by Amanda Sun
“She couldn’t keep food down for almost two weeks. We thought she was fading. But she pulled through, and that was that.”
“Wow,” I said. “That’s scary.”
Diane gave me a sad smile. “But you both came through it badly beat up. The doctors said there’d be side effects. Um...you know, birth defects.”
“Defects?”
“They said you’d have brain damage, that you’d never be able to walk. That you might not be able to see or communicate.” I could barely hear her; my world had stopped. Diane reached across the table and squeezed my hand. “But don’t worry about any of that now,” she said. “When you were born, you came out just fine. You were young enough at four months that your brain just kept growing, and here you are, just fine.”
Not completely, I thought. I’m not fine at all.
“It’s why your mom was always clinging to you,” Diane said. “Why she never wanted you to leave her side.”
“Because I almost left her before I was born,” I said. The tears welled up in my eyes. I hadn’t even known I’d fought for my life. The ink had tried to kill me long before any of this. “I always thought it was because Dad left...that she was worried I’d leave, too.”
One look at Diane, and I knew. I just knew. My heart thudded in my ears.
“Oh god,” I whispered. “Dad left her because of that, didn’t he? Because there was something wrong with me?”
Diane’s eyes filled with tears. “He was a sorry excuse for a man,” she said, her voice wavering. “You’re better off without him, Katie. We always loved you just the same, no matter what.”
The omurice turned in my stomach. Everything made sense, as horrible as it was. Everything except one detail.
“How did Mom get sick?” I asked.
Diane frowned. “We were never sure where she got the food poisoning,” she said. “We think it was the fruit your dad brought back from a business trip to Tokyo.”
Oh shit. “He went to Tokyo?” I whispered.
“He brought back these wrapped dragon fruits. You’ve probably seen them at the supa when we go shopping. Pink and green on the outside, but inside white with these little black seeds. The one she ate was really dark purple on the outside. Must have gone bad. The lab tested the other fruit and they came back fine, though, so we don’t know for certain.”
Black-and-white fruit. Oh god. Mom ate a dragon fruit sketched by a Kami. Who knew how it had got into the box. Maybe a worker had sketched the fruit because he’d swiped one to eat. Maybe...maybe Dad had poisoned her on purpose. But that was dumb. I was pissed he would leave her because something was wrong with me. What the hell? But still, something twisted in my stomach. In a way it was all my fault—Mom’s fear of losing me, all the overly careful parenting she’d done. All the loneliness she’d endured.
It was Dad’s fault, but now I felt responsible, too, even though I hadn’t asked for any of it to happen.
“Oh, Katie,” Diane said. “Did I tell you too much?”
“No,” I said. “No, I wanted to know.” I’d needed to know. “Thank you. For being honest with me.”
“That all happened a long time ago,” Diane said. “So never mind, okay? Look how strong and healthy you turned out. Nothing’s going to hold you back now.”
She was wrong. I was still suffering from the ink. I was still marked like I had been before I was born.
I was always destined for this. And like Tomohiro, the ink in me had been bringing sadness to those around me before I’d even known.
* * *
Yuki met me in the library at lunchtime the next day to go over my latest list of kanji. Tanaka had suddenly decided he needed to try out for the baseball team after watching the Giants game on TV the night before, so he’d gone to beg the club to take him halfway through the year.
“Okay, and this one?” Yuki said, pointing at the kanji from yesterday’s study session.
I racked my brain. “Um...guilt?”
She shook her head. “That one is guilt.” She pointed. “This one is to—”
“To put down,” I blurted out. “I remember.”
“Are we going too fast?”
I sliced my stewed egg in half with my chopsticks and shoveled a piece into my mouth. The salty soy sauce melted on my tongue. “I have to,” I said. “I don’t have time to learn these slowly. Anyway, that’s the only one I didn’t remember. Well, and this one, and this one...”
“Katie,” Yuki said, reaching for her salmon onigiri, “you’re really distracted today. Is everything okay with you and Tomohiro?”
I flushed red. “What? Why?”
Yuki grinned. “Because you’re not spilling the details, and if there’s drama going on, I need to know.”
“It’s not about Tomo,” I said, taking another bite of the egg. “It’s something I learned about my mom. She was really sick when she had me, Yuki-chan. I almost died.”
“Uso,” Yuki said in disbelief. “You’re kidding. But I’m glad you’re here, Katie, that you’re in Japan with me.”
“Me, too,” I smiled. And then I wondered if maybe I wasn’t supposed to die from that ink. Maybe I was supposed to survive, to move to Japan. Maybe there was actually purpose behind it all.
“So everything’s okay with Tomo, then?”
“It’s great,” I said. Except the whole me-lying-to-meet-up-with-another-guy thing, but obviously it wasn’t how it sounded.
“Good,” Yuki said. “Then let’s keep working on kanji so you can stay. Let’s work on myoji. Can you write my name?”
In phonetic hiragana I could. But myoji, the kanji for names...
I concentrated and wrote.
“That’s it!” Yuki squealed. She erased one of my strokes and fixed it up a little. “This one needs to be longer than this one,” she said, and I nodded. “Okay. Write another name.”
Yuu Tomohiro.
“Oh please,” Yuki said, jabbing me with her elbow. “Spare me. You guys are sappy beyond belief.”
I missed our time in Toro Iseki. I wished things didn’t feel like they were slipping between my fingers.
* * *
I only had to put the chairs on the desks for cleanup, so I arrived early to the gym for Kendo Club. Today was the last practice before the prefecture tournament over the weekend. I headed into the change room and pulled on my hakama skirt. Today’s practice was all about Tomohiro, really. With Ishikawa out and only a couple of our junior kendouka participating, he was the only one who had the skill to advance for Suntaba at the tournament. It would be such a relief to have it behind us. I wondered if the police were still hounding Ishikawa and Jun. I’d have to ask Jun the next time we met up.
The next time. How many times would we meet up? But the control he’d had drawing that glass of water—I wanted that for Tomohiro. Jun could live a normal life. Maybe Tomo could, too.
We started the class with the usual push-ups and laps around the gym. Many in the class hadn’t bothered to suit up in full bogu armor, but Nakamura-sensei and Watanabe-sensei didn’t notice, or at least didn’t care. They hounded Tomohiro, shouting at him to go faster as he did his laps.
“Pick up your feet!” they shouted during his kiri-kaeshi movements. “You’re stuck to the floor, Yuu. Lighter!” It was brutal, like they were hazing him.
“Ossu!” Tomohiro shouted to show he was listening, conforming.
“Swing harder. Focus! Better aim. Again!”
“Ossu!” he yelled back. The sweat was dripping off the ends of his tenugui headband onto the floor.
“Not good enough! More!” What the hell were they talking about? He was in peak form. It was almost cruel. They were pushing him to his limits, screaming at him, and he took it, time after time.
I realized I was staring, so I went
back to my exercises.
“I’ve never seen them work him so hard,” I whispered to my partner.
She nodded behind the mesh screen of her men helmet. “The competition is going to be really tough.”
“Okay, together!” Nakamura-sensei shouted, and all the kendouka gathered. We sat in a circle except for Tomohiro, who stood in the center, his body shaking with every breath. “Kamenashi, you’re up,” Coach said, and the kendouka stood to spar with Tomohiro. But Kamenashi was beaten down easily, even though he was high level.
Nakamura called another kendouka and then another. These two were a difficult match, and I started to realize what he was doing. Each team member he called had a different strength. Kamenashi was quick on his feet; Matsumoto had incredible defense; Hasegawa was aggressive and powerful. In this way, the coaches were training each aspect of Tomohiro’s abilities and looking for weaknesses.
“One more, and then we’re done for the day,” Watanabe-sensei said. “Katie, you’re up.”
What? I was still a junior kendouka. Tomo could beat me easily, way more easily than he’d beaten each of the partners I’d watched. Even with his body swaying, exhausted, the copper spikes sticking out from under his headband flattened with sweat, it wouldn’t be a challenge to him.
He looked at me through the bars of the men, his soft eyes looking into mine. And I realized why we’d been paired.
He’d trained on speed, defense, offense, power, aggression. There was one thing left. How would he fare when the battle was emotional? Pit him against his girlfriend—would he make mistakes, let down his guard? Smart thinking from the coaches, but did it ever suck for us.
“Get into seiza. Ready?”
I pulled myself from the circle, feeling numb. I crouched into seiza stance, my shinai gripped tightly in my hands.
“Hai, staato,” yelled Watanabe, and Tomo and I started circling. My thoughts were racing. Tomohiro looked collected and calm, but I hadn’t had his training. I yelled a loud kiai to steady myself, but it was hard to focus. He looked ready to collapse, and even then he was dangerous.
He swung, totally unexpected, and I barely dodged it by leaping back.
“Faster footwork, Tomohiro,” said Nakamura-sensei.
Tomo screamed, “Ossu!” His voice was strained. What were they trying to do, make him collapse?
I lunged at Tomohiro, but he blocked my shinai with his own. The crack of wood on wood echoed to the rafters of the gym, and the vibration shook in my hands. I barely recovered in time to dodge his next attack.
But I didn’t make it, and the shinai tapped into my dou.
“Point!” shouted Watanabe.
One more hit and we could stop this. One more point and he could rest. I wanted to just give in, to let him win. But it would be too obvious and he was the one who’d get in trouble. So I kept fighting.
He swiped at me and I backed up, almost into the circle of kendouka. I had to get back into the center of the arena or I’d end up out of bounds. I circled away, avoiding him. The shouts and encouragement of our classmates around us were disorienting paired with the stifling heat of the armor.
I circled Tomohiro, watching him carefully. And then he lunged, yelling his kiai as he approached.
Only that didn’t sound like his voice at all. It sounded strange, warped, like many people shouting at once. The same kind of shout I’d heard when we’d fought Jun at Sunpu Castle.
He hit his shinai so hard against mine that I collapsed onto the ground, my shinai skidding across the sleek floor. My whole back was out of bounds of the circle. He’d basically won.
But he didn’t stop. He raised his shinai high above his head as he screamed.
Why isn’t he stopping? Attacking me now was like beating someone with a broomstick. I would get injured for sure, with my spine against the hard floor like this.
“Yamero!” ordered Watanabe sharply as he and Nakamura approached Tomohiro. “Stop!”
They weren’t going to make it in time. The shinai was going to hit first.
I looked up at Tomohiro, my hands instinctively up to protect myself. His eyes shone dark and angry behind the men.
Dark angry pools of ink, vacant, lost.
He’d lost himself. And he was going to attack me.
He cried out, swinging the shinai down.
I cringed, waiting for impact. I could try to roll away, but I knew I wouldn’t be fast enough.
“Yuuto!” came a loud shout from the side of the gym.
Tomo stopped, the shinai a foot above my hip as I rolled out of the way. The shinai clattered against the floor as Tomohiro grabbed his helmet to steady himself.
I could see a shock of white hair from the doorway. Ishikawa. It had to be.
“What the hell were you thinking?” snapped Nakamura. Tomohiro was lifting the helmet off his head, his eyes normal and completely disoriented.
“You could’ve seriously hurt her!” said Watanabe. He reached up and smacked Tomohiro hard on the back of the head. I stared, terrified.
Tomohiro dropped to his knees, his armor clattering against the ground.
“Sumanakatta!” he shouted, a pretty serious apology. His shaking fingers clawed at the floor as he bent over, bowing low to the coaches and me. But it was a cover, I could see that. He’d collapsed to his knees from exhaustion and was turning it into the most serious apology he could make.
“Greene, you okay?” Ishikawa was beside me now, offering a hand to help me up. It was so weird to have Tomohiro as the danger and Ishikawa as the one to help, but I was too shaken to protest. I took his hand and got to my feet, lifting the men off my head.
The kendouka circle was silent, horrified.
“Dismissed!” said Nakamura, and they scattered to the change rooms. “To attack a kendouka like that is unacceptable, Yuu. What the hell is wrong with you?”
“Look at him,” Ishikawa said. “He’s exhausted, Coach. He’s as slick as a fish with all that sweat. He was probably delirious or something.”
“You,” said Watanabe, narrowing his eyes, and he pointed at Ishikawa. “You’re not even supposed to be here. You’re suspended from kendo until the police investigation is complete.”
Ishikawa was silent. It was a huge risk for him to come.
“I just wanted to cheer Yuuto on,” he said quietly.
“Go home,” Nakamura said. “We have enough trouble to deal with right now.”
“He’s right, though,” Watanabe added. “Yuu’s exhausted; he has better discipline than that. Katie, are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” I tried to say, but it came out shaky.
Tomohiro heaved the breath into his lungs, looking at me with what looked like tears in his eyes. He looked terrified as he reached a hand up to pull the headband from his hair.
“Sumanakatta,” he said again quietly.
I couldn’t believe it. I didn’t want to believe it. He was losing to the ink, and it had tried to hurt me.
The Kami in him was taking over.
Tomo and Ishikawa were chatting by the change-room door when I came back out.
“Katie,” Tomohiro said, rushing up to me and resting his hands on my arms. “Are you okay?”
“Fine,” I said, “but I’d really prefer you didn’t try to pound me into a pancake.”
“Greene,” Ishikawa said, running a hand through his white hair, “close one.” So suddenly he cared what happened to me? Between him and Jun, the lines of friends and enemies were blurring way too much for me to understand.
“Aren’t you supposed to be at home on bed rest?” I said.
“Yeah, I am.” Ishikawa started unbuttoning his shirt, and I threw a hand up like a visor over my eyes.
“Okay, I don’t need to see that.”
“No, st
upid. The wound.” He pulled the side of his shirt back to reveal a mass of bandages. “Still hurts like crap, but they managed to dig the bullet out, so I guess I won’t be setting off any metal detectors.”
Tomo tucked a strand of hair behind my ear and Ishikawa looked away, I guess because we both felt awkward. “So you’re really okay?” I knew Tomohiro hadn’t been himself when he attacked me, but still—I needed time to digest what had happened.
“What gives?” I said. “You’ve lost control before, but never toward me. I mean, the drawings, sure, but not...you.”
Ishikawa piped up. “I’m thinking this isn’t the best place for a discussion. And I’m hungry for something that isn’t konnyaku soup.”
“Oh no, konnyaku,” I said, rolling my eyes. “The tortures of being shot.”
“How about okonomiyaki?” Tomohiro said.
“Fine, let’s go,” I said, and we twisted down the hallways toward the genkan to get our shoes. I couldn’t believe I was going for lunch with Ishikawa.
But he had saved me just now. Maybe he was a changed person or something.
In the genkan, Tomo and Ishikawa headed over to the third-year shoe cubbies. I watched, feeling like I didn’t fit in with the two of them. Ishikawa’s occasional attempts at tolerating me were only because of his friendship with Tomohiro, anyway.
We headed toward the okonomiyaki place and sat across from each other, a giant black square griddle between us. I grabbed the menu, staring at the kanji for each item. A lot of the ingredients were in katakana, the Japanese system used for foreign words. Hamu. Cheesu. Bekon. I was tempted to order a ham, cheese and bacon version just to show them I was literate.
I stared at the ingredients I wasn’t so sure about. But before I could decipher everything, the waitress had arrived, and Ishikawa was rattling away our order.
Damn. Literacy was still out of reach.
Ishikawa leaned back, his arms folded across his chest. “So what the hell happened back there, Yuuto?”
“I blanked out,” Tomohiro said, looking at me. “I couldn’t focus. It was like being in a dream, where you can’t really control what you’re doing or thinking. You know something’s wrong, but you can’t fix it.”
