“Hai,” I mumble, feeling defeated.
“Rin, you know we still love you.”
“Hai,” I give an automatic response.
“Okay, can you put your Grandfather on the phone?”
I lower the receiver to the table and drag my feet towards Grandfather’s room. Giving it a soft knock, he opens it and glares at me.
“Mother wants to talk to you,” I say in the clearest and strongest Japanese I can manage.
“Bring me your tablets,” he orders as he walks past me to picks up the phone. Not wanting to listen to their conversation—mostly out of fear of hearing what Grandfather really thinks about me—I go up to Haruka’s room.
“Boy, she sounded angry.” Misa greets me in the hallway as I near the room. Face down cast, but still smiling. She’s not sorry one bit. “It’ll be okay, Rin.”
“Shut up,” I hiss as I enter Haruka’s room.
Misa skips in before I have a chance to stop her, her face beaming, whistling a tune in a high-pitched tone. I have to fight all of my urges not to cover my ears with my hands just to try to block her out. Though, I have tried that and it doesn’t seem to work. For some reason it only makes her louder.
“Why are you so happy?” I take a seat on my floor. I know it’s Haruka’s room, but I’m glad she’s not here at the moment. I just need some time to myself. Well as alone as I can get since I don’t think Misa will be disappearing anytime soon—but I can always hope.
“I thought you didn’t want to talk to me?” her voice chipper, as she collapses onto the bed beside mine—the one not on the ground.
“It would make me less crazy if I did stop talking to you,” I mumble as I reach out and grab my suitcase, pulling it towards me. I unzip the front section and retrieve the large white medicine bottle. I can only stare at it in my hand. These are the pills that are supposed to take away my hallucinations, curb my violent outbursts, and stop me from being crazy. These are the pills that don’t seem to be working.
“You’re not crazy,” her tone sounding more solemn than her usual chirpy self.
“I only wish that were true.” Pushing myself up, I give her one last look before leaving the room and see her just staring at the ground, her face set in a grimace. I force my feet to carry me along the wooden floorboards, expecting Misa to come following me, but she doesn’t leave Haruka’s room. Good.
How can someone who looks, acts, and even feels so real, be nothing more than a hallucination? Sure, I’m the only one who can see her and she hasn’t changed one bit in all the time I’ve known her, but—
I just wish she’d go away already. I don’t need an imaginary friend. All she does is mess up my life.
I stop in front of Grandfather’s door and give three solid knocks.
“Ohairi kudasai,” Grandfather’s stern voice calls from inside.
Taking a deep breath and forcing my trembling knees to stop clanging together, I open the door and enter the room. “I have the tablets for you.”
“Very good.” He’s back on the same cushion he was sitting on when he gave me the lecture before dinner. He indicates for me to sit on the other cushion.
I nod and move my heavy legs one wobbly step after another over to the cushion, holding out the bottle of pills.
“I have been told that you are required to take one of these daily.” He takes the container of medicine from me without emotion.
I nod without saying anything.
Unscrewing the cap, he tips one round, light pink, almost white, tablet onto his hand. “You will report to me after dinner each night and I will watch you take your tablet. This is at your mother’s request.”
I nod again, the capacity for speech above my abilities at the moment. I just take to staring at the tablet.
He holds out the tablet and a glass of water he removes from the floor beside his cushion, and waits for me to take them from him. I throw the tablet into my mouth and chug down a mouthful of water, letting the tablet slide down my throat. Just for show, I open my mouth to show him that the tablet is in fact gone.
“You may go.”
Again, as if that is the only motion I know, I nod and push myself up from the cushion. I start back to Haruka’s room, clenching my hands into fists to keep them from trembling. Boy, now I’m really feeling like I’m six years old again. Being watched to make sure I eat all of my vegetables and everything. Throw one boy down one flight of stairs and everyone starts looking at me like I should be in a padded cell. Geez, I’m not that crazy.
* * *
Darkness surrounds me. I don’t know where I am. Not Haruka’s room, that’s for sure. It’s much smaller, I can feel the walls closed in around me, just out of reach. The wooden floor beneath me sends chills up my spine as a feeling of familiarity crashes into me. It feels as though I’ve been in this room before, but I have no idea when. I squeeze my fingers tightly around the small box I didn’t even realise I was holding. Matches. I desperately want to light one, but it’s not time yet. What?
Laughter sounds from outside my tiny universe, little girls laughing, as if they’re enjoying my panic. The familiarity of their voices washes over me, making me want to find a way out of this darkness as if I’m going to greet some long-lost friends.
A shiver rushes down my spine when the girls stop their giggling and start repeating a single phrase in singsong whispers, seemingly from everywhere at once, “Watashi ni hikari o misete, samonakuba yami no naka ni nokose.”
Their whispers become repetitive chanting, growing louder and louder until they’re booming in my ear. I try to make sense of what they’re saying, but I can’t get past the feeling that I’ve heard this all before. Concentrating on the words, I translate: Give me the light or keep me in darkness.
All of a sudden the voices cut off, plunging my tiny room into silence once more, allowing me to hear the one last whispered warning from the girls. “Teokure ni naru mae ni hi o moyase.”
Light a match before it’s too late.
I yank a match from the box and start striking it. Sparks fly but no flame appears.
Icy hands grasp my shoulders and the match tumbles unlit from my trembling hands. I scramble for another match as I feel the icy claws dig into my flesh, turning me to face it. Pop! A faint golden light springs to life in my hands as I come face to face with ... nothing. An empty closet with creaky wooden boards. I giggle with relief.
A puff of air—as if someone is blowing out a candle—and my match goes out. Out of the darkness a pair of glowing red eyes erupt. I can’t see what creature’s attached to those eyes, and I’m sure I don’t want to know. I can only stare as it approaches. I can only stare as it—
“Rin!” Misa’s voice screams as tiny hands give my shoulders a furious shake, jerking me awake.
Sweat cascades down my back and my breathing comes out in short, ragged gasps. Pushing myself into a sitting position, the tangled sheets around me suck at me trying to drag me down to the floor. I look around the dark room, disoriented. I’m not in some dark forgotten closet. Everything’s the same as when I went to sleep. Haruka is still asleep in the bed beside me, not disturbed in the slightest. Everything’s normal. Everything’s fine.
“You were having a nightmare, Rin.” Misa’s nervous gaze never leaves my face.
“It felt so real,” I mumble as I lie back down and stare up at the ceiling. “Almost like it was really happening.”
“No. It was just a nightmare,” Misa says in a quick breath as she places her small hand against my forehead.
“Yeah.” I force my eyes closed, afraid that I’ll see those glowing red eyes again as soon as I do. My heart jackhammers as I briefly panic that I’ll have to spend my first day of life in Japan wandering around on zero sleep, but slowly I feel myself drifting off to sleep again. This time, thankfully, without dreams.
Chapter 4
“Okiro!” Haruka’s eager and overly energetic voice echoes throughout the room.
I pull the blankets over
my head and pretend she’s not leaning over me. The room’s still dark. No sane person’s up at this hour without being under threat of death or something equally horrific, especially after the nightmares I keep having. For the past two weeks—ever since I got here—I’ve been have the same dream every night. Like clockwork. I can’t remember much past those hideous red eyes, but all the same it’s not exactly happy fun times. Regardless, to be woken up like this is a criminal offense.
“Come on, sleepy head.” She yanks the sheets down, and I feel her warm breath on my face.
“What time is it?” I ask through a yawn, forgetting what language I’m speaking.
“Oh, time,” she mimics.
Shaking off the last remnants of sleep, I repeat the same question in reasonably irritated Japanese, “Sumimasen, nanji deska?”
“Six in the morning.” Her voice is too happy for this hour.
“Then what are you waking me up for?” I try to force the sheets back over my head, but Haruka rips them completely off my bed. “Not fair,” I whine as I push myself into a sitting position and rub my eyes. My aching hips and back definitely feel the floor. This is so not like a normal bed.
“You have to get up. Grandfather will be mad if you’re late for school.”
Oh, right, that’s today, isn’t it? After two weeks of basically being left alone—read: shunned—by the family. It’s time for me to actually get out and start doing stuff. Outside of a couple of trips out to obtain a phone and register with the school and whatnot, I’ve mostly spent my time locked away in Haruka’s room watching the clock tick. Probably the most boring two weeks of my entire life. And now there’s this. I have to get up for school. At six am apparently. Can I go back to doing nothing? Please?
“Doesn’t school start at 8:30?” I pull myself up from the uncomfortable floor-bed and over to my still un-unpacked bag, almost without thinking I pull a pair of purple and black drumsticks from it and start drumming a quiet rhythm against the floor. Letting my idle hands do their own thing, I look up at her. “It doesn’t take two hours to get to school, does it?”
“Oh, you play the drums?” She begins to make my bed—her attempt at changing the subject doesn’t go unnoticed. In five quick movements, Haruka folds my bed and stows it in the closet.
“Yeah, it was suggested to me for therapy.” I keep drumming. “So, what do we have to do before school, then?”
“Grandmother has prepared a special breakfast for your first day of school and then Grandfather wants me to show you around before homeroom.”
“Can I ask you a question?” I stare at the drumstick in my hand, twisting the smooth wood in between my fingers.
“Sure, what is it?”
“Why haven’t I seen your parents around?” I blurt out. It’s been bugging me for a while now, but I haven’t had the nerve to ask. Sure, her father was here that first night, but I’ve only seen him maybe twice in all the time I’ve been here and I haven’t come across Haruka’s mother at all yet. I know Grandfather wants me to stay out of the way, so I figured that was why I hadn’t seen anyone, but when all I receive from Haruka is silence, I stop drumming and risk a glance at her. She sits there, mouth turned down in a frown, not saying anything. “Did I say something wrong?”
“No, no, it’s okay.” She shakes her head, pulling herself back together. “My father is always away on business, so you probably won’t see him much. And my mother, she…”
When Haruka doesn’t finish her sentence I notice the look of long-worried sadness creeping into her eyes. “I’m sorry, Haruka. My parents didn’t tell me anything. I wouldn’t have asked if I knew.”
She turns her head away from me and swipes at her eyes. “It’s alright, you didn’t know. Come on, we don’t want to be late for breakfast. Today is going to be so much fun.”
She stands up, instantly back to her usual perky self, and practically skips out of the room without waiting for me. A complete change of mood that seems like a much practiced habit.
Tossing my drumsticks near the pack I bought for school, I push myself to a standing position and follow her down the stairs, pushing that awkward conversation from my mind as best I can, envious of how she can just switch gears like that, especially at such an early hour. Seriously, there should be a law against being upbeat before the sun comes up.
* * *
I stand outside the classroom, trying to figure out exactly what I’m going to say once I’m brought inside. I have to introduce myself in Japanese and tell them a little about myself. Just speaking without making a fool of myself will be an effort. What am I supposed to say to them? Oh, hey, I’m here because my imaginary friend tried to kill someone, and I may or may not be a raving psychopath that could snap at any moment. Nice to meet you. Yoroshikune.
Yes, that would be a smash hit way to introduce myself—not. I really don’t want to tell them anything more than I need to.
“Watashi no namae wa Rin desu,” I mumble to myself, practicing just getting my name right, staring at my white uwabaki, the slipper-type shoes that I’m required to wear while I’m in the school buildings. As soon as I got to school I had to deposit my shoes in a little cubby hole and don these weird looking things. I still don’t know whether to introduce myself using only my first name or throw in my surname, after all, I don’t exactly have a Japanese name—courtesy of my Australian father. Rin Waters, what kind of a Japanese name is that?
“Uotazu-san, you can come in now.” A woman with dark hair tied back in a tight no-nonsense ponytail opens the teacher’s door—students usually enter through a separate door—and pokes her head out. Her matching navy suit skirt and jacket makes her look immaculately professional and slightly terrifying. More than any of my previous teachers ever did, at any rate. When Haruka told me about the homeroom teacher, Yamada-sensei, she never mentioned how intimidatingly serious she looked.
I nod and take a deep breath—sucking in a nose-full of the countless dust particles hovering in the halls around me while I’m at it—as I try to steady my frazzled nerves—with very little success—before following her into the classroom.
She walks over behind her desk, and I’m left standing at the front, looking out at rows of desks filled with wide-eyed students gawking at the bizarre oddity standing before them. They all stare at this strange blue-eyed half-Japanese girl with purple streaks in her hair claiming to be from a distant land with a mixture of confusion and awe. Like they expect me to say something incredibly profound.
I take another deep breath and begin my spiel, “Hello, my name is Rin and I am from Sydney, Australia.”
I look around the room as I speak, trying to think of the exact right words to say, and trying not to be distracted by the many students—forty or so—watching me with eager anticipation. The first person to catch my eye is Miki, who bobs up and down in her seat waving frantically when she sees I’m looking her direction. Moving my gaze to the right I see Haruka, who gives me a small smile, which is much more reassuring.
Continuing my glance around the room, I almost stop speaking when I spot the boy at the back of the room staring at me like I’m the most interesting thing in the world. A boy with blond hair. It’s not just the way he’s staring at me that gives me the uber-creeps, it’s the way his mouth moves in the same pattern as mine as if he’s memorised my entire speech before I make it. I just watch him as I finish speaking.
“I was born in Japan, but my father was transferred back to Australia when I was only seven. I can play the drums. There’s nothing much else to say about me.” That I would want any of you to know, I think to myself.
The boy gives me a sly smile holding up a book, the same one he had at the café I’m sure, and I force my gaze away from his. The only thought I have at the moment is: how the hell does he know who I am?
“Thank you.” Yamada-sensei walks away from her desk towards the front of the room. “Tanaka-san, douzo.”
A lanky girl with a pair of wire-frame glasses perched on her
nose stands from her seat and approaches the front of the class. Her long, dark ponytail swishing back and forth as she moves her head. “On behalf of everyone, I would like to welcome you to class three. My name is Tanaka Satomi, class president of class three. If you need anything please feel free to ask.”
“Arigatō,” is the only thing I can think of to reply.
“Your seat will be over there.” Satomi points to a vacant seat beside the blond-haired boy, who is doing a bloody good job at freaking me out without needing to get any closer. I’m just going to ignore him and hope he goes away.
I take my seat and do my best to block out the lingering stares still locked onto me—a little part of me wonders just how much these people already know. I really can’t take being stared at like I’m some breed of exotic fish. Can’t they just get back to work already?
Yamada-sensei stands in front of a massive blackboard that takes up most of the front wall, saying something that I should probably be paying attention to, instead I find myself staring at the swirling clouds of chalk dust dancing in the beams of bright, natural light pouring in from the two great windows above the doors.
Occasional bubbles of murmured conversation erupt whenever she turns her back. I try not to think about how many of them are probably talking about me. I especially try not to think about the boy sitting next to me. The one still staring at me, clutching that comic book of his like it’s the holy freaking grail.
You’d think after the first hour or so it’d stop bothering me, but I can still feel him staring at me. I take to studying the girl in front of me, her long ponytail swinging in time with her shaking head as she whispers something to the girl next to her. My heart shudders a beat when I catch the tail-end of their conversation.
“…heard she was pushed.”
“But that’s what I heard,” the other girl, a girl with a short bob-style haircut, says. “She jumped. There was no one else around.”