Utako’s body was so skinny that he hadn’t been able to leave her at the
station, and now it had come to this. Jiro muttered silently to himself that
her thinness was his own responsibility, too. He tried to convince himself
that the reason he held her was not that he felt a new burgeoning of desire.
Even assuming that he felt no desire, the near miraculous efficacy of
imagining the war’s corpses struck him as frightening.
Utako was leaving everything to Jiro, she was flexible—but then too, he
could feel the strength draining from her body in his hands.
Utako felt relaxed, it was true. Yet at the same time she felt a loneliness,
like a dying flame.
She had caught her breath when, at Shinbashi station, Jiro suddenly
suggested they go to Hakone— had that catching of breath been pointless?
At the time she had resolved to resist him as much as she could—the
thought had come to her suddenly, it had flickered into her head—but
thinking back now it seemed pathetic even to have thought such a thinfi
Utako lay still for a short time, then began to sob. She moved her face
closer to Jiro’s. He was surprised
to see that her cheeks were soaked with tears. He wiped her cheeks with
the palm of his hand.
“I do cry a lot, don’t 1.” Utako laughed. “My parents are amazed.”
“Yeah, your nerves are really worn down. Divorce is a tough thing for
anyone to have to go through.” “That’s not true. Didn’t I tell you before
that it’s everything you have to go through until you split up that’s hard? Al
the putting up with things? It’s so hard that when all the ropes finally come
untied, its like your body is floating through space.”
“It was my fault that your marriage went so badly. I was praying for your
happiness, you know—off in the shadows. But I was too complacent. I
should have been much more critical of myself.”
