Narita International Airport is a recurring threshold in Jake Adelstein’s account: a practical route home that figured in a painful family dispute over Sekiguchi’s funeral, and the setting of a later, consequential meeting with one of Goto’s mistresses. In both episodes, the airport marks a departure, while the conversations around it expose obligations and unresolved conflict.

Departure and the funeral dispute

The day before the family was due to return to the United States, Sekiguchi’s wife called to tell Jake that Sekiguchi had died. Jake wanted to cancel the flight and remain in Japan for the funeral. Sunao and her mother disagreed with changing the family’s plans; Jake proposed that he escort Sunao and the children to Narita International Airport, then arrange for someone in America to meet them and drive them home. The proposal did not resolve the argument: Sunao and her mother accused him of putting his own need ahead of his family’s.

The journey he made instead

After the family left the Chinese restaurant, Jake and Sunao returned to her home. At ten that night, they set out by taxi in heavy rain for the Sekiguchi family’s house. Sunao accompanied him, though they were not speaking; the storm forced the taxi to stop once or twice, and the fare came to almost $250. The airport remained part of the alternative plan, not the journey he took that night. The trip instead carried him toward the family he had to see and the promise he had made to Sekiguchi to pay his respects.

A later meeting

In May 2008, shortly before one of Goto’s mistresses left Japan, Jake met her once more at Narita International Airport. He complained about Goto while she listened patiently. Halfway through his tirade, she interrupted to ask whether his hatred might come from the fact that he was so much like the man he hated. Jake denied seeing the resemblance. The airport scene thus became more than a farewell: it gave the woman a moment to challenge the reporter’s self-understanding as he was collecting the last pieces of evidence.