So I’ve decided to write a story. Yes , a story, I get it. Very unlike me. But I have actually written a lot of stories in school. Most of them got lost, and those that are left are better left untold. But I realized something about them. I hate the whole ‘make it an art’ thing. I do not like decorating a story with words that don’t belong there.
I would rather tell a story to someone right in front of me with all my biases and all. That is why I wanted to write my story in a way that perhaps other authors would not like.
Another inspiration was the character Takatsuki Sen from Tokyo Ghoul. I have no idea why I like this character so much. Maybe it was her backstory, maybe it was her attitude and demeanour, I don’t know. But I love her. As a character of course. I don’t want to be eaten by her. In particular, she has a double life as a writer and is supposed to have written many books of the horror genre. The names of one of those books stuck with me. Dear Kafka. Something about it felt so personal, so magnetic. It resonated with me. I decided that I wanted to write a book by the same name.
Of course, it won’t be a horror book, or I at least hope it won’t be. At it’s core, Dear Kafka is something of a story about people. It is the story of Kyton , a detective who is barely getting by, about his shattered hopes and dreams and expectations and the burden he bears of having to prove himself to his parents who are already dead. It is the story of Kafka, a girl who has accepted a name for her sins from the Books she read in her time as an innocent girl. It is the story of Erek, a young boy who just wants peace in a dysfunctional society. It is the story of Tao, a man who wanted peace but never knew how. I will narrate the story as it comes to me, for even I don’t know how it’ll go.
I think I’ve told something about Kyton. I will elaborate. Kyton is a detective and also a psychologist. He is 35, unmarried. He has some deep rooted issues with his parents, which I’ll talk of later. Now you might wonder why he’s such a bleak character. He’s got good reasons.
First of all, it’s the city he lives in. The city’s name is irrelevant. I’ll prove that it is irrelevant by not giving the city a name throughout the story. But to give a sort of clue, imagine some European or Russian city in the 1970-80s. The city was hit by a war (which let’s say ended in 1945), and this war affected the entire globe. The veterans came out traumatised. And that is very important later in the story. Worse yet, every country started blaming others for the war.
In this city, the scars of the war were still here. You couldn’t exactly see it in the infrastructure , but when you look at the people there, when you look at the streets, when you look at the public buildings, Some part of you tells you that something is just wrong. And you would be right.
There was no real conceivable way in which one could decide what was wrong, unless you yourself were part of the problem. Now the problem was deep rooted. There was widespread corruption, yes, but that was not all. The underworld, if you will, was a very powerful presence in this city. The crime lords and the politicians were buddies behind everyone’s backs- they had to be to avoid mutually assured destruction. The law enforcement did not dare arrest an actual criminal for too long- they might not just lose their jobs, but their lives and families as well. This place was a haven for the crime lords of the world. As long as you had the money, influence and manpower, you could do anything here and run your crime network around the world. This was not a land where you expect to be the master detective. If you were a police officer, you either are corrupt or dead.
Unfortunately for Kyton, he was born here. He lost his parents here. Here lies all the expectations put upon him, his traumatic and abused childhood, and yet, he doesn’t want to leave any of it. The trauma was all that he had to call his. So he stayed here. At some point, he had convinced himself that he was insane, and to cure his alleged insanity, he took up the little left from his savings and tried to find a therapist. But no matter how much money was spent, he reached no conclusion. There was left for him.
His parents had left nothing for him after they died in a double suicide. The property was confiscated, because it seemed that his father had taken up too much debt. His father was also a detective, a famous one at that. But he died in debt , so it doesn’t matter. Thinking back on it , it was inevitable, given how he made enemies of the underworld and funded a sort of juvenile prison for young criminals to bring them back to society. The fool. But back to Kyton. Kyton’s relatives took him after his parents died , but he soon ran away and started doing odd jobs. At some point, he found a stable job working in a grocery shop and talked things with the shop owner to be able to go to college and get a degree in forensics. But he realized that his job prospects were horrible in a city that was ruled by crime. He should have learnt that from his father. But he thought that it was his fault. And thus his psychological breakdown began. Eventually, he decided to stop therapy and save up money again for a degree in psychology. Seven years went by in saving. Seven years of practically begging and labouring on the streets. But he made it. He got a degree in psychology.. only to realize that it did not solve his issues. But he got a different type of job now.
His dual jobs gave him a new kind of job to do - brainwashing. The lazy police officials would sometimes hire him to convince innocent citizens to accept crimes that they didn’t do. He was perfect for the job because they could keep the public in check by calling him a detective , but asking personally for psychology related services instead. It still didn’t pay that much more, though. He was able to take a loan to reclaim his parent’s house and set up an office. Why didn’t he leave ? That is a question he asks himself every once in a while. He wanted to know how other parts of the world felt, but he could not get the will to go out of the city, and the papers could not be trusted anymore. The papers were simply just propaganda by the powerful - he knew it because he was part of that chain of manipulation. Those in power could always shift the blame to the innocent, and any truth could be twisted to fit any narrative. If you didn’t fit it, too bad, you’re gone.
Kyton wondered when all this pain would end.