I OFTEN CHANGE hiding places in order not to be identified with one particular spot. I cover my tracks. A moving target in a dazzling city. That should tell you just how disappointed I was when Mr. Mishima changed our meeting to a Japanese restaurant, rejecting my small, intimate café on Rue St-Denis where you can see without being seen. I hadn’t created all these identity displacements just to end up in a Japanese restaurant with Japanese people. In any case, that tells you a lot about the capacity of people to imagine the world, even those who are paid to be more curious than the rest of us. For them, the universe is narrowed down to their mental space and their petty diplomatic chicanery. They intend to die in the spot where they had their first shit. As you can see, I’m in a foul mood this morning. God! All that for nothing. I’m pissing and moaning but it’s far from over. And here I’d pictured our meeting in a restaurant other than Japanese. Chinese, for example. A Japanese guy in a Chinese restaurant is more interesting. And in a Korean restaurant—that’s practically subversive. There are so many sushi bars these days, they must sprout up overnight. How would I recognize two Japanese businessmen in a room full of Japanese businessmen? Two moon-shaped faces were shooting wide smiles in my direction from the back of the room. The same black suits, the same haircuts, the same smiles. Which was Mr. Mishima? Where was Mr. Tanizaki? I decided not to try telling them apart.
They both rose at the same time.
“I am Mr. Mishima, Japanese vice-consul. Officially, I am the cultural attaché, but I have no well-defined responsibilities. At the consulate, everyone does what he can. I am embarrassed to receive you so modestly.”
Nervous laughter.
“And I am his assistant, Mr. Tanizaki.”
“Please sit down,” Mr. Mishima told me.
Maybe it was Mr. Tanizaki who actually said that; I wasn’t paying attention to individual identity. I sat down. I wasn’t going to wait for their permission. Though actually, Mr. Tanizaki (or Mr. Mishima) monitored my seating arrangements with obsessive concern; he seemed on guard for the slightest detail that might compromise my comfort. He was like an entomologist slipping a black insect into a handsome lacquered case. Black was the establishment’s prime color. The tables, chairs, plates and tablecloths were black, while the knives and forks were red. Quite suddenly, Mr. Mishima demanded we be moved to another table. Since all the tables were taken, he wanted to change places with me. I had to assure him I was just fine where I was. But he wasn’t satisfied. He turned to Mr. Tanizaki, who immediately jumped to his feet to give me his seat, which offered a view of the street. Okay, okay. The charades continued until Mr. Mishima was completely convinced that everything had been done to ensure maximum comfort for me. I knew this was his courteous, Asian way of making me feel welcome, but it really wasn’t my style. Maybe they were expecting me to make a similar effort; I had no idea. No—they’re the thousand-year-old refined culture, whereas I represent savage young America. I sucked in my stomach, jammed my knees together and hunched my shoulders in order to enjoy the small space allotted to me. A compact kind of happiness. I looked around the place and saw it was designed for a certain size of person, as if they wanted to discourage larger formats—black American basketball players, for example.
“Do you like the restaurant?” Mr. Tanizaki asked me.
“It’s fine,” I said, in a neutral tone.
“I am happy it pleases you,” Mr. Mishima said, smiling. “Other places of this kind have no resemblance to a real restaurant in Tokyo.”
That’s another thing I detest: authenticity. A real restaurant. Real people. Real things. Real life. Nothing more fake than that. Life itself is a construct.
“Do you like sushi?”
“No.”
I decided to keep my bad mood a while longer. They looked totally lost. It’s true, if the guest doesn’t like sushi, his tastes can cause problems in a Japanese restaurant.
“I don’t like fish.”
Which is completely untrue.
“Oh, I see,” said Mr. Mishima, astonished that anyone could dare not to like fish. But he did his best to hide his disappointment.
“I’m not allergic to fish, and I’m not a vegetarian. I just can’t agree with the idea of eating fish. In my opinion, it’s just not a good practise.”
“Fortunately, Japanese cuisine offers more than fish,” Mr. Mishima said in a quiet voice.
“In any case, we would have found something else to eat,” Mr. Tanizaki chimed in quickly.