His cheek rests against mine, and I move so my nose grazes his face. He does the same, and our noses touch. Our lips just two sung notes apart. “Kite,” he whispers, though it sounds like music. “I…”
He tilts his head, and I think maybe the world tilts with him. It opens. The earth, the trees, all lean back and make space for us. For this.
His lips are like salt and jasmine. They’re soft with rough parts. The sea and the hull of a boat. And it’s so beautiful and feels so completely right that I start to cry, and my knees begin to buckle. I match him. I let him in, and he is careful with me. Respectful of me.
I never knew. I never knew. I never knew…
Anything.
My hand moves to his hair, and it ruffles under my fingers. Springs back into place. His fingers spread on my back, but they don’t wander. He is focused on our mouths. This new and amazing discovery. And I just can’t remember why or even believe that we waited so long for this.
I break away, sensing the reluctance in him to let go. Feel the disappointment as his hands press into my skin desperately. But we need oxygen. Dancing over the dark ceiling, I see a swirl of stars. I see wings fluttering and comets colliding. Gold dust sweeping over the stones like a storm.
I gather what air I need and take his face in mine, kissing him in an exploring kind of way, like I have all the time in the world. Still connected, he steps backward, leading me into his room. The curtain brushes over my shoulders, cocooning me like thick willow branches, ready to hide and protect me.
We sit on the bed, his hands still at my back. I want to launch at him. Throw my arms around him and push him onto the mattress, but…
There are things we do not do. There are ways in which they are done, an order in which to do them, and to Hiro, this is important.
I take his hands and clasp them in mine, my eyes blinking tears I’m glad he can’t see. I’m scared. Not of him. Never of him. I’m scared of what he’ll say. “Hiro,” I whisper.
There’s a small chuckle. The hitch of ribs as they move up and out of place. “I’m really starting to love it when you say my name.”
I beam, and I’m sure my mouth is a floating crescent moon. “Hiro. Hiro. Hiro.” He chuckles again, leaning in to kiss me as I speak his name aloud again, his lips landing on mine just as I whisper, “o”.
Against my cheek, he murmurs, “Yes. Still love it. It doesn’t wear out.”
“Hiro, I…” The words bang on my skull like three-foot neon signs. They’ve been living in there for quite some time now, and they want to be seen. To be heard. “Hiro, I love you.” He stops still. I’m swept up in first kisses and the deepest feelings. They lift me from the ground; they take me on a tour of the sky. I move off the bed, kneeling on the cold hard floor. “Hiro Jackson, will you marry me?”
His sigh is dug down. Cavernous. “No.” My wings snap in midair. I flutter, I fall, I fail.
His hand touches my face. Even though I should probably storm out, save my dignity before this gets worse, I stay. Leaning into his warm hand and listening to his explanation. “No.” Two simple letters. A million reasons to run. But I’m glued to the floor. “But why? Don’t you love me, too?”
I sniff, hating how pathetic I sound. Thing is that I know he loves me. There is no doubt in my mind.
“It doesn’t matter if I love you or not; that’s not the point. This isn’t the way. We haven’t even been on a single date, Kite. I’m just… I’m just…”
He breaks our hands apart, and I know without even seeing that he’s raking a frustrated hand through his hair. That his eyes have blotted to dark clouds over the sea and his lips have thinned to a line.
My knees grind into the stone floor. “You’re just what?”
“I’m just worried you’re doing this for the wrong reasons. After what Mr. Inkham said, I know it’s on your mind. I know you don’t want to stay here forever, and that marriage would be a simple way to get the money you need. And I don’t blame you, I don’t, but I’m sorry, my answer has to be no.”
My head sinks, and so does my heart. I get up to leave. He grabs my arm, running his fingers down the length of it and making me shiver. “Why does everything have to be so rushed? Can’t you give me some time?”
Nodding, I fold into his arms. “But I do love you. That is the truth,” I whisper, facing away from him. Letting my tears absorb into his pillow.
Into my hair, he murmurs, “I know.”
I understand. It was rushed. It wasn’t the right time, but I’m not sure that exists for us.
“You owe me a date then,” I say.
Groaning, he hugs me tighter. “Okay, okay. One date.” He thinks I don’t hear him when he says minutes after, when our breath has settled and sleep is hovering like mist on the water, “Then you’ll get it.”
Get what?
19
KITE
Hiro shoots up out of bed like someone’s poured a bucket of ice water over his head. He pulls the covers with him and my knees fly to my chest, feeling the instant cold of no covers and no Hiro to warm me. “Kamo!” he whispers harshly.
My heart plummets faster than a fish searching for the bottom of the ocean. How could we forget Kamo? But then, isn’t that what Hiro said? Everyone forgets Kamo. He’s so quiet, so pressed into his bed, the wall, the world. He disappears, and no one notices him.
I swallow. I understand what Hiro was saying now. I don’t want to, but I do.
I am sandstone and mortar. I am crumbling, crumbling, crumbling.
Hiro strikes a match and by disturbed, frantic candlelight, he pulls on his clothes, fast, wrapping everything he owns around him. I do the same. He doesn’t stop me. He doesn’t tell me I can’t come with him this time. I part the curtain of his room, and he grabs my arm. “Wait!” he whispers harshly.
I think he’s going to make me stay, but I can’t leave him to search for Kamo by himself. I open my mouth to protest, but he lifts a coat around my shoulders and places a wool hat on my head. His hand lingers at my throat as he straightens the collar. His touch burns like fire. His eyes are the dead sea. Dark, deep, and tomblike. He brushes my jaw with the rough pads of his fingers. “Thank you.”
I watch the mouth I had just kissed hours ago, turn to a grim line. Touching my fingers to his lips, I feel the warm breath pressing between them. “It will be okay.” Please let it be okay.
His eyes close for one long second, living in this small, warm moment before we enter the cold, harsh outside. When he opens them, his eyes say, you don’t know that. But he doesn’t speak the words. He takes my hand, and we leave the safety of the tunnel. Splashing through icy water that’s dripping down from above, to the platform.
I’m praying. Praying we find him, praying we don’t. I just want Kamo to be alive. I want to find him hiding against the wall in the station, pressed into the background like so many peeling posters, his mischievous, contemplative eyes squinting at us in glee.
The station is empty save a few stumbling, mumbling drunks and older homeless people. They stay in their corners and drink, leaning against the colorful tiles. They ignore us.
Hiro searches the restrooms, each time coming out with his palms up, eyes getting rounder and harder, like a dying planet, with each empty room.
Then he turns back toward home, and I’m surprised at how quickly he’s given up. He runs like he’s out of time, and I struggle to keep pace with him. A train pulls up to the station, and he jumps on. I follow.
Hiro’s mood fills the rattling car. Worry. Worry. Worry.
Blame. Blame. Blame.
I want to ease his pain, so I step closer. He won’t sit. Gripping the pole like he may rip it from its rivets. He’s so tense it’s like arranging a corpse with rigor mortis. I bite my lip, wishing that thought hadn’t entered my head. “Hiro.” I try to catch his eyes. “Try not to think the worst. You don’t know what’s happened to him. He may be perfectly fine.” I pry his hand from the pole and place it around my waist, drawing him
into me. He sighs deeply, burying his face in my hair. He is so much heart and hero. He is the lion and the knight. I press him close, feeling the fast rise of his chest as he breathes in sharp, unhappy breaths.
“I only know the worst,” he mutters, sad words caressing my ear. I press my lips to his shoulder, kissing him over the top five layers of fabric. We are one beating, spluttering heart. Trying so hard to do the right thing. Trying so hard to rescue everyone. Always feeling like we’re not enough. Wishing there was a place where we could be. Enough.
He holds me tight, and we breathe together on this empty subway car. One breath. Two breaths. Not wanting to let go, but knowing reality is about to make us.
The train squeals and stops, and the inertia pulls us apart. But I feel threaded to him even as we break away. We are more and more connected. Looped like chain mail and welded strong.
“Do you know where you’re going?” I ask.
His expression is pained. He hides things beneath those smooth, dark cheeks. Layers of love. Of letting go. “Kamo has a few places he likes to go.”
The doors to the outside rattle, swirls of white brushing the glass and gathering in piles at the foot of the entrance. Under the streetlights, they look like white moths, fluttering and dying. Never reaching the globe. Never resting.
My eyes connect with Hiro, and I try to say, ‘no.’ But he’s already pushed the door open, mounds of fresh powdery snow spilling into the station. Hands to our faces we step into the blizzard. The immediacy of the bitter cold is hard as icicles to the chest. We lift our scarves over our faces, eyelashes painted white, and trudge down the street.
I shout through the howling wind, but it dies before it reaches him. This storm is formidable. We can’t stay out here very long.
Hiro moves slowly through the snow, taking time to shelter in alcoves and under shop balconies. He points to a sign a few doors down. Two red and white poles of a barbershop look like giant candy canes in this winter horrorland. Hiro comes closer and lowers his scarf. “He likes to watch people go in looking one way and come out looking different.” My mouth lifts for a spindly second at the unbearable sweetness of this silent child, but it freezes into a frown. Hiro points to a narrow alleyway, just wide enough for some trash cans and a side door, and leads me down it.
It’s a battle. The snow piling higher and higher, but at least there’s light bouncing from the streetlights off the endless white, giving us something to see by. We kick and shove snow aside, looking up and down the alley. I breathe relief. But Hiro is unconvinced. He stomps through, feet sinking. I grab his shoulder, shake, and shout, “Let me go up there.” I point to the end of the alley, where there are mounds that could be boxes covered in snow, resting against a chain-link fence. “I’m lighter than you. I can get there without sinking in so far.”
He nods, chin falling, arms hugging his sides. I shiver. My fingers are numb. My nose and ears sting. We will have to find shelter soon.
As carefully as I can, I pad toward the back. My feet sink down half a foot, but I can rest on the compacted snow. I scan for signs of life. There is nothing. My eyes rest on the wet and disintegrating tips of boxes. The edge of a metal trash can. Discarded hair from the barber shop.
Thick, black hair next to the trash can, not in it.
I draw in a gasp, cold air stabbing my lungs, and my hand flies to my mouth.
Let me become the sun. Let me burst with light and warmth and banish this snow from the alley.
Please.
20
HIRO
Her hand flies to her chest, and my heart flies from my mine. She shakes as she leans down to sweep snow from something. She’s just cold is all. Just cold. She’s barely able to touch whatever it is. She crouches, snow up to her waist, and I start pushing my way through. I can’t feel my feet. I wish the rest of me was so lucky.
She turns, sadness all over her graying face. She puts her hand up to stop me. But nothing can stop me.
I reach her. Tears frozen to her cheeks. They should fall. They shouldn’t cling to her. Bite her with more grief. More pain. I am struck like lightning has shot up from beneath me. Kamo’s round face is blue. Blue and sleeping. I kneel. It’s difficult to breathe. Because of the cold. The grief. “Kamo…” I whisper, his name dying as I speak it. “Kamo.”
I speak the names of the ones I’ve lost. The list is long, marking all of my years with death.
I sweep the snow from his face and shoulders. He is stone. He cannot be warmed by any fire. We’re too late. Kite sniffs behind me. “Oh, Hiro. Is he…?”
I stand and step back. Swallowing acres of screams. It will do no good. “He’s gone,” I manage.
Kamo. One of the Lost Children. Now lost forever.
My teeth chatter. My jaw feels rigid. Kite’s shaking uncontrollably, and I put my arm around her shoulders to warm her.
His face is wrong. Wrong color. Wrong expression. He looks peaceful. Did people see him and leave him here? I gulp back hot, furious tears as my throat tightens. He died alone. In an alley. Like so many street kids. I stand and look to the sky. Trying to find a star or something to pin my grief to. A light. A hope. But it’s just an endless swirl of white. And now we must leave him here.
“We have to go,” I say, turning Kite away from my friend’s body and pushing her toward the street.
She clutches her hands together, every part of her rattling like bones in a bag. “Yes. Yes.” Her mouth quivers. “We need to call someone.”
I keep my mouth shut. Rushing back to the station. Keeping my feet in line. Trying to survive. Always and all we ever do. Just survive.
Kamo didn’t survive. Maybe the world couldn’t tolerate someone as sweet and unassuming as him. Maybe he’ll go to a… I can’t even finish the thought. I don’t believe in better places. Heaven. Neverland. A place in the clouds. It’s all bullshit.
There is concrete and cold and dirt.
There is death and disease every winter.
Squeezing my hands into fists, I shove the door open violently.
Kamo was the first casualty. There have been many before and there will be others after. But I shouldn’t have forgotten him. I could have prevented this night.
I let this happen.
Kite rushes to a payphone and picks up the receiver, finger poised to dial the emergency number. I press down on the button. “There’s no point,” I say flatly.
She stares at me, lips blue. Her face a tiger stripe of frozen and melting tears. “But… we can’t just leave him there. He needs to be…” She stutters, from cold and shock, and I try to see it from her perspective. She’s not used to the sight of death. Not the way I am.
I take the receiver from her gently, then hang up the phone. “They won’t care, Kite,” I explain. “Kamo is a street kid. He’s already…” I can’t finish my sentence. The word dead blares like an electric headache inside my brain. “Look, trust me. They won’t come.”
She’s horrified. Her knees weakening. Her body crumpling to the floor. I sink with her, putting my grief aside for a moment. “But he deserves to be put to rest. He needs…” I fold her into my arms.
“When the snow melts, he will be,” I say simply, feeling something move in my chest. A hard lump that grows like a tumor with every lost kid who stays lost. She sobs. Fast and hard, then she pulls back. Her golden eyes finding mine. An impossible amount of warmth emitting from those eyes.
She touches my face. Traces my eyebrows with the tips of her delicate fingers. “I’m sorry,” she says, breathing calm into her voice. Showing a solidness. A strength I kind of knew was there, but is now radiating from her like the brightest star. The star that outshone the moon. “This is not my pain. It’s not my grief.” She blinks, her face wet from melted snow, pools of water soaking into her clothes. “Hiro. Are you okay?”
My eyebrows rise. I don’t get asked this question. I stare at the floor. Finding the cracks in the tiles. Following the curl of the patterns. Fern leaves and simplified dai
sies. “I’m fine,” I mutter.
“You’re not.” Her words bloom like a cloud under my chin, pushing my face up. I feel stone breaking. Resolve cracking.
I rest my head on her shoulder. God, it would be easier if I could cry. But I’m an empty well, a bucket with a hole in it or something. There are no tears left. “No, you’re right. I’m not okay.”
As I rest on her shoulder, as I allow Kite to carry some of my weight, all I can think about is little Kamo. And how I’ll be forever sorry that I couldn’t do more, be more, for him. “He didn’t deserve this. I should have done better. I’m sorry, Kamo. I’m so sorry.”
Kite strokes my back and whispers, “This isn’t your fault, Hiro.”
And I try really hard to believe her.
21
KITE
We leave Kamo. His face frozen in sleep. His heart an iceberg in his chest. Hiro tells me we have to leave him, but it feels so wrong. He tells me this is what they’ve always done. And I’m too scared to ask how many times this has happened before. But by the look on his face, it’s a lot.
We drag ourselves home. Home. To a slightly less cold place. A place filled with hungry children. One less hungry child now. I gulp, and tears keep coming. When we open the door, Hiro breaks from me and storms to the back of the tunnel, flicking the lights on with a static crack. Tired faces creased by hessian and doll blankets blink and yawn as they rise from slumber. He stands in the middle of the room as they look to him expectantly. Hands on hips, he holds his weary body up. But he is weighed down by all of this.
“Kamo found his mom,” he announces. The Kings all exchange glances, and sadness rings their eyes. It’s obvious this is code for Kamo has died. But it’s a disconnected sadness. Kind of like, Oh, that’s too bad. They nod, tap their chests, and point to the sky, then some of them lay back down, pull their threadbare coverings over their heads, and close their eyes. “We’ll go through his things in the morning.”
Hiro Loves Kite Page 8
