The Bridegroom Was a Dog by Yōko Tawada

Author:Yōko Tawada [Tawada, Yōko]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Tags: Novella, Japanese Literature, Fiction
ISBN: 9780811220606
Publisher: New Directions
Published: 2012-10-01T23:00:00+00:00

After having sex with Mitsuko as usual, Taro went out, and a while later the phone rang. It was Mrs. Orita.

“I didn’t get a chance to talk at your house with so many people around, but it’s about that young man who’s living with you; I just saw him for the first time today, but he looks so much like a fellow called Iinuma who used to work under my husband that I couldn’t help wondering. . . . He was one of my husband’s favorites, you see, but he disappeared three years ago, and his wife’s been looking for him ever since, poor thing, so if that really is Iinuma, I’d like her to know.”

At first Mitsuko answered coldly, “Yes . . . yes,” but as she listened the air seemed to close in on her and she found it hard to speak, so when the woman said, “I’m going to talk to Iinuma’s wife and have her go see for herself,” as though it were already decided, she couldn’t object.

When Mrs. Orita asked, ‘Where did you meet that young man, anyway?” she fudged it, since telling what had really happened was out of the question.

“Oh, just by chance; someone introduced him, and asked me to rent him a room. But tell me, how do you write ‘Iinuma’?”

Ignoring her question, Mrs. Orita proceeded to explain at great length what sort of person he was, so Mitsuko protested:

“But I’m not very interested in his character — sorry, it may seem odd, but I don’t really want to hear about it.” And she started to put the phone down, then reluctantly picked it up again and, to help her endure the steady stream of chatter pouring into her ear, held her head in her left hand and closed her eyes, patiently waiting for it to end.

According to Mrs. Orita, Taro Iinuma had gone to work for the pharmaceutical company her husband was with after graduating from a university in Tokyo, and though her husband had taken a liking to him from the start, if you’d asked him why, he wouldn’t have been able to tell you, but if forced to give a reason he would have said it was because young Iinuma was the kind of guy who could accept your point of view — could say, “I see what you mean,’ without sounding snide or insincere in any way. For example, one day not long after he’d joined the company, Orita had seen him in the parking lot leaning against a car with one shoe off, wiping the sole with a handkerchief embroidered with violets, and when he’d asked him what he was doing, Iinuma had said: “I stepped on a worm and got my shoe all dirty.” Looking at the expanse of gray asphalt, Orita had shouted, “How could there be worms in a place like this!” to which Iinuma had replied: “I see what you mean,” and stopped wiping right then and there. Afterward, though, when he was

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