"I just found it at the library. The cover looked pretty so I picked it up."
Izaya laughed.
"So much for not judging a book by its cover, huh. How do you like it so far?"
A frown of concentration crossed Shizuo's brow.
"I'm not sure. I mean, it's interesting but at times I don't really understand what's going on."
"Welcome to the world of high literature!"
Shizuo glanced at the shiny picture that had first attracted him to the convoluted novel.
"Ever been to Kyoto? This temple, it's neat."
"Can't say that I have. I tend to stick around Tokyo and now I never leave!"
Shizuo shook his head. Izaya's sense of humor was far too weird.
"Did you read this book?"
"I've read all of Mishima's works. My favorite is still Confessions of a Mask. It may be his debut but most elements of his style were already present…inchoately so."
"Oh. I'll see if I can find that one, then. Is it easier to follow?"
Izaya chuckled. He was very much aware that he was setting Shizuo on a path that led precisely where his designs wanted him to be.
"Probably. At least it doesn't have all the Zen Buddhist meanderings and cat killer riddles."
Shizuo wrote down the title. It was ironically that he was widening his horizons now that there were concrete walls and bars around him all the time.
"Shizu-chan? Could it be that now that you are stuck here you realized that you'd love to visit Kyoto? 'Ah, when I could go anywhere I liked I never really bothered and now I can't go anywhere, only now do I value all those places I can no longer go to.' Something like that, maybe?"
Shizuo started.
"How did you know?"
"I can read your mind with my amazing skills!"
"Can't you be serious for a second? You always make fun out of everything."
Shizuo felt that this gloominess of his was almost petty but he could not help it.
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean it that way. Besides, wasn't it rather obvious? 'Footfalls echo in the memory/Down the passage which we did not take/Towards the door we never opened/Into the rose-garden. My words echo/Thus, in your mind.' T.S Eliot."
"Now that came out of nowhere."
Izaya took up the book.
"Not quite. I quote out of context, of course, but you always want you can't have. Be it a rose garden, a golden temple, freedom. You name it. In other words, you never know what you could have had until you lose it."
Shizuo mumbled something under his breath.
"There you go with your trippy philosophies."
"Not all that trippy in this case, though. I'm pretty sure you know what I mean just fine."
It was so but Shizuo was reluctant to admit it. Izaya flipped through the pages.
"It's been ages since I read it, mind if I borrow after you're done?"
"Go right ahead."
"Thanks."
A clang at the bars startled them both.
"3456! The warden wants to see you."
Izaya sighed and hopped from his bunk.
"You know, they say that for every time the temple gets destroyed it becomes shinier and more golden when it gets rebuilt. Maybe by the time you get out it'll be even more sparkly."
Shizuo watched him go and returned to the book. It was irregular for inmates to be personally called out by the warden and he could not shake certain uneasiness at it. The novel did little to dispel this, in fact it contributed greatly. Hours rolled by and Shizuo paced back and forth because there was nothing else to do. It was a long time until the guards returned Izaya to the cell and they did so without the typical announcement which by itself was already unusual.
"This is why I hate sadists, where's Amnesty International when you need it. I could swear they have an Asian branch."
Izaya limped awkwardly.
"You okay?"
"Been better Shizu-chan, been better. Mind if I take your bunk for the night?"
"No problem."
Shizuo helped him lie down.
"Today was officially a bad day. But there's always tomorrow. There's chocolate mousse for dessert tomorrow."
Shizuo sat next to him and withheld the impulse to brush aside a few strands of black hair.
"Want me to kill the bastard who did this to you?"
"I'm afraid the warden is beyond even you, Shizu-chan. But I'll take your mousse if you are feeling charitable. And then with the spoon I will dig a hole out of here."
