murakami, haruki - Norwegian wood

you."
"I'd like that," I said.
Midori tore a page from a notebook and drew a detailed map of the
way to her place. She used a red pen to make a large X where the
house stood.
"You can't miss it. There's a big sign: 'Kobayashi Bookshop'. Come at
noon. I'll have lunch ready."
I thanked her and put the map in my pocket. "I'd better get back to
campus now," I said. "My German lecture starts at two." Midori said
she had somewhere to go and took the train from Yotsuya.
Sunday morning I got up at nine, shaved, did my laundry and hung out
the clothes on the roof. It was a beautiful day. The first smell of
autumn was in the air. Red dragonflies flitted around the quadrangle,
chased by neighbourhood kids swinging nets. With no wind, the
Rising Sun flag hung limp on its pole. I put on a freshly ironed shirt
and walked from the dorm to the tram stop. A student neighbourhood
on a Sunday morning: the streets were dead, virtually empty, most
shops closed. What few sounds there were echoed with special clarity.
A girl wearing sabots clip-clopped across the asphalt roadway, and
next to the tram shelter four or five kids were throwing rocks at a row
of empty cans. A florist's was open, so I went in and bought some
daffodils. Daffodils in autumn: that was strange. But I had always
liked that particular flower.
Three old women were the only passengers on the Sunday morning
tram. They all looked at me and my flowers. One of them gave me a
smile. I smiled back. I sat in the last seat and watched the ancient
houses passing close to the window. The tram almost touched the
overhanging eaves. The laundry deck of one house had ten potted
tomato plants, next to which a big black cat lay stretched out in the
sun. In the garden of another house, a little girl was blowing soap
bubbles. I heard an Ayumi Ishida song coming from somewhere, and
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