awaii. The next few days were bliss. A respite of peace. When June showed up for my next installment, I begged a fever and turned her down politely. She was very gracious. She got a mechanical pencil from her bag and jotted down her number on a notepad. I could call when I felt up to it. Then she said good-bye and left, swinging her hips off into the sunset.

I took Yuki to her mother's a few more times. I took walks with Dick North on the beach, I swam in their pool. Dick could swim amazingly well. Having just one arm hardly seemed to make a difference. Yuki and her mother talked by themselves, about what I had no idea. Yuki never told me and I never asked.

On one occasion Dick recited some Robert Frost to me. My understanding of English wasn't good enough, but Dick's delivery alone conveyed the poetry, which flowed with rhythm and feeling. I also got to see some of Ame's photos, still wet from the developing. Pictures of Hawaiian faces. Ordinary portraits, but in her hands the subjects came alive with honest island vitality and grace. There was an earthiness, a chilling brutality, a sexiness. Powerful, yet unassuming. Yes, Ame had talent. Not like me and not like you, as Dick had said.

Dick looked after Ame in much the same way I looked after Yuki. Though he, of course, was far more thorough. He cleaned house, washed clothes, cooked meals, did the shopping. He recited poetry, told jokes, put out her cigarettes, kept her supplied with Tampax (I once accompanied him shopping), made sure she brushed her teeth, filed her photos, prepared a typewritten catalogue of all her works. All single-handedly. I didn't know where the poor guy found the time to do his own creative work. Though who was I to talk? I was having my trip paid by Yuki's father, with a call girl thrown in on top.

On days when we didn't visit Yuki's mother, we surfed, swam, lolled about on the beach, went shopping, drove around the island. Evenings, we went for strolls, saw movies, had pina coladas and fruit drinks. I had plenty of time to cook meals if I felt like it. We relaxed and got beautifully tanned, down to our fingertips. Yuki bought a new Hawaiian-print bikini at a boutique in the Hilton, and in it she looked like a real local girl. She got quite good at surfing and could catch waves that were beyond me. She listened to the Rolling Stones. Whenever I left her side on the beach, guys moved in, trying to strike up a conversation with her. But Yuki didn't speak a word of English, so she had no trouble ignoring them. They'd be shuffling off, disgruntled, when I got back.

"Do guys really desire girls so much?" Yuki asked.

"Yeah. Depends on the individual of course, but generally I guess you could say that men desire women. You know about sex, don't you?"

"I know enough," said Yuki dryly.

"Well, men have this physical desire to sleep with women," I explained. "It's a natural thing. The preservation of the species — "

"I don't care about the preservation of the species. I don't want to know about science and hygiene. I want to know about sex drive. How does that work?"

"Okay, suppose you were a bird," I said, "and flying was something you really enjoyed and made you feel good. But there were certain circumstances that, except on rare occasions, kept you from flying. I don't know, let's say, lousy weather conditions, the direction of the wind, the season, things like that. But the more you couldn't fly, the more you wanted to fly and your energy built up inside you and made you irritable. You felt bottled up or something like that. You got annoyed, maybe even angry. You get me?" "I get you," she said. "I always feel that way." "Well, that's your sex drive."

"So when was the last time you flew? That is, before Papa bought that prostitute for you?" "The end of last month." "Was it good?" I nodded.

"Is it always good?"

"No, not always," I said. "Bring two imperfect beings together and things don't always go right. You're flying along nice and easy, and suddenly there's this enormous tree in front of you that you didn't see before, and cr-rash."

Yuki mulled this over. Imagining, perhaps, a bird flying high, its peripheral vision completely missing the danger straight ahead. Was this a bad explanation or what? Was she going to take things the wrong way? Aww, what the hell, she'd find out for herself soon enough.

"The chance of things going right gradually improves with age," I continued my explanation. "You get the knack of things, and you learn to read the weather and wind. On the other side of the coin, sex drive decreases with age. That's just how it goes." "Pathetic," said Yuki. "Yes, pathetic." Hawaii.

Just how many days had I been in the Islands? The concept of time had vanished from my head. Today comes after yesterday, tomorrow comes after today. The sun comes up, the sun goes down; the moon rises, the moon sets; tide comes in, tide goes out.

I pulled out my appointment book and checked the calendar. We'd been in Hawaii for ten days! It was approaching the end of April. Wasn't I going to stay for one week? Or was it one month? Days of surfing and pina coladas. Not bad as far as that went.

But how did I get to this spot? It started with me looking for Kiki, except that I didn't know that was her name at the time. I'd retraced my steps to Sapporo, and ever since, there'd been one weird character after another. And now, look at me, lying in the shade of a coconut palm, tropical drink in hand, listening to Kalapana.

What happened along the way? Mei was murdered. The police hauled me in. Whatever happened with Mei's case? Did the cops find out who she was? What about Gotanda? How was he doing? The last time I saw him he looked awful, tired and run-down. And then we left everything half-assed up in the air.

Pretty soon I had to be getting back to Japan. But it was so hard to take the first step in that direction. Hawaii had been the first real release from tension in ages — for both Yuki and me — and boy, had we needed it. Day after day I was thinking about almost nothing. Just swimming and lying in the sun getting tan, driving around the island listening to the Stones and Bruce Springsteen, walking moonlit beaches, drinking in hotel bars.

I knew this couldn't go on forever. But I couldn't get myself moving. And I couldn't bear to see Yuki get all uptight again. It was a perfect excuse.

Two weeks passed. One day toward dusk, Yuki and I motored our way through downtown Honolulu. Traffic was bad, but we were in no hurry, content to drive around and take in all the roadside attractions. Porno theaters, thrift shops, Chinese grocers, Vietnamese clothing stores, used book and record shops, old men playing go, guys with blurry eyes standing on street corners. Funny town, Honolulu. Full of cheap, good, interesting places to eat. But not a place for a girl to walk alone.

Right outside the downtown area, toward the harbor, the city blocks became sparser, less inviting. There were office buildings and warehouses and coffee shops missing letters from their signs, and the buses were full of people going home from work.

That's when Yuki said she wanted to see E.T. again.

Okay, after dinner, I said.

Then she said what a great movie it was and how she wished I was more like E.T. and then she touched my forehead with her index finger.

"Don't do that," I said. "It'll never heal."

That drew a chuckle from her.

And that's when it happened.

When something connected up inside my head with a loud clink. Something happened, though I didn't know then what it was.

It was enough to make me slam on the brakes, though. The Camaro behind us honked bitterly and showered me with abuses as it pulled around us. I had seen something, and something connected. Just there now, something very important.

"What's the matter?" Yuki said, or so I thought she said.

I may not have heard a thing. Because I was deep in thought at that moment. I was deep in thought thinking that I'd just seen her. Kiki. I'd just seen Kiki — in downtown Honolulu! She was here! Why? It was definitely her. I'd driven past, close enough to have reached out and touched her. She was walking in the opposite direction, right beside the car. "Listen, close all the windows and lock all the doors. Don't set a foot outside. And don't open up for anyone. I'll be right back," I said, leaping out of the car. "Hey, wait! Don't leave me here!"

But I was already running down the sidewalk, bumping into people, pushing them out of my way. I didn't have time to be polite. I had to catch up with her. I had to stop her, I had to talk to her, I had found her! I ran for two blocks, I ran for three blocks. And then, way up ahead, I spotted her, in a blue dress with a white bag swinging at her side in the early evening light. She was heading back toward the hustle and bustle of town. I followed, reaching the main drag, where the sidewalk traffic got thicker. A woman three times the size of Yuki couldn't seem to get out of my way. But I kept going, trying to catch up. As Kiki kept walking. Not fast, not slow, at normal speed. But not turning around to look behind her, not glancing to the side, not stopping to board a bus, just walking straight ahead. You'd think I'd be right up with her any second now, but the distance between us never seemed to close.

The next thing I knew she turned a corner to the left. Naturally I followed suit. It was a narrow street, lined on both sides with nondescript, old office buildings. There was no sign of her anywhere. Out of breath, I came to a standstill. What is this? How could she disappear on me again? But Kiki hadn't disappeared. She'd just been hidden from view by a large delivery truck, because there she was again, walking at the same clip on the far sidewalk.

"Kiki! "I yelled.

She heard me, apparently. She shot a glance back in my direction. There was still some distance between us, it was dusk, and the streetlights weren't on yet, but it was Kiki all right. I was sure of it. I knew it was her. And she knew who was calling her. She even smiled.

But she didn't stop. She'd simply glanced over her shoulder at me. She didn't slacken her pace. She kept on walking and then entered a building. By the time I got there, it was too late. No one was in the foyer, and the elevator door was just shutting. It was an old elevator, the kind with a clock-like dial that told you what floor it was on. I took the time to breathe, eyes glued to the dial. Eight. She'd gotten off on eight. I pressed the button, then impulsively decided to take the stairs instead.

The whole building seemed to be empty, dead quiet. The gummy slap of my rubber soles on the linoleum steps resounded hollow through the dusty stairwell.

The eighth floor wasn't any different. Not a soul in sight. I looked left and right and saw nothing to suggest life. I walked down the hall and read the signs on each of the seven or eight doors. A trading company, a law office, a dentist,?None in business, the signs old and smudged. Nondescript offices on a nondescript floor of a nondescript building on a nondescript street. I went back and reexamined the signs on the doors. Nothing seemed to connect to Kiki; nothing made sense. I strained my ears, but the building was as quiet as a ruins.

Then came the sound. A clicking of heels, high heels. Echoing eerily off the ceilings, bearing a weight?the dry weight of old memories. All of a sudden, I was wandering through the labyrinthine viscera of a large organism. Long-dead, cracked, eroded. By something beyond reality, beyond human rationality, I had slipped through a fault in time and entered this?thing.

The clicking heels continued to echo, so loudly, so deeply, that it was difficult to determine which direction they were coming from. But listening carefully, I traced the steps to the distant end of a corridor that turned to the right. I moved quickly, quietly, to the door farthest. Those steps, the clicking of the heels, grew murky, remote, but they were there, beyond the door. An unmarked door. Which was unnerving. When I'd checked a minute before, each door had a sign.

Was this a dream? No, not with such continuity. All the details followed in perfect order. I'm in downtown Honolulu, I chased Kiki here. Something's gone whacky, but it's real. I knocked.

The footsteps stopped, the last echo sucked up midair. Silence filled the vacuum.

For thirty seconds I waited. Nothing. I tried the doorknob. And with a low, grating grumble, the door opened inward. Into a room that was dark, tinged with the somber blue of the waning of the day. There was a faint smell of floor wax. The room was empty, with the exception of old newspapers scattered on the floor.

Footsteps again. Exactly four footsteps, then silence.

The sound seemed to emerge from somewhere even farther. I walked toward the window and discovered another door set off to the side. It opened onto a stairwell that went up. I gripped the cold metal handrail, tested my footing, then slowly climbed into what became total black darkness. The stairs rose at a steep pitch. I imagined I could hear sounds above. The stairs ended. I groped for a light switch; there wasn't any. Instead, my hand found another door.

It opened into what I sensed to be a sizable space, perhaps an attic. There was not the total darkness of the stairwell, but it was still not light enough to see. Faint refractions from the glow of the streetlights below stole in through a skylight. I held on to the doorknob.

"Kiki! "I shouted.

There was no response.

I stood still, waiting, not knowing what to do. Time evaporated. I peered into the darkness, ears alert. Slowly, uncertainly, the light filtering into the room seemed to increase. The moon? The lights of the city? I proceeded cautiously into the center of the space.

"Kiki!" I called out again.

No response.

I turned slowly around, straining to see what I could. Odd pieces of furniture were arranged in the corners of the room. Gray silhouettes that might be a sofa, chairs, a table, a chest. Peculiar, very peculiar. The stage had been set as if by centrifuge, surreal, but real. I mean, the furniture looked real. On the sofa was a white object. A sheet? Or the white bag Kiki'd been carrying? I walked closer and discovered that it was something quite different. The something was bones.

Two human skeletons were seated side by side on the sofa. Two complete skeletons, one larger, one smaller, sitting exactly as they might have when they were alive. The larger skeleton rested one arm on the back of the sofa. The smaller one had both hands placed neatly on its lap. It was as if they'd died instantly, before they knew what hit them, their flesh having fallen away, their position intact. They almost seemed to be smiling. Smiling, and incredibly white.

I felt no fear. Why, I don't have the slightest idea, but I was quite calm. Everything in this room was so still, the bones clean and quiet. These two skeletons were extremely, irrevocably dead. There was nothing to fear.

I walked slowly around the room. There were six skeletons in all. Except for one, all were whole. All sat in natural positions. One man (at least from the size, I imagined it was a man) had his line of vision fixed on a television. Another was bent over a table still set with dishes, the food now dust. Yet another, the only skeleton in an imperfect state, lay in bed. Its left arm was missing from the shoulder. I squeezed my eyes shut. What on earth was this? Kiki, what are you trying to show me?

Again, I heard footsteps. Coming from another room, but in which direction? It seemed to have no location at all. As far as I could see, this room was a dead end. There was no other way out. The footsteps persisted, then vanished. The silence that lingered then was so dense it was suffocating. I wiped the sweat from my face with the palm of my hand. Kiki had disappeared again.

I exited through the door I'd entered from. One last glance: the six skeletons glowing faintly in the deep blue gloom. They almost seemed ready to get up and move about once I was gone. They'd switch on the TV, help themselves to hot food. I closed the door quietly, so as not to disturb them, then went back downstairs to the empty office. It was as before, not a soul around, old newspapers scattered on the floor.

I went over to the window and looked down. The streetlights glowed brightly; the same trucks and vans were parked in the narrow thoroughfare. The sun had completely set. Nobody in sight.

But lying on the dust-covered windowsill, I noticed a scrap of paper, the size of a business card. I picked it up and studied it carefully. There was a phone number on it. The paper was fresh, the ink unfaded. Curious. I slipped it in my pocket and went out into the corridor.

I was trying to find the building superintendent to ask about the office, when I remembered Yuki, stranded in the car, in a seedy section of town. How long had I left her there? Twenty minutes? An hour? The sky was sliding info night.

Yuki was dazed, her face buried into the seat, the radio on, when I got back to the car. I tapped on the window, and she unlocked the door.

"Sorry," I said solemnly.

"All kinds of weird people came. They yelled and they banged on the windshield and rocked the car," she said, almost numb. "I was scared out of my mind."

"I'm very sorry."

She looked me in the face. Then her eyes turned to ice. The pupils lost their color, the slightest tremor raced over her features like the surface of a lake rippled by a fallen leaf. Her lips formed unspoken words. Where on earth did you go?

"I don't know," my voice issued from somewhere and blurred out into the distance like those echoing footsteps. I pulled a handkerchief from my pocket and slowly wiped the sweat from my brow. "I don't know."

Yuki squinted and reached out to touch my cheek. Her fingertips were soft and smooth. She sniffed the air around me, her tiny nostrils swelling slightly. She gave me another long look. "You saw something, didn't you?"

I nodded.

"But you can't say what. You can't put it into words. Can't explain, not to anyone. But I can see it." She leaned over and grazed her cheek against mine. "Poor thing," she said.

"How come?" I asked, laughing. There was no reason to laugh, but I couldn't not laugh. "All things considered, I'm the most ordinary guy you could hope to find. So why do these weird things keep happening to me?"

"Yeah, why?" said Yuki. "Don't look at me. I'm just a kid. You're the adult here."

"True enough."

"But I understand how you feel."

"I don't."

"At times like this, adults need a drink."

We went to the Halekulani bar. The one indoors, not the one by the pool. I ordered a martini this time, and Yuki got a lemon soda. We were the only customers in the place. The balding pianist, with a Rachmaninoff scowl, was at the concert grand running through old standards — "Stardust," "But Not for Me," "Moonlight in Vermont." Flawlessly, with lackluster. Then he finished off with a very serious Chopin prelude. Yuki clapped for this, and the pianist forced a smile.

On my third martini, I shut my eyes and that room came to mind again. The sort of scene where you wake up drenched in sweat, relieved that it was just a dream. But it hadn't been a dream. I knew it and so did Yuki. She knew I'd seen something. Those six skeletons. What did they mean? Who were they? Was that one-armed skeleton supposed to be Dick North?

What was Kiki trying to tell me?

I remembered the scrap of paper in my pocket, the scrap of paper I'd found on the windowsill. I went to the phone and dialed the number. No answer. Only endless ringing, like plumb bobs hanging in bottomless oblivion. I returned to my bar stool and sighed. "I'm thinking about going back to Japan tomorrow. If I can get a seat, that is," I said. "I've been here a little too long. It's been great, but time to go back. I've got things I got to clear up back home."

Yuki nodded, as if she'd known this all along. "It's okay, don't worry about me. Go back if you think you should."

"What are you going to do? Stay here? Or do you want to go back with me?"

Yuki shrugged her shoulders. "I think I'll go stay with Mama for a while. I don't think she'd mind. I'm not in the mood to go back yet."

I finished up the last of my martini.

"We'll do this then: I'll drive you out to Makaha tomorrow. That way I get to see your mother one more time. And then I'll head off to the airport."

That night we had our last dinner together at a seafood restaurant near Aloha Tower. Yuki didn't talk much, and neither did I. I was sure I would drift off at any moment, mouth full of fried oysters, to join those skeletons in the attic.

Yuki gave me meaningful glances throughout the meal. After we were done, she said, "You better go home to bed. You look terrible."

Back in my room I poured myself some wine and turned on the television. The Yankees vs. the Orioles. I had no desire to watch baseball, but I left the game on anyway. It was a link to reality.

The wine had its effect. I got sleepy. And then I remembered the slip of paper in my pocket and tried the number again. No answer again. I let the telephone ring fifteen times. I glared at the tube to see Winfield step into the batter's box, when something occurred to me.

What was it? My eyes were fixed on the screen. Something resembled something. Something was connected to something.

Nah, unlikely. But what the hell, check it out. I took the slip of paper and went to get the notepad where June had written her phone number. I compared the two numbers.

Good grief. They were the same.

Everything, everything, was linking up. Except I didn't have a clue what it meant.

The next morning I rang up JAL and booked a flight for the afternoon. I paid our bills, and Yuki and I were on our way to Makaha. For once, the sky was overcast. A squall was brewing on the horizon.

"Sounds like there's a Pacman crunching away at your heart," said Yuki. "Bip-bip-bip-bip-bip-bip-bip-bip." "I don't understand." "Something's eating you."

I thought about that as I drove on. "Every so often I glimpse this shadow of death," I began. "It's a very dense shadow. As if death was very close, enveloping me, holding me down by the ankles. Any minute now it could happen. But it doesn't scare me. Because it's never my death. It's always someone else's. Still, each time someone dies it wears me down. How come?" Yuki shrugged.

"Death is always beside me, I don't know why. And given the slightest opening, it shows itself."

"Maybe that's your key. Maybe death's your connection to the world," Yuki said.

"What a depressing thought," I said.

Dick North seemed sincerely sad to see me leave. Not that we had a great deal in common, but we did enjoy a certain ease with each other. And I respected him for the poetry he brought to practical concerns. We shook hands. As we did, the one-armed skeleton came to mind. Could that really be this man?

"Dick, do you ever think about death? How you might die?" I asked him, as we sat around one last time.

He smiled. "I thought about death a lot during the War. There was death all around, so many ways you could get killed. But lately, no, I don't have time to worry about what I don't have control over. I'm busier in peace than in war," he laughed. "What makes you ask?"

No reason, I told him.

"I'll think about it. We'll talk about it next time we meet," he said.

Then Ame asked me to take a walk with her, and we strolled along a jogging path.

"Thanks for everything," said Ame. "Really, I mean it. I'm not very good at saying these things. But — umm — well, I mean it. You've really helped smooth things out. Yuki and I have been able to talk. We've gotten closer. And now she's come to stay with me."

"Isn't that nice," I said. I couldn't think of anything less banal to say. Of course Ame barely heard me.

"The child seems to have calmed down considerably since she met you. She's not so irritable and nervous. I don't know what it is, but you certainly have a way with her. What do you have in common with her?"

I assured her I didn't know.

What did I think ought to be done about Yuki's schooling?

"If she doesn't want to go to school, then maybe you should think of an alternative," I said. "Sometimes it's bad to force school on a kid, especially a kid like Yuki who's extra sensitive and attracts more attention than she likes. A tutor might be a good idea. I think it's pretty clear Yuki isn't cut out for all this cramming for entrance exams and all the silly competition and peer pressure and rules and extracurricular activities. Some people can do pretty well without it. I'm being idealistic, I know, but the important thing is that Yuki finds her talent and has a chance to cultivate it. Maybe she'll decide to go back to school. That would be okay too, if that's her decision."

"You're right, I suppose," Ame said after a moment's thought. "I'm not much of a group person, never kept up with school either, so I guess I understand what you're saying."

"If you understand, then there shouldn't be anything to think about. Where's the problem?"

She swiveled her head, going from side to side, popping her neck bones.

"There is no problem. I mean, the only problem is, I don't have unshakable confidence in myself as a mother. So I don't have it in me to stand up for her like that. If you lack confidence, you give in. Deep down, you worry that the idea of not going to school is socially wrong."

Socially wrong? "I can't make any reassurances, but who knows what's going to be right or what's going to be wrong? No one can read the future. The results could be devastating. But that could happen either way. I think if you showed the girl that you're really trying — as a mother or as a friend — to make things work with her, and if you showed her some respect, then she'd be sharp enough to pick up on it and do the rest for herself."

Ame stood there, hands in the pockets of her shorts, and was quiet. Then she said, "You really understand how the child feels, don't you? How come?"

Because I wasn't always on another planet, I felt like telling her. But I didn't.

Ame then said she wanted to give me something as an expression of her appreciation. I told her I'd already received more than enough from her former husband.

"But I want to. He's him and I'm me. And I want to thank you. And if I don't now, I'll forget to." "I'd be quite happy if you forgot," I joked. We sat down on a bench, and Ame pulled out a pack of Salems from her shirt pocket. She lit up, inhaled, exhaled. Then she let the thing turn to ash between her fingers. Meanwhile, I listened to the birds singing and watched the gardeners whirring about in their carts. The sky was beginning to clear, though I did hear the faint report of thunder in the distance. Strong sunlight was breaking through thick gray cloud cover. In her sunglasses and short sleeves, Ame seemed oblivious to the glare and heat, although several trails of sweat had stained the neck of her shirt. Maybe it wasn't the sun. Maybe it was concentration, or mental diffusion. Ten minutes went by, apparently not registering with her. The passage of time was not a practical component in her life. Or if it was, it wasn't high on her list of priorities. It was different for me. I had a plane to catch.

"I have to be going," I said, glancing at my watch. "I've got to return the car before I check in."

She made a vague effort to refocus her eyes on me. A look I occasionally noted in Yuki. Like mother, like daughter, after all. "Ah, yes, the time. I hadn't noticed," said Ame. "Sorry."

We got up from the bench and walked back to the cottage.

They all came outside to see me off. I told Yuki to cut out the junk food, but figured Dick North would see to that. Lined up in the rearview mirror as I pulled away, the three of them made a curious sight. Dick waving his one arm on high; Ame staring ahead blankly, arms folded across her chest; Yuki looking off to the side and kicking a pebble. The remnant of a family in a makeshift corner of an imperfect universe. How had I ever gotten involved with them? A left-hand turn of the wheel and they were gone from sight. For the first time in ages I was alone.