The Forest of Wool and Steel Read online

  But now, looking at my brother’s face, I could feel something stir in my heart. For it to have such an impact meant there had to have been something lurking there, unresolved. At school, my brother was always a little better than me in class, and a little better at sports. Had I been jealous of that? And of how our mother and grandmother seemed to love him just that tiny touch more?

  ‘You seemed to feel guilty for not coming back to live here.’ My brother turned to look at me and our eyes couldn’t help but meet. ‘When you told us you were going to be a piano tuner you looked sort of apologetic about it.’

  ‘Did I?’

  ‘You did. Grandma told you, “There’s no reason to feel sorry. Don’t worry,” she said, “about whether you should take over here or not.” She might have said the same thing to me, too.’

  Taking over – what? I was about to ask, but kept my mouth shut. We were both born and raised here. If there was anything to inherit, hadn’t we already inherited it inside ourselves?

  ‘You always talked so big,’ my brother said. ‘It kind of surprised everybody around you.’

  I looked at him, startled. ‘I did?’

  When had I done that? Talked big? It was my brother who used to brag. Making my mother and grandmother happy by describing some brilliant future that awaited him.

  ‘Don’t you remember?’ he asked. ‘How worked up you were, saying how the sound of the piano connected up with the whole world? The whole world’s not something people usually say. I haven’t even seen the world yet.’

  ‘Neither have I.’

  But this is the world, isn’t it? I can’t see everything, but it is the world.

  ‘You’re always dealing in big things – the world, music and so on,’ my brother said, and he laughed in a cloud of white breath. ‘But this, here – this isn’t the world. It’s just a mountain. Since I left this place, I’ve never come across anywhere else quite so remote or out of the way … Wow, it really is freezing!’ he added, rubbing his hands. ‘I’m going to catch a cold if I stay out here, so let’s go in,’ he urged, and I stood up.

  ‘Grandma said she didn’t understand the piano or music, but since you were small you had always loved the forest – and even when you lost your way among the trees, you’d find your way home. So you’ll be fine, she said.’ My brother walked off after that, without glancing back. He seemed to be a bit worked up.

  We got to the door of the house and he suddenly turned to me and said fiercely, ‘You’re always like that – so easy-going on the surface but hard to read underneath.’ His face had reddened. ‘Grandma was always so proud of you.’

  I was about to say it wasn’t true, but the words stuck in my throat.

  ‘I hate this. Why did she have to die? With her gone I have no idea what to do.’

  His voice was breaking into sobs, and deep-seated emotions began to well up in me. ‘I hate it too,’ I said, though it didn’t sound like my own voice.

  I realized at last that it was good to cry at times like this. And before I knew it, tears were sliding down my cheeks. I stretched my arm around my younger brother’s back; he was larger than me now. How long had it been since I’d hugged him closely like this? Something I’d pushed away from my life had jumped right back into me. It felt as if the outline of the world had suddenly been thrown into sharper relief.

  Early the next morning I took a walk in the forest. Trampling down the undergrowth, I stroked the rough reddish-brown trunks of the Yeddo spruce with my fingers. I heard a jay screeching from the top of a tree. An overwhelming nostalgia swept through me, along with confusion. Had I really forgotten this place? Was my heart really no longer here? The wind picked up and the scent of the forest grew sharper in my nostrils. Leaves rustled, branches rubbed together. When the still-green needles of the Yeddo spruce fell they made a sound that was outside any musical scale. I rested my ear against a rugged trunk and could faintly pick up the suck of water being absorbed up through the roots. The jay screeched again.

  The sound of the mountain at night and the voice of my brother echoed in my ears.

  One of Them Is Frozen

  Miss Kitagawa asked me to come downstairs, where I found Yuni, the younger of the Sakura twins, waiting for me. My heart did a backflip.

  ‘Hello,’ she said, smiling confidently and dipping her head in greeting as she always did. It made me want to rush right over.

  ‘Are you OK?’ I asked, trying to sound as casual as I could.

  ‘I’m fine.’ Yuni’s cheerful voice was all it took to lighten my spirits.

  It had been some time since the twins had cancelled the tuning. We’d heard that one of them could no longer play the piano, but otherwise not a word. I couldn’t very well probe for further details, but it continued to weigh heavily on my mind.

  When I’d first heard the news, I couldn’t help but hope it was Kazune who could still play. I wasn’t comparing the personalities of the two girls, it was purely about the piano. I loved Kazune’s playing. I couldn’t stand the thought of never being able to hear her play again. But I felt guilty, too, and bad for Yuni, which is why I was so overjoyed that she had stopped by. Happy that she looked so well. My guilt abated just a fraction.

  The instant I saw Yuni’s shining face, I knew. It was Kazune who couldn’t play any more. It was Yuni’s piano playing that remained. But still, seeing Yuni there in front of me made me very happy. I was genuinely pleased she was doing so well. If Kazune was OK, that would be enough.

  ‘I’m sorry we cancelled all of a sudden the other day,’ Yuni said, bowing, a solemn look on her face.

  ‘Please don’t worry.’ Mirroring Yuni, I bowed my own head in response.

  Smiling gently, she explained, ‘They say it’s a weird illness.’

  The word ‘illness’ came so unexpectedly that I flinched.

  ‘There are no other symptoms. You’re just unable to move your fingers when you try to play.’

  I was lost for words. I’d never heard of this condition. That must be hard. Should I say that? Or I hope she gets well soon? A little too casual. No matter what I might say, it would seem wrong.

  ‘Will it—’ Will it ever go away? is what I was about to say, but swallowed back the words. It was an insensitive question. And what good would asking that do? If, for some reason, Kazune would never recover, then asking her sister Yuni to respond to that was cruel.

  But Yuni seemed to guess my question. ‘I don’t know if you can recover from it or not,’ she said. ‘Most of the time people don’t, but it seems the doctors can’t determine that for sure.’

  Her matter-of-fact explanation sent a chill up my spine. Kazune may never play the piano again. I was utterly horrified by the prospect.

  ‘Please don’t look like that. I’m not that upset about it. Actually, it did really get me down to begin with, but it’s OK because there’s been a bit of improvement.’

  I couldn’t find a single thing to say, and felt miserable. At times like this you find out how generous and supportive another person really is.

  ‘I’m so very sorry,’ I finally said. I was infuriated with myself for not being able to react appropriately or give any meaningful response. ‘Thank you for coming all this way to tell me.’

  ‘You’re welcome.’ Yuni smiled.

  She looked as cheerful as always, but I had no clue as to what storm of emotions was swirling about inside her.

  ‘The reason I came today is because I wanted to ask your advice. It’s about Kazune.’ She lowered her voice. ‘Ever since the start of the illness she’s been so depressed. She doesn’t even want to go into the music room. I don’t know what to do.’

  That made perfect sense. It would be strange if she wasn’t upset.

  ‘She’s not even sick, but she won’t play. It’s awful.’

  Yuni said this in such a flippant way, wrinkling up her nose, that it confused me. It didn’t add up. After a moment, it dawned on me.

  It wasn’t Kazune who was unwell. It was
Yuni. I had jumped to conclusions.

  ‘Kazune is so angry about me getting sick.’ She inclined her head a little, and then rephrased her words. ‘She’s not angry at me, but at the illness. She’s angry that it made me unable to play, and now she can’t either.’

  I took a moment to digest the new situation. Then:

  ‘What about you, Yuni … Aren’t you angry?’

  She seemed to be considering this. ‘I am angry.’

  ‘Mmm,’ I said, in what I hoped to be a reassuring way.

  Of course she was. But she must be confused, too, not knowing where to direct her anger.

  ‘Kazune has to play even more, to make up for me not being able to. And yet …’ She was unable to complete the thought, stood there with her mouth open, taking rapid and shallow breaths as if struggling to draw air into her lungs. In the same instant her dark eyes started to well with tears.

  I wanted to reach out to her but my arms felt glued to my sides. I wanted to touch her, reassure her it was going to be all right. It’ll be OK, I wanted to tell her. But there was nothing OK about it.

  Before the tears could spill down her cheeks, she wiped them away with the back of her hand. Go ahead and cry, I thought, but I confess to feeling a little relieved, too, that I didn’t have to watch the flow of her tears.

  Someone cleared his throat nearby, and I turned to see Mr Akino strolling past, tuning case in hand. We must make an interesting little picture, I thought. A sixth-form girl in tears and a total dunce frozen awkwardly to the spot.

  Yuni stood still for a time, head down, but when she looked up the tears had stopped. Her eyes and nose were red. A single strand of her soft brown hair lay plastered from forehead to cheek.

  ‘I’m sorry. Thank you so much for listening.’ She bobbed her head, then turned away from me, peeling the hair from her face, and headed for the door.

  I didn’t know what to do. I was still on duty. But even if I had work scheduled, I knew I’d regret it if I didn’t talk more with her – right here, right now.

  I ran after Yuni and caught up with her along the pavement, lightly grabbing the sleeve of her school uniform. ‘I’ll walk you home.’

  ‘It’s OK, I’m fine.’ Yuni’s soft smile was back in place. But even with her normal expression restored, I just couldn’t figure it out: I couldn’t read how she was feeling on the inside. Although she’d gone out of her way to come and see me at work, and going home so quickly must mean she felt let down by my reaction.

  ‘Do you fancy a cup of tea somewhere?’ I racked my brain for a suitable place to take her.

  But Yuni flashed her smile at me again. ‘Really, it’s OK, don’t worry,’ she said.

  I had no idea if she was turning down my offer because she wanted to, or because she thought she should.

  ‘Well, be careful on your way home then.’ I couldn’t think of anything else to say. I gave a feeble wave as she walked away. She rounded the corner without looking back.

  Soft flakes of snow began to swirl around me. We were nearing the end of May and something, somewhere, wasn’t right.

  I turned around to walk back towards the shop, and was just reaching out for the door of the staff entrance when, out of nowhere, I recalled the sunny skies of midwinter. A translucent blue, with the sunbeams lighting up the branches of the frozen trees and making them sparkle with silver. Days so bright they hurt your eyes, and you just knew the temperature was about to take a plunge.

  In the mountain village where I was raised it sometimes dipped as low as minus thirty degrees. When it got that cold, just once or twice a year, the night before would see a sky full of stars. And the next morning, not a cloud to be seen. Everything frozen, just sparkling snow and ice. Your breath froze, your eyelashes stiffened, and if you were careless enough to open your mouth too widely your windpipe would close up with a sharp, stabbing pain.

  I remembered that sort of frozen morning. The sunny days were the most frightening.

  Kazune in torment. Yuni bursting out laughing. Yuni suddenly crying. Which one’s heart was truly frozen? That was a question I don’t think anyone could answer.

  IV

  Far From Advanced

  Surrender Yourself to the Wind

  ‘So I’m on the roof of a high-rise, standing alone on the wrong side of the safety barrier. My shoes are sticking out from the ledge; it’s only eight inches wide. Way down below I see cars and what look like people strolling. I try to steady my nerves, keep my footing. Raising my eyes, I look up at the sky. The wind is blowing and I don’t know how long I can hold on. Won’t someone please come and help me?

  ‘The heartless wind picks up. The building lurches to the side, but surely it’s my imagination – buildings can’t lean over. It’s the wind whipping my body this way and that. I’m exhausted and my knees are trembling. I can’t hold out for much longer.

  ‘But I stand firm, still holding on. I refuse to look down, and somehow I’m hanging on. Another gust of wind, my body sways, the building tilts a little further. Time to give up? I’m going to fall anyway – but not yet. I must try to hold on a little longer, just a little longer. There’s still a chance I might be saved.

  ‘But the wind blasts again and my body is thrown from the building.’ Mr Akino wrapped his bento box neatly in a red gingham cloth, then stowed it away. He looked up at me. ‘So what do you think?’

  I had no way of responding.

  He was telling me about a dream he often had. ‘It’s always the same. For whatever reason I’m standing way up in some high, dangerous place. If I fall, it’s all over for me, but all kinds of other awful things come along to make it even worse. The wind gusts, or the building leans over, and in the dream I know I’m going to fall any minute now. I try my best to hold on, to grab on for dear life, but in the end I always fall.’ He explained it all so matter-of-factly.

  ‘If you fall in a dream, do you die?’ I asked.

  Mr Akino inclined his head. ‘I don’t know. That’s not really important.’

  Then what is important? And why did he start telling me about his dreams anyway?

  ‘I have the same dream over and over. In the beginning I would do everything I could to hold on. But even then, I still fell.’

  ‘That’s a pretty scary dream.’

  ‘It’s awful. I’d wake up covered in sweat. But gradually, even when I was dreaming I began to understand that I can’t be helped, that I’ll always end up falling. Struggling won’t help. And over time I learned to give up more quickly.’

  To my surprise, I saw the faintest glimmer of a smile on Mr Akino’s face.

  ‘I knew I could try to hold on, but once the wind picked up it was all over. The last time I had that dream—’ He stopped and looked down, as if pondering something. ‘I remember it really well, even now. At the end I was standing on the ridge of a high mountain. I realized this was the same dream as always, and even before the wind and rain came along I hurled myself down all on my own.’ Mr Akino swept his index finger through the air in an arc from his eyes down to his desk. ‘When I woke up that time I wasn’t sweating at all. I thought – so that’s what giving up means.’

  ‘You mean giving up in the dream?’

  ‘It’s fairly easy to figure out, I imagine. The day I leapt down of my own accord was the day I decided to become a piano tuner.’ He stood up. ‘OK, time to go to work.’

  I watched his thin back recede as he exited the office, and then remembered something and dashed after him. Mr Akino was already walking down the stairs, and at the sound of my footsteps he halted and turned around. I hurried down.

  ‘How long did it take until you jumped down?’ I asked.

  ‘Four years,’ he said without hesitation.

  ‘Four years,’ I repeated to myself in a low voice. That was a bit of a shock. Would Yuni, too, spend her days scared she would fall for the next four years? But then end up jumping by herself?

  I remembered how Mr Akino had passed us the day when Yuni came
to the shop and wept. He must have heard what was going on. In his own way, he was telling me it would probably take her a long time to give up on the piano.

  I wanted to ask Mr Akino if he’d been afraid when he finally jumped, but I wasn’t brave enough. Compared to the terror and despair you went through before you fell, jumping had to be the better option. For all I knew, his face may have been wreathed in the kind of smile he’d shown me earlier when he finally pushed off from the ledge. At least I hoped so.

  I knew that Mr Akino had been hoping to be a pianist himself. And I knew a profession like that depended on how long and hard you tried and how passionate you were about it. Age mattered, too, and of course there was the issue of one’s personality. But still, I resolved to do whatever lay in my power to help release Yuni from the clutches of some horrible nightmare she’d have for the next four years.

  I followed Mr Akino as he left, and out in the car park I gritted my teeth and asked, ‘Why did you give up on being a pianist?’

  ‘Because I had a good ear,’ he said. ‘I had a good ear, so I could sense a world of difference between the playing of a first-class pianist and my own efforts at the keyboard. I always felt there was an unbridgeable gap between the melody I heard in my head and what my fingers produced. And I could never bridge that gap.’

  ‘But thanks to all that an excellent piano tuner was born.’

  I thought he was going to scoff, but instead his face broke into a wide grin.

  ‘You’ve grown to be quite the smooth-talking young man, Tomura.’ He laughed.