His face had changed as well. The mirror no longer showed a soft, decent-looking, though unthreatening and unfocused boy’s face. What stared out at him now was the face of a young man with cheekbones so prominent they looked as if they’d been chiseled by a trowel. There was a new light in his eyes, a glint he’d never seen before, a lonely, isolated light with limited range. His beard suddenly grew thicker, and he had to shave every morning. He grew his hair out, too.

Tsukuru didn’t particularly like his new looks. Nor did he hate them. They were, after all, just a convenient, makeshift mask. Though he was grateful, for the time being, that it wasn’t the face he’d worn before.

In any case, the boy named Tsukuru Tazaki had died. In the savage darkness he’d breathed his last and was buried in a small clearing in the forest. Quietly, secretly, in the predawn while everyone was still fast asleep. There was no grave marker. And what stood here now, breathing, was a brand-new Tsukuru Tazaki, one whose substance had been totally replaced. But he was the only one who knew this. And he didn’t plan to tell.

Just as before, he made the rounds sketching railroad stations and never missed a lecture at college. When he got up, he’d take a shower, wash his hair, and always brush his teeth after eating. He made his bed every morning, and ironed his own shirts. He did his best to keep busy. At night he read for two hours or so, mostly history or biographies. A long-standing habit. Habit, in fact, was what propelled his life forward. Though he no longer believed in a perfect community, nor felt the warmth of chemistry between people.

Every morning he’d stand at the bathroom sink and study his face in the mirror. And slowly he grew used to this new self, with all its changes. It was like acquiring a new language, memorizing the grammar.

Eventually he made a new friend. In June, nearly a year after his four friends in Nagoya abandoned him. This new friend went to the same college and was two years younger. He met the man at the college pool.

He met the man at the college pool.

Like Tsukuru, the man swam by himself early every morning. They began to have a nodding acquaintance, and eventually, they started to talk. After changing in the locker room, they went out for breakfast together in the school cafeteria. The man was two years behind Tsukuru in college, and was majoring in physics. They were in the same engineering college, but students in the physics department and the civil engineering department were like beings from different planets.

“What exactly do you do in the civil engineering department?” the student asked him.

“I build stations,” Tsukuru replied.

“Stations?”

“Railroad stations. Not TV stations or anything.”

“But why railroad stations?”

“The world needs them, that’s why,” Tsukuru said, as if it were obvious.

“Interesting,” the man said, as if he truly felt that way. “I’ve never really given much thought to the necessity of stations.”

“But you use stations yourself, I imagine. If there weren’t any, you’d be in trouble when you ride the train.”

“I do ride the train, and I see your point.… It’s just that I—well—never imagined there were people in the world who had a passion for building them.”

“Some people write string quartets, some grow lettuce and tomatoes. There have to be a few who build railroad stations, too,” Tsukuru said. “And I wouldn’t say I have a passion for it, exactly. I just have an interest in one specific thing.”

“This might sound rude, but I think it’s an amazing achievement to find even one specific thing that you’re interested in.”

Tsukuru thought the younger man was poking fun at him, and gazed intently at his handsome face. But he seemed serious, his expression open and straightforward.

“You like making things, just as your name implies,” the man said, referring to the fact that tsukuru meant “to make or build.”

“I’ve always liked making things that you can actually see,” Tsukuru admitted.

“Not me,” the man said. “I’ve always been terrible at making things. Ever since I was in grade school I’ve been hopeless with my hands. Couldn’t even put together a plastic model. I prefer thinking about abstract ideas, and I never get tired of it. But when it comes to actually using my hands to make something real, forget about it. I do like cooking, though, but that’s because it’s more like deconstructing things than constructing them.… I guess it must seem a little disturbing for someone like me, who can’t make anything, to go to engineering school.”

“What do you want to focus on here?”

The man gave it some thought. “I don’t really know.

I don’t have any set, clear goal like you. I just want to think deeply about things. Contemplate ideas in a pure, free sort of way. That’s all. If you think about it, that’s kind of like constructing a vacuum.”

“Well, the world needs a few people who create a vacuum.”

The other man laughed happily. “Yeah, but it’s different from people growing lettuce or tomatoes. If everybody in the world worked their hardest to create a vacuum, we’d be in big trouble.”

“Ideas are like beards. Men don’t have them until they grow up. Somebody said that, but I can’t remember who.”

“Voltaire,” the younger man said. He rubbed his chin and smiled, a cheerful, unaffected smile. “Voltaire might be off the mark, though, when it comes to me. I have hardly any beard at all, but have loved thinking about things since I was a kid.”

His face was indeed smooth, with no hint of a beard. His eyebrows were narrow, but thick, his ears nicely formed, like lovely seashells.

“I wonder if what Voltaire meant wasn’t ideas as much as meditation,” Tsukuru said.

The man inclined his head a fraction. “Pain is what gives rise to meditation. It has nothing to do with age, let alone beards.”

The young man’s name was Haida, which meant, literally, “gray field.” Fumiaki Haida. Another person with a color, Tsukuru mused. Mister Gray. Though gray, of course, was a fairly subdued color.

Neither of them was very sociable, but as they continued to meet, a natural friendliness grew between them and they began to open up to each other. They decided to meet every morning and swim laps together. They both swam long distances, freestyle, though Haida was a little faster. He’d gone to a swim school since he was a child, and his swimming form was beautiful, without a single wasted motion. His shoulder blades moved smoothly, like the wings of a butterfly, barely skimming the surface. After Haida gave Tsukuru some detailed pointers, and after Tsukuru had done more strength training, he was finally able to match Haida’s speed. At first they mainly talked about swimming techniques, but later branched out into other topics.

Haida was a short but handsome young man. His face was small and narrow, like an ancient Greek statue, but his facial features were, if anything, classical, with a kind of intelligent and reserved look. He wasn’t the type of pretty young boy who immediately grabbed people’s attention, but one whose graceful beauty only became apparent over time.

Haida’s hair was short and slightly curly, and he always dressed casually in the same chinos and light-colored shirts. But despite his simple, ordinary outfit, he knew how to wear his clothes well. He loved reading above all else, and, like Tsukuru, he seldom read novels. His preferences ran to philosophy and the classics. He enjoyed reading plays, too, and was a big fan of Greek tragedies and Shakespeare. He also knew Noh and bunraku well. Haida was from Akita Prefecture in the far north of Japan. He had very white skin and long fingers. Like Tsukuru, he couldn’t hold his liquor well, but unlike Tsukuru, he was able to distinguish between the music of Mendelssohn and the music of Schumann. Haida was extremely shy, and when he was together with more than three people, he did his best to stay invisible. There was an old, deep scar, about an inch and a half long, on his neck, like he’d been cut by a knife, but this scar added a strange accent to this otherwise serene young man’s appearance.