my god. What is this? Who are these people?
“Sou mitai,” Tomohiro smirked, which was way too casual a yes. A response like that was downright cruel. Even I knew that.
Myu’s glittery fingernails tightened around the book. She raised it high above her shoulders, the loose papers inside it slipping until it was a mess of corners.
Then she hurled the book at the floor.
The notebook exploded with pages as it trailed down, the papers catching in the air and filling the room like rain. They twirled and twisted as they came down, white edges framing thick lines of black ink and charcoal. They fluttered down to the floor like cherry petals.
One of the drawings fell in front of me, tapping gently against the end of my shoe as it came to a rest.
“What the hell?” Yuu shouted, picking up the book from the floor.
“What did it all mean, then?” she whispered. “What was I to you?”
Yuu straightened to his full height and tilted his chin back until his gleaming dark eyes gazed straight into hers. He took two swaggering steps toward her, bending forward until their lips almost met. Myu’s eyes widened.
He stood silently for a moment. Then he looked to the side, and I saw a pained look in his eyes. He breathed heavily, his cheeks pink, his eyes glossy. So he did have feelings after all, the beast. He started to reach for her chin with his fingers. And then his hand suddenly dropped into his pocket and he laughed.
“Betsu ni,” he said in a velvet voice. Nothing special.
You’re lying, I thought. Why are you lying?
But Myu looked like she’d been punched in the gut. And even with the cultural barriers that stood in my way, it was clear to me that he’d just discounted all her suffering, her feelings—the whole relationship. He looked like he didn’t give a shit, and that’s pretty much what he’d said.
Myu’s face turned a deep crimson, and her black hair clung to the sides of her snot-streaked face. Her hands squeezed into fists at her sides. Her gaze of hope turned cold and listless, like a mirror of Yuu’s face.
And then Myu lifted her hand and slugged him right in the jaw. She hit him so hard his face twisted to the left.
He lifted his hand to rub his cheek, and as he raised his eyes, they locked with mine.
Shit.
His gaze burned into me and I couldn’t move. Heat flooded my cheeks, and shame tingled down my neck.
I couldn’t look away. I stared at him with my mouth open.
But he didn’t call me out. He lifted his head, flicked his gaze back to Myu and pretended I didn’t exist. I let out a shaky breath.
“Saitei,” she spat, and I heard footsteps. After a moment, the door to the hallway slid shut.
I let out a breath.
Well, that was today’s dose of awkward.
I looked down at the paper, still touching the tip of my shoe. I reached for it, flipping the page over to look.
A girl lay back on a bench, roughly sketched in scrawls of ink as she looked out over the moat of Sunpu Park. She wore a school uniform, a tartan skirt clinging to her crossed legs. Little tufts of grass and flowers tangled with the bench legs, which had to be creative license—it was still too cold for blooms.
The girl was beautiful, in her crudely outlined way, with a lick of hair stuck to the back of her neck, her elbow resting against the top of the bench and her hand behind her head. She looked out at the moat of Sunpu Park, the sunlight sparkling off the dark water.
A pregnant bump of stomach curved under her blouse.
The other girl.
A queasy feeling started to twist in my stomach, like motion sickness.
And then the sketched girl on the bench turned her head, and her inky eyes glared straight into mine.
A chill shuddered through me.
Oh my god. She’s looking at me.
A hand snatched the paper out of mine. I looked up, my mind reeling, straight into the face of Yuu Tomohiro.
He slammed the page face-down on top of the pile of drawings he’d collected. He stood too close, so that he hovered over me.
“Did you draw that?” I whispered in English. He didn’t answer, staring hard at me. His cheek burned red and puffy where Myu had hit him.
I stared back. “Did you draw it?”
He smirked. “Kankenai darou!”
I looked at him blankly, and he sneered.
“Don’t you speak Japanese?” he said. I felt my cheeks flush with shame. He looked like he’d settled some sort of battle in his mind, and he turned, walking slowly away.
“She moved,” I blurted out.
He stumbled, just a little, but kept walking.
But I saw him stumble. And I saw the drawing look at me.
Didn’t I? My stomach churned. That was impossible, wasn’t it?
He went up the stairs, clutching the papers to his chest.
“She moved!” I said again, hesitant.
“I don’t speak English,” he said and slammed the door. It slid into the wall so hard it bounced back a little. I saw his shadow against the frosted glass of the door as he walked away.
Something oozed through the bottom of the sliding door, sluggish like dark blood. Did Myu hit him that hard?
The liquid dripped down the stairs, and after a moment of panic, I realized it was ink, not blood. From the drawings she’d thrown, maybe, or a cartridge of ink he’d kept inside the notebook.
I stood for a minute watching it drip, thinking of the burning eyes of the girl staring at me, the same flame in Yuu’s eyes.
Had Myu seen it, too? Would anyone believe me? I wasn’t even sure what the heck I’d seen.
It couldn’t be real. I was too tired, overwhelmed in a country where I struggled to even communicate. That was the only answer.
I hurried toward the front door and out into the fresh spring air. Yuki and her friends had already vanished. I checked my watch—must be for a club practice. Fine. I was too jittery to talk about what I’d seen anyway. I ran across the courtyard, sans slippers this time, through the gate of Suntaba School and toward the weaving pathways of Sunpu Park.
When my mother died, it didn’t
