Birthday (short story collection)

Birthday (バースデイ, Bāsudei) is an anthology by Japanese writer Koji Suzuki first published on February 5, 1999 in Japan. It is the fourth installment of Suzuki's Ring series.

The book consists of three short stories occurring each in a different timeframe, and are all related to the Ring universe:

In November 1990 during the events of Spiral, Mai Takano finds herself waking up at the bottom of an exhaust shaft of a building near Tokyo Bay. The only way out of the shaft is by climbing a cloth tied to a beam nearby, but her ankle is broken and the shaft is too small for an adult to reasonably move about. To her surprise, Mai also finds out that she is pregnant, despite never having a sexual encounter before. She experiences bouts of leaving and entering unconsciousness and tries to recall her life and the events that made her there. As a former aide of Ryuji Takayama, who died of the ring virus, she was ordered by his publisher to search for some missing work papers in his childhood home. Rather than finding them, Mai was entranced by Ryuji's copy of the cursed video and decided to take it home and watch it. Upon watching, she felt movement in her belly and underwent morning sickness. Mai realizes that she herself is responsible for her predicament; her baby caused her to go into a trance and ordered her to leave her home while going commando and carrying a cloth and a sack of towel. She secretly went to the shaft and tied cloth to its surroundings, intending to climb down, but she slipped and fell, breaking her ankle.

Mai's pregnancy is soon due and she gives birth to a baby whom she realizes is Sadako Yamamura, reborn. The baby Sadako cuts her umbilical cord from the placenta, wipes herself with the towel, and finally leaves the shaft with the cord using the cloth, but not before flashing a grin at Mai and throwing the cloth, tied, back to the shaft, leaving Mai to die.

Hiroshi Toyama calls journalist Kenzo Yoshino to tell him more about Sadako Yamamura. Yoshino has just attended Kazuyuki Asakawa's funeral and also receives news of Mai Takano's death in an exhaust shaft. Toyama is nearing his fifties, a twice-married man with children and a stable job, but he longs to meet Sadako, the only woman he truly loves. He recounts to Yoshino events that transpired 21 years earlier, when Toyama was merely a young sound director trainee of the Hishio acting troupe. Toyama had a secret affair with Sadako, who begged him not to reveal it to outsiders as she still wanted to achieve success as a stage actress without controversy. Sadako pointed out the existence of an altar with a wrinkled umbilical cord behind Toyama's work room, which unsettled him. Toyama was further unsettled when Sadako groped director Yusaku Shigemori, which she stated was just a way to keep him away from her. She later apologized by having sex with Toyama in his work room. Toyama felt as if her voice penetrated his head directly.