"Good morning, the time is now 12:30 A.M.," said a robotic-sounding woman's voice in Japanese. There followed the tinny noise of a rooster's crowing that awakened Jake out of his slumber. As the woman's voice started to repeat her greeting his right hand shot out in the darkness, knocking over the plastic alarm clock. He sat up on his futon and raised his hands blindly above his head, fumbling for the pull-down cord connected to the overhead lamp. The cord evaded his first couple of swipes before dancing into his hand. Yanking on it caused a small explosion of pain to register behind his closed eyelids at the intrusion of the alien light.

He stumbled bleary eyed to the bathroom and dropping his trousers, squatted over the benjo-concave porcelain toilet embedded in the tiled floor. Shit squat he thought to himself and snorted. It was the endearing name the Japanese used for his present position. Still he found the benjo preferable to the new breed of hi- tech toilets popular in Japan such as the Washlet Multi Function Toilet. A computerized and deodorizing bidet, the Washlet squirts an adjustable stream of water at its users most private parts, then blows them dry. Forced to use one on several occasions, he could never get over the novelty of the experience.

Inches away from his face sat the grimy bathroom wall, festooned with graffiti. He had already discovered with some dismay he could almost complete the entire shower, shit, and shave routine without moving more than a foot in any one direction in the cramped bathroom.

* * *

Toweling off after a brief shower, he opened the tiny window to clear the air, taking in the view the hotel backed onto, miles and miles of congested freeway. Elevated on towering concrete piers, the freeway seemed to loop and swirl off into infinity. From his room twelve floors up, the drivers below resembled Lego-land characters during the daytime, speeding past in their shiny parade of small cars; Isuzus, Suzukis, Mazdas and Daihatsus. Leaving the steamy room he walked over to the kitchenette and grabbed a can of Jive coffee out of the otherwise empty mini-fridge. He had purchased the coffee earlier from a row of tall metal vending machines that stood side by side outside his hotel like a row of oversized dominoes.

If he had been so inclined he could also have purchased a bizarre array of other consumer products from the same row of vending machines which included among their selection; beer, cigarettes, goldfish food and women's used panties. Cracking the can open he gulped the cold brown liquid down, not really enjoying the coffee's stale taste but welcoming the shot of caffeine into his system.

He had rented a room at Jessica's last known address, The Plaza One Hotel on the outskirts of Roppongi. The hotel was a dilapidated seventies-era concrete shell; mainly used by the local population of prostitutes and drug addicts, but it had served its purpose. By asking around he had been able to meet up with some of the working girls who had known Jessica. They had provided him with the tip off about her pusher dealing in Ueno Park.

Dressing in jeans and a black leather jacket, he grabbed his room keys and headed out the door, catching his reflection in the small mirror on the wall opposite. For the past two weeks he had been working the hours of a vampire. Observing his ghostly pale face he realized he was starting to look the part. In terms of the world he was trying to explore, daytime was wasted time, a mere adjunct to the lives of the nocturnal populace who inhabited the Mizu Shobai, the water trade which comprised the whole gamut of Japan's seedy nightclubs, bars and brothels.

* * *

The taxi he had taken from his hotel pulled over on the broad traffic choked boulevard of Yasukuni Dori Avenue. The heavily trafficked roadway separated the red light district of Kabukicho from the rest of Shinjuku, one of Tokyo's busiest commercial, entertainment and business hubs. Aside from the fare he hadn't wanted the cab ride to end. Being driven fast late at night amidst the surging traffic on the four lane elevated expressway 5 into central Tokyo was an exhilarating experience; riding over the top of the city's sprawling prefectures and wards, illuminated beneath by thousands of pinpoints of light. As the cab had entered Tokyo's immense cityscape of neon and electric signage it hadn't been hard to imagine that he was in the flow of some colossal artery pumping into the heart of Japan.

Paying the driver he got out, momentarily dazed as he stood there absorbing the Technicolor onslaught of images that emitted from the mammoth digital screens hanging off the walls of buildings like postmodern artworks in some giant cyber gallery. One o'clock in the morning and Kabukicho was frenetically alive, a chaotic blur of light, sound and people making him feel as if the area had harnessed all of Tokyo's adrenaline into its streets: it was Tokyo on speed. As he stepped up onto the crowded footpath the fierce spasms of flashing light bulbs surrounding every conceivable sign and shop front burned their afterimages on his retinas.

He started walking along the main strip on the lookout for Black Cat. Eaves and walls of nearby buildings dripped with lurid pink and purple neon signage, advertising the local clubs, strip bars and pornography emporiums. Spaces not consumed by neon were taken up with billboards and electronics ads for products like Suntory Whiskey, Asahi Dry Beer and Camel cigarettes. Even in Kabukicho he noticed the Japanese fetish for uniforms was apparent. Longhaired, heavily made up girls in matching pink bikinis, heels and see-through cellophane waistcoats stood outside their club's doors, letting out high-pitched wails of invitation to the passers by, their voices distorted through heavily amplified sound systems.

Not that he thought the girls' appearance stood out in a country which seemed to adore over-the-top uniforms. He guessed it arose from the psyche of a nation steeped in conformity but influenced by a modern love for technology and pop culture. Whatever the reasons, he often found the resultant outcome pretty fucking weird as garbage men worked the streets looking like they'd walked out of an episode of Astroboy and parking attendants dressed up like earth-bound star-fleet commanders in pompous military style garb.

Vying for his attention, the cacophonous mixture of dance music blaring out of open bar doors and the clamor erupting from shiny Pachinko gambling parlors almost drowned out the club girls' enthusiastic screams. Alongside him, walked the usual chaotic mixture of people that places like Kabukicho attracted. Foreign tourists, with bum bags strapped to their waists and freshly purchased Nikon cameras slung over their shoulders rubbernecked their way up the sidewalk next to crowds of drunken Japanese salarymen, staggering along like ants sprayed with insecticide. Parties of young Tokyo revelers mixed in with the local population of prostitutes, weirdoes, drug users and homeless. Gangs of noisy leather and denim-clad bikers lounged around next to their imported Harley Davidson Hogs, tilted on their kickstands in long rows of gleaming chrome and metal alongside the busy street. Hawkers for the local clubs dressed in flashy satin jackets stood outside their black-windowed establishments heckling passersby. He heard one of them call out in broken English to him, "Harro there! Come see our girl show, they do ping pong, bananas, razor brades, carigrafree, open steegi, no entry fee."

Ignoring the hawker's pitch he walked on. Benkei had told him about open steegi. It was Japanese for open stage meaning that the audience was invited to get in on the live sex act and participate with the performers. A bit like karaoke Benkei had helpfully suggested.

His first impression as he made his way down the main strip was that Kabukicho was an evil place. Beneath the façade of bright lights and good times he sensed an almost palpable atmosphere of darkness about it. Many of Kabukicho's inhabitants seemed to embody that darkness. Yakuza gangsters, identifiable by the heavy irezumi tattoos snaking down their arms stood sentinel outside the open doors of brothels, emanating silent menace.

He had to admit to himself the chances of survival of the young charge he was looking for were getting slimmer the more he discovered about the destructive life she had been living. In the weeks prior, with Benkei's assistance, he had uncovered a string of legitimate hostess bars in the more up-market Roppongi area Jessica had been sacked from. During brief conversation with the Mama-san's of these establishments, they had all cited her serious drug use as the contributing factor to her retrenchment. He figured Kabukicho was just going to be another stop off she had taken on her downward spiral.

By now he could see the tall column of neon signage for Black Cat which ran down the length of the two-story black glass building it occupied. A ratty looking Japanese man in a cheap tuxedo standing in the club's doorway encouraged him to enter, dandruff on his oily slicked-back hair made all the more apparent by the bars of fluorescent lighting hanging above his head.

As he approached, the doorman smiled knowingly at him, "Come in, come in, many girl for you, live show," the man said, opening the black-glassed doors.

Before Jake walked inside, he glanced at a notice board hanging off the wall beside the door. It was a menu of sorts, crammed with Kodak snapshots showing young Japanese women in various states of undress with the hourly rates for the girls, conveniently converted for overseas currencies, placed next to the photos. A sticker above the snaps proudly proclaimed that they accepted AMEX and all other major credit cards. He scanned the photos and felt a flare of hope arise when he saw the name of the woman he had been advised to contact, Maya, scrawled in text underneath the picture of a strikingly beautiful longhaired Japanese woman. Her face was cast in a peculiar melancholic smile that reminded him of the Mona Lisa. Something about that smile touched him, held him there mesmerized as if in one look she had managed to express some ineffable secret to him of who she was. Maya, how do I know you? He wondered, gazing at her photo.

* * *

Inside the dark smoky club, a Japanese waitress dressed in a Playboy bunny-suit complete with fishnet stockings, fluffy tail and pointy ears, showed him to a booth. She guided him through the dark with a small torch whose beam momentarily shone on the passing vision of the clubs patrons; mainly Japanese salarymen, entangled with scantily clad hostesses. Some of the men appeared to be simply drinking but others had half-naked hostesses straddling their laps or with their heads buried in the men's crotch. As he took his seat the waitress put a large menu down on the tacky Plexiglas table in front of him which as well as food and drinks included photos of the club's girls. Numbers and names were listed next to the photos. Turning the menu's page over he found the same striking picture of Maya neatly listed as number fourteen.
"Is Maya, number fourteen, available?" he asked.

"Eh...Numba fawteen...Yes, I bring for you," the waitress replied.

"Great. Could you send over some sake for us both," he said, raising his voice to be heard over the dance music they had blaring at an annoying volume. Bowing briefly in reply the waitress minced off on her heels. Through the haze of smoke that hung in the air above the booths like a low-lying storm cloud he could see a small built-up stage at the front of the room. Center-stage were a couple of busty, tanned blonde women in fluorescent g-strings gyrating raucously around a pole, simulating sexual maneuvers on each other to the applause of the Japanese customers, sitting in the booths nearest. Allowing his eyes to adapt to the light he found he could discern peoples faces. The majority of the hostesses sitting with the customers were Asian, not all appearing to be Japanese. Easily distinguishable were the hostess's western counterparts, blonde tanned Barbie girl types, drinking with Japanese salarymen. Wow, Kenji and Barbie he thought.

Maya suddenly appeared at his table. Taller than he expected, she was dressed in a tight black cocktail dress that showed off the fine curves on her slender figure. Pinned to the front of her dress was a small pink number and nametag, with her name scrawled in both Japanese and English. Up close she had an almost ethereal air the photo hadn't captured. Offset against porcelain-white skin, her lightly made up lips reminded him of the vermilion red petals of a flower. Beneath long arching eyebrows her exotic jet-black eyes held him captivated with their piercing gaze.

"Hello, I'm Maya," she said, unperturbed by his staring. She bowed her head gracefully. Her striking features held him enthralled for a second before he realized he was making her stand.

"Uh, hi, take a seat," he said, moving over in the booth to accommodate her. Unnoticed by him, the waitress had already returned with their sake, which stood on the table.

Maya sat, for long seconds gazing at him and not saying a word. Behind the mask of her classically beautiful Japanese features he sensed a keen intelligence at work, apparent in the way her dark eyes watched his intently, as if studying him.

"So what should I call you?" She asked finally, pulling her long hair back from her brow.

"Jake would be fine."

"And what brings you to Tokyo, Jake? Business no doubt?"

He nodded. "You don't seem surprised; do you get many gaijins coming in here?"

"Not so many, they usually go to nicer places like Ginza."

He noticed her English was next to perfect, displaying none of the stumbling awkwardness that characterized the efforts of so many English-speaking Japanese. "You speak very well. Did you study somewhere?"

She laughed softly as if embarrassed. "I studied linguistics as a sub-major at college, I had plans to work overseas but it didn't happen."

"What did happen?"

Looking aside a moment, she smiled. "You don't want to talk about me all night, do you? I want to hear more about you." Sitting closer, she gave his arm a gentle squeeze. "You're single, aren't you?"

"It's that obvious?"

"I guess you could say women's intuition," she replied, smiling.

"So can you guess when guys aren't single?"

"Sure. Sometimes it's just body language. Married guys squirm a lot or they rub their ring finger. Of course you never see a ring."

"Of course," he replied and laughed. "Hey, let's have a drink." He raised his glass towards hers, which she clinked, with her own. "Cheers," he said, watching her as she drank the burning liquid, her small, finely shaped nose crinkling up with distaste as she swallowed.

He'd found that the hostesses who knew Jessica were more forthcoming the more drink he could get them to partake of, but with Maya he somehow felt comfortable she'd help him anyway. "I've got a little proposition for you," he said, watching as a tired, resigned look filled her eyes. Realizing she thought he was going to ask her to sleep with him he quickly continued his question. "I'll give you twenty thousand yen if you answer some questions for me."

"Questions...Well, sure," she replied.

He pulled the photo of Jessica out of his jacket pocket, placing it on the table in front of her.
"Did you ever see this woman working here?"

She stared at it for a second before snatching it off the table and putting it back in his jacket.
"What are you a cop?" Her eyes were filled with fear.

"No, relax, let me explain. I've been hired to look for Jessica and I heard you were her friend. I came here to ask for your help in the hope that I can find her, so how about it? Do you think you can help me?"
He watched as she stared at the table for a few seconds as if about to say something, before finally nodding mutely.

"We can't talk here; the only way we can do this is if we pretend you're a client I'm taking to a love hotel."

"That's fine. I'll pay for any time you spend with me. Can we go now?"

"Sure, the hotel is only a couple of minutes away."

"Great, let's go." Throwing some yen notes on the table he followed her through the club's maze of tables. As they approached the bar near the exit, a beefy, drunken Japanese salaryman sitting there with some of his buddies called out to Maya, "hey, pansuke, go fuck GI Joe!" to howls of laughter from his friends.
Jake had only heard old-style slang like pansuke once before. It was used to describe the prostitutes that had slept with the American servicemen who had occupied Japan after the war.

"Just ignore them," Maya said, taking his hand and hurrying towards the exit but the salaryman ran after them and, roughly shoving Jake aside grabbed Maya's shoulder, spinning her light frame around. Before Jake could do anything the salaryman was grinding his lips onto hers in less of a kiss than an assault. At the same time he had stuck one of his hands up her skirt, trying forcefully to pull her panties down to cheers of encouragement from his friends at the bar who now ran over to form a circle around the night's entertainment.

Behind the group of men, Jake heard Maya let out a muffled scream. He looked around. The bar staff appeared to be blatantly ignoring the situation and security had disappeared. Wrapping his hand around the neck of a beer bottle from the table behind him he smashed it against the table's side. Approaching the group unnoticed he kicked hard at the back of the man nearest in the circle. As the guy went sprawling he continued forward with the momentum of his kick, cutting the distance to Maya's attacker in a second. He grabbed a handful of the salaryman's hair and lifting his head back, placed the bottleneck to his throat, casting quick glances around, making sure he didn't get jumped.

"Let go of her," he said calmly, trying hard not to show the panic he felt inside. The drunken salaryman froze, freeing Maya almost instantly. Suddenly a couple of large, blunt nosed Japanese men appeared, dressed in loud Hawaiian shirts, arms covered in tattoos signifying they were some kind of yakuza, and grabbed the salaryman from Jake's hands.

"You again, Iinuma," Jake heard one of them say, before hauling the drunken businessman over to the bar.
"Put it down, gaijin," the other yakuza said resting his hand casually on a gun stuck in the waistband of his jeans.

Stepping between them Maya grabbed Jake's hand, forcing the bottleneck from his tight grip. "Its okay, he's with me," she said quickly, leading him away.

Stunned by the pace of events Jake went quietly, noting as he passed that Maya's attacker was being handed a new beer by the bartender.

"Don't worry about those guys, they're security," she assured him as they walked out the door, into a dark alley alongside the club, lined with the stinking dumpsters of neighboring businesses.

"Security. Really? Jake replied, feeling his heart beat return to normal. "Somebody should tell them. They think they're the beach boys."

* * *

Jake rapped on the door of the bathroom. "Hey, Maya, are you okay?"

"Yes fine, I'll just be a minute."

She'd already been in there more than twenty minutes. He briefly wondered if she was shooting up then brushed the thought off. She didn't look the type, but then who did? He walked back to their suite's one piece of furniture; a vibrating king size bed with a coin meter attached to the bed head. Lying back he watched his reflection gazing down at him from the mirrored ceiling. Classy digs. The mini fridge stocked with beer and soft drinks that sat alongside the bed also lay reflected in the mirror above. On the other side of the room he could see a small vending machine, the words Auto Roman Box emblazoned in English and Japanese characters on its side. As the bizarre name indicated the little machine offered a variety of different condoms and oddly shaped latex adult toys for sale. Situated only a block away from Black Cat, the love hotel they were ensconced in, Shogun's Palace, was cut-rate by Tokyo standards. Aside from its flamboyant Ferro-concrete exterior of battlements, turrets and imitation statuary there wasn't any of the usual paraphernalia he had come to associate with the standard love hotel's unique interior design. Probably why the room was so cheap. Not so strange he guessed, in a place like Kabukicho, where cheap sex was taken as a given.

Based on a couple of regrettable past experiences he knew that the usual idea for Love Hotel's hire-by-the-hour rooms was that they had an escapist theme attached to their kitsch interior design. Suites came with names like Arabian Nights, decorated in a style reminiscent of a desert harem, or Disco Dream; with the room designed as a dance studio complete with strobe lighting and mirror balls hanging from the ceiling. He guessed part of the appeal of love hotels was that their tumescent, larger-than-life settings allowed the occupants to forget the mundane crowded world outside and escape into their own erotic fantasy. Personally he couldn't get past the décor, which inevitably left him feeling like a walk-in on the set of a B-grade porn flick. Snapping the remote on he watched an X-rated movie appear on the flickering screen of the television. Changing the channels he only seemed to be able to get more porn. Maya walked out of the bathroom.

"What's on?" she asked, sitting next to him, crossing her long legs over. Her eyes appeared watery as if she'd been crying.

"Well it's not Discovery Channel. How you doing?" he asked, turning the set off.

"I'm okay. I'm sorry I took so long in there. I just needed to settle down." Leaning over to the side of the bed she grabbed the can of Coke she had taken from the room's bar fridge earlier and removed the pink straw from it, twisting and turning it nimbly between her slender fingers.

"You're still pretty shaken up, aren't you?"

She nodded, "I hate that creep. He's always harassing me because I won't sleep with him. He's so disgusting. I really have to thank you."

"For what?"

"For helping me. You could have left me there."

Jake laughed, "Left you with that freak practically raping you? What kind of loser would do that?"

"I know lots," she replied shrugging. "Security wouldn't have bothered to interrupt if you hadn't threatened him."

"Why not?"

"They only care about the customers. The guy who grabbed me spends a lot there so they let him do what he wants."

"That's so wrong." He suddenly became aware of the depth of sadness evident in her face, emotions her beautiful features usually managed to hide. "So why don't you just leave?"

"Hmmm," was all she said by way of reply, turning her face downward to focus her attention on the pink straw she was folding between her fingertips into a mass of tiny folds.

He glanced down at her handiwork. "Hey, what's that, origami?"

"Origami with a straw Jake? I don't believe so," she replied, smiling mischievously at him as she continued to manipulate its shape. "Do you know what hanami is?"

"Sure, cherry blossom viewing right? You guys take it so seriously, I saw these reporters on the news the other night doing a cherry blossom front. They've got a whole camera crew trekking north across the country to areas where the flowers have started to bloom. They were even checking out the buds at historically famous strands of cherry trees," he grinned at the memory, noticing that Maya appeared totally absorbed in the pink straw she was toying with. Seconds later he realized that the straw folds had blossomed between her fingers into the intricate shape of a flower, a cherry blossom in miniature. "Oh, that's beautiful. How did you do that?"

Holding it up, she surveyed her handiwork admiringly, turning it around delicately between her fingertips. "Making a cherry blossom is nothing. I learnt to do it when I was a little girl. Do you know what these particular blossoms represent for the Japanese?" she asked, fixing her large black eyes upon his.

"Cherry blossoms? Well, something of beauty, I guess."

"Yes, but so much more," she replied, her eyes shining. "They represent the fleetingness of life to us, flowering briefly but splendidly, only to scatter upon the nearest wind. When we see the cherry blossom we should recognize that we are the same and live our life to its fullest, for it too will soon be over."

"That's kind of profound, I like that."

Looking at him, then at the flower, she giggled softly, her skin reddening a touch. "If I give you this, will you be my friend?" she asked, holding it out to him.

"Oh. of course," he said, gently taking the flower from her hand. "Whenever I see it I'll think of you."
"Yeah sure," Maya replied and laughed at his mock-hurt expression.

She suddenly looked down at her watch and gasped, "Oh, god, I'm sorry, I've wasted so much of your time tonight. They charge this room out by the hour so if you want me to start answering some questions..."

"Don't worry about the money," he interrupted, "how much would it cost to have you stay here overnight? No sex, just you telling me what you know about Jessica?"

She looked at him seriously, "you understand it doesn't matter what we do, it'll still cost you about a hundred and fifty thousand yen."

"That's fine."

"Who's paying you to look for her?"

"Her father."

"I didn't think they were so close."

He nodded. Kerry Beaumont had gone into enough detail to allow him to understand that his relationship with his daughter had become estranged late last year after he had discovered her dependence on narcotics. Cutting off Jessica's credit cards and substantial allowance had been a ploy he had used to force her to bring her addictions under control but it had backfired. Kerry soon learned from Jessica's friends she had left the country then a couple of weeks later she called him from Japan, refusing any help he offered.

"They weren't," Jake said, "but I get the feeling that underneath it all, he loves her. I mean I wouldn't be here otherwise."

"I guess so."

"Okay first up, I've got a fair idea about how things work in the clubs but why couldn't we talk there, what's stopping us?"

"The club is watched over by a gang, you know yakuza?"

"Sure, which clan?"

"Noguchi-gummi, those security guys are part of it. They all wear those loud shirts, let everyone know who they are. The Mama-san that runs the club pays them to make sure nobody gives her any trouble. It's one of the gang's house rules for the club that nobody talks to outsiders about girls who've left, disappeared. I guess they think the fewer questions asked about the way that they do business the better. Are you sure she's still in Japan?"

He nodded. "Her disappearance was officially registered with Tokyo Metro Police a couple of weeks ago. Its routine procedure for them to scan the backlog of air and sea departures so they can rule out the possibility of the person having left the country. The last verified record of Jessica's passport being used was at Tokyo Airport in December of last year when she came into the country."

Sighing, Maya looked hurt by the news, "so you mean nobody has any idea where she is?"

"No, but maybe somebody in Noguchi-gummi might. You think I should try and approach them? Ask if they know anything?"

"Don't," Maya said adamantly, shaking her head, fear suddenly visible in her eyes. "You have to be careful Jake, they don't play by the rules around here, if you get caught doing something or asking questions they don't like there's a good chance you could get hurt or killed."

"I didn't know it was that serious. You had run-ins with these guys before?"

Maya nodded, a grave look suddenly crossing over her face as she steadily matched his gaze. "You know...I hate Noguchi-gummi with all my soul, they're animals." Her fine jaw quivered with emotion.

He realized she was close to breaking down in tears. He put his hand on her shoulder, not knowing what to say. Reaching over she hugged him, resting her head on his chest. So fragile he thought. Something about her didn't sit right, an incongruity in her effect that had been nagging at the back of his mind since they met. She didn't act like any prostitute he had ever known, rejecting potential clients, playfully making him a flower. There was none of the calculated hardness or desperateness about her he usually associated with women who had to sell their bodies. In stark contrast, her character, like her movements, seemed delicate and refined. Other things stuck out as well. He'd noticed that most of the girls at Black Cat weren't pretty. Cloaked in darkness their function didn't really revolve around looks so much as the ability to quickly satisfy their customer's lustful appetites. Maya's beauty looked so out of place there, real beauty like she could be a model, she doesn't need to work there.

"How did you get into this scene?" he asked suddenly. For long seconds she remained quiet then he felt her hot tears seep through the fabric of his shirt. "I'm sorry I just..."

"No. It's okay. You can ask." Breaking their clinch she wiped the tears from her eyes. "I don't know why but I feel like I can trust you, besides it might make you realize what sort of people you're dealing with here." Sitting back a little she looked at him squarely.

"I never wanted to get into this crap. About a year ago my father fell into debt with his importing business. It wasn't a big operation but it was running okay before the yen's value got weak, then he started suffering giant trading losses in overseas markets. Basically he needed a lot of cash fast to keep the business afloat but the banks wouldn't cover it, he was too much of a credit risk. One afternoon he went out got drunk and borrowed the money from a sarakin. Do you know what that is?"

He nodded. Sarakin-Consumer loan company, a nice name for loan sharks. Fully approved by the Ministry of Finance, they could legally charge interest of forty percent but some went higher.

"At the time he told my mother and me that he got the money from a normal bank. He invested the money into the company but the same problems were still there with our currency and he started to owe more. The sarakin charged huge daily interest on his loan and he couldn't raise it, so he borrowed more again from another sarakin group. When he couldn't pay up we got a visit at home from the people behind both sarakin offices that he had been to, Noguchi-gummi."

"How did he expect to pay the money back if the business was losing so much?"

"He got desperate. He tried to gamble his way out but he just kept losing. It might be hard for you to imagine but for his generation it's an unacceptable loss of face to admit you are in debt and can't support yourself. It's like the ultimate shame for people like my father," she said, shaking her head. "Because he hid it from us we didn't find out until it was too late. Even if we had of filed for bankruptcy it wouldn't have mattered by then because Noguchi-gummi got involved. Once you owe them they never give up until you're dead or they get your money." She sighed deeply then closed her eyes. He watched as fresh tears slowly started to descend her beautiful face.

"Maya, if you don't want to talk about this anymore..."

"No I'm okay," she said, managing a weak smile, wiping at the tears with the sleeve of her jacket. "In the end we had to sell everything we had to cover the debts but he still owed these huge amounts on the interest. Every day that he didn't pay these Noguchi animals would come over and bash him, humiliate him in public. They'd take him out into the middle of our street and yell out to our neighbors that my father owed moneys he couldn't repay. Drive him around to our relatives, his friends, business contacts and force him to borrow money off them. One day some Noguchi guys inspected our house but they said its sale wouldn't cover all the debt. They offered him one alternative; I had to go work for them in their club as a hostess, a whore. You know, I was starting university when they took me. I was an honor student."

"How could your father let them do that to you?"

She looked at him anguished, making him feel sorry he'd asked.

"He had no choice; they threatened to kill all of us if he didn't. It was too much for him though. He killed himself later that night. I found him in the morning, hanging from the rafters in our garage..." her voice faltered into deep racking sobs.

Feeling gutted, he realized where that peculiar look of sadness had come from which she carried in her smile. "Oh, god, Maya..."

"They've ruined my life, look at me Jake. I'm-I'm number fourteen," she finished, crying uncontrollably.
Reaching over, he hugged her to his chest, feeling her body heave with sobs.