People like
*
I didn’t say anything. Carrot’s mother was silent, as was the boy. The security guard had worn himself out talking and sank
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back into the general silence. In another room a phone rang, and someone picked it up on the first ring. “So, what should we do?” he asked.
I said: “How about we string him upside down from the ceiling until he says he’s sorry?”
“I like it! ‘Course you know that we’d both be out on our ears.”
“Well, then, the only thing we can do is patiently take the time to discuss the problem. That’s all I can say.”
Someone from another room knocked at the door and entered. “Mr Nakamura, could you lend me the key to the storeroom?” he asked. Mr Nakamura rummaged through the drawer in his desk for a while, but couldn’t find it.
“It’s gone,” he said. “That’s strange. I always keep it in here.”
“It’s very important,” the other man said. “I need it now.”
The way the two of them talked about it, it sounded like a very important key, something that probably shouldn’t have been kept in a drawer to begin with. They rifled through every drawer, but came up empty-handed.
The three of us just sat there while this was going on. A couple of times Carrot’s mother glanced at me beseechingly. Carrot sat as before, expressionless, eyes pinned to the ground. Pointless, random thoughts flashed through my head. The room was stifling.
The man who needed the key gave up, grumbling as he left.
“That’s enough,” Mr Nakamura said, turning to us; in a toneless, matter-of-fact voice he continued: “Thank you for coming. We’re finished here. I’ll leave the rest up to you and the boy’s mother. But get one thing clear—if he does this one more time, he won’t get off this easy. You do understand that, I hope? I don’t want any trouble. But I do have to do my job.”
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She nodded, and so did I. Carrot looked as though he hadn’t heard a word. I stood up, and the two of them weakly followed suit.
“One last thing,” the security guard said, still seated. He looked up at me. “I know this is rude of me, but I’ll just go ahead and say it. Since I laid eyes on you there’s something just not quite right. You’re young, tall, make a good impression, nicely tanned, logical. Everything you say makes absolute sense. I’m sure the parents of your pupils like you a lot. I can’t really explain it, but since I first saw you something’s been gnawing at me. Something I just can’t swallow. Nothing personal, so don’t get angry. It’s just something bothers me. But what is it that’s gnawing at me, I wonder?”
“Would you mind if I ask you something personal?” I said.
“Ask away.”
“If people aren’t equal, where would you fit in?”
Mr Nakamura took a deep lungful of cigarette smoke, shook his head, and exhaled ever so slowly, as if he were forcing someone to do something. “I don’t know,” he replied.
“Don’t you worry, though. The two of us won’t be sharing the same level.”
*
She’d parked her red Toyota Celica in the supermarket car park. I called her over to one side, away from her son, and told her to go on home alone.
“I need to talk to your son alone for a while,” I said. “I’ll bring him home later.” She nodded. She was about to say something, but didn’t, got in her car, took her sunglasses from her bag, and started the engine.
After she left I took Carrot to a cheerful-looking little coffee shop I noticed nearby. I relaxed in the air-conditioning, ordered
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an iced tea for myself and an ice-cream for the boy. I undid the top button of my shirt, took off my tie, and slipped it in my jacket pocket. Carrot remained sunk in silence. His expression and the look in his eyes were unchanged from when we were in the security office. He looked completely blank, like he was going to be that way for a while. His small hands placed neatly in his lap, he looked down at the floor, averting his face. I drank my iced tea, but Carrot didn’t touch his ice-cream. It slowly melted in the dish, but he didn’t seem to notice. We sat facing each other like some married couple sharing an awkward silence. Every time she stopped by our table, the waitress looked tense.
*
