Work Text:
The snow is deep on the ground.
Always the light falls
softly on the hair of my belovèd.
- The Snow is Deep on the Ground, Kenneth Patchen
-
Keiji heaves out the last of his cigarette, letting the embers of smoke rise out into the cool air. The last of the snow has fallen now, blanketing the Tokyo backstreets in a glimmer of white. The whole landscape is quiet and stark, as if even one step would undo the careful balance of the evening. And so Keiji stays still, standing by a nearby lamp post, waiting for something.
Or perhaps, waiting is the whole point.
Amidst the silence, only then does Keiji have time to reflect on the evening.
The night comes in a flash of technicolor, first the fluorescent flash of the press conference, then the neon-embossed backstreets of Tokyo on the walk to the izakaya. The memories come in hot and cold, the warm feeling of praise, tainted by the occasional backhanded comment of an envious author. But it’s no small feat, of course—being the grand laureate of the whole night, the recipient of the Akutagawa Prize for his debut novel.
But the shock of it has long since passed, and now Keiji looks to the future in that quiet Tokyo skyline. There’s always more work to be done—the next novel to write, the next work to be published.
Keiji stubs out his cigarette onto a nearby ash tray, the smoke having all gone out by now. He heaves out a sigh. The pungent smell permeates the stale air, clinging to his thin puffer jacket and expensive slacks.
“So, the Akutugawa Prize, huh?” comes a voice.
The question startles Keiji—how stupid to think no one would’ve followed him out here from the gathering at the izakaya. It always goes like this, a slightly off-kilter fan with too much information on his whereabouts, or a fellow author wanting to criticize his work. The guise of anonymity is always temporary in Tokyo.
But when Keiji turns around, he’s not met with a fan, yet someone much more familiar.
“Miya-san?”
The reunion should come as a surprise, but somehow it’s the complete opposite; Keiji remains unfazed at Osamu’s presence. He supposes it was only a matter of time before they crossed paths again, as if the whole universe was conspiring for Osamu to somehow end up in Tokyo. Osamu fits in under the city skyscape anyway, his profile made soft by the warm, flicking lamp-post above them. And it’s this fact that seems to shake the very ground Keiji stands on, as if all the months in between them have dissolved.
“You read it?” Keiji asks.
“How couldn’t I?”
Keiji can’t help but smile back, some warm feeling rushing over his body, extinguishing all the pain and regret that had gone into writing the damn thing. “I thought you weren’t much of a reader.”
“I’m not,” Osamu replies. “But for you, yeah, I am.”
“What did you think?”
“I can see why you won the damn prize. Avante-garde.” Osamu leans his back against the adjacent lamp-post. The soft light cuts across his face, the other half draped in darkness. “But to be honest, I didn’t expect it from anyone else. You always had it in ya.”
“That’s some awfully high praise coming from you, Miya-san.”
“You know me,” Osamu replies. “I don’t lie.”
That’s a partial truth, at least in the way their relationship had thinned out at the end. Osamu’s texts and calls were shorter each week, meanwhile Keiji realized he left Kobe with less than he arrived with each time. But it can’t be a lie when nothing is said in the first place, can it?
“Aren’t you cold out here?” Osamu asks. “All alone.”
“I’m used to it,” Keiji replies. He prefers it at times—the harsh bite of the cold air, almost strong enough to drown out the passing world.
“Worse than Kobe ever was?”
“No,” Keiji says in earnest. “Worse here.”
Kobe is suddenly embedded in every surface of this quiet Tokyo scene—the flickering neon lights of the nearby bar not far off from those around Sannomiya Station, the fresh snowfall not unlike the white-blanketed mountains of Hyogo. The memories are frozen in time, of Keiji’s first winter in Kobe—the way Osamu had tenderly wiped freshly-fallen snowflakes off Keiji’s cheeks, the way he opened his home and restaurant for him.
“I wouldn’t know anyways,” Keiji adds. “I haven’t been back to Kobe the last time I left.” He doesn’t know why he says it like this, an admission of guilt. But he feels the need to clear the air, all the shame settled in his gut that has accrued since last winter, then over the spring, summer, fall.
“You ever miss it?” Osamu asks back. Barely concealed is the question of, do you miss me?
“Sometimes,” Keiji concedes.
The conversation plateaus, bogged down with baggage of the past Keiji can’t begin to parse through in the present. Not soon after, a small Kei car passes by, the white headlights blinding Keiji’s vision in the process. The sound of tires screeching against the slick ice is prominent, an impending reminder of the past colliding with the present.
“Want my jacket?” Osamu finally says after the car has passed. “You must be freezing in that puffer of yours.”
“I’m fine.”
“Suit yourself then,” Osamu replies. “Always so damn stubborn.”
The arrogance in Osamu’s voice is enough to drive Keiji up the walls, as if he still knows best after all this time. And it’s the way that Osamu says it, so patronizing, when he had been the one to walk out in the first place.
“You haven’t changed at all,” Keiji says.
To this Osamu doesn’t reply, but instead he shifts his body weight and runs a hand over his barely visible aftershave. His gestures are the same as Keiji remembers, as if Keiji’s been transported back to the past, to a snow-gleaming Kobe.
After a moment, Osamu breaks the silence. “It’s only been a year.”
“A lot can change in a year,” Keiji replies. “I know it has for me.”
“So much change you forgot about me all together?”
“You can’t really say it like that when you were the one to leave.”
“You weren’t too invested either,” Osamu says. “It’s hard to stay when the other person already has one foot out the door.”
“I wasn’t—“ Keiji cuts himself off.
The way Osamu puts it is unfair, not considering the way Keiji had constantly been travelling to and fro. The weekly Shinkansen trips from Tokyo to Kobe burned him out, the fatigue perpetual. At a certain point his life seemed to be solely in pursuit of their situationship, for the two days he got with Osamu out of the seven. He was constantly a body in motion, never settled.
“But to be fair, can’t say I wasn’t at fault either,” Osamu later admits.
Keiji lets Osamu have this one. “No, you can’t.”
In the still moments of silence that follow, Keiji glances back down the street, to the quiet liminal spaces in between early-Edo buildings. The black wood is stark against the white snowfall on the ground, and suddenly he finds himself deep in snow country—a reminder of the trip Osamu and he had taken to Toyama the previous winter.
The memories come in fragments—of Osamu’s warm hand as he led them down the snow-paved paths, of the rice wine from the local izakaya, of the train cutting through the center of town, a fragment of the outside world. But what stands out the most was the way time had stood still, as if Toyama was sealed off from the rest of Japan by way of train. The nights seemed to expand and contract under the haze of darkness, as if they’d never get out of snow country.
Now in Tokyo, Keiji wonders what would’ve happened if they never left Toyama, an impediment to whatever timeline he’s stepped into. Because what good does a literary prize mean in a life that rings hollow?
“Tell me, what are you actually doing here?” Keiji asks, glancing back to Osamu. It comes out more like an interrogation than a question, but Keiji needs to know the truth—the ugliest parts of himself now spilling over what he’s barely kept contained.
“Am I not allowed here in the first place?”
“I never said that.”
“Sure,” Osamu replies.
Quieter, he admits, “Thought I’d tag along with ‘Tsumu and Sakusa-san after the press conference. I’m in the area on a business trip…” He pauses, taking out a cigarette pack from his jeans pocket. He holds it in the palm of his hand, the Camel logo barely visible to Keiji—a distraction from the situation, maybe. “But I was just curious, I guess. I didn’t even mean to talk to ya ‘til I saw you all alone out here.”
Keiji exhales a breath. “So you took my being alone as permission to speak with me. Even when we haven’t spoken for months.”
“Would ya have wanted this conversation to happen elsewhere?”
“No,” Keiji replies. “But it’s weird you think you can just strike this up with me after having basically left me in the dust. Or ghosted, I should add.”
“Ghosted…” Osamu says. “If that’s really the way you wanna put it.” He doesn’t look at Keiji as he takes a fresh cigarette out of the pack, placing the rest back in his pocket.
“Maybe we have different definitions of ghosting.”
“Don’t know if it can be considered ghostin’ if you ya never told me what you wanted in the first place.”
“I did.”
“Really?” Osamu sighs, running his free hand over his jaw. “Remind me again of what that was.”
“You don’t remember?”
Clearing his throat, Osamu replies. “Was it something to the effect of, Kobe or me?”
Keiji can’t reply, the shame and self-embarrassment growing uncanny with every passing second. What’s worse is the framing of the whole thing: the debut Akutagawa laureate arguing with his ex outside a run-down izakaya. And worst of all, almost completely sober.
“And was that ever fair, Keiji? Why should’ve I had to choose between you or the restaurant?” Osamu demands with grit in his voice. That seems to break him, who shifts his posture and flicks the cigarette in his hand as if it’s already been lit.
“That was never what I meant.”
“Does that make a difference?”
“Don’t put words in my mouth,” Keiji chides back. He can’t help himself now, wanting to have control over this conversation as if it was something he could win in the first place. “And besides, we talked about it. You could’ve moved out here to establish the Tokyo branch and commuted back to Kobe.”
“Was that really ever an option?” Osamu scoffs, and looks away to the Tokyo nightline in the distance. “I could see how much the distance was tearin’ us apart. You could barely focus on your job. The restaurant in Kobe was just takin’ off, I couldn’t just leave.”
“And so what? Just like that, you gave up because it was too much work for you?”
Osamu stares back at him emotionless, his eyes glazed over and distant.
“You know I would’ve followed you if I had the chance.” His voice breaks, like the vision of an alternative reality has just played out in his mind. Keiji can see it too. “But I couldn’t just give up on my dreams, everything I had built back in Kobe, for something I wasn’t even sure would pan out in Tokyo.” He seems to regret it as soon as he says it, the words spilling out into the cold night.
“Is that what you felt when I left Kobe for the last time, the grief of losing me?” Keiji asks, his voice in careful contemplation. “Over something you didn’t completely believe in?”
“I did believe in us,” Osamu says, quietly. The lamp-post above them momentarily flickers on and off, a cast of shadow blinking in and out across Osamu’s profile. “I never intended to lose you,” he adds quieter.
“But that is what you did,” Keiji replies, setting ablaze everything that has been said before. “Your actions precede your words.”
The conversation seems to have reached a tipping point, Keiji bubbling over the surface in all his grief and anger, the Tokyo skyline around them seemingly in flames. And then Keiji can’t take it anymore, not the regret, not the what-ifs, and certainly not the resentment. Not when the memories are warm and edged with gold, seeping into every present moment, oozing out into an Osamu-filled Tokyo he can only comprehend in his dreams.
“Well if words still mean anything, I always wanted both.” Osamu heaves out a sigh, running a hand through his now short-shaven hair. “You and the damn restaurant.”
The admission startles Keiji, the use of present-tense as if Osamu is insinuating he still knows him. And he finds himself wanting to know more, to know truly just how much the separation of time has changed them both.
“Do you still think of us sometimes?”
Osamu runs a hand over the back of his neck, then settles further against the lamp post. “Really want me to answer that?”
“Yes,” Keiji demands.
Keiji already knows the answer to this—it’s obvious in the way Osamu looks back at him, the flashing neon lights of the bar across the street embedded on his skin, in those gray eyes of his. But he wants to hear Osamu admit it still, to have the satisfaction of being the one who got away.
“You already know the truth, anyway,” Osamu begins. He doesn’t say anything else for a moment, instead remaining silent as he lights his cigarette with a lighter from his pocket. The small flame that erupts is red, crimson as can be, and Keiji thinks maybe it’s not far off from the way they move in this world. Hot in one moment, cold in the next.
Osamu exhales the cigarette, the smoke rising into the nightline. He finally admits, “I always imagine you in the restaurant, back in Kobe. You with your oversized trench coat and new haircut. Comin’ in after closing time to walk me back home.”
“What happens next?”
“You tell me.”
The vision comes to Keiji easily, in part thanks to the countless interviews Osamu has had with editorials and magazines. He can still envision the peeled-back bamboo interior of the restaurant, the tall glass windows giving way to the view of a snow-enveloped Kobe. In a different timeline, or in a different world, maybe it was the place they would’ve met, no consideration of the distance in between them.
But now in the present, Keiji glances back out to the Tokyo skyline. He takes an inhale, the cold, bitter air of winter filling his lungs. Somewhere out there, in Kobe, Osamu’s life has carried on without him, a bed made home to others, a restaurant morphed and folded without his presence.
What right does he have to be greedy after all this time?
“I wouldn’t remember the way back to your place, though, Miya-san,” Keiji says, quietly. He looks back to Osamu, unable to measure the level of commitment in those gray eyes. “I wouldn’t want to intrude.”
“I can show you,” Osamu replies. “It’s not intruding if I’m letting you in.”
“Is that what you say to everyone?” Keiji crosses his arms, burying them against the down fabric of his jacket. The night is too cold for him, and suddenly he feels too exposed—as if the entire Tokyo nightline is mirrored against his pale skin, all for Osamu to see. A moment later, he adds, “How am I any different?”
“Different? I think it says somethin’ that I can’t forget about you.”
The admission is only a slight revelation, but it seems to undo every part of Keiji’s belief system, as if the stories he’s told himself perhaps aren’t exactly true. He thinks back to last winter, to the walks he took around the Tokyo Bay, the harsh wind cutting across his uncovered skin. The sense of loneliness had been impenetrable, the coldness seeping through every part of his body. And it was all made worse by the fact that Osamu seemed to be everywhere, a constant reminder of what he’d lost. The silence was the most unbearable, the constant questioning of what would become of their relationship.
Had he been wrong all along then, assuming Osamu wanted nothing to do with him?
Back outside the izakaya, Osamu takes another draw of his cigarette, a plume of smoke following as he lowers his hand. The tip of it burns red. Keiji focuses on it like it might lead him to the truth in all of this.
“And what now?” Keiji asks. But he already knows the answer himself, that time cannot be unwound, that there is no undoing what has become. Instead, we must live with the consequences of our actions, for the ways we see the world.
“When’s the next time you’re in Kobe?” Osamu replies, his arms crossed over his chest, the ember from his cigarette having nearly gone out by now.
Keiji commits the view before him to memory, of the way the Tokyo winter falls across Osamu’s pale skin, of the small snowflakes now melted on his short brown hair. The fullness of the scene compels him to restrain himself as he responds to Osamu, biting back at the underlying meaning of the whole conversation.
“I’ve got a press conference in Osaka next week. I was thinking of stopping off in Kobe for another signing, but wasn’t sure… But I’m not tied down to Tokyo anymore, with the whole writing gig now, of course.”
“Have enough time to stop in at the restaurant?”
In response Keiji can’t help but smile. “Is that an invitation?”
“Whatever you want it to be.” Osamu flicks the excess ash off his cigarette, glancing back at Keiji. His facial expression has softened, his smile barely hidden under the guise of apathy. “There’s a few new items on the menu I’ve been meanin’ for someone to try. Never can trust the cooks like I could you… need someone to tell it to me straight, you know.”
“Maybe I’ll stop in then,” Keiji replies.
He takes a step forward closer to Osamu, just close enough to take his bare cheek in hand, his skin warm and familiar. Maybe one kiss wouldn’t hurt.
-
That last time I saw you in Kobe at the train station, just as the sun was going down… what hurt the most wasn’t the goodbye, but the way you kissed me as if we would see one another again. And it was what I remembered in the following days, the warmth of your breath on mine, how tightly you held me against the cold. How could I have forgotten you after that?
After my return to Tokyo, I didn’t know what to do with myself. I would wander the streets late at night, trawling from Shibuya to Ginza and back again… in search of something, I don’t know. What I liked the most was how the streets hollowed out, fewer people to confront myself with. But even still the city held me firmly in its grasp, the neon lights of izakayas and 24-hour laundromats not far off from those I knew in Kobe. I think I was trying to escape your memory, like if I could just somehow walk far enough, I would never think of you again.
But looking back, I was only trying to run away from myself. It was as if the city could be a distraction for all that I’d lost, and maybe I’d find something new to hold onto, even if just for a moment. But it seemed everywhere I walked, I found you there again, in the cracks of what had been our previous life together. The walks we took around Tokyo Bay, where it seemed like you held the world in your hands, my old flat where you first kissed me…
And it’s on nights like this, where the cold bites at my skin, snow as far as the eye can see, that I still wonder if you think of me anymore. Do you remember my departure from Kobe like I do, a cascading drop-off from everything we had built before that? Do you think of my presence at the restaurant, the chair I had once sat, now made home to other customers, as if I was just passing through to begin with?