Ever since I was a child I've been good at falling asleep. I suppose one of my most impressive points—apart from the knack I have for identifying phone calls from my boyfriend—is that I can fall asleep whenever I want. As a kind of hobby, my mother worked nights at a snack bar run by one of her friends, and though my father was just an ordinary businessman he had a peculiarly large streak of generosity, so that he not only thought it was okay for my mother to do work like that, but even stopped by the bar fairly often. Since I was an only child, I ended up spending most nights at home alone. And since our house was much too big for a child to stay in all by herself, I made it my policy just to hold my breath and count to three and hurl myself headlong into sleep. The thoughts that twirled through my head when I turned out the bedroom lights and lay there gazing up at the dark ceiling were always so deliciously sweet and full of loneliness that I hated them. I didn't want to start liking that loneliness, so before I knew it I'd be asleep.

The first time I started remembering all this as an adult was after my boyfriend and I spent our first night together, as we were driving back. We'd gone up and spent the night in Kanagawa Prefecture, done a bit of sight-seeing the next day, and then started back in the evening. I'm not sure why, but somehow the fact that the day was about to end really terrified me, left me wallowing in despair. I sat in the car, cursing all the green lights, and every time we got caught at a red light I'd feel a gush of relief, and a wave of joy would surge up within me. It was extremely hard to have to return to Tokyo and then head back again to our separate lives, our individual daily routines. I suppose this was because we'd just slept together for the first time, and—yes, this most of all—because I'd been thinking about his wife the whole time. I'd never felt this nervous before. I kept imagining the moment when I'd arrive back at my apartment, when I'd be all alone again, and every time I'd get so scared it felt like my skin was being peeled away.

I was sinking down into the depths of the scene before me, into those long lines of continuing lights—that's how I felt. My body shrank into itself. I can't really explain why I felt so lonely. My boyfriend was the same as always, just as gentle and kind as always, and he was cracking jokes, and I was laughing. But the fear never went away. It felt as if I were turning into ice.