was here.

He was not dead. He was still alive. Here, outside of his house, he wished fervently to return to the family.

It was sorrow enough for him to forget his hunger. His wife preparing dinner for Tanaka who would be on his way home, his children around the dinner table. Those normal days he had so countless many of. Once cut off from them, they were now a distant dreamy story entitled 'Every Day'. He didn't understand how it was that he had passed such days of such warm tranquility without any special emotion back then.

Wouldn't somebody notice his existence? Wouldn't somebody call to him, say how grand it was he came back to life and come out to greet him? Unable to escape from such a childish dream, Tanaka was nailed in place. The same as last night. The difference was that tonight the unbearable suffering that enveloped him from the inside was now inching beyond his control.

While casting his eyes about his surroundings, Tanaka walked along the road in the deep of night. There were lights on in the house but it seemed like his family was asleep. Tanaka came to the front of the house and looked up to the second story. The storm shutters were drawn over the children's windows as if to reject him.

Tanaka went around to the back. There, there was a storage shed. The laundry poles were stood. Looking at this side, the dust window was likewise closed, also with the storm shutters drawn shut. Beyond that window, his wife slept.

I at least want to see my wife's face, he thought. I want her to know I exist. He wanted her to know what he had been through, to comfort him. Tanaka would not find salvation in meeting his wife and receiving her comfort. He reached out his hand with trepidation, as if to knock on the storm windows, but he did not have the courage to actually knock. He was terrified that the children would overhear. ---Though he had other fears as well. Why on earth did he think his family so fearsome, why was there such bitter pain in his chest just coming near to them like this?

He wanted to return yet was afraid to. It was as if the house itself held an ill will towards him, was rejecting him. This was what Megumi was talking about when she warned him that it was "closed off" to him.

It meant that Tanaka could no longer enter his own home without an invitation. In the past, Tanaka was ordered by Megumi to invite her in. While at that point the house had become open to the Shiki, once Tanaka who had invited them had died, it once again became closed off. No, maybe it had happened when Tanaka had revived. While dead, he was still a member of that house. The dead would be as welcomed as ever to dwell in the house, were qualified to be cherished within the family's memories. But a Shiki had no such qualifications. Tanaka was no longer a member of the family; he was a complete outsider. That was all the more reason that in order to set foot in the house, he would have to be invited by somebody in his family.

Still not able to see that for himself, Tanaka timidly treated towards the back door. It was locked, but he knew there was a spare key. He felt around in the unused flowerpot by the back door. He took the key and yet his hand shook so much that he couldn't even get the key into the keyhole. Without reason, he feared the house. It felt like a cold hand clutched his no longer beating heart, unbearably painful.

Just when he realized he couldn't enter the house he heard a low voice from nearby. It sounded like the voice of something on the ground, from the dog house near the back door. The moment he realized it was Love, the dog began howling as if a fire had been lit under him.

Tanaka jumped up and scurried away from the house. Love's frantic voice told him more clearly than anything yet: this was no longer Tanaka's house, he was no longer qualified to set foot here.

When he first moved to flee, not far off he heard the sound of a window opening. The storm shutters were still closed, but after the sound of only the window behind them opening, he heard the nostalgic sound of his wife's voice.

"Is that you, Akira?" His wife's half-asleep voice sounded so sweet. "What's all the fuss?"

Along with her voice came the sound of the storm shutters opening. His wife's face poked out. No, not his wife, Tanaka thought.

---Sachiko.

Tanaka wanted to be with his wife. He wanted to be with her and take comfort. He yearned for a family home, and the center of that warm gathering place was the woman he yearned for, but the one who was in the role of his wife, Sachiko, was no such woman.

Would she be happy that he'd risen? ---Sachiko? Would she accept him, forgive his sins, understand and soothe his lonely heart? Tanaka couldn't even imagine Sachiko being one to do that. She'd surely curse him as a monster, no doubt she'd cry out in hysterics that he'd come to attack her. Without sparing a single thought to Tanaka's own plight, she would line up and fire off her complaints about the hardships she had to endure due to his death. She lay out her bitterness into Tanaka with everything she had.

Tanaka hunched over and crawled along towards the window. As Love's cries grew ever more frantic, Sachiko pinned the window open. Sachiko leaned out the window in annoyance with Love. He grabbed her arm and pulled her forward, stopping up her mouth. Though he no longer needed to breathe, in holding his breath his shoulders rise and fell frantically. Sachiko's eyes were wide, her body flailing as she raised her voice louder.

Tanaka sneered.

For the first time, he understood that he hated this woman.



When Motoko woke early on the dawn of the twenty sixth, Tomiko was dead in her room. Motoko's brows furrowed as she looked at that corpse.

With no particular emotion she went to the second floor. She informed her son who was rising up from the bed to acknowledge her that he could miss school today.

"You don't have to go to school today, so I'd like you to be a good boy in your room. Be sure especially not to go into your grandmother's room. If you have to go to the bathroom, be a good boy and use the upstairs, if you could. Okay?"

Shigeki looked uncertainly at Motoko, and then nodded. Motoko repeated it, emphatically, then headed downstairs.

Contact Toshio, contact the managers. ---She thought about it, but it seemed so bothersome. That was when she remembered that an undertaker had come to down. An undertaker would take care of all aspects for her. She didn't like the idea of having to wash Tomiko's body for the burial or having the corpse in the house that long. Nor did she want such a crowd of people, coming and going. If they did, there was a chance, however slim, that they might spread some weird disease to Shigeki.

Motoko looked to her mother-in-law's corpse with unmasked disgust. She wanted to get her somewhere she didn't have to see it, somewhere outside of her safety zone so badly it was unbearable.

Motoko looked in the drawer in the living room and pulled out the flyer she and stuffed in there after Shiori's funeral service. When she called, the company resident Hayami picked up immediately.

"My mother-in-law is dead. But I don't want to touch her. I have a small child as well, so I'd like you to do something quickly." Motoko said, asking if it would be complicated, to which Hayami answered congenially.

"Oh, I quite understand your concerns. I can conjecture what it is that you must be feeling. We will be by right away to take away the remains. You needn't worry, we shall handle everything, and will store the remains at the funeral home for you."

"Oh," Motoko exhaled. "Then, please do."

Hanging up the phone, leaving Tomiko's corpse where it was, she thoroughly washed her hands several times before going upstairs. She had to keep watch, to be sure that Shigeki didn't go anywhere near his grandmother.