Tokyo K.O.

Tokyo K.O. part 4

I knew now what I had to do. 

Miki may have checkmated me with the spare key I leant her... but I wasn't having it! I wasn't falling for that shit, no way! I would punch through the night with a bottle of rum and drink on straight until I the morning train. Maybe then, I'd catch a shower at the gym and nice breakfast.

"Tell you what," I said. "I've changed my mind. I want to buy a drink for Sinatra over there and get me a bottle."

"Pardon? I can't hear you over the music..." she said, leaning in close to take my order, so close I could almost feel her hair on my face.

"A bottle. A bottle of rum! And the drink whatever!"

"Okay." she said, standing up straight now and looking at me quizzically.

"But you have to do me a favour. See this guy over here?" She nodded that she did. Pour him one and just start a conversation with him. He speaks less English than you do Japanese for sure, but he wants to learn. He even told me he was too damn shy to talk with you."

"Really?" she replied, her demeanor lightening visibly.

"He's the perfect person for you to practice with, a virtual beginner like yourself. Just keep him busy for a while, so I can...do my thing in my own company," I say cryptically. She looks at me strangely, like I might be the type of person to self harm.

"I just want to be on my own right now. Broke up with my girlfriend; it's a long story. I just want to drink myself stupid tonight. Okay?"

"I'm sorry," she said, looking as if she might be beginning to regret her curiosity.

"Don't be. We're two very different people and our relationship has become more of a habit than has a relation urp, reltion. Relationship of lovers. You know what I mean? Hell, tonight I'm a party of one, my wallet's open and I'm celebrating being single again!"

Clearly the booze was seeping into my tongue as much as it had my head. In any case, she thanks me and bounds off to the counter to fix the drinks.

I take a seat another table a little further off, and closing my eyes, I let them roll back into the rubber landscape of my face a few minutes, savoring the dull sunshine of my dying buzz, but feeling content, at least, in the moment. I would have the drink I wanted and maybe even finally kick it up a notch. I listen with satisfaction to the sound of my drink being placed down on the table in front of me. I thank her with a smile and she thanks me. Squinting, I see before me a lovely whiskey on ice which I raise in the air to toast myself properly this time, seeing my own self-satisfied smirk in the reflection of my cup.

"Alone at la..!"

It suddenly occurs to me. Where's the bottle? I look around and I realize,.. she has fucked up the fucking order! With slow creeping horror, I look in the direction of Sinatra, just in time to see his surprised reaction as Mara places my bottle in front of him and points over in my direction. She's fucked up the order and given him my bottle instead of a drink! I close my slack jaw and smile feebly, attempting to turn away and look occupied by my phone, but there is no going back now. My anonymity in this snack bar is ruined. I can already hear his reaction in the background.

"Sugoi,..na? naaande?" he is taken aback and flattered by my false generosity. I can hear a flurry of conversation at the table and see a couple of guests looking over from the periphery of my vision.

Sinatra stops Mamasan on the way to the stage and points toward me. She nods and smiles, both now looking over in my direction. Beside them I see Mara, uncertainty spreading across her face as it dawns on her that I don't look happy and something has gone wrong.

The crowd politely applauds as some old bent fossil, hobbles off the stage and hands the microphone to Mamasan, who in turn announces she will be doing a duet with a good friend and long standing client, handing a second microphone over to Sinatra.

"This ahhh...fora my new friendo," says Sinatra, reiterating much more eloquently in Japanese, how flattered he is to make friends, and how he wished to dedicate this classic song to a generous new acquaintance from far away.

A new level of cringe crystalizes in my face, as I suddenly become the object of much attention, with numerous other customers at the snack bar, careening their necks to look back, smiling and raising their glasses in toast.

No fucking way, I think, as I hear the first few bars of that song - that infernal love song, Miki once dedicated to me. That love song that clung to me like a curse! - Love Letter from Canada. For a brief moment, I see Mara look over at me, silently shrugging her shoulders and flashing me a queasy smile that suggested she was sorry.

Too late. Now I feel compelled to play along, like I'm flattered and grateful, nodding along, my fake demeanor at an absolute peak of artifice and falsitude as a bottle is brought to my table courtesy of Sinatra and Mamasan. It is literally at that moment that I gave up on the idea of being anonymous. Really, what else could I do? At least I knew I was getting good and wrecked that night.

I don't remember a lot about what happened next. I remember Sinatra's friends inviting me over to their table and I think I even had a good time, once I gave into it. I think I might have even got up on stage to sing something, though I don't remember what it was. Even Mara, seemed to relax and the next thing you know she and Sinatra were making plans to see each other before work the next day. Funny how it is, you can sometimes let it all go in the company of strangers, while the people closest to you can sometimes be the biggest stone around your neck.

I must have blacked out at some point in the bar, because the next thing I know, I'm sitting on the floor and Mamasan is asking if I'm alright. I assure her that I am and she tells me she wants me to come back some night so we can talk more about Vancouver. And then she parts in her fake furs and fake smile, leaving her staff to lock up. And then everything is black, until my hands feel the cold rough surface of cement. I'm sitting on the curbside of a street puking my guts out in the gutter. Sinatra, Mara and other Japanese hostess are standing above me discussing what to do with me. Someone asks if they could spare a futon, but Mara lives with a host family, the other hostess with her parents and Sinatra doesn't think his wife would allow it either. They insist on calling me a taxi, but I refuse, plucking up enough energy to mumble that I will take the train to work as soon as it starts running.

I remember stumbling, leaning on Sinatra, my feet dragging at moments until we finally arrive at the station. I remember them asking, if I'm sure I'll be okay. I wave them away with exaggerated gesture and a slurred smile, telling them not to worry, keeping it together long enough to weave my way to the platform. And then I'm lying on a bench and the whole universe is spinning, spinning, spinning to that song, that infernal song and I'm feeling dizzy again. I suddenly become aware that I am drooling and wipe my mouth clean with the back of my hand. I slowly lower the fingers, reaching down and touching the cold, platform tiles. The world stops spinning for a moment and I find myself again. Smirking with self-satisfaction I raise a pretend glass of nothing in the air and make a toast to myself, to the single life!

"Alone at last...Alone at last!"