Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman Page 0,2

the novel The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, and likewise both “Firefly” and “Man-Eating Cats,” with some changes, were incorporated as parts of, respectively, the novels Norwegian Wood and Sputnik Sweetheart. There was a period when narratives I’d written as short stories, after I’d published them, kept expanding in my mind, developing into novels. A short story I’d written long ago would barge into my house in the middle of the night, shake me awake, and shout, “Hey, this is no time to be sleeping! You can’t forget about me, there’s still more to write!” Impelled by that voice, I’d find myself writing a novel. In this sense, too, my short stories and novels connect up inside me in a very natural, organic way.

Many people have encouraged me and led me to write short stories. Every time I see Amanda Urban, my agent at ICM, she repeats this mantra-like exhortation: “Haruki, write more short stories!” Gary Fisketjon at Knopf, editor of The Elephant Vanishes, also edited the present collection and was pivotal in seeing Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman into print. Both Jay Rubin and Philip Gabriel, my hardworking, skilled translators, have their own unique touch, and it’s been a real pleasure to read my stories again in their superb translations. I’ve also been greatly inspired by Deborah Treisman, and her predecessor, Linda Asher, literary editors at The New Yorker, which has published many of my stories. Thanks to all of them, this new collection of short stories is now published and—as a short story writer—I couldn’t be more pleased with what we’ve accomplished.

—H.M.

BLIND WILLOW, SLEEPING WOMAN

When I closed my eyes, the scent of the wind wafted up toward me. A May wind, swelling up like a piece of fruit, with a rough outer skin, slimy flesh, dozens of seeds. The flesh split open in midair, spraying seeds like gentle buckshot into the bare skin of my arms, leaving behind a faint trace of pain.

“What time is it?” my cousin asked me. About eight inches shorter than me, he had to look up when he talked.

I glanced at my watch. “Ten twenty.”

“Does that watch tell good time?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

My cousin grabbed my wrist to look at the watch. His slim, smooth fingers were surprisingly strong. “Did it cost a lot?”

“No, it’s pretty cheap,” I said, glancing again at the timetable.

No response.

My cousin looked confused. The white teeth between his parted lips looked like bones that had atrophied.

“It’s pretty cheap,” I said, looking right at him, carefully repeating the words. “It’s pretty cheap, but it keeps good time.”

My cousin nodded silently.

My cousin can’t hear well out of his right ear. Soon after he went into elementary school he was hit by a baseball and it screwed up his hearing. That doesn’t keep him from functioning normally most of the time. He attends a regular school, leads an entirely normal life. In his classroom, he always sits in the front row, on the right, so he can keep his left ear toward the teacher. And his grades aren’t so bad. The thing is, though, he goes through periods when he can hear sounds pretty well, and periods when he can’t. It’s cyclical, like the tides. And sometimes, maybe twice a year, he can barely hear anything out of either ear. It’s like the silence in his right ear deepens to the point where it crushes out any sound on the left side. When that happens, ordinary life goes out the window and he has to take some time off from school. The doctors are basically stumped. They’ve never seen a case like it, so there’s nothing they can do.

“Just because a watch is expensive doesn’t mean it’s accurate,” my cousin said, as if trying to convince himself. “I used to have a pretty expensive watch, but it was always off. I got it when I started junior high, but I lost it a year later. Since then I’ve gone without a watch. They won’t buy me a new one.”

“Must be tough to get along without one,” I said.

“What?” he asked.

“Isn’t it hard to get along without a watch?” I repeated, looking right at him.

“No, it isn’t,” he replied, shaking his head. “It’s not like I’m living off in the mountains or something. If I want to know the time I just ask somebody.”

“True enough,” I said.

We were silent again for a while.

I knew I should say something more, try to be kind to him, try to make him relax a little until we arrived