“The owl is inside me,” Tengo commented. The owl had become a part of his consciousness, a vital part that couldn’t be separated out.

“The owl is the guardian deity of the woods. He knows all and gives us the wisdom of the night,” Kumi said.

But where and how should he seek this wisdom? The owl was everywhere, and nowhere. “I can’t think of a question to ask him,” Tengo said.

Kumi Adachi held his hand. “There’s no need for questions. All you need to do is go into the woods yourself. That way is much simpler.”

He could hear laughter again from the comedy next door. Applause as well. The show’s assistant, off camera, was probably holding up cue cards to the audience that said Laugh and Applaud. Tengo closed his eyes and thought of the woods, of himself going into the woods. Deep in the dark forest was the realm of the Little People. But the owl was still there too. The owl knows all and gives us the wisdom of the night.

Suddenly all sound vanished, as if someone had come up behind him stealthily and stuck corks in his ears. Someone had closed one lid, while someone else, somewhere, had opened another lid. Entrance and exit had switched.

Tengo found himself in an elementary school classroom.

The window was wide open and children’s voices filtered in from the schoolyard. The wind blew, almost as an afterthought, and the white curtains waved in the breeze. Aomame was beside him, holding his hand tightly. It was the same scene as always—but something was different. Everything he could see was crystal clear, almost painfully clear, fresh and focused down to the texture. He could make out each and every detail of the forms and shapes of things around him. If he reached out his hand, he could actually touch them. The smell of the early-winter afternoon hit him strongly, as if what had been covering up those smells until then had been yanked away. Real smells. The set smells of the season: of the blackboard erasers, the floor cleaner, the fallen leaves burning in the incinerator in a corner of the schoolyard—all these were mixed inseparably together. When he breathed in these scents, he felt them spread out deep and wide within his mind. The structure of his body was being reassembled. His heartbeat was no longer just a heartbeat.

For an instant, he could push the door of time inward. Old light mixed with the new light, the two becoming one. The old air mixed in with the new to become one. It is this light, and this air, Tengo thought. He understood everything now. Almost everything. Why couldn’t I remember this smell until now? It’s so simple. It’s such a straightforward world, yet I didn’t get it.

“I wanted to see you,” Tengo said to Aomame. His voice was far away and faltering, but it was definitely his voice.

“I wanted to see you, too,” the girl said. The voice sounded like Kumi Adachi’s. He couldn’t make out the boundary between reality and imagination. If he tried to pin it down, the bowl slipped sideways and his brains sloshed around.

Tengo spoke. “I should have started searching for you long ago. But I couldn’t.”

“It’s not too late. You can still find me,” the girl said.

“But how can I find you?”

No response. The answer was not put into words.

“But I know I can find you,” Tengo said.

The girl spoke. “Because I could find you.”

“You found me?”

“Find me,” the girl said. “While there’s still time.”

Like a departed soul that had failed to leave in time, the white curtain soundlessly and gently wavered. That was the last thing Tengo saw.

When he came to, he was lying in a narrow bed. The lights were out, the room faintly lit by the streetlights filtering in through a gap in the curtains. He was wearing a T-shirt and boxers. Kumi wore only her smiley-face shirt. Underneath the long shirt, she was nude. Her soft breasts lay against his arm. The owl was still hooting in Tengo’s head. The woods lingered inside him—he was still clinging to the nighttime woods.

Even in bed like this with the young nurse, he felt no desire. Kumi seemed to feel the same way. She wrapped her arms around his body and giggled. What was so funny? Tengo had no idea. Maybe somebody, somewhere, was holding out a sign that said Laugh.

What time could it be? He lifted his head to look for a clock but couldn’t see any. Kumi suddenly stopped laughing and wrapped her arms around his neck.

“I was reborn,” she said, her hot breath brushing his ear.

“You were reborn,” Tengo said.

“Because I died once.”

“You died once,” Tengo repeated.

“On a night when there was a cold rain falling,” she said.

“Why did you die?”

“So I would be reborn like this.”

“You would be reborn,” Tengo said.

“More or less,” she whispered very quietly. “In all sorts of forms.”

Tengo pondered this statement. What did it mean to be reborn more or less, in all sorts of forms? His brain was heavy, and was brimming with the germs of life, like some primeval sea. Not that these led him anywhere.

“Where do air chrysalises come from, anyway?”

“That’s the wrong question,” Kumi said, and chuckled.

She twisted her body on top of his and Tengo could feel her pubic hair against his thighs. Thick, rich hair. It was like her pubic hair was a part of her thinking process.

“What is necessary in order to be reborn?” Tengo asked.

“The biggest problem when it comes to being reborn,” the small nurse said, as if revealing a secret, “is that people aren’t reborn for their own sakes. They can only do it for someone else.”

“Which is what you mean by more or less, in all sorts of forms.”

“When morning comes you will be leaving here, Tengo. Before the exit is blocked.”

“When morning comes I’ll be leaving here,” Tengo repeated the nurse’s words.

Once more she rubbed her rich pubic hair against his thigh, as if to leave behind some sort of sign. “Air chrysalises don’t come from somewhere. They won’t come no matter how long you wait.”

“You know that.”

“Because I died once,” she said. “It’s painful to die. Much more painful than you imagine, Tengo. You are utterly lonely. It’s amazing how completely lonely a person can be. You had better remember that. But you know, unless you die once, you won’t be reborn.”

“Unless you die once, you won’t be reborn,” Tengo confirmed.

“But people face death while they’re still alive.”

“People face death while they’re still alive,” Tengo repeated, unsure of what it meant.

The white curtain continued to flutter in the breeze. The air in the classroom smelled of a mixture of blackboard erasers and cleaner. There was the scent of burning leaves. Someone was practicing the recorder. The girl was squeezing his hand tightly. In his lower half he felt a sweet ache, but he didn’t have an erection. That would come later on. The words later on promised him eternity. Eternity was a single long pole that stretched out without end. The bowl tipped a bit again, and again his brains sloshed to one side.

When he woke up, it took Tengo a while to figure out where he was, and to piece together the events of the previous night. Bright sunlight shone in through the gap between the flowery curtains, while birds whistled away noisily outside. He had been sleeping in an uncomfortable, cramped position in the narrow bed. He found it hard to believe he could have slept the whole night in such a position. Kumi was lying beside him, her face pressed into the pillow, sound asleep. Her hair was plastered against her cheeks, like lush summer grass wet with dew. Kumi Adachi, Tengo thought. A young nurse who just turned twenty-three. His wristwatch had fallen to the floor. The hands showed 7:20—7:20 in the morning.

Tengo slipped quietly out of bed, careful not to wake Kumi, and looked out the window through a crack in the curtains. There was a cabbage field. Rows of cabbages crouched stolidly on the dark soil. Beyond the field was the woods. Tengo remembered the hoot of the owl. Last night it had definitely been hooting. The wisdom of the night. Tengo and the nurse had listened to it as they smoked hashish. He could still feel her stiff pubic hair on his thigh.