Killing Commendatore

by Haruki Murakami

lees,

lark.

plopped

bumper

If your palms were callused, you were deemed a peasant and might be released. If they were soft, however, it was assumed that you were a soldier who’d tossed his uniform to pass as a civilian, and you were summarily executed.

An order from an officer in Japan’s Imperial Army was an order from the Emperor himself.

unblemished

subsist.

mustered

demure.

surmised,”

“Dolphins have the power to put the right or left half of their brain to sleep.

parboiled

“Jura is also known as the place where George Orwell wrote 1984.

impervious

dawdling

“No question, I will age,” Menshiki said. “My body will decline, and I’ll probably grow more and more solitary. But I’m not there yet. I have an idea what it will be like. But I’m the kind of guy who doesn’t believe something until he’s seen it.

lugging

I go all out in whatever I do. I want to stretch myself as far as I can, to see what I’m capable of. I have no time to be bored. That’s the best way I know of keeping fear and emptiness at arm’s length.”

haggard

phantasm—in

cohered.

blahs.

forlornly

Masahiko had always been picky about food and drink. I was a different story. I ate and drank whatever was put in front of me.

‘The greatest surprise in life is old age’?”

if you can’t find the right words, why not paint it? You are an artist, after all.”

wring

carnally,

incubus

winced

loiters

trompe l’oeil.

mane

concocted

Even the darkest, thickest cloud shines silver when viewed from above.

loafers.

parlance.”

mussed

tinny

quizzical

I promised him I would. But I had no intention of following through.

All minivans look identical to me. Like cans of tasteless biscuits.

squat,

plying

humped

oomph.

lavish

ostentatiously

furrowed