Tengo had no confidence that his story was reaching his father’s ears, and even if it was, he had no way of telling whether or not his father was understanding it. He felt his words had no impact and he could see no response. Even if his words were getting through, Tengo had no way of knowing if his father was even interested. Maybe the old man just found them annoying. Maybe he was thinking, “Who gives a damn about other people’s life stories? Just let me sleep!” All Tengo could do, though, was continue to say whatever came to his mind. He couldn’t think of anything better to do while crammed into this little room with his father.

His father never made the slightest movement. His eyes were closed tightly at the bottom of those two deep, dark hollows. He might as well have been waiting for winter to come and the hollows to fill up with snow.

“I can’t say that things are going all that well for the moment, but if possible I’d like to make my living by writing—not just rewriting somebody else’s work but writing what I want to write, the way I want to write it. Writing—and especially fiction writing—is well suited to my personality, I think. It’s good to have something you want to do, and now I finally have it. Nothing of mine has ever been published with my name on it, but that ought to happen soon enough. I’m really not a bad writer, if I do say so myself. At least one editor gives me some credit for my talent. I’m not worried on that front.”

And I seem to have the qualities needed to be a Receiver, Tengo thought of adding. So much so that I have been drawn into the fictional world that I myself have written. But this was no place to start talking about such complicated matters. That was a whole different story. He decided to change the subject.

“A more pressing problem for me is that I have never been able to love anyone seriously. I have never felt unconditional love for anyone since the day I was born, never felt that I could give myself completely to that one person. Never once.”

Even as he said this, Tengo found himself wondering if this miserable-looking old man before him had ever experienced loving someone with his whole heart. Perhaps he had seriously loved Tengo’s mother, which may have been why he was willing to raise Tengo as his own child, even though he knew they had no blood tie. If so, that meant he had lived a far more spiritually fulfilling life than Tengo.

“The one possible exception is a girl I remember very well. We were in the same class in the third and fourth grades in Ichikawa. Yes, I’m talking about something that happened a good twenty years ago. I was very strongly drawn to her. I’ve thought about her all this time, and even now I still think about her a lot. But I never really talked to her. She changed schools, and I never saw her again. But something happened recently that made me want to find her. I finally realized that I need her, that I want to see her and talk to her about all kinds of things. But I haven’t been able to track her down. I suppose I should have started looking for her a lot sooner. It might have been much easier then.”

Tengo fell silent, waiting for the things he had talked about so far to sink into his father’s mind—or, rather, to sink into his own mind. Then he started speaking again.

“Yes, I was too much of a coward where these things were concerned. The same reason kept me from investigating my own family register. If I wanted to find out whether my mother really died or not, I could have looked it up easily. All I had to do was go to the city hall and look up the record. In fact, I thought about doing it any number of times. I even walked as far as the city hall. But I couldn’t make myself request the documents. I was afraid to see the truth before my eyes. I was afraid to expose it with my own hands. And so I waited for it to happen by itself, naturally.”

Tengo released a sigh.

“Oh well, all that aside, I should have started looking for the girl a lot sooner. I took a huge detour. I couldn’t get myself going. I just—how should I put this?—I’m a coward when it comes to matters of the heart. That is my fatal flaw.”

Tengo got up from the stool, went to the window, and looked out at the pine woods. The wind had died. He couldn’t hear the roar of the ocean. A large cat was crossing the garden. Judging from its sagging middle, it was probably pregnant. It lay down at the base of a tree, spread its legs, and started licking its belly.

Leaning against the windowsill, Tengo continued to speak to his father.

“But anyhow, lately it has begun to seem as if my life has finally started to change. I feel that way. To tell you the truth, I hated you for a long time. From the time I was little, I used to think that I didn’t belong in such a miserable little place, that I was someone who deserved to be in more comfortable circumstances. I felt it was unfair for you to treat me as you did. My classmates all seemed to be living happy, satisfying lives. Kids whose gifts and talents were far inferior to mine were having much more fun than I was every day. I used to seriously wish that you were not my father. I imagined that this had to be some mistake; you couldn’t possibly be my real father; there couldn’t possibly be any blood relationship.”

Tengo looked out of the window again at the cat. It was still absorbed in licking its swollen belly, unaware that it was being watched. Tengo kept his gaze on the cat as he continued talking.

“I don’t feel that way anymore. Now I think that I was in the right circumstances for me and had the right father. I really mean it. To tell you the truth, I was a useless human being, a person of no value. In a sense, I’m the one who ruined me: I did it myself. I can see that now. I was a math prodigy when I was little, that’s for sure. Even I know I had a real talent. Everybody kept their eye on me and made a big deal over me. But ultimately, it was a talent that had no hope of developing into anything meaningful. It was just there. I was always a big boy and good at judo, and I always did well in the prefectural tournaments. But when I went out into the wider world, there were lots of guys who were stronger than I was. I was never chosen to represent my university in the national tournaments. This was a great shock to me, and for a while I no longer knew who I was. But that was only natural, because in fact I was nobody.”

Tengo opened the bottle of mineral water he had brought with him and took a drink. Then he sat down on the stool again.

“I told you this before, but I’m grateful to you. I believe I’m not your real son. I’m almost sure of it. I’m grateful to you for having raised me even though we had no blood tie. I’m sure it wasn’t easy for a man to raise a small child alone. Now, though, when I recall how you took me around on your NHK collections, I feel sick at heart. I have only terrible memories of that. But I’m sure that you could think of no other way to communicate with me. How should I put it? It was probably the best you could do. That was your only point of contact with society, and you wanted to show me what it was like out there. I can see that now. Of course, you also calculated that having a child with you would make it easier for you to collect the money. But that wasn’t all you had in mind, I suspect.”

Tengo paused briefly to let his words sink in and to organize his own thoughts.

“Of course, as a child, I couldn’t see it that way. It was just embarrassing and painful to me—that I had to go around with you making collections while my classmates spent their Sundays having fun. I can’t tell you how much I hated it when Sundays came around. But now, at least to some extent, I can understand what you did. I’m not saying that it was right. It left me with scars. It was hard for a child. But what’s done is done. Don’t let it bother you. One good thing it did was to make me tougher. I learned firsthand that it’s not easy making your way through this world.”