Friends Like These: My Worldwide Quest to Find My Best Childhood Friends, Knock on Their Doors, and Ask Them to Come Out and Play (48 page)

“Maybe we should ask inside?” said Bob, chewing on a hot dog and then offering me some. I waved it away. I had no time for
food.

“They might have a staff list,” he said. “Or a special area where all the doctors sit?”

It was a good idea. I barreled through the double doors and immediately saw a noticeboard.

“There!” I said.

Bob and I ran up to it and simply stared at it. Everything was in Japanese. It wasn’t surprising. We were in Japan.

“Any ideas?” I said, while Bob tried his best to decipher the code.

“Mah-ts-oo-eh…” he said, tracing his finger down a sheet of paper. “Can’t see anything…”

“Excuse me,” I said, to a passing student. “Do you speak any English?”

He smiled apologetically and moved on.

“Does
anybody
know this man?” I said, loudly, and pointing at my chest. “Akira Matsui? Anyone? Akira
Matsui!
”

But I got nothing back except embarrassed looks.

And then…

“Matsui?”

There was a thin and wiry student with a kind face looking back at me.

“Matsui sensei?”

Sensei!
Hang on—that meant… teacher! I
knew
it did! I’d seen it on
The Karate Kid
! Akira must be teaching here as well as being a medical doctor! It made perfect sense!

“Yes!
Sensei!
Yes!” I said. “
Sensei,
Bob,
sensei!
”

Bob gave me a double thumbs-up and looked excited.

“I know him,” said the stranger.

“You do? Can you take me to him? I’m an old friend!”

He shrugged.

“I
think
yes…”

I shot Bob a look. This was it!

“You come with me,” said our new friend, whose name was Kyohei. “I can try to help you…”

“This is very kind of you,” I told Kyohei. “I haven’t seen Akira in many years…”

“This is chance for me practice En glish,” he said. “One day I wish to be a doctor in a foreign land.”

“Is Akira teaching you well?”

“Matsui sensei is good teacher. Good man.”

I smiled. I knew he would be.

“Come, we find his room…”

Kyohei, Bob and I marched down a dark corridor. A flickering striplight briefly lit the olive green floors and drab beige
walls, and I stole quick glances into offices as we walked. I’d never have found my way here without Kyohei. And I’d never
have found my way to Kyohei without Bob. I was filled with gratitude for the kindness of friends, and the kindness of strangers.
Without these two, I’d still be trying to break into a spectacles factory in Yamanashi, possibly with greatly extended lips.

Finally, after what seemed like a thousand double doors and faceless corridors, we arrived at a room.

“This his office,” said Kyohei.

“Here?” I said, and Kyohei nodded.

I listened at the door. There was someone in there! Akira Matsui was in there! And before I could gather my thoughts, Kyohei
had knocked on the door. A voice said something in Japanese. Kyohei opened the door wide. A man sat in a chair.

“Akira!” I said. “It’s me! Daniel Wallace!”

He looked absolutely stunned to see me. Absolutely
stunned.
Well, wouldn’t you be? A friend you haven’t seen in twenty years—a friend you barely recognize—standing in your office in
the middle of the countryside after flying thousands of miles to see you?

“I’ve got your face on my T-shirt!” I shouted, proudly.

And the man muttered something, which was probably about how happy he was to see me, and how much I had also changed over
the years.

And then Kyohei quietly shut the door.

“That was not him,” he said, and we all tiptoed away, very quickly indeed.

“So where could he be?” I asked, increasingly worried that we were running out of time. “Is he
definitely
here?”

“I do not know,” said Kyohei. “Perhaps he is in the laboratory.”

We walked down a flight of stairs and through some more double doors. In one of the laboratories, several men were chatting
quietly over a microscope. Kyohei approached them and spoke to them softly while Bob and I hung back.

“I’m worried, Bob,” I whispered. “None of them is Akira Matsui. He’s not in his office. We’ve checked the staffroom… what
time’s the last train to Tokyo?”

“We’ve got about an hour if we don’t want to get stuck in the countryside,” said Bob. “We’ve got to get that slow train, then
the train to Yamanashi, and
then
the train to Tokyo…”

We looked back at Kyohei, who was approaching us.

“They told me they have not seen him. Perhaps he is in conference. Conference finishes only in two hours.”

I looked at my watch.

“That’s too late… can we interrupt it?” I said.

Kyohei looked appalled.

“No—absolute no. Only when it finish can we see who is inside. But also—one of these men says he has not seen Matsui sensei
today. Perhaps he has holiday.”

“What?”
I said. “He might be on
holiday?
He’s just
been!
He went to a gastroenteritis convention, or something!”

Bob looked as distraught as I felt. But then he had an idea.

“His
house!
” said Bob. “He must live around here! Maybe he even lives on
campus!
”

Of course! This place was miles from anywhere. If someone worked out here, chances are they’d have to
live
out here as well…

“Kyohei—how could we find his home?” I asked. “How could we find Akira’s
house?
”

Kyohei said, “Hmmm.”

“This is it!” I said. “This is the street!”

Kyohei had piled me and Bob into his tiny red car and driven us a couple of miles away to a street which a man with a clipboard
had assured us was Akira’s. Kyohei now seemed as excited at the prospect of meeting Akira as Bob and I did.

“Second house,” said Kyohei. “Black door.”

“Okay, let’s do this…”

The three of us, looking like the strangest gang in the world, stepped out of the car and approached the door.

“Definitely this one?” I asked, and Kyohei said, “Yes. Definitely.”

I took a deep breath and knocked twice, hard, on the door.

I looked at Bob. Bob looked at me. We both looked at Kyohei, whose eyes darted between us. We all looked at the door.

Nothing.

“Maybe he’s asleep,” I said, and then banged on the door, louder this time.

I pressed my ear to the door. I flipped open the letterbox and peered in. It was dark in there. Curtains drawn. No noise whatsoever.

I stood up and shook my head.

And then I banged on the door again. Three times. And then I paused for a second and a second only and I banged again.

“I’m not sure he’s in…” said Bob, but I didn’t hear the rest of the sentence because I was banging again. I kept banging,
and I tried banging the letterbox, and I caught sight of a concerned Kyohei, and then there was a hand on my shoulder and
Bob was saying, “Let it go…”

“I can’t let it go,” I said, stopping, and turning to him.

“He’s not there…” said Bob. “He’s gone…”

And in that moment, I knew he had.

It was no good. I would not be meeting Akira today. Maybe, I realized, I would never meet him again.

We sat in silence in Kyohei’s little red car and drove down a smooth, stark street. Kyohei had offered to drive us back to
the station, and anything was better than giving Bob a map.

And then his phone rang. He took the call while Bob tried to make me feel better.

“Well, at least you tried,” said Bob. “That’s something. Who needed all twelve anyway? You’ve done very well indeed.”

I sighed. I supposed he was right.

And then Kyohei stopped the car.

I looked at Bob. What was going on?

Kyohei put the car in reverse, backed into someone’s drive and turned the car round.

“What’s up?” I asked.

“Conference about to have break,” said Kyohei. “We drive fast, we get there…”

Kyohei sped into the car park, stopped the car at an awkward angle and all three of us got out and ran.

“Into elevator!” yelled Kyohei, who I now loved more than any Japanese medical student I have ever met before.

The three of us jammed ourselves in and Kyohei pressed 5.

We rode in nervous silence, and when the doors finally pinged open, we could hear talking. Chitter-chatter. Voices, dozens
of them, and all coming from behind one door…

We pushed it open.

Inside, various doctors and delegates were holding small cups of coffee and juice, and nibbling on foreign biscuits.

“Do you see him?” asked Bob.

“I don’t know—hang on…”

My eyes scoured the room. He had to be here. Dr. Akira Matsui
had
to be here…

“I can’t see him…” I said. “I can’t…”

And then my eyes came to rest on someone. Someone whose eyes had come to rest on me.

It wasn’t Akira.

It was a short, jolly woman, who was now smiling at me, with a curious expression.

She was pointing at me, now, and telling someone else to look.

I smiled and raised my hand in a friendly wave.

And then she pointed at my T-shirt, and she said…

“Akira?”

My eyes widened and my heart leapt.

The T-shirt had worked.

The T-shirt had bloody
worked!

“Yes!” I said. “Akira! Akira Matsui!”

This seemed to delight her, and she called for someone else to take a look at my shirt, and he found it as curious as she
did.

“Kyohei—can you explain?”

And Kyohei did his best.

“What are they saying?” I asked Bob.

“Something about Akira… something about you traveling a long way to find him… something about his house…”

“Do they know him, then? Do they know where he is?”

“Hang on…”

And then, with no warning whatsoever, the small, jolly woman jabbed her finger in the air and shouted, “Ah!” And then she
turned on her heel and ran away.

“What’s happened?” I said, mildly panicked. “Where’s that small jolly woman going?”

She returned a moment or two later with something orange in her hand. A phone. She found a number. Pressed Dial. And then
handed me the phone.

“Is this… ?” I said. “Kyohei, is
this
… ?”

Kyohei nodded. Bob gave me another double thumbs-up.

I put the phone to my ear.

It was ringing.

A male voice answered.

“… Akira?” I tried.

“Hai,” said the voice.

“Akira Matsui?”

“…”

“This is… Daniel Wallace, from Loughborough… I knew you when you were little…”

“… Daniel?” he said.

“Yes! Me! I’ve come all the way from England to say hello! And then I couldn’t find you and I’d been looking for everyone
else and I’d found lots of them and then I was in Australia and then I came to find you and I was in Tokyo and I came here
but couldn’t find you and then this lady gave me the phone how are you?”

And then I realized that all of that had come out in pretty much two seconds, and I decided to start again.

“Akira. Where are you?”

“… I… am… with my mother and father… in Tokyo…”

He was struggling to find his words. Struggling to speak English again after all these years.

“I… am…”

He trailed off. It was okay. I knew what I had to say next.

“Akira. I have come a long way to see you. Will you meet with me?”

And then there was a pause.

And Akira collected his thoughts.

And he weighed up what I’d said. And he made his decision. And he said…

“Daniel. I am very sorry… I can
not
meet with you…”

Huh?

I looked up to see my small crowd of friends new and old. Bob smiling. Kyohei genuinely excited. The small jolly woman positively
beaming. And I didn’t know what to say. Had he
really
said that?
Why?

“Sorry, did you…”

“I am
sorry,
Daniel…”

This was too much. This was
not
acceptable. This was just not
acceptable.

“Akira, I’ve traveled from London. From London, Akira. All the way just to say hello to you. For the past few months I’ve
been doing it a lot. I’ve been back to Loughborough, where we met. I’ve been to Berlin, and to LA, and to Melbourne. And now
I’m here in Japan—and it’s all for you! Please, you
have
to meet with me…”

A silence.

An uncomfortable silence.

Was this really so weird? For me, turning up and saying hi wherever an old friend might be had just become natural. Normal.
But for Akira, oblivious to my actions of the past few months and just trying to get on with his life, this would be strange.
Why
should
he meet up with me? The fact that I’d traveled so far just added to the pressure. For me it was a reason he should meet me.
For him, it could very well be a reason not to.

Part of me had always hoped I could rely on the past to help secure the future. That I could remind people how close we had
been. Hoped that that would be enough to convince them that reconnecting would be okay.

But people move on. They grow up. They don’t
need
their past.

Tom, for example. Tom who didn’t want to meet. Didn’t need to meet. Thought meeting would be
weird.

Was that what Akira was thinking right now?

And, more importantly, could I let that change things? Could I allow him not to meet up? Could I let a fear of awkwardness
spoil an experience which, in its own small way—and for me, at least—had become something of a small but rich beauty?

No.

I had a decision to make.

The people around me had realized something was up. I’d been silent too long. Staring, sad-eyed, too long. The jolly woman
looked less jolly. Kyohei and Bob had let their smiles drift.

I knew what to do.

I spoke swiftly and confidently.

“Akira, I’m coming back to Tokyo now. I’m going to get on the next train from Joieu and I’ll be at Shinjuku station by nine
p.m. You
have
to meet me there. I will see you at Shinjuku station at nine p.m.”