the chair, then hurriedly closes the window from the outside. Akari is left alone in the room, slowly burning, her right arm hanging limply off the sofa
.
The door opens. A different man enters. Stunned, he looks at the fire burning before him. The flames grow steadily more intense. The man keeps standing there. He begins to sweat
profusely. He starts to tremble, as if he is having convulsions. Smoke gushes forth, and the sofa is engulfed as the fire rages. Suddenly, the man lunges at the stationary camera. He clicks the shutter, over and over again. From the way his mouth is moving, one can see he is crying out Yuriko Kobayashi’s name. Yet even as he calls her name, he continues to squeeze the shutter as if he were obsessed. But there is no one else there besides him and his sister
.
The screen shifts to the window frame covered by the curtains in the room. The building that houses the studio recedes slowly, farther and farther away. It becomes clear that this picture is being filmed with a small camera, through a gap in the curtain no more than two centimeters wide. But then, as if remembering something, the scene closes back in on the studio. Someone’s right hand comes into the picture—a man’s hand. In it he holds a bundle of notes of some kind. The hand isn’t trembling at all. He scatters the notes under the window of the studio, and then the building again recedes from view
.
The camera approaches a car. Inside it are Yuriko Kobayashi and the first man. He hands her Yudai Kiharazaka’s sister’s apartment key, her insurance card, and her pension account book. Also doctored photographs and her diary, for practicing her handwriting. Yuriko Kobayashi has regained her composure and is smiling at the man. From here it is impossible to see
his expression. The camera gets into the car. The door closes and the car slowly begins to drive away. The picture abruptly ends there
.
Archive 11-1
I wonder how long I’ve been wrong.
But, when I look back on my life like this, I always get confused. Just when exactly did I screw up? Sometimes I get depressed and can’t help but feel that, ultimately, it goes all the way back, and I should have just been born differently. Maybe life is just like that. Even if my life has been wrong, I’m going to wait and see what happens at the very end. Whatever I am, I’ll be until the end. I guess …
Let’s talk about us. Because there’s little else in my life that has any meaning. Do you remember the first time we met? It was at the library. At a small symposium on Braille. I had never seen anyone experience someone’s words so beautifully.
You accessed the words written in books through the tips of your fingers. Now and then, as your fingers slid forward, you smiled. You never believed it, but you were a very beautiful woman. At the time, you were reading
Snow
, by Orhan Pamuk. It’s one of my favorite books. Back then, when I asked you what you were reading, you smiled as you replied to my question.
After that I quickly apologized. For disturbing you while you were reading, for disrupting the world of the book and rudely calling you back to this world. You gave me a puzzled look as I apologized. At that moment you … you were so lovely.
“I’ve read many books,” you said to me. “I think something happens when you read—it’s like the passage of your own lifebecomes immersed within something else. I’ve spent my life amidst the words of so many writers. Among well-chosen words, the various life stories, the frustrations and sorrows experienced by other people, as well as their hopes … I consider myself very fortunate.”
I wonder if you remember the first time we kissed. It was on a bench in front of a fountain that was lit up. But it wasn’t romantic at all. They were trying to conserve water so the fountain was turned off, and the bench was in disrepair. I was a little worried about people around us seeing, but you said, “It’s all right, no
.
The door opens. A different man enters. Stunned, he looks at the fire burning before him. The flames grow steadily more intense. The man keeps standing there. He begins to sweat
profusely. He starts to tremble, as if he is having convulsions. Smoke gushes forth, and the sofa is engulfed as the fire rages. Suddenly, the man lunges at the stationary camera. He clicks the shutter, over and over again. From the way his mouth is moving, one can see he is crying out Yuriko Kobayashi’s name. Yet even as he calls her name, he continues to squeeze the shutter as if he were obsessed. But there is no one else there besides him and his sister
.
The screen shifts to the window frame covered by the curtains in the room. The building that houses the studio recedes slowly, farther and farther away. It becomes clear that this picture is being filmed with a small camera, through a gap in the curtain no more than two centimeters wide. But then, as if remembering something, the scene closes back in on the studio. Someone’s right hand comes into the picture—a man’s hand. In it he holds a bundle of notes of some kind. The hand isn’t trembling at all. He scatters the notes under the window of the studio, and then the building again recedes from view
.
The camera approaches a car. Inside it are Yuriko Kobayashi and the first man. He hands her Yudai Kiharazaka’s sister’s apartment key, her insurance card, and her pension account book. Also doctored photographs and her diary, for practicing her handwriting. Yuriko Kobayashi has regained her composure and is smiling at the man. From here it is impossible to see
his expression. The camera gets into the car. The door closes and the car slowly begins to drive away. The picture abruptly ends there
.
Archive 11-1
I wonder how long I’ve been wrong.
But, when I look back on my life like this, I always get confused. Just when exactly did I screw up? Sometimes I get depressed and can’t help but feel that, ultimately, it goes all the way back, and I should have just been born differently. Maybe life is just like that. Even if my life has been wrong, I’m going to wait and see what happens at the very end. Whatever I am, I’ll be until the end. I guess …
Let’s talk about us. Because there’s little else in my life that has any meaning. Do you remember the first time we met? It was at the library. At a small symposium on Braille. I had never seen anyone experience someone’s words so beautifully.
You accessed the words written in books through the tips of your fingers. Now and then, as your fingers slid forward, you smiled. You never believed it, but you were a very beautiful woman. At the time, you were reading
Snow
, by Orhan Pamuk. It’s one of my favorite books. Back then, when I asked you what you were reading, you smiled as you replied to my question.
After that I quickly apologized. For disturbing you while you were reading, for disrupting the world of the book and rudely calling you back to this world. You gave me a puzzled look as I apologized. At that moment you … you were so lovely.
“I’ve read many books,” you said to me. “I think something happens when you read—it’s like the passage of your own lifebecomes immersed within something else. I’ve spent my life amidst the words of so many writers. Among well-chosen words, the various life stories, the frustrations and sorrows experienced by other people, as well as their hopes … I consider myself very fortunate.”
I wonder if you remember the first time we kissed. It was on a bench in front of a fountain that was lit up. But it wasn’t romantic at all. They were trying to conserve water so the fountain was turned off, and the bench was in disrepair. I was a little worried about people around us seeing, but you said, “It’s all right, no
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