In the Spring of 2023, on the precipice of my long torturous divorce, my pain took me to the Kyoto Railway Museum. I remember that time being glacial, like I was functioning behind a thick, solid pane of glass, unable to touch the world. The curve of the Zero makes me feel hollow inside. I feel caught in amber. I can’t feel, I can’t escape, I’m not there, I’m not here.
It is a museum. One exits through the gift shop. There, I see something I haven’t before. Rows of soft toys, in three different sizes, Dr Yellow, the Komachi, the Hayabusa.
It took a long time to deduce that I could get them by purchasing a ticket. I fumble my way through conversation, my face hot, frightened and embarrassed. Unable to understand the world, let alone what the person at the counter was saying. But I wanted it. I assumed it was a raffle and the ticket would determine which train you received. I won’t get the one I want, I think. I didn’t deserve it.
Handing the ticket over, they tell me I can choose which one I want. The ticket only specified the size of the toy, not which train. I remember a feeling. A nostalgic scent, caressing me lightly. Delight. That was how I met my first Dr Yellow soft toy. You can choose, they said. And I chose him. It was a small moment of agency at a time when I felt my life had none.
–
When I came back to Japan a few months later, he came with me, cradling my head while I cried in a hostel. Warming my hands while my friends talked me into leaving my room to eat. Waiting for me while I fucked my way around Tokyo.
When I came back to Singapore and got into my first real post-breakup infatuation - an intriguing wild haired pianist who I was severely incompatible with - I left him at his house as a little gesture of trust, thinking I would come back for him. We ended up being separated for far too long. Never again, I thought. I’ll protect my Dr Yellow, this Dr Yellow. Through my subsequent, numerous romances, I’d held on to him. I’d give away different Dr Yellows. A die-cast one. A hand-painted one. Not this one.
When I left to move to Japan, via Europe, I’d given away my soft toys to my favourite children and packed all my things in boxes to be shipped. Not him though. He was coming with me.
On the plane to Lisbon, I remember not being able to find him in my backpack and going into a panic. Did someone steal him? I’d have to call the hostel in Camden and ask. Who would care? It was a huge relief to find him in my luggage. Of course I packed you. I’d never forget you, how could I? I thought.
–
It’s been exactly a year since I’ve moved here. So many things have happened but this is the story I wanted to tell.
In summer last year, I met a man who got into the same cabin as me on the Chuo, came with me to the Metro Museum, put me in my first Green Car and showed me the real Dr Yellow. Slowly, our lives began to seep into each other like an act of co-creation. A peaceful, loving infrastructure that I’d never experienced before.
In autumn, I left Dr Yellow in his bed. A choice far less casual than I let on.
When I returned, he’d put Dr Yellow neatly between two pillows and tucked him in. It touched me so so so deeply.
It’s summer again now and I’ve been here for a year. Now I have the Komachi and the Hayabusa too. And two of the larger Dr Yellow soft toys. I live in Koenji, in an apartment just big enough for me. I have a guitar and piano to play when I get songs stuck in my head in the morning. I have things that I’m learning and things that I’m building. I have ice-cream in my fridge. I have friends to sing with, to eat with, to tell me that everything’s going to be ok. I have the most enchanting man to go on adventures with, to link hands with, to kiss and to hold.
But Dr Yellow? That Dr Yellow? He lives in Kugayama now, with this man. And for the first time, I trust that, even if I’m not there, he’ll be happy, safe and loved.