“I get up at five-thirty,” Yuichi said, stroking her wrist with his thumb.

“Doesn’t it take about two hours from here to Nagasaki? We don’t have much time.”

“I just wanted to see you…”

The digital clock on the dashboard showed 9:18.

“You have to go back, right?” Mitsuyo asked.

The thumb stopped stroking her. Yuichi paused. “Yeah. If I don’t go back tonight, I’ll have to get up at three,” he said, forcing a smile.

I wanted to see you so much. I just had to see you, so I drove here right from work. Yuichi didn’t put it into words, but his fingers conveyed this message clearly as he stroked her wrist.

They could go to a love hotel now and spend a couple of hours together. But then he’d have to drive back to Nagasaki. That meant he’d get home around one a.m. Even if he went to sleep right away, Yuichi would have to go to his exhausting job with only four hours of sleep.

Two hours is fine, Mitsuyo thought, as long as I can be with him. But I want him to get as much sleep as he can, too-even an extra hour.

“If only my sister weren’t at home…” Mitsuyo surprised herself. She’d never thought of her sister as a bother before. She’d always worried instead about when Tamayo would be back.

“You want to go to a… hotel?” Yuichi asked. He seemed hesitant, as if worried about tomorrow morning.

“But if we go to a hotel it’ll be really late when you go home.”

“Yeah, you’re right.” Yuichi’s fingers on top of the gearshift tensed.

“Nagasaki and Saga are so far away,” Mitsuyo murmured. “No… that isn’t what I mean,” she quickly added, shaking her head. “It’s not that… It’s just that you came all this way and I wish we could spend more time together.”

“It’s a weekday. Nothing we can do about it,” he muttered resignedly. He sounded cool about it, and Mitsuyo couldn’t help but say, “You’re so serious, you know that?”

“I can’t take a day off. It’s my uncle’s company.”

“But it’s hard for me to get Saturday off. It’s almost impossible for me to get two days off in a row like last time.” She sounded a bit miffed and the instant she said that Yuichi’s fingers went limp.

He came to see me, Mitsuyo thought. He didn’t come all this way just to be told that we don’t have time to see each other. He drove two hours to see me, after doing his backbreaking job.

“You want to park next door?” Mitsuyo tugged at his fingers. “The store’s closed and there won’t be any other cars. We can talk for a while. If you park behind the building, nobody can see you from the road.”

Yuichi glanced over the fence toward the darkened menswear store, and quickly released the parking brake.

“Hold on a second,” Mitsuyo hastily added. “You probably haven’t had any dinner. Let me buy you something.”

“No, I had some udon at a rest area. I couldn’t wait,” Yuichi laughed.

He drove out of the fast-food-restaurant parking lot and over to the lot behind Wakaba. Behind the store it was dark, the only light an illuminated billboard for makeup in the field beyond the fence.

“Next Friday’s a holiday, so I was thinking of going to Nagasaki. Just a day trip,” Mitsuyo said. The car had come to a halt and Yuichi’s hands were resting on the steering wheel. He suddenly reached out and placed his hot hand on her, stroking her earlobe and neck. Without a word, he kissed her. For a second, Mitsuyo was taken aback, but before she knew it he was all over her. She closed her eyes and let him have his way.

It was after ten p.m. when they left the parking lot. Mitsuyo wanted to stay in his arms forever, but she knew that that would make it all the harder for him the next morning. After they left the parking lot, Yuichi headed to her apartment without needing directions. He deftly changed lanes, zooming past one car after another.

“Three days from now, I’ll take the bus to Nagasaki,” Mitsuyo said, letting herself sway back and forth with the motion of the car, a lulling feeling she was already used to.

“I finish work at six,” Yuichi said, pulling up close to the car in front.

“I have the day off, so I was thinking of going in the morning and doing a little sightseeing by myself. It’s been years since I’ve been in Nagasaki… Last year my sister and I went to the Huis Ten Bosch theme park, though.”

“I wish I could show you around…”

“Don’t worry. I’ll just eat some champon, go see the cathedrals…”

It usually took fifteen minutes by bike to go home but at the speed Yuichi drove, it took only three. As he did the last time, Yuichi steered his car down the unpaved path right up to the apartment building.

“Darn it-my sister’s home.” Mitsuyo looked up to the second-floor window, where the light was on. “I wish we had more time,” she added in a low voice, and as she did Yuichi’s dry lips covered hers again.

“Drive carefully,” she said. Yuichi nodded, lips still glued to hers. For a second it seemed as if he wanted to say something more, so she pulled away a bit. But he just looked down and was silent.

Mitsuyo watched as the car pulled away down the dirt path. When he came out on the paved road he beeped his horn once and shot away.

I’m so lonely, she thought. I can’t wait to see him again. Mitsuyo stood there watching until his rear lights disappeared.

She remembered how when Tamayo was going out with a guy who was a hairdresser, she’d said the very same thing. That she was so lonely. That she couldn’t wait to see him again. At the time, Mitsuyo couldn’t understand her feelings, but now she did. She understood, and wondered how anyone could stand it. She wanted to run after his car-or fall to the ground and cry her eyes out. If she could only be with Yuichi, anything was possible.

Yuichi wasn’t sure how much time had passed since Mitsuyo’s figure in the rearview mirror, waving goodbye, had disappeared. At an intersection near the on-ramp to the highway, he had to stop for a red light. He pulled his wallet out of his back pocket and saw he had less than five thousand yen. If Mitsuyo had agreed to go to a hotel, he would have had to take the surface streets home, no matter how late that made him. Fortunately she’d been worried about his job, so he still had enough money to take the highway.

He’d been dying to see her. Although they’d only met a few days ago, he was scared to death the relationship would end. At night, no matter how long he talked with her on the phone, he couldn’t rid himself of this fear. As soon as he hung up he couldn’t stand it, convinced he’d never see her again. When he slept, he dreamed she was gone. As soon as he woke up in the morning he wanted to call her, but hesitated since it was five a.m.; he thought about her all day long at work. By the end of the day today, he couldn’t stand it, and before he knew what he was doing, he was heading toward Saga. Maybe he’d already made an unconscious decision to do just that, which is why he took his car to work instead of riding in his uncle’s van.

The red light seemed to take forever, and Yuichi pounded the steering wheel. If another car hadn’t been right beside him, he would have slammed his forehead against it in frustration.

When I was little, he recalled, before Mom took me to live with my grandparents and we were still living in an apartment in the city, she said she’d take me out to see my father, and I was so happy getting ready, and riding the streetcar together. “When we get to the station we’ll transfer to a train,” she explained. I asked her, “Is it far?” and she said, “Way far away.”

In the crowded streetcar, she clung to the strap. And I held on to her skirt. When the streetcar started to move, some men seated in front of us began to elbow each other and laugh. They were laughing at my mom, who’d forgotten to shave her underarms. Mom turned all red and hid her underarm with a handkerchief. It was a hot day. The packed streetcar lurched to one side and her handkerchief slipped off and the men tried to keep from laughing.