Louise was bustling around the house, chatting with her girlfriend, while I dragged a chair outside
just to avoid hearing any of Their talk didn't interest me.
I used to have a girlfriend, too. For a while I'd visit her in the city and we went to all sorts of odd little places — open-air cinemas, museums, even once made it to the base of Mount Fuji and took a
bunch of photos. Then she died. Not the mountain — the girl. Her weak heart gave in to some congenital illness, and I was alone again. Just like now, despite the guest in my house.
Fog was walking the shoreline, and some invisible hand was laying it down like a woven cloth — starting from the water and drifting, further and further inland...
I gave in and took a few shots, even though I was never into surface photography. I liked the depths, and the secrets they hid — places that lived by laws very different from those of the noisy world above. I opened the gallery and scrolled through the photos showing my recent contact with a creature from an unknown underwater civilization. Or maybe he was the only one of his kind.
Here — a tail. And here — fins, beside which hung long, hook-like arms, thin and muscleless. My heart was racing. Even if I didn't capture the whole creature in one frame, I still had undeniable evidence of its existence. That was something. The existence of these photos meant I—
—I'm not insane. I'm not like that. — I muttered under my breath, echoing the words from earlier.
You're wrong, You always were.
Maybe I should've jumped up and run inside, proved my truth to her and to the whole world. But I stayed still, sitting in that chair, just watching the fog.
When I was a kid, I used to watch a cartoon called Life with Louie, and the father, Andy, once said something that stuck with me. A giant fish had bitten their canoe and left behind a massive tooth. His son wanted to show it to all the bullies, so they'd stop mocking his dad's stories. But Andy just said, -You know. I know. That's enough.-
I didn't have a dad to share a secret like that with, but I did have Mr. Satoshi — someone who
wouldn't laugh at me. Sure, I could try to start media frenzy, go viral with the story and the photos, and Louise would've begged me to. But I didn't want that kind of fame. Once was more than enough.
So I just stared at the empty coastline, and saw a woman emerge from the folds of mist — dressed in a full-body diving suit, flippers, and a mask. In her hands was a large wooden bucket rimmed with steel. For some people, the ocean is just a view. For others, it's a living.
I didn't know this newcomer, but people did show up here from time to time, even on the ragged edge of the world. I once saw a group of drunken foreigners try to surf these waters. The diver fit in much better.
She was an ama, come to collect. I wondered if she was hoping for pearls.
Natural pearls are hard to find now, as fewer and fewer women become divers. Most ama these days go underwater for seaweed or shellfish. Still, sometimes, they find what they're hoping for...
Back when I started diving, I dreamt of stumbling across a hoard of pearls and selling them off for a fortune. But I got pulled in by other things and dropped that idea. This diver, though, clearly loved what she did. She was well-equipped, and once she reached the edge of the water, she paused and wrapped her arms around her shoulders in that familiar pose from horror flicks — like a sleeping
vampire. I knew what she was doing. Sea people are superstitious, full of rituals, charms, incense, and whatever else they think can keep trouble away.
Still, I'd never seen this one before. Maybe it came from something ancient and forgotten. Or maybe she made it up herself. She stood there for two or three minutes, then bent down, scooped up a handful of sand, and let it scatter in the breeze — then started to undress.
That's when I leaned forward, involuntarily. I had no way of explaining this. She slowly removed her entire diver's outfit, the thermal layer beneath it, and then her underwear. Naked now, alone with nature, she pulled a pin from her bun and let her hair fall freely over her shoulders. Then, with the same slow, detached motion, she walked into the sea, step by step, away from the shore.
And she didn't look back. Not once. As if she'd done this before. As if someone — or something — was waiting for her in the water. And somehow, I had the feeling she wasn't going in to search for pearls.
She was bringing one back.
It all became clear to me. Maybe I had thought about something like this before... or maybe I just now intuited it, but I pushed back the chair and ran — to help that woman. I know you're not supposed to interfere in someone else's affairs or mess with the choice they've already made, but detached contemplation is one thing, and facing such a sorrowful situation yourself — that hits instinct. I ran before I even understood what I was doing.
Ama walked steadily, as if stamping each step like a coin, and the distance between us didn't matter. Why am I doing this? I shouldn't! Maybe for her, this isn't an act of despair, but a manifestation of inner strength. Despite all the years I spent in Nihon, I still remained a gaijin in my mind.
Bursting into the water, my legs slowed down from the resistance, but I was still moving way more actively than the diveress heading for her date with death. She was so deep inside herself that she didn't even turn around to look at the loud, noisy guy running her way. At that moment, her vanishing silhouette slicing through the foggy veil looked more like a memory come to life than a real person made of flesh and blood.
And yet, in this race of speeds, she was the one who won — when the top of her head disappeared beneath the water's surface. That only made me speed up. Just a little more! Any second now, I'll dive in and pull her out quickly. Why am I so damn slow? I have to help her!
Despair was flooding me, and I desperately hoped she had enough air to last as long as possible. It's now or never! I inhaled all the air in the world and plunged myself into the water. I rarely dove without gear, and even my hardened body was pierced to the bone by the icy wetness. I needed to find her fast, or hypothermia and cramps would kick in.
Swimming under the surface, I could barely see anything — the water was murky and dark — but a trained eye can catch what's necessary, and eventually I noticed long strands of hair floating in the water. Digging deeper with my arms and legs, I made a few powerful strokes and grabbed the diveress by her hair — surely causing her pain she was trying to escape forever… but I believed my
intention outweighed everything else. So I started winding the hair around my arm, and the woman's body began to rise higher and higher, until finally she was level with my eyes…
…and staring back at me was a little girl in a green sweater, with cropped hair and an upturned nose. A chill hit me that could easily compete with the grave itself, because staring at me were empty eye sockets — no eyes inside. The girl was frowning with thick eyebrows and blowing out a bunch of bubbles from her nostrils, then opened her mouth and I distinctly heard my own voice, because she was speaking in it! Even the fact that she was talking underwater was, to put it mildly, alarming.
Why are you doing this? Stop it!
Accusing me of something, she suddenly grabbed my T-shirt with her tiny hands and started tearing it to shreds!