Tanimura shares the story of Dr. Tokai, a man whom he believes lives an artificial life. Dr. Tokai is a bachelor at the age of 52. He does not actively seek out a partner, is comfortable alone in bed, and is sufficient in keeping his home tidy. He works as a plastic surgeon, which guarantees him many chances to meet women. From an early age, Tokai knew he did not want to be married, and did not look for a serious partner. Instead, he dates, many times more than one woman at once. Most of these women are already in relationships or marriages, and Tokai takes on the role of a secondary lover.

Tokai is most comfortable with these casual flings. He enjoys going out to dinner, talking with these women, and having sex. His goal is to be present in the moment and always aims to simply have a great time. Many women leave him, deciding to get married, and it never bothers him. In fact, he is rather adept at assessing when a woman may be growing attached, and ends the relationship without hurting her.

The majority of Tokai’s friends are parents, who encourage him to have kids. He does not want to marry and become a father, and believes that his friends merely want him to suffer like they do with uncooperative and unappreciative children. Tanimura describes Tokai as a likeable and kind person. Though he discusses the women he meets, he never allows the conversations to turn vulgar.

Since Tokai often dates more than one woman at once, his secretary at his clinic organizes his schedule, often coordinating his meetings with these women and booking travel accommodations for Tokai to see them. Though some partners suspect their wives’ and girlfriends’ infidelity with Tokai, none are ever able to confirm it, and Tokai never deals with the actions of an angry lover. Tokai considers himself lucky to escape this jealousy and lives this kind of life for 30 years, until one day, he falls uncontrollably in love.

The woman is 16 years younger than him, with a child and a husband. They see each other for a year and a half. Tokai explains to Tanimura that it is a painful experience for him, and he tries to stop himself from feeling love. He tries focusing on her imperfections, but finds himself only falling in love with these too. The love overwhelms him, and Tokai believes that it has an actual, physical effect on his body. The woman, however, is unsure if they should continue the affair, and Tokai tells Tanimura that he obsesses over this horrifying possibility.

Tanimura met Tokai at the local gym, where both played squash on the weekends. They played a few games together and began meeting weekly, always going for a beer afterwards. Over these drinks, Tokai shares his life with Tanimura. He tells Tanimura that he loves this woman because she is special, and a “complete presence,” even though he has been with “better” women. The woman began the affair when she discovered her own husband’s infidelity, even though he tried to make amends.

The affair’s impact on Tokai is substantial, and he begins to wonder amidst these new feelings if he even knows who he is. He credits these thoughts to a story he read about Nazi concentration camps, and how one prisoner was kept from the gas chambers because of his skills as a doctor. As a plastic surgeon, Tokai realizes that his skills are not useful enough to save him if he were in the same position. Therefore, he wonders what his worth is if everything in his life were yanked away. Tokai admits that he wishes he could start his life over, feeling that he wasted it.

Part of Tokai’s obsession with discovering his self-worth stems from the role this woman now plays in his life. He thinks of her constantly, no matter what he is doing, and can no longer maintain more than one affair at a time. The longer they are together, the deeper his love for her becomes. Tanimura tries to tell Tokai that this is a normal reaction to love, but Tokai insists that it is not. He explains the rage he feels at the idea of not seeing her. This is the last time Tanimura and Tokai speak.

Tokai stops coming to the gym, and two months later, Tanimura receives a call from Tokai’s secretary, who informs Tanimura that Tokai passed away and has left something for Tokai. When they meet, the secretary tells Tanimura that Tokai stopped eating. After this, he also stopped caring what he looked like and was distracted. Most concerning, he stopped seeing women. His health declined as he lost weight from not eating, and he was soon too weak to operate on anyone. Eventually, he stopped coming to the clinic at all.

When the secretary could not reach Tokai for two days, he went to Tokai’s apartment and let himself in, only to find the apartment a mess and Tokai silent and still on the bed. The apartment reeked, but Tokai was not dead. He looked at the secretary, but never said a word. The secretary cleaned the apartment and opened the windows. He called the doctor, who came and examined Tokai, who still did not move or speak.

Tokai suffered from a form of anorexia, refusing to eat. The secretary believes that Tokai intentionally did this, taking joy from watching himself waste away, as though he wanted to be erased. The doctor tried to help Tokai, giving him nutritional shots and an IV, but nothing stopped his health from further declining. Throughout all of this, Tokai remained silent.

Tanimura asks the secretary if something happened between Tokai and the woman he loved. The secretary reveals that he tried to contact the woman to ask her, but only reached her husband. Her husband informed him that the woman no longer lived with him and their daughter. When the secretary finally found her, she was living with another man. While Tokai was madly in love with her, she was conducting another affair and chose that man over him.

Tanimura realizes that this is a wound Tokai could not heal from. The secretary tells Tanimura that when Tokai died, he weighed less than half of his normal weight and resembled the Jewish survivors of the Holocaust. In the end, Tokai died from heart failure, as though his heart broke. Despite pleading with the woman to see Tokai, she refused.

Before leaving, the secretary gives Tanimura a new squash racket. Tokai ordered it, but was too weak to play when it finally arrived, and wanted Tanimura to have it. The secretary also pleads with Tanimura not to forget Tokai, and now, Tanimura sees his account of Tokai’s death as a means of not forgetting him.

Tanimura remembers one specific conversation he had with Tokai. He believed that women were born with an independent organ that allowed them to lie. He believed that this is why they could lie and feel no regret. Now, Tanimura agrees with him. He remembers his friend, admiring how he loved completely, even though the loss of his love led Tokai to erase himself.

When Tanimura plays squash with Tokai’s racket, he wonders if it is in a way a sign from Tokai that he finally found an answer to the question of who he was, and that this was his way of telling him.