“Sorry,” I said. “I was just thinking about your mom, that’s all.”
“She was a great cook. She used to make sweet egg for my
“I miss my mom’s cooking, too,” I said. “She used to make this awesome pasta. Mushrooms and some kind of white sauce.
It tasted like heaven. God, I’m glad I can talk to you about it.”
“Of course,” he said. “I hope you took my very good advice and let yourself be changed.”
“I did.”
“The first time the ink attacked me was about a year after I lost her. It’s like the Kami bloodline realized she was gone, so it moved on to me.”
“Does it work like that?”
“Nah, coincidence, I think. Hits when you’re not a kid anymore. Otherwise there’d be some big ink-related disasters.”
“Makes sense,” I said.
“Hell of a genetic parting gift she left me.”
He tipped the bowl of miso soup into his mouth, clawing with a spare chopstick at the seaweed stuck on the bottom.
“You told me I could be angry, Tomo. That she’s gone.”
“You can feel any way you want to,” he said, clanking the bowl down on the table. “Any way you need to.”
“Are you angry?”
“Angry as hell.”
It shouldn’t have, but it made me smile. Tomo smiled, too, and stood up suddenly, pushing his dishes to either side.
He reached across the table and pressed his lips to mine. He smelled of tofu and seaweed and miso paste, his hair gel like sweet vanilla.
When he pulled away, I said quietly, “What happened to her, Tomo?”
He frowned, tracing circles on my jaws with his thumbs.
“The nightmares,” he said. “They can be so bad. It’s not like I have them all the time, but when I do—god. Things made of shadow calling for you, chasing you, forcing you into corners and revealing the darkness inside you. Telling you horrible things they say they know you want, the things you don’t want, so when you wake up you don’t know what’s real anymore. And you— Never mind. I don’t really want to talk about it, but they’re sick.” He looked jittery, his eyes staring at something far away. I couldn’t believe anything could shake him up like this. “I know. They can’t really hurt you, right? They’re just dreams. But even dreams can kill you if they’re scary enough. Heart attack in your sleep, and that’s it.”
“They killed her?” I whispered. Was it just like what had happened to Mom? But he shook his head.
“She couldn’t sleep at night,” he said. “She couldn’t face them. She’d wake up screaming all the time but wouldn’t tell me why. She’d stay up as late as she could, terrified to close her eyes. Sometimes she’d be awake for days at a time. She was a wreck. And then—”
He slumped down into his chair.
“I forgot my lunch. She was bringing it to me. When she heard the crosswalk chime, she didn’t even check which direction it was. She didn’t even look before she stepped out.”
My hand went to my mouth. “Oh god.”
“I remember running to the window of my classroom, the sound of all the sirens. The rice and sweet egg all over the road.”
My eyes filled with tears. “I’m so sorry.”
“So you bet I’m angry. And that’s why I won’t lose anything else to the ink. Not my life, not my mind—not you.”
The table was a barrier, Tomohiro so far away. I skirted it desperately and wrapped my arms around him, sinking into his warmth.
“I’m okay,” he said. “It was almost eight years ago.”
“It’s horrible.”
“Sorry,” he said. “I didn’t want to make you sad. I’m fine, just changed. And mad.” He brushed the hair out of my face and tucked it behind my ears with his good wrist. “And now we need to get to school before we’re both late.”
I dabbed my eyes, nodding, and I felt a small thrill then, that I knew Tomohiro better than anyone at school, that he trusted me more than Myu or Ishikawa or anyone. It was a stupid thrill in the face of such a story, but I couldn’t help feeling it.
I left the house first, walking south a few blocks before turning west. That way I would still come from the south side of Shizuoka Station and wouldn’t stand out. Tomohiro would ride his bike north and come along the stone wall, the one he often jumped over to look badass, to cover that he was really sneaking off to draw.
The rain had cleared some of the humidity, and the crisp morning air felt refreshing against my bare arms. I passed OLs—office ladies—in suits on their way to work, salarymen and schoolteachers, students wearing other uniforms. One of them, a guy from another school, walked the same way I did for a while; I got a little paranoid. If he hadn’t been in front of me, I would’ve sworn he was following me. I wasn’t sure about which school uniform he wore—from behind I couldn’t see the tie, and the white shirt and dark pants were pretty basic—but then he turned his head to look across the street, and I saw the shock of blond hair tucked behind his ears, the silver earring glinting in the sunlight.
Jun.
He saw me, too, and stared at my Suntaba uniform. He smiled broadly, lifting his hand and bobbing his head.
“Good morning!” he said.
“Morning,” I stammered. He stopped and waited for me.
“You get caught in the storm last night?” he said.
“What?” Oh god, how did everyone know? Did I radiate guilt or something?
“The mud,” he said, pointing at the stains that pretty much covered me head to toe.
“Oh. Yeah.”
He stared at me another minute. “So you’re on Suntaba’s kendo team, huh? I was surprised to see you at the tournament.”
Of course he’d noticed. I was the only blond-haired girl in the school, for god’s sake.
“Yeah,” I said politely, stifling my inner monologue. “So you’re the famous Takahashi.”
“I guess I am.” He grinned. “Just a sport I’m into, right?”
His hair slipped from behind his ear and he tucked it back again. “This weekend is the kendo retreat with some
“I’m not going,” I said, waving my hand in front of me.
“I’m not good enough. Mostly the seniors are going.”
“Ah,” he said, tilting his head backward and looking up at the bright blue sky. “Too bad.”
He was just being polite, I knew. But somehow his subtle compliment made the hairs stand up on the back of my neck.
“That ink thing was weird, huh?” he said.
“What?”
“At the tournament.”
“Oh,” I said. “Yeah, that was super weird.”
“Made me think of that story you told me at the station.
You know, with that boy at your school who was drawing things.”
Not good. Not. Good.
“Oh, yeah, he transferred,” I said. “Haven’t seen him since.”
