A man shares his recent bout with nausea and vomiting with a new friend, Mr. Murakami. For forty days, he experienced nausea and for forty days, he vomited practically everything he swallowed. At first, it had no apparent cause, besides perhaps alcohol, but when the vomiting continued to go on for days on end, he began to worry. These worries were only compounded when he began receiving phone calls on day three from a mysterious man who would simply whisper his name and hang up; he began to notice that his nausea was seemingly induced by the calls, going to vomit after the man hung up. He can't figure out who is calling him, but he has no lack of possible enemies: a fetish of his is to have sex with his friends' girlfriends or wives. Although it appears that none of these men ever found out about his tendency for infidelity, he wonders nonetheless if they put someone up to it. Seeing doctors, psychiatrists, and the police, no one could conclude what the cause of his nausea was, nor who the caller was. His weight declines at an alarming rate so, paranoid, he checks into a hotel. Initially, he can eat like normal, but it isn't long before the caller finds him again. He buys new clothes to fit his emaciated body and begins to adjust to a life of lack. But, on the fortieth day, for no apparent reason, both the calls and nausea ceased. While the caller kept up his habit of only whispering the man's name, for his final call, he asked if he knew who he was, then hung up. The two discuss what could've possibly happened, but Mr. Murakami sums it up by saying that things that begin with no apparent cause also end with no cause.