A Cop's Eyes (10 page)

“How did it go?” Yabusawa, who was standing in the hallway, asked as they exited the interrogation room.

“He wouldn't admit to it.”

“I see—should we have someone else try?”

Nagamine slumped his shoulders and headed to the assembly hall. “What do you think?” he asked Natsume, who was walking beside him.

“Hard to say … But he seems like a far cry from ‘the manliest person I'd ever met' whom Ms. Sakurai spoke of.”

“They say don't judge a book by its cover, though.”

“They do, don't they? Don't judge a book by its cover.” Natsume halted, turned to him, and invited, “Can we go test that out?”

With an intent look, Natsume headed on toward the stairs.

“Hey, what is this about?!” Nagamine hollered, realizing that they'd come to the boxing gym.

“Times like these, we need to blow some steam,” Natsume said innocently, tugging on Nagamine's sleeve.

“Don't test me. It's almost time for the investigation meeting!” he yelled pointing to his wristwatch, but Natsume dragged him into the gym heedlessly.

The guy was messing around with him, damn it.

“Oh, the detectives from the other day. Do you have something you need?” the manager called to them as they entered the gym.

“Is Ms. Aikawa taking today off?” Natsume asked, looking around.

“She's doing roadwork right now.”

“I see.” Natsume stepped up to a sandbag and displayed some nimble footwork.

“Detective, you've got talent,” the manager said, admiring his movements.

“Youthful follies. I dabbled in it a bit while I was a student.”

“Amateur boxing, huh.”

“I might not look it, but I did come in third in my prefecture once.”

“In that case, why don't you try hitting it?”

The manager gave Natsume a pair of gloves. He took off his jacket and put them on. With an animated expression he'd never shown to Nagamine, he started hitting the sandbag.

Observing the man's moves, Nagamine bought that Natsume was no ordinary amateur. As a detective, however, the guy was below amateurish, he thought bitterly.

“Do you have some business with me?”

He turned around to find Miu, who'd returned from roadwork, standing there.

It was Natsume who replied, “No … not really. I just wanted to exercise my body since it's been a while.”

“This detective apparently boxed when he was a student. He says he was once third in his prefecture. No wonder his footwork is good.”

“Oh …”

Miu went to another sandbag without showing much interest.

“Hey, Miu—” Puma Asami, who'd been practicing up in the ring, called to her. “Care to be my sparring partner for a bit?”

“No … Sorry, but I'll pass.”

“Tsk, coward,” Asami snorted. She left the ring and went upstairs.

Miu seemed to be biting back her chagrin. With a sharp gaze aimed at the sandbag, she started hitting it.

“Ms. Aikawa—” Natsume called to Miu, who stopped moving and faced him. “Would you spar with me?”

Holy—what was he thinking? She was a woman.

“Detective, that's a little …” the manager balked at this, too.

“Maybe we shouldn't,” Natsume said to stir her up.

The mocking look he was directing at Miu made Nagamine wonder. He'd thought of his partner as a correct sort until now, but was he actually mean-spirited?

“Sounds like fun.” Miu put on headgear and got up into the ring. “In exchange, no pulling punches.”

“Of course.”

The manager, who'd been fretting, seemed to resign himself and put headgear on Natsume. “Only one round, then.”

What was Natsume thinking? What was he getting out of this?

The difference in their frames was manifest. Miu was twice as slender as Natsume and then some. Even her chest was flat, and she looked like a boy. There was also a considerable height difference.

Miu said they weren't to pull any punches, but she probably thought they were fooling around.

But when the gong sounded, Natsume moved in ferociously. Without a hint of hesitation, he landed sharp punches all over Miu's face and body.

The manager, of course, and the other trainees gazed at the ring in shock.

Miu, who hadn't been able to counterattack at all, swiveled and escaped to Natsume's back. The moment he turned around, she lay one into his torso. Natsume doubled over and paused for a moment. Immediately, with magnificent footwork, she treated his face to an upper cut.

Reversing his disadvantage in a second, Natsume slammed his fist into Miu's own face next. Fresh blood flew from her nose, but instead of circling to his back, she sent punches into his body and chin. The sound of creaking flesh resounded through the gym. It was a fierce exchange of blows—

The gong sounded, and suddenly they stopped. They each moved back to their opposite corners.

When Miu took off her headgear, her face was flushed a bright red. Her shoulders heaved as she used a towel to wipe the blood dripping from her nose.

Natsume, in the corner right in front of Nagamine, was also completely out of breath and had a nosebleed.

“Detective—” Miu drew closer and threw Natsume the towel she had used. “You've got it in you.”

“You too—if you went pro, there's no mistaking you'd be a champion.”

“And what's that worth, a women's boxing champ …”

“Does your mother know that you're boxing?”

“Of course not. She's the type who says women need to be ladylike. If she saw me like this she'd faint.” Miu laughed, then exited the ring and went upstairs.

Natsume wiped his face with the towel, then got down from the ring as well. The manager and trainees were throwing questioning looks at him.

“Sorry for troubling you.”

Jacket in hand, Natsume left the gym.

“What were you thinking?! She's a woman. Why didn't you go easy on her?”

“That would have been rude to someone who'd asked for a real match.”

What did he mean—

“But now, I'm convinced.”

With her hat low over her eyes, a pair of jeans, and a casual shirt, Miu walked into the train station at Mejiro. She took the Yamanote line and got off at Ikebukuro. Concealed amidst the surge of people, he and Natsume continued to follow Miu.

What in the world was Natsume thinking?

If they neglected to attend the investigation meeting, Yabusawa and the other chiefs would tell them off. Frustrated, Nagamine looked at his watch.

After passing through the JR gate, Miu entered a restroom in the station. Natsume stopped and watched intently.

After about ten minutes, she abruptly walked out. Pushing her way through the wave of people, she crossed the station compound.

“Kai—” Natsume called, to which a woman turned.

She looked fashionable, had long hair, and wore a skirt. As she gazed at him, her expression stiffened.

Studying the woman's face for his part, Nagamine was shocked. Although it was hard to tell immediately with her makeup, the person in front of him was, without a doubt upon close inspection, Miu. Even her chest seemed larger, as though she'd put on padding.

“I'd like to talk to you a bit more …” Natsume said, accosting her.

“At a police station, I presume?”

“Yes.”

“I have two conditions.”

“What would they be?”

“I'll talk to you. I don't want to talk to a person who wouldn't understand.”

“And the other?”

“May I change? I can't relax looking like this. I have to dress up this way for my mom back home.”

Nagamine watched Miu's face, and Natsume's back, from beside the interrogation room door.

He was a little irked that he'd been relegated to writing the report while the jurisdictional detective took charge of the questioning, but it was a promise to Miu and couldn't be helped.

“You're Kai, Ayano's lover, right?” Natsume began.

“What the hell?” Nagamine said, standing up.

“You be quiet for a bit, okay? I'll tell you everything. I've accepted it. I won't run or hide.”

At Miu's words, he meekly sat back down.
You better tell us
,
he thought as he glanced at her bosom, which was now flat.

“A chest binder?” Natsume asked her.

“Yes. I hate having breasts, so at work and at the gym, I wear one.”

“Gender dysphoria,” Natsume said.

Miu nodded. “You got it. I'm FTM.”

When your body's sex is in disharmony with your conscious gender, you suffer from gender dysphoria, and FTM means being female in body but identifying as male, Miu explained.

“Way back from when I was still a kid, I had vague doubts about being a woman. I hated having long hair and wearing skirts, and the people I liked were always women. By the time I was in high school I was convinced that I was gender dysphoric, but couldn't tell anyone. Ever since I was little, my parents always wanted me, their only child, to be ladylike … But it became hopelessly difficult, and just when I was trying to confess to my parents, my dad died in an accident. My mom was horribly shocked and I couldn't worry her any more, so I ended up not being able to tell her I was gender dysphoric. For twenty-six years, I always felt alone.”

“You met her one year ago.”

“Yeah … when Ayano was being harassed by a weird man near my house and I tried to help her. But instead, I got beat up by Kamiya … Ayano brought me to her apartment and treated me. She was really concerned about the wounds on my face, so I told her it was a medal and laughed. And I confessed about the true me for the first time.”

“Then you started dating her.”

Miu nodded. “Even though I'd fessed up, I thought it wasn't meant to be, but unexpectedly, Ayano said she liked me. After that … I busted my ass to become a man who could protect Ayano. I trained my body, and mentally, I did my fucking best to become a guy she could always rely on. Because I loved Ayano.
Because it was the first time I had someone who was so dear to me. I thought Ayano also loved me in the same way. But I guess I was wrong …” Miu shrugged his shoulders with a lonely expression.

“That night, while doing roadwork, you saw Mr. Kaitani leave her condominium, is that right?”

“Yeah. I immediately went up to her room. I wanted to know why Kaitani had been in her condo. Then, when I looked around her room and found the condom, I tore into her. No wonder decent men ignored such a slut, I cursed her. Then Ayano got fired up too and said, ‘Who're you to be blaming me?' Ayano came closer and exposed herself in her bathrobe and spat at me, ‘Then satisfy me. Satisfy me completely. You can't even do that, so don't just blame me.' It was humiliating. That's the moment when my pride, which was always teetering, crumbled.”

“That was when you pushed her onto the bed and strangled her.”

“My mind went blank and I don't remember much … But I remember trying my damned best to choke back tears.”

“Even from my viewpoint, I think you were pretty manly. That pride of yours set you apart from lowlifes who're violent toward women and cause them harm.”

And what's that worth, a women's boxing champ
—

What Miu had said at the gym came back to Nagamine as he listened to Natsume. Maybe what those words meant was that as a man, Miu didn't want to be hitting women.

“I'd loved for you to have upheld that pride,” Natsume said.

“Right …” Miu hung his head. “May I ask something?”

“Go ahead.”

“How did you … figure me out?”

“At first it was just a suspicion. When Detective Nagamine called you a ‘tomboy,' you lost your temper. However, to me that seemed a little strange. A woman who moves heavy packages as
her job, and who boxes, should be used to such comments and would have learned to ignore them. But your anger was disproportionate. A tomboy ‘acts like a boy, even though she's a girl.' I thought perhaps the ‘even though' bit ticked you off. Up until a little while ago I still wasn't confident, but I thought I'd ask your body.”

“And … what did it tell you?”

“That gut punch was eloquent. I felt certain that your heart and soul were as unmistakably male as my own.”

“I've gotta say, I had a bad feeling from the moment we sparred.”

“In addition … If Ayano's lover turned out to be you, it made sense that she'd move to Ikebukuro despite the risk of encountering Mr. Kamiya. Your workplace and gym are both near Ikebukuro. She must have wanted to spend as much time with you as possible.”

“Yeah … this past year was a special time in my life. If only I hadn't witnessed that,” Miu sighed heavily.

“Did you take her cellphone because you'd be traced as a person she knew?”

“The texts would instantly tell you what sort of relationship we were in. I took it because I saw on TV or somewhere that even if they're deleted, the contents can be restored in the hands of the police.”

Listening to Miu's response, Natsume nodded.

“Why ‘Kai'?” Nagamine couldn't help asking.

Natsume glanced at him, then looked back at Miu and guessed, “Miu is a very feminine name. You must have thought that there'd be a disparity between even a nickname like Mii and the manly person you were trying to become. Mi-u … U-mi … 
Umi
as in ‘the sea' … whose alternative reading is
Kai
 … You probably went through that thought process to come up with your masculine nickname …”

Miu's shoulders drooped, as though he'd been completely trounced. “Wow …”

“Apparently, she had said to acquaintances about you, ‘He'd protect me with his life. He's the manliest person I've ever met.' At the same time, she said that although she loved you to death, perhaps it wasn't meant to be … There are many ways to protect your dear ones, I think. Was what happened the only possible conclusion for you two?”