“Three of the people from that group attended our wedding ceremony in Nagoya. Aka, Shiro, and Ao. I believe those were their names? Colorful people.”

“Yes, that’s right,” Tsukuru said. “Unfortunately I wasn’t able to attend the wedding.”

“But now we’re able to meet like this,” he said with a warm smile. His long beard fluttered on his cheeks like the intimate flickering of a campfire flame. “Did you come to Finland on a trip, Mr. Tazaki?”

“I did,” Tsukuru replied. Telling the truth would take too long. “I took a trip to Helsinki and thought I’d take a side trip and see Eri, since I haven’t seen her in a long time. I’m sorry I couldn’t get in touch ahead of time. I hope I’m not inconveniencing you.”

“No, not at all. You came all this way, and we’re happy to have you. It’s lucky that I stayed at home. I know Eri will be really happy to see you.”

I hope you’re right, Tsukuru told himself.

“May I take a look at your work?” Tsukuru said, pointing to the pottery lined up on the shelves.

“Of course. Feel free to touch any of them. Her work and mine are mixed together, but I’m sure you’ll figure out which are which without me telling you.”

Tsukuru walked over to the wall shelf and studied the pottery one by one. Most were practical dining ware—plates, bowls, and cups. There were several vases and jars as well.

As Edvard said, Tsukuru could distinguish between his pieces and Eri’s at a glance. The ones with a smooth texture and pastel colors were Edvard’s. Here and there on the surface, the colors were darker or lighter, a subtle shading like the flow of the wind or water. Not a single one had any added design. The change in colors itself was the pattern, and even Tsukuru, a complete novice when it came to pottery, could tell that coloring like this required a high level of technical skill. The pieces had an intentional absence of any extraneous decoration, and a smooth, refined feel. Though fundamentally northern European, their pared-down simplicity revealed the clear influence of Japanese pottery. They were unexpectedly light to hold, too, and felt natural and right in his hand. Edvard had taken painstaking care with all the details, and they were the kind of work that only the finest craftsman could achieve. He never would have been able to display this kind of talent while working at a large company that dealt in mass production.

Compared to Edvard’s style, Eri’s was far simpler, hardly reaching the finely wrought subtlety of her husband’s creations. Overall there was a lush, fleshy feel to her pieces, the rims slightly warped, and a lack of any refined, focused beauty. But her pottery also had an unusual warmth that brought a sense of comfort and solace. The slight irregularities and rough texture provided a quiet sense of calm, like the feeling of touching natural fabric, or sitting on a porch watching the clouds go by.

In contrast to her husband’s work, Eri’s pottery featured patterns—like leaves blown on the wind. In some cases the design was scattered over the pottery, in others gathered in one spot, and depending on how the design was distributed, the pieces felt either sad, or brilliant, or even flamboyant. The exquisite designs reminded Tsukuru of fine patterns on an old kimono. He looked closely at each piece, trying to decipher each design, but he couldn’t identify what the configurations might signify. They were odd and unique figures. From a slight distance they struck him as leaves scattered on a forest floor. Leaves trampled by anonymous animals who were quietly, secretly, making their way through the woods.

In Eri’s works, different again from her husband’s, color was simply a backdrop, its purpose to showcase the design, to give it life. The colors lightly, reticently yet effectively, served as background to the design itself.

Tsukuru picked up Edvard’s work, then Eri’s, comparing them. This couple must live in a nice balance in their real lives as well. The pleasant contrast in their artistic creations hinted at this. Their styles were very different, but each of them seemed to accept the other’s distinctive qualities.

“Since I’m her husband, maybe it’s not right for me to praise her work so highly,” Edvard said, watching Tsukuru’s reaction. “What do you call that in Japanese? ‘Favoritism?’ Is that the right word?”

Tsukuru smiled but didn’t say anything.

“I’m not saying this because we’re married, but I really like Eri’s work. There are plenty of people in the world who can make better, more beautiful pottery. But her pottery isn’t narrow in any way. You feel an emotional generosity. I wish I could explain it better.”

“I understand exactly what you mean,” Tsukuru said.

“I think something like that comes from heaven,” Edvard said, pointing to the ceiling. “It’s a gift. I have no doubt she’ll only get more skilled as time goes on. Eri still has a lot of room to grow.”

Outside the dog barked, a special, friendly sort of bark.

“Eri and the girls are back,” Edvard said, looking in that direction. He stood up and walked toward the door.

Tsukuru carefully placed Eri’s pottery back on the shelf and stood there, waiting for her to arrive.

When Kuro first spotted Tsukuru, she looked as if she couldn’t understand what was happening. The expression on her face vanished, replaced by a blank look. She pushed her sunglasses up on her head and gazed at Tsukuru without a word. She’d gone out for an after-lunch walk with her daughters, only to come back and find a man, a Japanese man by the look of him, standing next to her husband. A face she didn’t recognize.

She was holding her younger daughter’s hand. The little girl looked about three. Next to her stood the older daughter, a little bigger and probably two or three years older than her sister. The girls wore matching flower-print dresses and plastic sandals. The door was still open, and outside the dog was barking noisily. Edvard stuck his head outside and gave the dog a quick scolding. It soon stopped barking and lay down on the porch. The daughters, like their mother, stood there silently, staring at Tsukuru.

Kuro didn’t look much different from the last time he’d seen her, sixteen years earlier. The soft, full visage of her teenage years, though, had retreated, filled in now by more straightforward, expressive features. She’d always been robust and sturdy, but now her unwavering, unclouded eyes seemed more introspective. Those eyes had surely seen so many things over the years, things that remained in her heart. Her lips were tight, her forehead and cheeks tanned and healthy-looking. Abundant black hair fell straight to her shoulders, her bangs pinned back with a barrette, and her breasts were fuller than before. She was wearing a plain blue cotton dress, a cream-colored shawl draped around her shoulders, and white tennis shoes.

Kuro turned to her husband as if for an explanation, but Edvard said nothing. He merely shook his head slightly. She turned to look back at Tsukuru, and lightly bit her lip.

What Tsukuru saw in front of him now was the healthy body of a woman who had walked a completely different path in life from the one he’d taken. Seeing her now, the true weight of sixteen years of time struck him with a sudden intensity. There are some things, he concluded, that can only be expressed through a woman’s form.

As she gazed at him, Kuro’s face was a bit strained. Her lips quivered, as if a ripple had run through them, and one side of her mouth rose. A small dimple appeared on her right cheek—technically not a dimple, but a shallow depression that appeared as her face was filled with a cheerful bitterness. Tsukuru remembered this expression well, the expression that came to her face just before she voiced some sarcastic remark. But now she wasn’t going to say something sarcastic. She was simply trying to draw a distant hypothesis closer to her.