The Seventh Man

The Seventh Man 

Haruki Murakami 

A huge wave nearly swept me away,’ said the seventh man, almost whispering. ‘It happened one September afternoon when I was ten years old.’
The man was the last one to tell his story that night. The hands of the clock had moved past ten. The small group that huddled in a circle could hear the wind tearing through the darkness outside, heading west. It shook the trees, set the windows to rattling, and moved past the house with one final whistle.
‘It was the biggest wave I had ever seen in my life,’ he said. ‘A strange wave. An absolute giant.’
He paused.
‘It just barely missed me, but in my place it swallowed everything that mattered most to me and swept it off to another world. I took years to find it again and to recover from the experience–precious years that can never be replaced.’

More: Granta Magazine