Born in London in 1980. Debuted in 2012 with the Kodansha BOX Powers Newcomer Award-winning The Psychic Test. In 2015 she won the Japan Horror Novel Awards Reader's Choice for The Memory Eraser, and in 2021 she won the Miraiya Novel Award Grand Prize for A Bouquet and a Venom. Her other works include She's There, Don't Suspect Your Neighbors, Kiss and Smoke, and The Phantom Woman: The Case Files of Snake-Eyed Detective Sakichi.
The restaurant was on the fifth floor of an eight story building, behind a heavy wooden door.
As I entered, I saw a large window directly across from the door, with two tables in front of it and two more against the wall. It was a small restaurant where every seat had a view to the kitchen. There was only one other customer, a man sitting at one of the tables. Every other seat was empty.
It had the air of a cozy small town bar, and above the counter was a blackboard listing the day's recommendations. As a bar and restaurant, they listed proper meals alongside snacks and drinks. The sight of the list of appetizing dishes made me realize how hungry I was.
The owner, behind the counter, told me to sit down wherever I wanted, so I sat across from Himura at a window seat near the kitchen.
After ordering beer and food, we looked around and Himura said “Looks pretty nice.” I wanted to act like a regular and say “Yeah, it is,” but truth be told, it was my first time as well. The clerk at the bookstore where I'd gone for an event had recommended it to me.
The clerk, a man by the name of Tsuji, had overheard me telling my editor, Katagiri, “As long as I'm in Tokyo, I'm planning to stay an extra night to do some research and then meet up with Himura for drinks. He’s also in Tokyo for a conference,” and said “In that case, I know a great place.”
“The food is good, the prices are fair, it isn't too noisy, and if you can get a window seat there's a great view of the railway.”
And so, the restaurant where I'd be getting dinner with Himura was decided.
The man had been in his twenties, and said he was an avid reader of my work. Naturally, that meant he knew I liked trains, hence his recommendation.
First we toasted our beers over a platter of smoked meats. As we were drinking, brown mushroom salad and hasselback potatoes seasoned with herbs and black pepper were brought out. It was all delicious. Since the other dishes also looked promising, we also ordered a shank of beer-braised beef and Scotch eggs off the blackboard.
Since I had more opportunities to visit Tokyo than Himura, I let him take the seat that faced the window and its panoramic view of the nighttime world outside. I turned my body to look out the window behind me to the view down below.
Just as the clerk had said, I could see train tracks tracing a gentle curve along the ground.
It reminded me of the spine of a pacific saury. When I pictured myself fishing one up and peeling it to the bone, I got a sudden craving for seafood.
The front door opened, and I heard a customer enter.
I didn't turn around, but I heard someone call out “Mr. Arisugawa.” The customer who'd just entered was someone I knew.
It was the bookstore employee who'd told me about the restaurant.
“Mr. Tsuji. Good evening.”
“Good evening, thank you for yesterday. Is this the professor you were talking to Mr. Katagiri about?”
As I went to stand up, Tsuji stopped me, saying “Oh, no, don't let me trouble you,” and bowed to Himura.
“I'm Tsuji from XX Bookstore. I'm in Mr. Arisugawa's debt.”
“Himura.”
“Not at all, I'm the one who's indebted to you.”
Tsuji smiled as he went on about what a coincidence this was. I doubted it actually was a coincidence that he'd come the same day I'd said I was meeting Himura there, but I agreed anyway.
Katagiri, an editor at Hakuyusha who had also been at the event yesterday, had been begging Himura to write a book about crime for a long time now, and the topic had come up again yesterday. That was how Tsuji had learned that my friend was a “clinical criminologist” who went to crime scenes and helped with police investigations. He'd seemed interested. He'd probably thought that if he gave me a restaurant recommendation and visited it the same day, he could meet the rumored real life great detective.
“May I join you? As long as it isn't trouble, of course.”
Before I could say anything, Himura replied “Please.” If Himura didn't mind, I had no reason to refuse either.
Tsuji ordered a beer and some garlic pilaf.
“I heard from Mr. Arisugawa and Mr. Katagiri that you're a real life great detective, Professor Himura. It's an honor to meet you.”
Himura glanced at me.
I signaled with my eyes that I hadn't initiated anything with him.
“There's no need to be so formal. I don't know about Himura, but there's no need to keep calling me 'Mr.'”
“Oh, I couldn't. I'm such a big fan...”
I expected he would want to talk to Himura about the cases he'd solved, but perhaps he could tell Himura didn't want to talk about them, because he never asked. The food we'd ordered was brought over along with refills of our beers, and we ate for a while.
We got to talking about yesterday's events, then my latest work, which from there branched into a conversation about a new mystery movie that was releasing next week and its source novel.
By the time we'd finished our second glasses, the atmosphere had grown mostly relaxed.
“Do you read many mystery novels, Professor Himura?”
“I don't know enough to talk to someone who works in a bookstore, but I've read Arisugawa's works.”
“It isn't just detective fiction. In Japan, horror and fantasy works are sometimes included under the umbrella of 'mystery'. What do you think of those?”
“I don't know much about them.”
Tsuji shifted his gaze from Himura to me, so I replied that I didn't dislike them.
“I enjoy them as stories. I read things that interest me, or whatever is a hot topic at the moment.”
“You have experience writing horror as well, don't you, Mr. Arisugawa? I read your story about the dead body found on the abandoned railway line. A freelance writer who is a friend of a friend of mine went missing very similarly. It chills me to the bone. Although, he wasn't found dead, but merely left his belongings behind at an abandoned train station.”
A freelance writer disappeared, leaving behind only his belongings at an abandoned train station. It was a setup that could easily be developed into a mystery. I wanted to hear more, but it seemed that Tsuji didn't know any more than that.
“Are you interested in visiting real haunted locations or hearing true stories? You two seem like you don't scare easily.”
“Yeah, I don't think I'm easy to scare, but I am interested. I like to think about things that would be scary and then extrapolate what would happen afterwards.”
Even if I don't often go to haunted places of my own volition, I enjoy hearing stories from people who do, and if I'm told a place I’m already in has ghosts, my imagination starts running wild. If I'm told what will happen, I'll start theorizing why the phenomenon occurs and who or what causes it. It's fun, but it's not very conductive to enjoying the scares themselves. I suppose that's an author's nature.
“What about you, Professor Himura?”
“I'm afraid that's outside my area of expertise.”
Himura was being considerate. The truth was that he didn't believe in or care about ghost stories at all.
“Do you like ghost stories, Mr. Tsuji?”
“Actually, I do.”
I could have figured that much from how many questions he'd asked. Tsuji admitted it was obvious and scratched his head.
“It's embarrassing to admit now, but when I was a student, I loved visiting haunted places. If I heard something strange had happened at a friend's house, I'd immediately ask to stay the night... I've seen some creepy things.”
“I see,” I said, leaning forward. Tsuji looked pleased. I guessed this was what he'd wanted to talk about from the beginning.
“It was the apartment of a junior at the company I was working at part-time. It's a common enough story, but the TV would turn itself on and off in the middle of the night, and the apartment would fill with a burning smell... he complained about all sorts of unpleasant things.”
He began, lowering his voice slightly.
According to him, the strange phenomenon had begun as soon as the junior moved in.
First, the TV would turn on by itself, and turn off when it was being watched, sometimes both in rapid succession. Both happened in the middle of the night.
It definitely wasn't just someone touching the remote by accident. Once, while he was sleeping, he was awoken by a late night TV drama suddenly playing at high volume.
After that, he decided to always unplug the TV before going to bed, but if he forgot to unplug it, the TV would once again wake him in the middle of the night.
Not only the TV, but the air conditioning and his battery powered radio would also activate on their own. He was able to resolve this by removing the batteries and unplugging the AC when it wasn't in use, but it was inconvenient.
Then, one day, he found a box of electronic toys thrown away in the apartment's trash area, alongside a sign saying “Feel Free To Take Them”. They were replicas of weapons carried by the main character of a popular anime, so popular that they had sold out.
The fact that it said “Feel Free To Take Them” meant they probably weren't broken. As far as he could see, the box didn't look damaged at all. As he was looking at them, wondering how much they'd fetch at an online auction, a neighbor, apparently the one who'd thrown them out, noticed him and said “Please take them if you want.”
Feeling embarrassed, he said “No, I was just curious. These look brand new,” and she told him how she'd thrown away the toys she'd just bought her son last Christmas.
“He hates it when they start going off in the middle of the night. It's so scary.”
After talking further, he learned that the appliances in her room, right next door to his own, often malfunctioned in the middle of the night. She, who lived alone with her young son, was worried that there may have been a listening device in the room, so she'd asked a private investigator she knew to search the apartment, but he hadn't found a thing.
The junior hadn't even thought of that, but a quick online search confirmed that it was possible for signals from a wiretap to cause problems with home appliances. However, if a thorough search by an expert just next door hadn't found anything, it was unlikely to be the cause of his own problems. As a man who lived alone, he didn't know how someone could have even gotten the bug into his room.
In the end, the only thing he knew for sure was that the malfunction wasn't caused by a listening device. The true cause of the strange phenomenon was still unknown.
He was worried that something may have been wrong, not only with his room, but with the entire apartment building, but the rent was cheap and the malfunctioning electrical devices weren't truly hurting anyone, so he remained there. That was what Tsuji's junior had told him during a break. It wasn't any sort of request for advice, just a complaint.
Though Tsuji and the junior weren't particularly close, as soon as he heard the story he asked if he could stay over at his apartment.
“Don't look at me like that. Back then I was so into ghost stories that I would jump at any chance to see one in person. I didn't record them for YouTube or anything, I just saw them for myself.”
As he spoke, Tsuji spooned up the remaining grains of rice and put them in his mouth.
“I didn't want to show up empty-handed when he was letting me stay over, so I bought some beer and snacks at the convenience store next door. As we drank, we watched horror movies on DVDs late into the night, and when we ran out of booze, we went out to buy more... I was enjoying myself so much I thought it would be okay even if nothing supernatural occurred.”
He stacked his dishes one atop the other and clasped his fingers together over the table. He didn't sound like he was deliberately doing a scary voice, but the way he stopped and stared at my face was exactly like a veteran teller of ghost stories.
“It must have been around one in the morning. We were choosing some snacks at the convenience store when the automatic doors slid open. I wondered why there would be another customer that late at night, so I casually looked over, but no one was there. No one had come, and no one had gone, yet the door was open. The man behind the counter gave a look that said 'Not again'. My junior and I turned to each other.”
I nodded understandingly.
“So we bought the snacks and drinks and returned to his room, where we found the TV on, even though we were both sure we'd left it off. I suddenly didn't want to watch horror movies anymore.”
He told us he'd lost contact with that junior after he quit that part time job.
“I only stayed there once, but the strange phenomenon continued afterwards. He told me that in addition to the malfunctioning devices, he also smelled a burning smell in the middle of the night. The woman in the next room also moved out without anyone noticing... He was also looking for a new place the last time we spoke, so he might not live there anymore.”
“But I really do hate that room.”
Leaving aside whether it was the work of a ghost or not, it was unsettling the way the appliances kept malfunctioning. While I gave a wishy-washy comment that neither supported nor opposed the existence of spirits, Himura silently sipped his beer.
“Sorry, was that boring, Professor Himura?”
“Not at all. I was just thinking about a part of your story, actually.”
Tsuji scratched his head. Eventually, Himura slowly opened his mouth.
“What exactly happened when your junior smelled the burning scent?”
He must have been happy that a great detective was interested in his story, because Tsuji straightened his back before he spoke.
“I remember he told me that he had a dream about a fire, and when he woke up in the middle of the night, he could still smell the burning. He opened the curtains, but he couldn't see fire or smoke, and there was no sound of a fire engine. The heating was off, even though he was sure he'd turned it on before going to bed, so he concluded that he must have awoken due to the cold and that the mysterious smell had been the cause of his nightmare. He forced himself to go back to sleep, and when he woke up the next morning, he said he thought the smell was still there, although it's possible it was just his imagination...”
In other words, if the smell was still there, it must have weakened considerably. Even if it wasn't just his imagination, the natural conclusion was that it was a small neighborhood fire that was already put out by the time he awoke. I didn't think it qualified as a mysterious phenomenon, but I kept my mouth shut.
Himura nodded.
“And by any chance did you ever discover the cause of the strange phenomenon?”
Himura asked a second question before Tsuji had a chance to answer. It sounded less like a question and more like confirmation.
“It's an apartment along the highway, isn't it?”
“Oh, yes. It's near the exit of the XX interchange.”
At that moment, I realized what Himura was saying.
I had also come up with a few ideas about the “supernatural” malfunction of the electrical appliances. One of them was a listening device, but Tsuji had ruled that out already. But there was more than one way to fake a ghost.
Himura noticed that I'd noticed. He glanced at me, and I signaled with my hand that he should go on. It's the detective's job to explain the truth. Tsuji must have been expecting this.
“I think the malfunctions were probably due to a truck's radio.”
Himura's explanation was smooth and even. He probably felt like this was nothing to get excited about. He spoke with a calm he never had while giving lectures as a professor.
“Sometimes long distance truckers outfit their trucks with illegally modified radios. These radios have strong output signals that can interfere with nearby electrical appliances. That's probably why the TV and air conditioner turned on and off by themselves.”
Tsuji looked like he had some idea what we were talking about.
“I see, so that explains the toys in the next room... and the automatic doors of the convenience store, too?”
“The radio waves would have reached the next room and neighboring buildings as well.”
The malfunctions were the result of radio interference with the electronic circuits, so even battery operated toys and radios could be affected.
The malfunctions occurred at night because that's when truckers drive to avoid the higher daytime tolls. I'd heard stories before of automatic doors opening and closing every time a truck passed by.
“This is just a guess, but I think that burning smell might have been caused by something like a malfunction in the electric stove in the next room. If it caused a small fire, it would make sense why your neighbor moved out without saying anything.”
She'd probably moved out without telling anyone because she felt guilty about almost burning down the apartment.
Tsuji was dumbfounded.
“Sorry to ruin the magic.”
“Oh, no, that's not it. I'm relieved, I always wondered what was happening.”
Tsuji was clearly flustered, bowing his head to Himura as he spoke. For him, this was a denial of his experience, but lucky for us, he didn't seem upset. Rather, it looked like it had ignited his ghost story-loving spirit.
“I also have some other stories I've lived through. Would you like to hear them? I'd like to hear if they also have logical explanations, and even if they don't, they might be inspirations for your works, Mr. Arisugawa.”
Tsuji turned from Himura to me.
“I love hearing these sorts of stories,” I said, and he smiled and started on his next story.
It was a story from when Tsuji was a freshman in university. He and some friends had stayed in a hotel in Chiba to attend a training camp for the university's table tennis club.
Since it wasn't during summer vacation, the hotel was fairly cheap, and they spent the days practicing at the attached sports facility and the nights enjoying themselves setting off fireworks and holding tests of courage.
The final night of their three day-two night stay, they held a party. Some time after 11:00 P.M., Tsuji and a friend from the same year left the hotel to buy alcohol and snacks at the convenience store at the foot of the mountain. They had alcohol and snacks inside the hotel, of course, but they were expensive.
They'd rented a car, but nobody was sober enough to drive, so they walked along the edge of the winding mountain road all the way to the convenience store. The road through the forest was longer than they'd thought, and it was a nearly 20 minute walk one way.
After finishing their shopping, the two of them decided to cut through the forest, not wanting to make the long walk again.
“It was my idea. We could see the light from the hotel through the trees, so if we followed it, we wouldn't get lost, and it would halve our travel time. The trees were sparse enough that we thought we'd be able to walk straight through.”
Under the light of the moon, they had no trouble making their way. They walked, using the hotel in the distance as a landmark, until they spotted something strange.
Tsuji thought it was a giant mushroom. His friend later told him he'd thought it was a big rock, or maybe a sleeping animal.
Looking closer, they saw two protrusions on the top of the round shape. Just as Tsuji realized that they looked like ears, his friend muttered “It's a bear.”
His friend stepped back, ready to flee back the way they'd come.
Tsuji almost followed him, but he realized something. The bear looked awfully small, even if it was lying down. And if it was a cub, the position of its ears was odd.
Shining the light of his smartphone on it, the thing definitely had the shape of a bear, but its texture was unrealistic.
It was a stuffed animal... or more accurately, the detached head of a bear costume, lying on the ground.
Tsuji sighed with relief and called back to his friend “Look, it's just a costume.”
Why would a costume be in a place like that, let alone just the head? It was creepy and incomprehensible, but unlike a real bear, it wasn't dangerous.
His friend, who had already made it a few meters away, stopped in his tracks and said “What?”
“Look.”
Tsuji shone his light on the head again, tracing its outline. Two round ears popped out above the smooth curve of the head in a way that would have been impossible on a real bear.
The costume head was facing away from them, but if they turned it around, they would probably see a cartoony face designed to appeal to children.
“What, that's it?”
Tsuji laughed and replied “Yeah.”
“Scared the shit out of me...”
He was about to say more when he gasped.
The costume head was moving.
It was awkward and jittery, but it appeared to be turning towards them.
It hadn't made it the full 180 degrees yet, but Tsuji and the man behind him could already see the costume's eyes and nose, which had been hidden before.
If it went much further, they'd make eye contact. The moment they thought that, Tsuji and his friend both turned and ran away.
As his friend ran, he repeatedly asked what was happening, but there was no way Tsuji could answer that. They returned to the paved road and made their way back to the hotel, never once taking their eyes off the forest.
They doubted their drunk seniors would take their story seriously, and they definitely didn't want to go back if someone said “Let me see!”, so they decided not to tell what they'd seen.
However, they had confirmed with each other, saying “You saw that, right?” and “It moved!” several times.
Tsuji had been so distracted he hadn't noticed, but his friend said he'd heard something like a growling animal.
“I see, how frightening.”
After listening to Tsuji's story, Himura spoke his mind.
“I sure thought so.”
Tsuji nodded with satisfaction.
I'd also found the story scary. But not as a ghost story.
Finding a costume head on the ground and seeing it move was already a surreal and frightening, but considering it as a true story that happened in the mountains late at night during the off-season, a different, non-paranormal explanation was possible.
If the costume had moved on its own while no one was inside, it would make sense to conclude paranormal activity had taken place. But they hadn't confirmed the costume was empty.
If all they could see was the head, then the body must have been below ground. And if the head was moving, then its owner was still alive.
In other words, a person was buried up to the neck, the costume head was placed over their head, and then they were abandoned in the woods.
That was far more then a mere prank. A serial killer, torture, making an example of someone... Whatever the reason, it wasn't something a normal person would even consider. If they'd stayed in that forest, there was a chance the culprit could have returned, and Tsuji and his friend may have been placed in danger. In the end, running away had probably been the right decision.
The groans that Tsuji's friend had heard must have been the voice of the buried person. They had probably been gagged to stop them from calling for help or otherwise in a state that prevented them from speaking properly.
My conclusion was obvious if you thought about it rationally, but once you've convinced yourself you've had a paranormal experience, it's hard to think of any other possibility.
Himura must have noticed it right away, but he didn't suggest the possibility that it was a living person. Neither did I. Tsuji had introduced it as a story from when he was a university student, and that had been many years ago. There was nothing we could do now. I felt sorry for Tsuji, who was thinking for all the wrong reasons about the person crying for help he'd abandoned to die. Someday, he might tell the story to someone else who would explain it to him, but not today.
If, at the time, the news had reported on a body found wearing a costume head, Tsuji and his friend would have seen it, so I wanted to believe that the person was still alive. I could only hope they hadn't died there and been buried deeper.
I made a mental note to look up the newspapers from back then later.
“I'm glad you enjoyed it. I have more. Another story set in a forest, or rather, on a mountain... Oh, excuse me, can I get a draft beer? Do you two want anything?”
Tsuji turned to the counter and raised his hand to order something from the bartender. Himura and I ordered the same thing.
While we waited for the drinks, Tsuji turned to Himura and asked “Does it bother you, me just telling stories like this?”
“Not at all, I'm very interested.”
Himura shook his head like a gentleman, and Tsuji smiled. He appeared to have regained his confidence after we called his last story scary. He was getting carried away... No, I'm being judgmental.
“I only have two more, so please bear with me a little longer. If you have any thoughts, please feel free to interpret the strange phenomenon from the perspective of a great detective.”
“I'm nothing special, but I can at least listen.”
“You've had this many real experiences? This is a treasure trove of material, isn't it?”
When I said that, Tsuji replied “No” while grinning from ear to ear.
“I'm not sure if I can call this one my own experience. I only heard the story and visited the scene after the fact... My friend from the mountaineering club had a strange experience in the mountains.”
“A mountain spirit.”
That was one of the classics of ghost stories.
Tsuji nodded. “I guess it was.”
“It isn't a scary story so much as one of those 'bewitched by a fox' tales. In that sense, it might be even more of a typical mountain story.”
The bartender brought over our drinks. He had good timing.
Tsuji picked up his beer and moistened his throat, then began.
“Even though he was in the mountaineering club, he didn't ever climb big mountains; he just liked hiking and enjoying the scenery. He usually climbed alone, on mountains small enough to be conquered in a day.”
One day, he was walking alone on a mountain in the Kanto region.
There was a road running along the opposite slope, but he didn't want to walk a paved road. He was taking the old mountain trail.
Although the road made for cars had been finished a few years ago, the old path should still have been in use as a hiking trail, but, maybe because it was afternoon on a weekday, there were no other hikers in sight, not in front of him or behind.
The mountain path was well maintained and easy to walk. He enjoyed the birdsong and the smell of the forest as he made his way, but just as he reached the halfway point, fog started to roll in. It had been clear and bright only a moment ago, but he told himself that was just how the weather was up in the mountains.
It wasn't so foggy that he couldn't see ahead of him, but it was too thick to see his own feet. He decided it was safer to find somewhere safe to wait for the fog to clear.
As he walked, wondering what to do, he saw a wooden building up ahead.
It was a small hut on the side of the road.
Mountains with hiking routes often have huts built for hikers. They're usually located on the summit and halfway up the mountain, serving as combination lodges, restaurants, and shops. However, his friend could tell at a glance that this wasn't that sort of hut.
It was an extremely basic wooden hut without any signage.
He tried opening the door, and was thankful to find it was unlocked.
He went inside the hut and put down his pack.
The inside of the hut was completely empty. There was a small window high up on the southern wall, letting in some light, but not much. If it was a rest area for climbers, it was one without any bedding – no sleeping bags, no blankets, no cushions. It was just four walls and a roof.
Still, for climbers who've been out on the mountain for hours, just having a place to sit and rest is a blessing. He sat down in one corner of the deserted hut.
Outside the window was pure white. The fog was getting thicker.
He looked around the hut, but there wasn't much to see. He wondered if there might be a carved signature or some graffiti left by a previous occupant, but apparently no one had been that rude. The only mark was a barely visible scratch on the north wall, as though something had rubbed against it.
However, on the wall just next to the door's handle was a rough carving in the shape of a cat's head. It looked like it had been made by a child. Only the outline of the head was visible; there was no face. Perhaps the child's parents had caught them making it and stopped them.
He rested and ate the rice balls he'd prepared until the fog cleared, then put his backpack back on and headed out.
Afterwards, he walked for an hour. It should have been thirty more minutes until he reached the summit.
As he walked, the fog started to roll in again. He kept walking, hoping it wouldn't get any thicker, when he saw a hut up ahead.
“What?”, he thought.
One patch of forest looks the same as another, so he hadn't even thought to suspect anything until now, but there was no mistaking that hut. It looked exactly like the one he'd rested in an hour ago, standing once again to the side of the path.
For a moment, he thought he'd gotten turned around, but that wasn't possible. The path hadn't forked a single time.
It was strange for there to be two rest areas so close together, especially on such a small mountain. Strange, to be sure, but he couldn't deny it was there.
He hadn't seen anyone else on his climb today, but maybe in a different season there would have been enough climbers that one rest stop wouldn't be enough. Even so, would there be any time when such a gentle path would require two rest areas? If there were multiple toilets, that would be one thing, but these huts offered nothing but shelter from the wind and rain.
Standing in front of the hut, it looked exactly the same as the previous one.
Perhaps only their exteriors were similar, and this hut is actually used for something different, like storage. Thinking that, he gently opened the door. As he'd expected, it wasn't locked.
The inside was exactly the same as the previous hut. It was bare and barren, only a small window on the south wall. A building with no function except shelter from the elements.
He felt uneasy.
If both huts were rest areas, there was no reason to build them so close together. No matter how you looked at it, they were redundant.
He looked around the hut and noticed a mark on the north wall.
It wasn't much. Except that it was identical to the one in the last hut.
The moment he saw it, he remembered the previous hut again and his heart filled with a clammy, unpleasant sensation.
Even if it was just a coincidence, it was creepy. For some reason, he hesitated to go inside. He wasn't so tired that he needed a break. He was about to close the door and return to climbing when he caught sight of what was on the wall to his right.
There was a carving of a cat.
He left the hut as though fleeing for his life. Without looking back, he focused on his destination.
He didn't know what he would have done if he'd seen the same hut again, but he was able to make it safely to the summit. He decided to take the wide, paved road on the other side on his way down.
“You walk one way, but somehow wind up in the same place... It's a classic ghost story. The fog is a staple element of these sorts of stories.”
After finishing his story in a single unbroken monologue, Tsuji drank his beer and sighed.
“When we heard that story from him at a drinking party, everyone laughed and said he must have gotten lost and gone around in circles, but he insisted that couldn't be it because he'd been walking on a straight path... So I asked him where the mountain was, and I went there.”
“You've got initiative.”
I was impressed. I wasn't just flattering him, I truly meant it. A shut-in writer like me could have never.
“Well, I was a lot younger back then. I didn't hear the story until about two years after my friend climbed the mountain, but the old trail was still there. I thought it was harder than he'd made it sound, but there was no fog that day, and even I could handle it if I stayed on the path.”
“And was there a hut?”
“There was.”
Tsuji answered my question with a solemn nod.
“But only one. There was one small hut on the mountainside, exactly like the ones in the story, totally empty. The scratch on the wall and the carving of the cat were both there.”
He took out his smartphone and showed us a photo from his images folder.
The scratch on the wooden wall was faint enough that it was hard to make out in the picture, but the carving was definitely of a cat's head.
I didn't doubt his story before, but seeing that photo made it all suddenly real. Tsuji showed the photo to Himura, then left his smartphone on the edge of the table.
“If neither of the huts had been there, I might have thought he was just wrong. But one of them was there, and the inside looked exactly like he'd described. So I thought that maybe his story actually had happened.”
I agreed with him.
Getting lost and ending up in the same place over and over again is common, both in ghost stories and otherwise, but it's strange to have it happen while walking a straight mountain path. I saw why Tsuji had compared it to being tricked by a fox.
It was hard to call it a scary story, but it must have been creepy for the man who experienced it. Especially if he was alone in thick fog.
Tsuji looked at Himura, checking what he thought.
Himura politely said “It was an interesting story.” Stingy prick. But he was probably being considerate to one of my business associates, so I couldn't just tell him to say what he was thinking already.
Tsuji also didn't appreciate Himura's social niceties. Perhaps sensing that he did have something to say, he persisted, asking “What do you think happened to my friend?”
“Do you have a theory, Professor?”
Himura took a sip before replying.
“I might be able to give you a realistic explanation.”
“Please, tell me.”
Tsuji leaned forward.
“It's got no romance or mystery to it. It might be better to leave this as just a peculiar happening.”
“That's fine,” said Tsuji. “My friend was so frightened that he said he'd never set foot on that mountain again, so I think he'd be happy to learn that it wasn't the work of a spirit.”
That's what he said, but the way Tsuji looked at Himura was more like a challenge.
Himura put down his glass and opened his mouth.
“Unless your friend did go off the path without realizing, or that path formed a circle... There could have only been two identical huts on the path.”
Tsuji and I both inhaled.
Himura shrugged, as if he'd expected our reaction.
“A bit of a letdown, huh? But if your friend wasn't hallucinating, that's the only thing I can think of. One of the huts must have been torn down in the intervening two years.”
So when Tsuji went there, there was only one hut. It was that simple.
“But the two huts had identical scratches and carvings.”
I spoke on behalf of Tsuji, who looked confused.
If it was only the scratch, it might have been possible to write them off as a coincidence. But those cats had been carved on purpose.
“They probably noticed the scratch and the carvings in one hut and made copies of them in the other. I don't know if it was the owner or one of the people who'd stayed there, but someone deliberately made those two huts into identical copies.”
“Ah,” I heard Tsuji gasp from beside me. I didn't speak either, but I understood.
Just because there were scratches and carvings in the same place, that wasn't proof they were the same building. That much was true. Since there was no way it was a coincidence, it made sense that someone had intentionally made the two buildings look the same.
However, you wouldn't expect a prank like this to be played in huts out in the mountains, where few people would see it. So it was only natural that Tsuji's friend, who had looked into the two huts without knowing anything, had mistaken them for the same building.
“It's unusual to find two similar huts within an hour's walk of each other out on the mountains. I think the reason they look so similar is because they were built by the same construction company following the same blueprints, or possibly even the same kits. Someone must have wanted to surprise someone who used the huts. They might have even had a specific person in mind.
“But why... I can't stop asking myself that. Just for fun?”
“The buildings already looked exactly the same. It didn't take any effort to replicate the scratch and carving.”
Whatever their motive, it was just a prank someone came up with after realizing there were two huts.
It was too bad nobody realized sooner.
The “culprit” - probably the owner of the huts – must have loved either mysteries or ghost stories.
“Personally, I'm more curious as to why there were two huts built within an hour's walk of each other.”
“I agree,” Himura responded.
“What do you think, Alice?”
“I think...”
As an author, I wanted to give a romantic answer. I put down my glass and crossed my arms.
“The reason there were two rest stops so close together... It's possible that mountain is actually a popular spot, and during mountain climbing season it gets so crowded that one hut isn't enough. But since we've come this far, let's think of a more horror-themed reason. Like, maybe there's a festival held only in that region, and the two huts are used in it... Or the locals all know that you should never, ever camp outdoors on that mountain. Oh, or what if there's some sort of mysterious creature living in the woods, and they built huts all over the mountain so people could hide from it?”
“I don't believe any of those.”
Neither did I. Each of my theories was so far-fetched that it would be a waste of time to even bother articulating what was wrong with them.
I retracted my theories.
“Well, the most natural explanation would be... that they were built for people who work on the mountain. To serve as rest spots, storehouses for equipment and materials, and so on. The reason there were two huts is because they worked in multiple locations, or because there were lots of workers. It's a bit boring as an answer.”
But Tsuji's friend had mentioned in the story that the mountain was well maintained.
Himura agreed.
“After the work was done, the huts weren't needed any longer. I guess they left them as they were for a while, but after two years, one of them was damaged to the point where it would be dangerous to leave alone, so it was torn down. You did say it was a simple structure, and for all we know the other hut may have also been torn down by now. It may have been damaged by a hurricane.”
I'm far from an outdoorsman, but even I know that you can buy kits to assemble simple log houses online or in home improvement stores. If you know what you're doing, you can put them together in a few hours, and they're easy to take back apart. If they can be dismantled that quickly, it only makes sense that they wouldn't be very durable.
At least we had a reasonable explanation.
I could probably have confirmed it if I contacted the owner of the mountain, but I didn't feel like going that far.
“I see... That does make sense.”
Tsuji sounded like he was being forced to admit it.
He may have viewed us as a pair of tactless logicians who refused to allow the romance of the paranormal. He was the one who'd asked us to share our thoughts with him, but I think he'd secretly wanted us to agree that they were inexplicable stories.
Tsuji looked at his glass, then glanced at the counter. He appeared to be debating whether or not to order a refill for his beer. Himura and I each had about half our glasses left, while Tsuji was down to a third.
Eventually, he turned back to Himura and I without ordering any more.
“Alright, how about this? In my opinion, this is the most mysterious thing that's ever happened to me. Of course, if you can come up with a mundane explanation for it, I'd love to hear it.”
He didn't say it out loud, but his eyes were declaring that this was his final effort.
“I've saved the best for last.”
“Then let's hear it.”
To my surprise, Himura also sounded like he was interested.
Tsuji straightened his back, zeroed in on us, and began to speak.
His story went like this.
When he was in university, he was, as we'd established, addicted to visiting haunted spots. He was in his hometown for summer vacation when Kagawa, an old friend from high school, invited him to an abandoned amusement park as a test of courage.
Yumoto, Kagawa's senior from middle school who now worked part-time in civil engineering, had been assigned to demolish the park, and had offered to secretly let them in one last time before it was destroyed. Originally, Kagawa, Yumoto, and one of their friends had been planning to go, but the something had suddenly come up and the third friend couldn't make it. A test of courage with only two guys wasn't very exciting, so they asked him to come.
Tsuji had only been to the park, which was located about a 30 minute drive from the city center, once, early in elementary school. There weren't many thrilling rides, and it was understandable why the park was closed down after only a few years. It was a park with nothing special about it.
However, Tsuji did remember having been scared of the house of mirrors, which had a picture of a clown on the sign. Or maybe it was the clown itself that was scary...
The house of mirrors apparently hadn't been demolished yet. Tsuji felt a bit nostalgic as he sat in the passenger seat of Kagawa's car as they rode to the park. They met up with Yumoto, who was staying in a hotel close to the park, on site.
Yumoto had arrived first. As you'd expect from a man who worked at a construction site, he was strong and tan. He gave the perfect “athletic senior” impression.
The demolition was scheduled to begin the next day. There were no security guards, and no one else would come all the way out there, so Yumoto assured them there was no risk of their being caught.
Passing the deserted ticket booth, the three of them looked around the grounds. All the standard amusement park attractions – the merry go round, the spinning cups, the roller coaster – were present and accounted for. Tsuji had feared that the local delinquents may have adopted it as a hangout, but perhaps because it was far from town and there was nothing else nearby, there truly wasn't anyone there.
The house of mirrors was in the far back of the grounds.
The clown sign he remembered must have been removed, for it was nowhere to be found.
There were two entryways without doors in the front wall of the building, one on the left and one on the right. Tsuji could barely make out the word “IN” painted next to the left entrance. So, you entered through the left entrance, made your way through, and exited through the right.
Thinking back, Tsuji remembered that, when he was a child, there had been a line to get in, and as he waited in it, he saw people emerging from the exit to the right of him, screaming and laughing. Perhaps the entrance and exit had been placed on the same wall to build the customers' anticipation.
“Let's go one at a time,” Yumoto suggested.
The dilapidated house of mirrors was certainly an ideal place for a test of courage. Tsuji and Kagawa both agreed, having kind of expected things would go in that direction.
The paint was peeling and the exterior looked shabby, but the building itself was solid enough that nobody was afraid of going in. Yumoto, who was in charge of the demolition, said it, so it must have been true. However, he did warn them not to touch the mirrors and to watch their step in case of broken glass.
“If anything happens, it will be my fault. I don't want to get fired.”
If they were caught trespassing, Yumoto could lose his job. Tsuji and Kagawa promised to be careful.
Yumoto went in alone, holding a penlight. When he emerged, he would hand the light to Kagawa, then Kagawa could go through and hand it to Tsuji on his way out.
Normally, when you go on a test of courage, you have to either leave or take some evidence from the scene to prove that you really went, but since the house of mirrors was one way, just going in one end and leaving the other was proof enough.
Tsuji and Kagawa stood in front of the building and reminisced about their high school days while they waited for Yumoto.
Kagawa was a bit of a coward, and he didn't seem eager to go into the house of mirrors alone. In that case, he probably shouldn't have come to a test of courage, but Tsuji guessed he couldn't refuse the invitation. Yumoto was a man with a strong air about him. Maybe Kagawa had asked him to come because he didn't want to be alone with the older man.
Roughly five minutes had passed since Yumoto had entered the house of mirrors. That felt like longer than he should have needed. The house of mirrors wasn't that large, and it shouldn't have been so complicated that an adult could get lost in it.
They assumed he was just walking carefully since it was dark, but after ten minutes, Yumoto still hadn't emerged.
“He's awfully slow,” Tsuji commented, and Kagawa nodded.
“There's no way it would take that long, right? This thing's made for kids.”
Kagawa looked worried. His eyes darted from the house of mirrors to Tsuji and back.
He said that something must have happened, but didn't propose going inside.
Kagawa tried calling Yumoto on his smartphone, but he was answered by the automated announcement that the number he was trying to reach was either turned off or out of range. Tsuji, standing next to him, heard the mechanical female voice.
“Maybe he's waiting for us to come look for him so he can surprise us.”
Kagawa didn't say anything more, so Tsuji raised the possibility. It must have already occurred to Kagawa. “That seems likely,” he said, looking displeased by the thought.
“I don't want to go in.”
“But if he's waiting to surprise us, he'll probably get upset if we don't go.”
Kagawa was hesitant, but Tsuji, thinking he understood how he felt, encouraged him.
Kagawa agreed with a sigh.
Setting aside Tsuji, who had just met him that day, to Kagawa Yumoto was a senior from their hometown. Whether something had really happened to him for he was just messing with them, they couldn't just leave him there.
If they went in together, there was a chance that Yumoto could leave and they'd miss each other. Kagawa went in to look for Yumoto, and Tsuji waited outside.
Yumoto still had the penlight, so Kagawa turned on his smartphone's flashlight and cautiously entered the house of mirrors.
Tsuji clutched his smartphone and waited, standing where he could see both the entrance and the exit.
After about five minutes, Kagawa emerged from the exit.
When his and Tsuji's eyes met, he looked confused.
“Did he come out while I was inside?”
Kagawa said he hadn't seen Yumoto inside. When Tsuji replied that Yumoto hadn't come out, Kagawa was visibly shaken “You're kidding me. Why? This is so scary,” he said, his voice shaking.
“The inside of that house of mirrors is like a maze, right? Maybe he's just hiding at the end of a path you didn't take...”
“But why would he do something like that? He didn't jump out and scare me or anything.”
He had a point.
Maybe Kagawa and Yumoto were working together to scare him.
However, the expression of fear on Kagawa's face didn't look like an act.
Puzzled, Tsuji asked point blank.
“You two aren't pulling some sort of prank on me, are you?”
Kagawa immediately denied it.
“Of course not. You just met Yumoto for the first time today. If anything, I was just about to ask you the same thing.”
Kagawa insisted he hadn't seen Yumoto inside. Tsuji had no choice but to trust him.
Next, Kagawa was left to watch the entrances while Tsuji went inside.
The last time he'd set foot in the building, he'd been a child, but he still had a vague memory of how the interior was laid out. Calling out “Yumoto!” as he went, he slowly made his way through pitch black darkness, using his smartphone as a flashlight.
The inside of the building was dusty, but not as much as he'd expected. A few of the mirrors were broken, though most of them were still intact.
All of the intact mirrors were coated with dust until they no longer reflected anything. Although he couldn't make out any images, he could barely see his shadow, so while it was a bit eerie, it didn't feel like a maze of mirrors. It was just a regular maze.
Tsuji kept the light on his feet, occasionally stopping to turn back and check each dead end one by one, searching for Yumoto.
The longer he searched, the more anxious he felt.
Considering how far he'd walked, he must have been over halfway. But he hadn't seen a trace of Yumoto. Without the mirror images distracting him, the maze wasn't at all complicated, and it didn't seem like there was anywhere he could hide.
Also, for some reason, he couldn't shake the feeling he was being watched. The sight of his shadow, cast in the light of the smartphone, floating in the dusty mirrors surrounding him on all sides. He imagined that one of the shadows could, on closer examination, have been revealed to actually be another person... and quickly looked away.
“Yumoto?”
He forced cheer into his voice to cover up the fear slowly filling his body. There was no reply.
Attempting to keep his eyes on the path before him, he moved the light, and when he raised his eyes, he was so shocked he nearly cried out loud.
There was a person there.
Is what he thought, but then he realized it was his own reflection in the mirror.
First he was relieved, then he was confused again.
Every other mirror was either broken or dirty enough that he couldn't see his own face in it, just a vague shadow on a thick layer of dust. But the image in front of him was perfectly clear.
For some reason, this one mirror was the only one that wasn't dirty. There was almost no dust on it at all.
Instead, it appeared to be covered in small scratches, leaving its image somewhat blurred. It was probably extremely old, so it wasn't strange that there it was scratched, but his image appeared to be completely covered in small, regular scratches, creating an eerie effect.
When he arrived directly in front of the mirror, the path continued to the left.
Why was this one mirror different from the others? As he approached it and shone the light on his reflection, he saw another person appear, superimposed over his reflection.
Tsuji jumped back and ran as fast as he could.
On his way out, he dropped his smartphone, but luckily he kicked it in the direction he was going, so he was able to quickly retrieve it.
If he looked back, he might have seen that figure in the mirror again. Thinking that just made him run faster, not once turning back.
He took a left and two rights, and the exit was in sight. He came barreling out, and Kagawa ran up to him.
“S-S-Something's in there. I saw something. It was in the mirror.”
“What? What are you talking about?”
When Kagawa asked where his senior was, he simply repeated that he wasn't there. Not wanting to stay in front of the house of mirrors, his feet started moving on their own. Kagawa followed him.
Looking at his smartphone, the screen had suffered a spiderweb crack and was totally unusable. That was enough to tell Kagawa that Tsuji was being serious.
Kagawa told him that Yumoto hadn't come out while he was searching. Tsuji explained about how he'd carefully searched for Yumoto, but hadn't seen him.
Then he told him what he had seen. Even without having seen it himself, Kagawa went pale.
“There was a clean, polished mirror. Didn't you notice it when you went in?”
Tsuji asked, thinking how scary it would be if he said no, but Kagawa mused “Now that you mention it...” as though he remembered something.
Being easily scared, Kagawa had kept his head down the whole time and avoided looking up. So he hadn't been paying attention to his surroundings, but come to think of it, there had been a mirror that clearly reflected his feet.
“Then I heard a sound. Like something hitting the wall. I told myself it was just a tree branch or something like that being moved by the wind and that I shouldn't worry about it, but...”
It looked like he was feeling fear just talking about it. Kagawa suggested they go home.
“Maybe he snuck out and went home ahead of us. That's the sort of man he is; he loves scaring other people.”
They'd been taking turns watching the exits, so Tsuji didn't find that very likely, but he also wanted to go home. If Yumoto was still inside, he would feel bad leaving him there, but he wanted to get out of there as soon as possible.
Kagawa tried calling Yumoto again, but it still didn't go through.
They made excuses to each other, saying they'd done all they could and that there was nothing else to do, and Tsuji and Kagawa left the amusement park. They decided to call the police if they couldn't find Yumoto by tomorrow, and after Kagawa drove them home, they parted ways.
A few days later, Tsuji returned to Tokyo. He and Kagawa hadn't spoken.
“So, did he ever find Mr. Yumoto?” I asked, and Tsuji shook his head and said he didn't know.
“I didn't hear if he was found, or even if he ever reported it to the police. I figured if anything happened, Kagawa would contact me, so I just waited. I thought about contacting him myself, but we really weren't all that close to begin with... and I had to get my phone repaired, so it wasn't a good time.”
If Yumoto had been in danger, he wouldn't have wanted to know because it would make him feel bad. If Yumoto hadn't been in danger, that was great, but he'd probably also yell at them “You left me behind!” I could understand his feelings. Judging from the way Kagawa and Tsuji had talked about him, Yumoto didn't seem very popular.
Tsuji looked back and forth between Himura and I, anticipating our responses.
“If he had gone missing, I'm sure Kagawa would have contacted me and asked what we should do, so I assume he was found. But Yumoto disappearing from the house of mirrors and the creepy thing I saw inside were both real events, so I think it's fair to call this a ghost story.”
“Yes. But if you added an ending where Mr. Yumoto returned looking like a completely different person, it would be even more of a ghost story.”
“You're a real writer, Mr. Arisugawa. So? What then?”
“The next day, Mr. Yumoto went into work as though nothing had happened, denying that he'd ever helped Mr. Tsuji and Mr. Kagawa sneak into the amusement park. He even had an alibi, having been somewhere else at the time. Or if Mr. Yumoto never returned, then 'he didn't exist to begin with, and nobody except Mr. Kagawa and Mr. Tsuji remembers him' would be a common story.”
“Even if you call it cliche, it would be scary to have it actually happen to you.”
Tsuji's interjection was true enough.
Even if it was told as a ghost story, making an enjoyable storytelling session out of a real person going missing would probably reflect poorly on us as people, so we decided to skip ahead to our analysis.
“If Mr. Yumoto really had gone missing, what we're doing here would be a bit inappropriate, but I think he's probably safe. Right?”
When I pressed him, Himura nodded and said “Probably.”
Tsuji stiffened up. “You mean...” he said.
“There's a logical explanation for all this? For years, I've lived in fear because I thought I'd experienced a real supernatural phenomenon.”
“I only noticed it because I happen to know a certain fact... You sound like you also saw it, Alice.”
“I had to look into it once for a trick.”
Tsuji looked like he'd had cold water splashed on his face. “Just because you see the truth, that's nothing to be proud of,” he seemed to say. Even if he hadn't given me that look, I wasn't going to get carried away over something like this... As his assistant, I once again motioned for Himura to continue.
Himura turned back to Tsuji and began to speak.
“Mr. Tsuji, you said that the house of mirrors was frightening to you as a child. You also remembered seeing people who'd gone before you reacting as though it was scary. From those two details, it sounds like a haunted house.”
He nodded without a word.
Although mirror mazes can be somewhat eerie, generally speaking, they're something to enjoy, somewhere you lose track of yourself in the strange experience of being surrounded by reflections. But for Tsuji's child self, it was scary. There must have been a reason he remembered it like that.
“Wasn't there something in that house of mirrors that scared visitors? Say, staff dressed as ghosts who would wander the maze or chase the guests?”
Tsuji gasped.
“Yes, that's exactly what it was. If you went the wrong way, there would be a clown waiting at the end of the dead end path... and even if you didn't make any wrong turns, at the end, the clown would pop out and scare you. I remember how I jumped and ran away. I think there were other things, like gusts of wind and spooky laughter... but it wasn't anything too elaborate.”
When Himura pointed it out, it seemed like his memory returned in detail. After he'd rapidly explained all of that, he calmed down and seemed to realize something.
“But even if there was some sort of mechanism to project a ghost onto the mirror, the electricity had shut off by the time we arrived, so there's no way it would have worked. If it did, that would be scary enough itself.”
Of course, he added, the lights weren't on during his visit.
Himura nodded.
“Yes, I'm sure there wasn't any electricity. But the other mechanism was still there. To be specific, the one mirror you saw that was clean but covered in scratches.”
Among the mirrors that had accumulated dust until you could no longer see yourself in them, there was one that was clean and reflected a clear image. And then, as if superimposed on the image, a ghost was also reflected. As soon as I'd heard that, it all clicked.
“That was probably the only mirror that was a magic mirror. Magic mirrors transmit light, so you can't cover them with protective coating. That's why they scratch more easily than normal mirrors. I'm sure Mr. Yumoto polished its surface so it would reflect your image.”
It's not like magic mirrors are more resistant to dirt than normal mirrors, so if that was the only one that was clean, it must have been cleaned by someone beforehand.
“Yumoto? Then...”
“Yes, I think this whole thing was a prank set up by Mr. Yumoto. There must have been a secret door somewhere in the house of mirrors. The sort of mechanism that could be used even without electricity. When you saw the ghost in the mirror, it was actually Mr. Yumoto standing behind the mirror – the magic mirror.”
If there was a ghost who jumped out and scared the customers – Tsuji had said it was a clown – it would be stranger for there to not be a secret room or passage where the staff could wait in ambush. I didn't know if the magic mirror itself was the secret door or if there was another entrance nearby, but there was no doubt it my mind that behind the magic mirror was a space large enough for a person to hide.
“He was going to work on its demolition, so he must have searched it beforehand and learned about the hidden door. I think he was planning to tease his junior, Mr. Kagawa, who was easily frightened.”
Kagawa had said he'd walked through the house of mirrors without ever looking up, so he hadn't even noticed Yumoto's trick. The noise he'd heard may have been made by Yumoto in an attempt to get his attention.
Yumoto had failed to scare Kagawa, so he switched targets to Tsuji – maybe he'd expected the two of them to enter together in the first place – and waited.
A magic mirror is designed to allow the person on the dark side to see through to the light side, so if he'd darkened the area behind the mirror and waited, Yumoto would have been able to see Tsuji, holding a light, approach him.
When the time came, Yumoto turned on the light he was holding, and the inside became brighter than the outside, causing Yumoto's image to appear in the mirror Tsuji saw.
“The ghost I saw was Yumoto on the other side of the mirror. I ran away before I even made note of his face, so I didn't recognize him... I see.”
Tsuji let out a deep breath and leaned back in his chair to look up at the ceiling. “I see, that makes sense,” he repeated, slowly sitting up and facing Himura again.
“Why didn't Kagawa tell me? Surely he must know?”
“I'm sure Mr. Kagawa was told right after the test of courage. Mr. Yumoto may have asked him to keep quiet because he didn't want you to demand repayment for his crime.”
“I think the statute of limitations is probably expired by now, but maybe Kagawa never got a chance to tell me.”
Himura's theory seemed to convince him. Tsuji smiled and raised his hand to ask the owner for another beer. He confirmed with Himura and I and ordered three. Those would be our final drinks for the night.
“Well, that's all I had. I'm honestly embarrassed that the stories I've told at ghost story meetups so many times were logically dismantled so easily, but I'll look on the bright side. You two were able to solve some mysteries that have been plaguing me for a long time now.”
He looked a bit frustrated, but I was glad he wasn't making excuses. All of his stories had been on the level of “Oh, that's it?”, and I'd thought that maybe it would have been better if we'd left them alone, but hearing his response made it all worth it.
The atmosphere grew relaxed, and as we nibbled at our remaining snacks, I saw the man at the counter stand up. He'd left his bag behind, so I thought maybe he was on his way to the bathroom, but he came to us.
Just then,
“Er... Excuse me,”
His approach was timid.
“I'm sorry to interrupt like this, but I could help overhearing your conversation... I didn't mean to eavesdrop, but I am a bit curious. May I talk to you for a moment?”
We looked at each other, not knowing what else to do. He hurriedly took a business card from his jacket.
“My name is Ito. I'm not suspicious. Although, telling you that probably made you think I am suspicious... Um, this is who I am.”
He bowed like a model salaryman and handed his card to Himura. The name, at least, matched what he'd told us. If he had overheard our conversation and been interested enough to approach us, I'd thought he might be a writer or something like that, but his title was Head of Sales for a food company.
“The truth is, I'm being followed by a ghost right now.”
Himura, Tsuji, and I were all momentarily struck speechless.
We hadn't expected that. Ito raised his head and looked to Himura with pleading eyes.
“I want to say it's just my imagination or someone playing a prank on me, but I cant help suspecting it's more than that... I haven't been able to sleep properly for days now. I don't know where to go, and I've reached my wit's end. Could I please ask you for some advice?”
I couldn't just ignore someone who acted so humble on our first meeting.
Himura glanced at me and Tsuji as if asking for our consent. I had no objections.
It was helping someone, and a chance to hear something interesting. When I gave a slight nod, Himura told Ito:
“It might be a bit presumptuous, but if you don't mind, I'd like to hear it.”
Ito repeated an exaggerated amount of thank yous. He must have been in a lot of trouble.
After asking the owner for permission, Tsuji pulled up a chair from the next table over.
Ito sat down and looked rather embarrassed as he ordered grapefruit juice instead of alcohol, then began speaking without waiting for it to arrive.
“Every night, a woman's ghost appears at my bedside.”
He told us it wasn't the face of a woman he recognized. She wore a loose-fitting knit top and a white skirt, and her hair came down to her shoulders. She wasn't covered in blood or sporting a disfigured face, and at a glance, you couldn't tell she was dead, but she had an aura about her that was deeply unpleasant, he explained.
“I feel damp, cold air, and next thing I know, she's standing silently beside my bed, glaring at me with hateful, accusatory eyes. Even when I notice her, I try not to look, but I can still sense her presence, and she stands there for incredibly long stretches of time. Eventually, I always break and look at her face... the moment our eyes meet, I feel a chill and wake up. That's how it always goes.”
At first, he'd thought it was just a nightmare, but after repeating it several days in a row, it began to grow profoundly frightening. The woman's ghost sometimes appeared just as he was beginning to doze off, and sometimes he would wake up in the middle of the night feeling her presence and see her standing there. Even if he stayed at a hotel or a friend's house, she always appeared whenever he slept. He told us he wasn't getting enough sleep.
“Has anyone else seen the ghost of this woman?”
In response to Himura's question, Ito shook his head.
“Even if I sleep with someone else, I'm the only one who ever wakes up and sees her. Even if I ask a friend to keep watch over me all night, I don't think anyone else can see her.”
This was trouble.
It was completely different from the four experiences Tsuji had told us about. In this case, the only evidence of the ghost's existence was Ito's testimony. I didn't think he was lying, but I couldn't logically prove or disprove the existence of a ghost only he could see.
The fact that it had appeared in hotels and friends' houses meant it probably wasn't someone's prank. What was appearing before Ito, then – whether it was a recurring dream, a brain abnormality, or a genuine paranormal phenomenon – didn't physically exist.
If he could see it, it was real to him, so we couldn't just tell him “It's just your imagination” and call it a day.
However, when it came to explaining something that couldn't be confirmed to exist, Himura's approach didn't apply.
Our conversation was interrupted by the arrival of the grapefruit juice.
If Ito could have heard us, then the owner must have heard us, too. But he was a professional and returned to the counter without a word.
“Do you have any idea why the ghost started haunting you?”
When Himura asked, Ito, surprisingly, said he did.
“On my way to work every day, I pass an intersection where it looks like a traffic accident once took place. I caught a glimpse of the flowers set by the side of the road, and... one day, as I was watching a romance movie and feeling the urge to do some good in the world, I remembered them.”
He told us he'd bought some seasonal flowers from a local florist and replaced the memorial flowers, which had completely wilted. It was just a momentary whim. He left the fresh flowers at the scene of the accident, gave a prayer for the stranger's soul, and felt good about himself.
The ghost of the woman had started appearing that night.
“I did a good thing, so why is she haunting me?”
Tsuji lowered his head in disbelief.
It did seem unfair to the man who had so kindly offered her flowers.
“Oh, maybe... she's following you because she was happy for the flowers. They do say you should be careful showing sympathy to spirits and never pray at a shrine you don't know.”
That was the first idea that came to my mind. I'd heard stories where the protagonists sympathized too carelessly with the dead, causing the spirits to cling to them, expecting help, ultimately possessing them.
However, Ito looked down.
“The woman always glares at me with a look of resentment... I don't think she feels any gratitude.”
“Then maybe she's a stalker... Um, that's all I can think of.”
Tsuji looked at Himura as though pleading for help, but Himura shook his head.
“Sorry, but I don't think I can help you with this one.”
In fact, he looked at me as though this one was my responsibility. Naturally, Tsuji and Ito also looked at me, so I straightened up.
As a mystery writer, I had a reputation to uphold.
“The question here is the motive. Why does the ghost appear before Mr. Ito? What does she want?”
The female ghost was said to look at Ito with resentful eyes, but perhaps she was trying to tell him something.
If she wanted him to join her in the next world, there wasn't much to be done, but if it was something else, there had to be some way to appease her.
“Indeed, if we learn that, we might be able to make her disappear.”
Tsuji chimed in. I nodded.
“Assuming that the ghost is a victim of the traffic accident, the only connection between her and Mr. Ito is the flowers he offered. That was what made her take notice of Mr. Ito.”
According to Ito, she never looked at him with anything but hatred, so for some reason, that act had antagonized her.
“Are you sure you didn't do anything to make her angry? Like accidentally knocking over an offering or saying something you didn't mean?”
“All I did was offer the flowers and give a prayer. It barely took five minutes.”
It wasn't easy to earn someone's eternal, undying hate that quickly. So...
“The truth is, Mr. Ito does have some connection to that woman when she was alive that he's forgotten... Whether it was deserved or not, you earned her grudge. Her spirit took note of you when you offered those flowers.”
“He passed the scene on his way to work every day. Why didn't she notice him then?”
Huh...
Himura casually pointed out something that made me take my theory back.
That must have been Ito and the ghost's first meeting... In that case, the reason she was stalking him was because of something that happened in the few minutes it took for him to offer the flowers and pray. Whether it was love or hatred, what had happened in that brief period?
“Even if she doesn't like you, maybe seeing that you're kind enough to offer flowers to a complete stranger made her expect something more from you,” said Tsuji, trying to follow up.
That was possible. If that was what it meant, than the look in her eyes was because...
“Does she feel resentful? Because she's wondering why you aren't helping her? That makes sense.”
Ito let out a groan of dismay.
“I can't accept an answer like that. I never would have offered those flowers if I'd know it would result in this.”
Tsuji soothingly said “There, there, it isn't over yet.”
But if he really had been trapped in this nightmare just because he “seemed kind”, then it was perfectly reasonable for him to be upset.
Himura had been silent for a while, so I asked him what he thought. Himura shrugged and said “I don't know.”
“I could come up with a theoretically unlimited number of possibilities as to what that resentful look 'means'. But if we start looking deeper, we'll never find a bottom, so I think we should keep things simple.”
That made sense.
If you don't overthink things and just take the story at its word... If a ghost looks at someone with resentful eyes, that means she resents them. The question is why.
“What happens if we think about it simply?”
“I told you this one isn't in my wheelhouse.”
“Don't say that, give us some more hints.”
“I'm not doing a bit here. I genuinely don't have anything more to add. I don't know how to read a ghost's mind.”
The great detective was being awfully cautious.
“You only feel uncomfortable around her because she's a ghost. Just pretend she's still alive.”
I said that to the hesitant Himura, but as soon as the words passed my lips, I realized. I'd inadvertently cut straight to the heart of the matter.
Why would a woman be resentful if you gave her flowers? If she hated you. Receiving gifts from people you don't like is just annoying.
If she appeared at his bedside every night and looked at him resentfully...
“I get it.”
Think about it simply. The ghost hates Ito. The only connection between them is that he offered her flowers, ergo the flowers are the reason for the hate.
I turned to Ito.
“When you left the offering of flowers, did you throw away the old ones that were already there?”
Ito nodded at me, looking confused.
“Yes, I did... they'd completely wilted.”
As I suspected. I replied,
“Maybe that's the reason. Maybe those flowers were originally left by someone important to her, or someone she loved.”
Ito and Tsuji gasped in sync.
Withered flowers are, generally speaking, worthless. Ordinarily, throwing them away and replacing them with new flowers would be considered a good deed. But what if the withered flowers were irreplaceable?
“In that case, what you thought was an act of kindness was just meddling.”
Ito's face turned pale.
“But that isn't my fault. I didn't mean any harm... I was just being nice.”
Tsuji tried to comfort him, but there wasn't much to say, and he knew it. Regardless of how Ito felt, he had thrown away something important to the woman.
Ito was at a loss.
“What should I do?”
I didn't know.
Even if he had learned why she hated him, she was a ghost. I doubted she'd understand. I had no idea how to solve his problem.
“Maybe the next time you see the ghost, you should apologize... Or maybe you should find out who left the original flowers and bring them there.”
It was nice of Tsuji to try helping, but I wasn't sure the former would work, and the latter was a lot harder than he made it sound. He'd have to look up the deceased woman's background, find out about her former relationships, and then ask all of them to find out who left the flowers. Even if he did all that, it wasn't guaranteed that he'd actually be able to find them.
“First off... Is it even possible to communicate with ghosts, whether to apologize or to try and reason with them?”
“I always say I'm sorry and ask her not to come back whenever she appears, but... it doesn't seem to get through to her. Maybe it's because at the time, I still didn't know what I'd done wrong.”
“It's better to try than to not. Who knows? Maybe if you admit to your mistake and gave a sincere apology, it'll work.”
Himura said that, but I know he didn't mean it.
Himura doesn't believe in the supernatural. So there's no way he believes that it's possible to get forgiveness from a ghost. He probably thought the ghost was just a product of Ito's brain, so if he could get Ito to accept that, the ghost would disappear.
In that sense, you could say Himura's advice was well founded.
But either way, Ito himself looked convinced that an apology wouldn't be enough. In other words, even if he apologized, the ghost wouldn't disappear. And yet, he had no other ideas.
Just as Himura had said, this was outside of our expertise.
“I wish there was an expert we could take this to.”
“You mean like an exorcist or a fortune teller? Mr. Arisugawa, do you have any connections to them through your publisher?”
“Not a one.”
I was sorry I couldn't live up to Tsuji's expectations, but I'm a mystery writer. It was rare enough to be friends with a real life great detective. It was greedy of him to also demand I introduce him to a psychic. That's an entirely different genre.
As we all sat scratching our heads, the owner came over to take away our plates.
We thanked him for the food and gave a bow.
“I'm sorry to interrupt, but...”
As he stacked our plates, he began hesitantly.
“I couldn't help overhearing what you were saying, dear customers. I understand that you're having trouble, so I've decided to speak up.”
We all turned to the owner.
Ito had overheard Tsuji and I, so I'd assumed the man could overhear us as well, but I hadn't expected him to join in.
The owner began to put our empty glasses on the tray as he continued.
“Another customer who once visited my bar once told me about a detective who specializes in cases like these. Some sort of psychic detective... as I understand.”
Himura cocked an eyebrow. It was obvious he was suspicious.
But Ito jumped at the chance, asking “Please, tell me more.” I could understand the urge to grasp at the first straw offered. Tsuji also said “Really? Amazing!”
A helping hand from an unexpected source. I gave Himura a wink and told him to leave it to the experts.
Himura shrugged and drained the remainder of his beer.
“Do you know their contact details?”
Ito took out his smartphone, ready to record them, and the owner nodded.
“The number is a mnemonic. That's why I remember it so well. It was...”
Ito quickly began taking notes. For some reason, so was Tsuji. Maybe he was preparing for the day when he encountered a real supernatural incident.
It was a number I didn't need. But, perhaps because it was so easy to remember, the phone number remained in my memory even after hearing it only once.
I'm sure I'll forget it soon, but for some reason, I feel like some day, it will come rushing back to me.
Some day, when I need it.
Himura gazed silently out at the night view of Tokyo.