Kenji’s knees went weak. Haruka. The name hit him like a bus – no, like a train. Summer of ’94. He was twenty-three. She was a waitress at a tiny okonomiyaki shop. He’d been shy, clumsy. On their third date, he’d brought her a bar of the mazome soap from his own bathroom, wrapped in newspaper, because she’d mentioned her skin got dry in winter.
“I know,” she interrupted, then flushed. “I mean. I’m looking for someone. They said to meet here. A man who uses the mazome soap.” Mazome Soap de Aimashou