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The night air hummed sweetly with the sound of crickets chirping. A hazy white-noise that awoke the evening, the swift vibrating of their wings marking the cusp of summer. It would not be long until they would have to slide the doors that opened onto the engawa veranda shut, when the honeyed heat slowly melted away into autumnal frost.
A chill already hung in the air, one that pricked goosebumps on her skin. He wondered if he should have already shut the door, but to deprive her of that beautiful vista… to deprive her of the moon and the stars that overlooked her at night… he could not bring himself to do it. And so the hum of crickets continued to fill her room, and so too did the slightly smoky scent of sweet osmanthus.
“Sister… Did you know?”
She did not respond. That was alright - after all, she could not. Not while a machine pumped rhythmically into her lungs. Not while she remained artificially sedated. Not while her mouth lay open, red and angry and raw.
It was alright.
She was resting so that she could heal.
“The singing of crickets in Brazil is said to be a sign of impending rains.”
‘Ah! Korekiyo, and why do you think that is?’
“Perhaps when the conditions are most suited for the crickets to mate and die is just prior to the rainy season.”
‘Hm-hm ~, the mating song does sound a little like the pitter-patter of rain, do you agree?’
“I would never have considered that, but of course! Yes… to examine every angle of a symbol, environmental, textural, sensual… Only then do we have a chance of finding the truth.”
Her mouth stayed open, her endotracheal tube sitting pertly between her teeth. The only noise she made was a faint gargling sound. Could the tube have been fitted improperly? Or was it her body’s natural reaction, them muscles in her throat tightening and relaxing against this foreign invasion.
He brushed her lips with his finger, leaning forwards as he examined her mouth, hair falling over her chest.
‘Do you think we can ever find the truth? Even with all our thick descriptions, our deep thoughts, our probing questions… most things will be forever shrouded in the mists of the unknown. Does that frustrate you, Korekiyo?’
“Not at all, Sister. I think… that is what makes it so fun.”
Her throat looked so dry… Salvia weakly bubbled, yellow-green mucus forming around the edges of her mouth. Does it hurt? No, he chides himself. She’s dreaming, in a world of ecstasy. Nothing can hurt her in there. Nothing.
“To be unable to understand everything, to frustrate ourselves with even the simplest of things; such as why a Brazilian hears a cricket and thinks rain but a pilgrim in Kyoto hears the voice of Buddha… The infinite possibilities one humble insect possesses over the human mind. That is what I find so intriguing.”
Standing, he quickly searched the room, returning after a brief moment with a bag of toiletries. It would be some time, now, before a nurse would visit. But, she needn’t worry. This was no chore to him. To help her, in any small way, that was his honour.
Kneeling into the tatami, the sound of crickets still thrumming in his ear, he gently dipped a cotton bud into her throat.
“In parts of China, they believed that the cricket would bring good fortune. In Barbados, they say the same thing. Fourteen thousand kilometres between those distant shores - and yet, still, the whirring of an insect’s wings inspired the same thought in them.”
Carefully swabbing away her mucus, he continued to stare deep into her throat. The ridges of her mouth. Her flaccid tongue. Her teeth… they would need brushing, too. And her hair… her whole body, really, was begging for attention.
He put down the swab. First, he would change her catheter bag.
To do that, she would have to be undressed.
Gently running his hands over her hair, he gazed quietly at her face. Her expressionless sleep. Her folded eyes.
“Sister. Please, you desire the feeling of cleanliness, yes?”
She always seemed her happiest after a bath, cheeks a sensational red, her smile full and genuine. Come feel my skin. It’s so soft. Laughing as she squeezed her own arm. It feels like I’ve gained weight. I’ll have to bathe before they weigh me, next time. What do you think?
“I am sorry. I will have to undress you. Is that alright?”
Her mouth tightening, a red smile blossoming. She’d lift up her bathrobe - sudden and unexpectedly, the laughter reaching its peak. Anasyrma. A softening of her expression as she swayed side to side, her lewdness still exposed. It is a ritual gesture recognised in cultures all across the world. Pliny the Elder thought a woman could lull the storm out of the sea with this gesture alone, the Chinese and Irish both marvelling in its ability to ward off enemies. It can chase off demons, scare the gods, end the rains. Are you scared of it, Korekiyo?
He began to undo the ties of the hospital gown around her neck, untucking the robe from her sides, pulling it from her body like wind rippling over sand. Her chest stared up at him, breasts limp and her stretched brown nipples arousing absolutely nothing in him. Her body was speckled with familiar markings - her scars that cleaved her like white kintsugi rivulets, her freckled hips, the mole just by her stomach. It was still her body, but… how different it looked. Swallowing air, veins flush to the surface, new sores forming.
She was still laughing, completely disrobed now. Deep summer, the veranda still in full view. No one will notice, she insisted - and besides, the moon illuminated her body in a way that was far too flattering to dismiss. How alive she had looked, then. Drinking in the light, her breasts kissed by that white-blue air that seemed to soften everything. Are you frightened, Korekiyo? Or do you think this gesture represents something else entirely? She’d opened her legs, her mouth brighter than her eyes. To me, I think, it evokes surprise and laughter. To me, I think that it can be used for emotional healing.
He spread her legs so that he might access her catheter more easily. Standing, he went to wash his hands. Returning, he carefully removed the catheter tubing that connected to the bag. He re-connected the tubing to another bag. The soiled bag was taken to the bathroom. He opened the valve and let the contents drain into the toilet. He repeated the washing of his hands. He filled the bag with warm, soapy water. He drained it of soap. He refilled it with a disinfectant. Shaking the solution, he placed the bag on the bathroom counter - leaving it to rest. He washed his hands again.
To me, I think it represents letting go of sadness.
Filling a basin, he returned to her side. With a washcloth, he softly wiped away the sweat and oils that had come to her skin’s surface. She remained motionless as he scrubbed under her armpit, lifting her breast so that he might clean beneath it, watching as soap bubbles gathered between her ribs and in the depression where her stomach lay and her hips jutted from. She was so thin, but not as thin, he reminded himself, as last year.
“You’ve not been eating. I have observed it, the way you slip food from your plate. Mother may not be able to see it, but I do.” Her face had soured, then. Her cheeks sucked in, her teeth rubbing against her lips. She hadn’t said anything, but he knew it was because she had lost the ability to taste. How all foods must have been reduced to textures, like chewing through bark. Perhaps it was ritualistic fasting, but they both knew there was no curative powers to that.
“So, allow me to eat for you.”
With a dry washcloth, he dabbed all of the places the water had flowed over. It was not the same ritual, he knew, that she used to take. All of her lotions and oils and pretty-smelling things. Mother complained if he applied them, because then, of course, she’d know he had been doing this. Then she’d be reminded of her negligence. Failing to love unselfishly must be a torturous thing.
And she had watched, with disbelieving eyes - as he scraped the hospital food from her plate. Slipped the overcooked noodles into his mouth, cold and flavourless - and instead, described to her their exquisite ecstasy. No longer was it noodles he was eating, but living Unagi. “Ah, this eel! How excellently she has been prepared Split from the stomach, Osakan style, encouraging one to literally ‘spill their guts’ during a night of socialising. The way she still writhes in my mouth, tickling my gums, bringing sensations to places I nary knew existed - isn’t it wonderful? Should I swallow her whole, Sister - or do you think she deserves mercy for this sacrifice?”
This sight, of a noodle transformed into an eel - a strand still hanging through the zip of the meal-time mask she had made… It made her laugh. The shock of the question, the horror and beauty and ecstasy that he was describing - it made her laugh even harder. The idea that this hospital would serve a delicacy like live unagi! She had taken his chopsticks then, brought the eel to her own mouth - quivered as it slipped between her lips.
Let’s study how both methods affect the culinary experience. Crunch her between your teeth, savour her flavouring, relax in knowing that you have delivered a sweet mercy. But I will swallow her, and I will delight in her agony as she travels through my digestive system, and I will remember how she did not give up trying to escape until the very last moment.
And it didn’t matter, then, that the lack of taste made her throat clamp up. That noodle, transformed, the memories of grilled eel with rice and pickles, the realisation that she could not give in because of this - not yet, no. Not yet. She had to keep eating, she had to keep dreaming, she had to - because this laughter, those gentle eyes, this moment alone was worth any pain.
And now, she doesn’t feel pain at all - do you, Sister?
Isn’t it beautiful?
She was dry, now. His fingers slipping through her hair as he combed it. He would wash it later. Clip her nails. Give her a massage. Speak to her until Mother came back from wherever she was, wherever it was that she went every night instead of being here with her.
“But, Sister. Did you know? Crickets do not only symbolise positive things. Human beings as fickle things. No matter how hard social structures try, there will always be those who see one thing and think another. Yes. The cricket,” he breathed, “Is said to have been the first being who wished death into the world.”
“In Alagoas, it is said that the cricket announces death when it enters the house.”
Carefully combing out a tangle, he stared out into the veranda. Golden light pierced the sky, pink clouds on a background of stripped blue. The sound of crickets still drowned out everything, louder than her ventilator, far louder than his whispered voice, louder still than the sweeping of the brush through her hair.
‘I wonder,’ He said to himself in a falsetto, knowing that if he could eat for her, he may as well speak for her, too. ‘I wonder which it will be for us. A harbinger of good fortune, the crackling laughter of god, or a messenger of death?’
Placing her comb beside the futon - he leaned across her body, resting his head on her shoulder.
‘Don’t cry.’
Don’t cry, she’d croaked, leaning limply on him, golden eyes barely open. There’s no time for weeping. You have to be strong. If you cry, I will cry. And that would be a rotten thing, wouldn’t it?
‘Don’t cry,’ she repeated, now, in his voice. He remembered her embrace, how easily she once squeezed resolve, joy, warmth into him. Lifting one of her heavy, lifeless arms, he drew it over his back. The other, he draped across his waist.
Held like this, in the cusp of summer, her voice a pleasant memory leaking from his lips - he felt…
Wonderful.
Their two bodies entwined like this, the flickering of life in her like a candle easing in and out of the wind.
Is it frightening?
Is it deserving of mercy?
Is it representative of the letting go of sadness, or is it wishing death into the world?
Are we all of these things?
Are we any of them?