The Lake by Banana Yoshimoto & Michael Emmerich

Author:Banana Yoshimoto & Michael Emmerich
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Literary, Azizex666, Fiction
ISBN: 9781935554691
Publisher: Melville House
Published: 2005-01-01T05:00:00+00:00

The next week, my mural-painting days got under way.

I set out from the apartment at eight each morning, as if I were a construction worker on the way to a site. Because that’s when the light is best.

I would plant a kiss on Nakajima’s cheek, then head straight for my wall.

The first day, I painted a few frolicking monkeys. After that, I decided that I would paint a big lake on the left third of the wall. Of course, I’d put monkeys around the lake, too. Calm monkeys, and lots of trees. A monkey brother and sister, and a mother monkey and her son.

I knew it would be painful to paint these things, but I couldn’t stop myself.

A little girl came and said, “You’re drawing monkeys?” And that got things started: little by little, children began gathering around. I seriously bawled out a few boys who were about to start messing around with my paints, and then I apologized, and after that even they slowly started to appreciate what I was doing.

One skinny little boy with big eyes and a flat nose came over and asked, “Does it mean the school won’t be closed anymore when it has your picture?” Clearly Sayuri and his parents had been talking to him. People called him Yotchan, and he was taking English classes.

“No, I’m afraid not. Even with my picture, it may be closed.”

“Then why are you drawing it?”

“Because there’s a place to paint, and they asked me to paint it. Won’t it be nicer to have some pretty colors here, even if it’s only for a little while?”

“It isn’t for art?”

“Hardly,” I said, laughing. “Not by a long shot. It’s just a picture of some monkeys.”

“Um, are those monkeys ghosts?” Yotchan asked.

Following his finger with my eyes, I realized he was pointing to the four monkeys over by the lake. I had only sketched their forms, so they were just uncolored outlines, half transparent.

“No, they aren’t ghosts. I’ll color them in later on.”

“Oh,” Yotchan said. “I thought it was funny.”

Children are incredible, I thought. It never would have occurred to me to paint ghosts into such a happy picture.

I kept mulling over the composition as I brushed on the colors.

The area around the lake was going to be the most colorful, and I wanted to keep it balanced with the rest of the painting, so I would probably be doing it last. But I couldn’t leave those monkeys as ghosts. I’d give them some fun-looking colors, but nothing too loud, since they lived quiet lives. I’d use the happiest tones I could come up with. And I’d paint in some tea, too. And cake. I’d fill in the area around that harsh sleeping beauty with lovely, lovely colors.

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