Piercing

Free Piercing by Ryu Murakami Page A

Book: Piercing by Ryu Murakami Read Free Book Online
Authors: Ryu Murakami
Tags: Fiction, General
all these words were slipping off into darkness and memories were rising to take their place. This was the scariest part - the sudden anticipation of the Nightmare to come. Once the Nightmare began, of course, there wouldn’t even be anything you could recognise as fear.
    My make-up, she thought. I’ve got to fix my make-up.
    Kawashima didn’t know what was happening to the girl, but something was, and it was unnerving to watch. Had he made her angry by laughing at the masturbation act and then shouting at her? Her face was a blank mask, and her eyes seemed to bob freely in their sockets, focused on nothing. He was about to say something to her when she suddenly reached for the handbag at her feet, placed it on her lap, dug around inside, and extracted a tube of lipstick. She then calmly proceeded to apply it to her lips, peering into a compact she held in her left hand. So she’s not angry, he thought, feeling mildly relieved. He didn’t notice the tip of the lipstick trembling, or the resulting slightly uneven line.
    She put the lipstick and compact back in her bag and stood up.
    ‘I’ll just take a shower,’ she said.
    There was something different about her voice now too.
    ‘Will you let me tie you up after that?’
    ‘Anything you like!’ she said and giggled. Tucking the handbag under her arm she made her way to the bathroom, went inside, and shut the door behind her.
     
    What was she doing in there? Thirty minutes had passed since the girl had painted her lips red and disappeared into the bathroom. Kawashima had carefully and repeatedly wiped the Cola can clean of any fingerprints, and all the implements necessary for the ritual were in place. He’d already put on a new pair of leather gloves and unwrapped the knife and ice pick, picturing the girl’s slender legs as he did so. Her waist would be slender too, her stomach flat. He’d bought the longest ice pick he could find - the metal part was fifteen or sixteen centimetres long - and it might just pierce all the way through her. His intention had been to tie her to the sofa, but he’d better rethink that or he wouldn’t be able to see the point of the ice pick protruding out of her back. To suspend her from the ceiling, with just the tips of her toes touching the floor, would be ideal, but it wouldn’t be possible in this room. There was nothing to attach a rope to.
    His heartbeat quickened as these thoughts raced through his mind. He was leaning against the wall in the vestibule outside the bathroom now, taking the gloves off and putting them back on and growing agitated. What the hell was she doing in there - shampooing, maybe?
    What bothered him most was the faraway look he’d seen in the girl’s eyes. Those restless, disconnected, oddly glazed eyes. It seemed to Kawashima that he’d met a woman with eyes like that before, but he didn’t try to remember who she was. He had nothing but unpleasant memories of all the women in his past, with the single exception of Yoko.
    ‘You all right in there?’ he said, knocking on the bathroom door.
    I’m fine! came the reply. Just a little while longer! The voice was high-pitched and the intonation oddly warped, like a cassette tape coming unreeled. He could still hear the shower.
    My lipstick’s crooked, Chiaki had thought when she first looked in the bathroom mirror. You have to take extra special care with lipstick. She rubbed violently at her mistake with a tissue, pressing hard enough almost to bruise her lips, but they’d already lost the capacity to feel anything. She took off her dress, folded it, shook it out and refolded it several times before setting it on the counter next to the sink, then went through the same routine with her slip. She turned on the shower and slowly twisted the handle from C to H until the air filled with steam, then felt the water with her hand and gave a little cry. It was scalding. She turned the handle slowly back towards C before checking the temperature again,

Similar Books

Honor Crowned

Michael G. Southwick

The Price of Silence

Camilla Trinchieri

Glamour

Louise Bagshawe

The Story Traveller

Judy Stubley

The Merchant Adventurer

Patrick E. McLean

Touched by a Vampire

Beth Felker Jones