I Called Him Necktie Read Online Free

the house. Like a fluttering flag. I could run back. But there’s the bus coming. I get in. It goes to the station. Onto the express train. To the A. Into the subway. To the O. In its way, it works. I don’t. He was still laughing. It works.
23
    And you? What brings you here? I shrugged my shoulders. No idea? Hm, you’re still young. Eighteen? I froze. Nineteen? Twenty? Incredible, so young. You have everything before you. No past. He sighed. Incredible, to have been so young once myself. Although what does that mean? There is only one age for anyone. I was and am, will always be fifty-eight. But you. Be careful what age you end up. It sticks to you. It seals you shut. The age you choose is like glue, it sets around you. This wisdom is not mine, you know. I got it from a book. A movie. I’m not sure. You notice things. It’s incredible. Your whole life you notice things.
    As he read the newspaper I considered what he had said. Yet the more I considered it, the What escaped me and instead, the How took hold of me. The weary note that gave the words a bitter taste. Whether young or incredible, both had, the way he said them, acquired a stringent, heavy tone, and both were, as I had heard them, one and the same word. That’s how you speak, I thought, when you have been silent for a long time. All words are the same to you then and you can hardly understand how one differs from another. Whether glue or life, it didn’t make all that much difference.
24
    His sleep came suddenly. On page two of the sports section it caught him. Leaning back he’d dozed off, his head bowed. His palms open over a picture of the Giants baseball team. A network of lines. Crossing the heartline. Grimy black print on his right forefinger. Again he looked like a child. Harmless. Vulnerable in his innocence. And again I felt the need to cover him, a natural desire to protect him somehow from harm.
    When he woke up it was already past five thirty. Yawning, he stretched and wiped the dust from his eyes. A few more minutes, he said, blinking, then the day will be done. No overtime today. He folded up the newspaper. The nicest thing about working is the coming home. My first words when I come through the door, standing inside the entrance. It smells of garlic and ginger. Freshly steamed vegetables. I stand in the entrance, savor this smell and say: The nicest thing about working is the coming home. Kyōko calls me an idiot. From her it sounds so gentle. No offense meant. Do you understand. She could call me a lot worse things. A liar, a deceiver. And yet it would be with the same tenderness, I really hope, as when she calls me an idiot. Although. I’d rather not know. So long as there is hope, I’d rather not know how it would be if I told her the truth. What’s the point after all? She deserves better than the truth, so much better.
25
    Five to six. He straightened his tie. Not too fast. Rather as if he had to restrain himself. A horse in harness, pulling at the reins. Again and again he shook his hand above him, pushed back the shirtsleeve, looked at his watch. I’mgoing now. Three minutes to six. No, wait a bit. Two minutes to six. Now, really. One minute to six. So then? Till tomorrow? I nodded. He spoke quietly, almost too faint to hear: Thank you so much. A last glance at his wrist. Exactly six. He got up with a jerk. I imitated him. We stood eye to eye, the same height. Goodbye. My voice. After two years of silence it was as translucent as glass. Goodbye. That was it. A crisp conjunction of consonants and vowels. Once more I was mute. Then it shot out of me: My name is Taguchi Hiro. I am twenty years old. Twenty is the age I have chosen. I bowed, awkwardly, stayed in the bow till he had gone. A strange satisfaction: I can still do it. Introduce myself to someone. I have not forgotten. Even though my name might dissolve on my tongue.
26
    As I walked home, I imagined how his story would unfold. Perhaps it was enough that he had confided in me,