hen I got back to the Dolphin Hotel, three female receptionists stood behind the front desk. As ever, they were uniformed in neatly pressed blazers and spotless white blouses. They greeted me with smiles. Yumiyoshi was not among them. Which upset me. Or rather, it tipped over all my hopes. I'd been counting so much on being able to see Yumiyoshi right away that I could hardly pronounce my own name when asked. As a result, the receptionist wavered slightly behind her smile and eyed my credit card suspiciously as she ran a computer check.

I was given a room on the seventeenth floor. I dropped my bag, washed up, and went back down to the lobby. Then I sat on the sofa and pretended to read a magazine, while casting occasional glances at the front desk. Maybe Yumiyoshi was on a break. After forty minutes she still had not shown. Still the same three indistinguishable women with identical hairstyles on duty. After one hour, I gave up.

I went out into town and bought the evening paper. Then I went into a cafe and read the thing from front to back over a cup of coffee, hoping for some article of interest.

There wasn't. Not a thing about either Gotanda or Mei. Notices of other murders, though, other suicides. As I read, I was hoping Yumiyoshi would be standing behind the counter when I got back to the hotel. No such luck.

Had she for some unknown reason suddenly vanished? Walked into a wall? I felt a terrible uneasiness. I tried calling her at home; no answer. Finally I telephoned the front desk. Yumiyoshi had taken "a leave of absence." She'd be back on duty the day after next. Brilliant, I thought, why hadn't I called her before I showed up?

I'd worked myself up into such a state that it hadn't entered my mind to do something as obvious as that. What a dummy! And when was the last time I'd called her anyway? Not once since Gotanda died. And who knows when before that. Maybe not since Yuki threw up on the beach. How long ago was that? I'd forgotten about Yumiyoshi. I had no idea what might have happened with her. And things do happen.

I was suddenly shaken. What if Yumiyoshi had disappeared into a wall, and I'd never see her again? Yes, one more corpse to go. I didn't want to think about it. I started hyperventilating. I had trouble breathing. My heart swelled big enough to burst through my chest. Did this mean I was in love with Yumiyoshi? I had to see her face-to-face to know for sure. I called her apartment, over and over, so many times my fingers hurt. No answer.

I couldn't sleep. I lay in my hotel bed, sweating. I switched on the light and looked at the clock. Two o'clock. Three-fifteen. Four-twenty. After that, I gave up. I sat by the window and watched the city grow light to the beating of my heart.

Yumiyoshi, don't leave me alone. I need you. I don't want to be alone anymore. Without you I'll be flung out to the far corners of the universe. Show your face, please, tie me down somewhere. Tie me to this world. I don't want to join the ghosts. I'm just an ordinary guy. I need you.

From six-thirty in the morning I dialed her apartment at half-hour intervals. To no avail. June in Sapporo is a wonderful time of year. The snow has long since melted, the plains that were frozen tundra a few months earlier are dark and fertile. Life breathes everywhere. The trees are thick with foliage, the leaves sway in the breeze. The sky is high and clear, crisply outlining the clouds. An inspirational season. Yet here I was in my hotel room dialing Yumiyoshi's number like a maniac. She'll be back tomorrow — what was my rush? I must have told myself this every ten minutes. I couldn't wait. Who could guarantee she'd come back tomorrow? I sat by the phone and kept dialing. And then I sprawled out on the bed and stared up at the ceiling.

Here is where the old Dolphin Hotel used to stand. It was the pits of a hotel. Untold others stayed there, stepped in the grooves in the floor, saw the spots on the wall. I sat deep in my chair, feet on the table, eyes closed, picturing the old place. The shape of the front door, the worn-out carpeting, the tarnished brass keys, the corners of window frames thick with dust. I'd walked those halls, opened those doors, entered those rooms.

The old Dolphin Hotel had disappeared. Yet its presence lingered on. Beneath this new intercontinental Dolphin, behind it, within it. I could close my eyes and go in. The cr-cr-crr-creaking of the elevator, like an old dog wheezing. It was still here. No one knew, but it was here. This place was my nexus, where everything tied together. This place is here for me, I told myself. Yumiyoshi had to come back. All I had to do was sit tight and wait.

I had room service bring up dinner, which I accompanied with a beer from the mini-bar. And at eight o'clock I tried Yumiyoshi's number again. No answer again.

I turned on the TV and watched baseball, with the sound off. It was a lousy game. I didn't want to watch baseball anyway. I wanted to see live human bodies in action. Badminton, water polo, anything would have done as well. At nine o'clock I tried calling again. This time, she picked up after one ring. At first I couldn't believe she was actually there. I was cut to the quick, a lump of air stuck in my throat. Yumiyoshi was actually there.

"I just got back this minute," said Yumiyoshi, utterly cool. "I went to Tokyo to see relatives. I called your place twice, but nobody answered."

"I'm up here in Sapporo and I've been calling you like crazy."

"So we nearly missed each other."

"Nearly missed," was all I could bring myself to say, tightly gripping the receiver and peering at the muted TV screen. Words would not come. I was caught off-guard, impossibly confused.

"Hey, are you there? Hello? Hello?"

"I'm here all right."

"Your voice sounds strange."

"I?I'm nervous," I explained. "I've got to see you or I can't talk. I've been on edge all day. I've got to see you."

"I think I can see you tomorrow night," she said after a moment's thought. I could just picture her pushing her glasses up on the bridge of her nose.

Receiver fast to my ear, I lowered myself onto the floor and leaned back against the wall. "Tomorrow's a long way off. I kind of think it'd be better to meet tonight. Right away, in fact."

A negative air came to her voice. Even if that voice hadn't said anything yet, the negative came across. "I'm too tired now. I'm exhausted. I just got back. And since I'm on duty tomorrow morning, tonight I just want to sleep. Tomorrow, after I get off, let's get together. How about that? Or won't you be around tomorrow?"

"No, I'll be here for a while. And I do sympathize with your being tired. Only, honestly, I'm worried. Like maybe by tomorrow you'll have disappeared."

"Disappeared?"

"Disappeared. Vanished." Yumiyoshi laughed. "I don't disappear so easily. I'm not going anywhere."

"No, it's not like that. You don't understand. We keep moving. And as we do, things around us, well, they disappear. I know I'm not entirely coherent, but that's what worries me. Yumiyoshi, I need you. I mean, I really need you. Like I've never needed anything before. Please don't disappear on me."

Yumiyoshi paused for a moment. "Golly," she said. "I promise. I won't disappear. I'll see you tomorrow. So please just wait until then."

"Okay," I said. I had no choice but to be satisfied — though I wasn't — with her assurances.

"Good night then," she said, and hung up.

I paced around the room, then went up to the lounge on the twenty-sixth floor, the lounge where I'd first seen Yuki. The place was crowded. Two young women were drinking at the bar, both very fashionably dressed, one with beautiful legs. I sat, nursing my vodka tonic, and eyed them with no special intentions. Then I turned my gaze to the night skyline. I pressed my fingers to my temples, though I did not have a headache. Then I felt the shape of my skull, slowly tracing the shape of bone matter beneath the skin, imagining the skeletons of the women at the bar. Skull, vertebrae, sternum, pelvis, arms, legs, joints. Beautiful white bones inside those beautiful legs. Pristine, white as clouds, expressionless. Miss Legs looked my way, undoubtedly aware of my stare. I would have liked to explain. That I wasn't looking at her body. That I was only thinking about her bones!

I had three drinks, then returned to my room. Having reached Yumiyoshi at last, I slept like a dream.

Yumiyoshi showed up at three in the morning. The doorbell rang, I turned on the bedside lamp, and looked at the clock. Then throwing on a bathrobe, I went to the door, innocently, three-quarters asleep. I cracked it open. And there she was, in her light blue uniform blazer. She stepped into the room through the narrow opening, like she always did.

She stood in the middle of the room and breathed deeply. Without a sound she removed her blazer and folded it carefully over the back of the chair. The same as ever.

"Well, I haven't disappeared, have I?" was the first thing she said.

"No, it doesn't look like you've disappeared," came my voice from somewhere. I couldn't quite grasp whether this was actually happening or not.

"People don't disappear so easily," she spoke deliberately.

"You just don't know. Lots of things can happen in this world. You name it."

"Perhaps, but I'm here. I haven't disappeared. You do admit that, don't you?"

I glanced around the room and looked Yumiyoshi in the eye. This was real waking reality. "Yes, I admit it. You don't seem to have disappeared. But what brings you to my room at three in the morning?"

"I couldn't sleep," she said. "I went to bed right after you called, but my eyes popped wide open at a little past one and I didn't sleep a wink after that. What you said kind of got to me. So I called a taxi and came here."

"Didn't anyone think it was strange, you showing up at three in the morning?"

"Nobody noticed. Everyone's asleep. The hotel keeps going twenty-four hours, but the only people awake at three A.M. are the front desk and room service. Nobody's hanging around the employees' entrance. And nobody keeps track anyway. You can always say you came to sleep in the sleep room. I've done it plenty of times before."

"You've done this before?"

"Yes, when I couldn't sleep. I come and wander around. I know this sounds strange, but it's very restful. And, well, I like it. No one ever notices. It's not a problem. Of course, if they found me in this room, that's another story. But don't worry, I'll stay until morning and slip out to work. Okay?"

"Of course it's okay by me. What time do you have to be on duty?"

"Eight," she said. "Another five hours."

Yumiyoshi nervously removed her watch and laid it down on the table. Then she straightened her skirt. I sat down on the corner of the bed, having slowly awakened to the circumstances. "So now," said she, "did I hear you say you need me?"

"Like crazy," I said. "I've been all around. I've made a complete revolution. And I've come back to the fact that I need you."

"Like crazy," she reminded me, tugging at the hem of her skirt.

"That's right, like crazy."

"Just where all around have you been?"

"You wouldn't believe it if I told you. I've made it back to reality — that's the important thing. I've come full circle. And I'm still on my feet, dancing."

She looked at me quizzically.

"I can't go into details. Just believe me. I need you. That's very important, to me anyway. Maybe it could be important to you too."

"So what do you want me to do?" said Yumiyoshi, with no change of expression. "Fall into your arms? Be moved to tears? Tell you how wonderful it is to be wanted?"

"No, no, nothing like that," I said quickly, but then couldn't find the right words to go on. As if there were right words. "What can I tell you? I've known it all along and never doubted it. I knew that we would sleep together. Only at first we couldn't. The timing wasn't right. It had to wait until it was right."

"So now I'm supposed to sleep with you? Just like that?"

"I know the argument's short-circuited. And I know it's the worst possible way to convince you. But to be honest, that's what it comes down to. I can't help how the words come out. I mean, with me too, if these were normal circum- stances, I'd try to do things in the proper order. I'm not that much of a dud. But this is a very simple thing, and this approach is truer. I know it. Which is why I can't express it any other way. I've always known that we would sleep together. It's decided, it's fact. And we shouldn't go fiddling around with that. That might ruin everything. Honest!"

Yumiyoshi eyed her watch. "You do realize you're not making much sense, don't you?" she said. Then she sighed and began to unbutton her blouse. "Don't look."

I lay back on the bed and gazed up at a corner of the ceiling. There's another world somewhere, but now I'm here, in this one. Yumiyoshi undressed slowly. I could hear soft sounds of fabric against skin, then the sound of folding. Then the sound of her glasses being set down. A very sexy sound. And then she was turning out the bedside lamp and sliding under the covers next to me. As quietly as she'd stolen into my room.

We touched. Her body and mine. Smooth, but with a certain gravity. Yes, this was real. Unlike with Mei. Mei had been a dream, fantasy, illusion. Cuck-koo. But Yumiyoshi existed in the real world. Her warmth and weight and vitality were real. I caressed her and held her.

Gotanda's fingers trailing down Kiki's back was also illusion. It was acting, light flickering on a screen, a shadow slipping between one world and another. It was not reality. Cuck-koo.

My real fingers were stroking Yumiyoshi's real skin. Yumiyoshi buried her face in my neck. I felt the touch of her nose. I searched out every part of her body. Shoulder, elbow, wrist, palm, the tips of ten fingers. My fingers explored and my lips kissed. Her breasts, her stomach, her sides and back and legs, each form registered and sealed. I needed to be sure. I ran my fingers over her pubis. I moved down and kissed it. Cuck-koo.

We did not speak. We held each other. Her breath was warm and wet. Words that were not words hung in the air. I entered her. I was hard, very hard, and full of desire. Toward climax, Yumiyoshi bit my arm, enough to draw blood. The pain was real. I held her hips and slowly eased into ejaculation. Ever so slowly, sure not to miss a step.

At seven I woke her. "Yumiyoshi, time to get up," I said.

She opened her eyes and looked at me. Then slid out of bed like a fish and stood naked in the morning light. She seemed full of new life, alive. I propped myself on my pillow and admired her. The body I'd registered and sealed a few hours before.

Yumiyoshi showered and brushed her hair with my brush and got dressed. I watched her put on each article of clothing, the care she took doing up each button. Her blazer was next, then she checked in the mirror for wrinkles. She was very serious about these things. Her attitude said "morning." "My makeup is down in my locker," she announced.

"You're beautiful as you are," I said.

"Thanks. But makeup is a part of the job. I don't have a choice."

I gave Yumiyoshi a hug. It was so good to hold her with her glasses and blazer on.

"You still want me, now that it's morning?" she asked.

"I still want you," I said. "I want you more than I wanted you yesterday."

"I've never had anyone want me so much before."

"No one's ever wanted you?"

"Not the way you do," she said. "It's like being in a nice, warm room. Nice and cozy."

"Well, stay put. There's no reason ever to leave."

"Are you going to stay put?"

"Yes, I'm going to stay put."

Yumiyoshi pulled back a bit. "Can I come stay with you again tonight?"

"Absolutely. But aren't the risks too high? Wouldn't it be better if I went to your place or stayed in another hotel?"

"No," she said, "I like it here. This is your place, and it's also my place. I want to make love with you here. That is, if it's all right with you."

"I want to make love with you wherever you like." "Okay, I'll see you this evening. Here." Then she cracked the door open and slipped away.

I felt happy. Yes, I felt happy. And then I wondered if, maybe, it was time to give up the shoveling habit. Do some writing for myself for a change. Without the deadlines. Something for myself. Not a novel or anything. But something for myself.