Kafka on the Shore

Chapter 41

When I go into the woods this time I've outfitted myself with everything I might need: compass, knife, canteen, some emergency food, work gloves, a can of yellow spray paint, and the small hatchet I'd used before. I stuff all this into a small nylon daypack that was also in the tool shed, and head off into the forest. I'm wearing a long-sleeved shirt, a towel wrapped around my neck, and the cap Oshima gave me, and I've sprayed insect repellent over all the exposed parts of my body. The sky's overcast, and it's hot and sticky like it could rain any minute, so I throw a poncho into the pack just in case. A flock of birds screech at each other as they cut across the low, leaden sky.

I make it easily to that round clearing in the forest. Checking my compass to make sure I'm generally heading north, I step deeper into the woods. This time I spray yellow markings on tree trunks to mark the route. Unlike Hansel and Gretel's bread crumbs, spray paint's safe from hungry birds.

I'm better prepared, so I'm not as afraid. I'm nervous, sure, but my heart's not pounding. Curiosity's what's leading me on. I want to know what lies down this path. Even if there's nothing there, I want to know that. I have to know. Memorizing the scenery as I pass by, I move steadily forward, step by careful step.

Occasionally there's some weird sound. A thud like something hitting the ground, a creak like floorboards groaning under weight, and others I can't even describe. I have no idea what these mean, since there's no knowing what they are. Sometimes they sound far away, sometimes right near by-the sense of distance expanding and contracting. Bird wings echo above me, sounding louder, more exaggerated, than they should. Every time I hear this I stop and listen intently, holding my breath, waiting for something to happen. Nothing does, and I walk on.

Besides these sudden, unexpected sounds, everything else is still. There's no wind, no rustle of leaves in the treetops, just my own footsteps as I push through the brush. When I step on a fallen branch, the snap reverberates through the air.

I grasp the hatchet, which I'd sharpened, and it feels rough in my gloveless hands. Up to this point it hasn't come in handy, but its heft is comforting, and makes me feel protected. But from what? There aren't any bears or wolves in this forest. A few poisonous snakes, perhaps. The most dangerous creature here would have to be me. So maybe I'm just scared of my own shadow.

Still, as I walk along I get the feeling something, somewhere, is watching me, listening to me, holding its breath, blending into the background, watching my every move. Somewhere far off, something's listening to all the sounds I make, trying to guess where I'm headed and why. I try not to think about it. The more you think about illusions, the more they'll swell up and take on form. And no longer be an illusion.

I try whistling to fill in the silence. The soprano sax from Coltrane's "My Favorite Things," though of course my dubious whistling doesn't come anywhere near the complex, lightning-quick original. I just add bits so what I hear in my head approximates the sound. Better than nothing, I figure. I glance at my watch-it's ten-thirty. Oshima must be getting the library ready to open. Today would be… Wednesday. I picture him sprinkling water in the garden, wiping off the desks with a cloth, boiling water and brewing up some coffee. All the tasks I normally take care of. But now I'm here, deep in the forest, heading even deeper. Nobody has any idea I'm here. The only ones who do are me, and them.

I continue down the path. Calling it a path, though, isn't quite right. It's more like some natural kind of channel that water's carved out over time. When there's a downpour in the forest, rushing water gouges out the dirt, sweeping the grasses before it, exposing the roots of trees. When it hits a boulder it makes a detour around it. Once the rain lets up you're left with a dry riverbed that's something like a path. This pseudo-path is covered with ferns and green grass, and if you don't pay attention you'll lose it entirely. It gets steep every once in a while, and I scramble up by grabbing hold of tree trunks.

Somewhere along the line Coltrane's soprano sax runs out of steam. Now it's McCoy Tyner's piano solo I hear, the left hand carving out a repetitious rhythm and the right layering on thick, forbidding chords. Like some mythic scene, the music portrays somebody's-a nameless, faceless somebody's-dim past, all the details laid out as clearly as entrails being dragged out of the darkness. Or at least that's how it sounds to me. The patient, repeating music ever so slowly breaks apart the real, rearranging the pieces. It has a hypnotic, menacing smell, just like the forest.

I hike along, spraying marks on the trees as I go, sometimes turning to make sure these yellow marks are still visible. It's okay-the marks that lead me home are like an uneven line of buoys in the sea. Just to be doubly sure, every once in a while I hack out a notch in a tree trunk. My little hatchet isn't very sharp, so I pick out the thinner, softer-looking trunks to hack. The trees receive these blows in silence.

Huge black mosquitoes buzz me like reconnaissance patrols, aiming for the exposed skin around my eyes. When I hear their buzz I brush them away or squash them. Whenever I smush one it makes a squish, already bloated with blood it's sucked out of me. It feels itchy only later. I wipe the blood off my hands on the towel around my neck.

The army marching through these woods, if it was summer, must have had the same problems with mosquitoes. Full battle gear-how much would that have weighed? Those old-style rifles like a clump of iron, ammunition belt, bayonet, steel helmet, a couple of grenades, food and rations, of course, entrenching tools to dig foxholes, mess kit… All that gear must add up to well over forty pounds. Damn heavy, and a lot more than my little daypack. I have the distinct feeling I'm going to bump into those soldiers around the next bend, even though they disappeared here more than sixty years ago.

I remember Napoleon's troops marching into Russia in the summer of 1812. They must have swatted away their share of mosquitoes, too, on that long road to Moscow. Of course mosquitoes weren't the only problem. They had to struggle to survive all kinds of other things-hunger, thirst, muddy roads, infectious disease, sweltering heat, Cossack commandos attacking their thin supply lines, lack of medical supplies, not to mention huge battles with the regular Russian army. When the French forces finally straggled into a deserted Moscow, their number had been reduced from 500,000 to a mere 100,000.

I stop and take a swig of water from my canteen. My watch shows exactly eleven o'clock. The library is just opening up. Oshima's unlocking the door, taking his usual seat behind the counter, a stack of long, neatly sharpened pencils on the desk. He picks one up and twirls it, gently pushing the eraser end against his temple. I can see it all clearly. But that place is so far away.

I've never had periods, says Oshima. I do anal sex and have never used my vagina for sex. My clitoris is sensitive but my breasts aren't.

I remember Oshima asleep in the bed in the cabin, his face to the wall. And the signs he/she left behind. Cloaked in those signs, I went to sleep in the same bed.

I give up thinking about it anymore. Instead I think about war. The Napoleonic Wars, the war the Japanese soldiers had to go off and fight. I feel the heft of the hatchet in my hands. That pale, sharp blade glints and I have to turn my eyes away from it. Why do people wage war? Why do hundreds of thousands, even millions of people group together and try to annihilate each other? Do people start wars out of anger? Or fear? Or are anger and fear just two aspects of the same spirit?

I hack another notch in a tree with my hatchet. The tree cries out silently, bleeding invisible blood. I keep on trudging. Coltrane picks up his soprano sax again. Once more the repetition breaks apart the real, rearranging the pieces.

Before long my mind wanders into the realm of dreams. They come back so quietly. I'm holding Sakura. She's in my arms, and I'm inside her. I don't want to be at the mercy of things outside me anymore, thrown into confusion by things I can't control. I've already murdered my father and violated my mother-and now here I am inside my sister. If there's a curse in all this, I mean to grab it by the horns and fulfill the program that's been laid out for me. Lift the burden from my shoulders and live-not caught up in someone else's schemes, but as me. That's what I really want. And I come inside her.

"Even if it's in a dream, you shouldn't have done that," the boy named Crow calls out. He's right behind me, walking in the forest. "I tried my best to stop you. I wanted you to understand. You heard, but you didn't listen. You just forged on ahead."

I don't respond or turn around, just silently keep on trudging.

"You thought that's how you could overcome the curse, right? But was it?" Crow asks.

But was it? You killed the person who's your father, violated your mother, and now your sister. You thought that would put an end to the curse your father laid on you, so you did everything that was prophesied about you. But nothing's really over. You didn't overcome anything. That curse is branded on your soul even deeper than before. You should realize that by now. That curse is part of your DNA. You breathe out the curse, the wind carries it to the four corners of the Earth, but the dark confusion inside you remains. Your fear, anger, unease-nothing's disappeared. They're all still inside you, still torturing you.

"Listen up-there's no war that will end all wars," Crow tells me. "War breeds war. Lapping up the blood shed by violence, feeding on wounded flesh. War is a perfect, self-contained being. You need to know that."

"Sakura-my sister," I say. I shouldn't have raped her. Even if it was in a dream. "What should I do?" I ask, staring at the ground in front of me.

"You have to overcome the fear and anger inside you," the boy named Crow says. "Let a bright light shine in and melt the coldness in your heart. That's what being tough is all about. Do that and you really will be the toughest fifteen-year-old on the planet. You following me? There's still time. You can still get your self back. Use your head. Think about what you've got to do. You're no dunce. You should be able to figure it out."

"Did I really murder my father?" I ask.

No reply. I swing around, but the boy named Crow is gone and the silence swallows my question.

Alone in such a deep forest, the person called me feels empty, horribly empty. Oshima once used the term hollow men. Well, that's exactly what I've become. There's a void inside me, a blank that's slowly expanding, devouring what's left of who I am. I can hear it happening. I'm totally lost, my identity dying. There's no direction where I am, no sky, no ground. I think of Miss Saeki, of Sakura, of Oshima. But I'm light-years away from them. It's like I'm looking through the wrong end of a pair of binoculars, and no matter how far I stretch out my hand, I can't touch them. I'm all alone in the middle of a dim maze. Listen to the wind, Oshima told me. I listen, but no wind's blowing. Even the boy named Crow has vanished.

Use your head. Think about what you've got to do.

But I can't think anymore. No matter how much I try, I wind up at a dead end in the maze. What is it inside me that makes up me? Is this what's supposed to stand up to the void?

If only I could wipe out this me who's here, right here and right now. I seriously consider it. In this thick wall of trees, on this path that's not a path, if I stopped breathing, my consciousness would silently be buried in the darkness, every last drop of my dark violent blood dripping out, my DNA rotting among the weeds. Then my battle would be over. Otherwise, I'll eternally be murdering my father, violating my mother, violating my sister, lashing out at the world forever. I close my eyes and try to find my center. The darkness that covers it is rough and jagged. There's a break in the dark clouds, like looking out the window to see the leaves of the dogwood gleaming like a thousand blades in the moonlight.

I feel something rearranging itself under my skin, and there's a tinkling sound in my head. I open my eyes and take a deep breath. I throw away the can of spray paint, the hatchet, the compass. From far away I hear them all clatter to the ground. I feel lighter. I slip the daypack off my shoulders and toss it aside. My sense of touch seems suddenly acute. The air around me's grown more transparent. My sense of the forest has grown more intense. Coltrane's labyrinthine solo plays on in my ears, never ending.

Thinking it over, I reach into the daypack and take out the hunting knife and stuff it in my pocket. The razor-sharp knife I stole from my father's desk. If need be, I could use it to slash my wrists and let every drop of blood inside me gush out onto the ground. That would destroy the device.

I head off into the heart of the forest, a hollow man, a void that devours all that's substantial. There is nothing left to fear. Not a thing.

And I head off into the heart of the forest.