When did I become so shal ow? I scrunched my hands deeper into the leather of my book bag, until the zipper dug into my knuckles.
“Ano!” I said to get his attention, squeezing my eyes shut as I said it. The clicking of his shoes stopped. Around us the noisy chatter of other students buzzed in my brain, fading into background noise like ringing in my ears. All I could focus on was the silence that had replaced his footsteps, the sound I imagined of his breathing.
Now what? I wanted to ask why he’d been staring at me, why everything felt off when he was there. And about the drawing, the memory sitting unsettled in my gut. But how could I ask him that? He’d think I was nuts. The limits of my Japanese shoved against me, which only proved his point and pissed me off more. What was I thinking to confront him? And what exactly could I say that wouldn’t make me look like an idiot?
A moment passed, and I heard a single laugh under his breath. Then the click, click, click of him walking away toward the eastern wall. The clicking suddenly sped up, and I turned to look. He ran at the wall, leaping up the stone face and grabbing the branches of the momiji tree above, slipping over the wall and out of sight.
I’d let him do it again, let him tip me off balance for the second time in five minutes. I shuddered with anger as I stared at the branch, still swaying, dusting the wall with maple leaves.
The branch.
I didn’t spend my summers hiking in the woods for nothing.
My shoes pounded against the cement as I raced toward the wall. Students backed out of my way just in time, breaking apart their little groups out of curiosity about what I was about to do next. Slippers were about to take a backseat.
I threw my hands around the tree trunk and pressed my feet against the slippery bark. My book bag clattered to the ground as I reached for the branches, hoisting myself up.
Leaves and twigs tangled in my hair, but I climbed higher and higher, until I cleared the wall and the street on the other side came into view.
I scanned the sidewalks for the Suntaba uniform—there, behind the line of salarymen. He was combing a hand through his copper hair, his blazer draped over his arm.
“Yuu Tomohiro!” I shouted at the top of my lungs. He jerked to a stop, but didn’t turn around. I stared at the curve of his shoulder blades under the white dress shirt as he breathed in and out slowly.
Then he turned, looking up in slow motion when he didn’t see me on the street.
“That’s right, Tarzan, look up!” I screamed in English. “You’re not the only one around here who can make an exit!” My lungs burned with adrenaline as I watched him stare at me.
I couldn’t help it. The grin spread across my face, knowing I’d beaten him at his own game.
He waited a minute, completely still, and I wondered if he hadn’t understood a word I’d said. Not that it mattered.
He’d still get the point. I was the winner.
“What do you have to say now?” I shouted.
Still nothing.
And then he slowly raised his arm, his finger pointed.
“I can see up your skirt,” he said.
Oh god.
I’d totally forgotten I was wearing my short uniform skirt.
Crap, crap, crap!
I twisted to look down at the ring of students gathered around the tree trunk. They were starting to giggle, and if they hadn’t been looking up my skirt before, they definitely were now.
A couple of squealing girls reached into their bags. They better not be bringing out cell phones to immortalize my humiliation.
I let go of the branches with one hand to press my skirt tight against my legs. I turned back to look at Yuu. He was smiling, beaming even, like this was some sort of amusing moment we were sharing. Like it was just the two of us. And worse, the smile made my stomach twist. Then he beat his fists against his chest a couple times Tarzan-style and turned, walking out of sight.
My fingers tightened around the branch. Why did he act like two different people? A giggle from below and my anger surged up again.
All right, Mr. Creepy Sketch Guy. You want war?
You’re on.
The maze of Sunpu Park calmed me down a little. It always did, with the twisting hedges and the murky moats in deep channels. An old castle towered over the eastern side of the park, but I didn’t see much of it on my way home. I headed south over a long concrete bridge above the water teeming with koi, and then twisted past the underground walkways to Shin-shizuoka Station.
I scanned my pass, and the little metal doors slammed into the sides of the barriers to let me through. I walked slowly to the platforms, my eyes squinting at the signs of scrolling kanji.
The train was coming in three minutes, so I sat on one of the light blue benches and rested my bag on my lap.
I noticed a twig caught in the wool of my skirt, and I pulled it from the fabric.
“Why did I do that?” I groaned, slumping my chin on my bag. As if fitting in wasn’t hard enough, I had to go and climb a tree to yell at a boy and flash my underwear to half the school population.
Maybe I should be sick tomorrow.
A group of girls suddenly rushed in front of me, laughing as they punched out texts on their cell phones. One of them tripped over my foot, and her friends caught her by the shoulders as she stumbled.
“Sorry!” I burst out, tucking my feet as far as I could under the bench.
The girl looked at me for a minute, and then the three of them shuffled away, mumbling loudly to each other. Their green-and-blue-tartan skirts showed me they were from a different high school, so why should I care if they were being snobby? I wanted to stick my tongue out but stopped short. It was too much—I didn’t fit in at school, and I couldn’t even blend in at the train station. How the heck was I supposed to survive here anyway? Without Mom, without anything familiar. The tears started to blur in my eyes.
I heard a muffled greeting as a boy called to the girls. They didn’t answer him. Typical. Rude bunch of—
He said hello to them again. They still didn’t answer. What was their problem?
“Domo,” he tried again, and this time I looked up.
His dark eyes caught mine immediately. He had black hair that flopped around his ears, with two thick blond highlights tucked behind them. His bangs trailed diagonally across his forehead, so they almost covered his left eye. A silver earring glinted in his left ear as he nodded at me.
Wait. He’s talking to me.
“Hi?” I managed. It came out like a question.
He smiled. He wore the same uniform colors as the girls—
a white dress shirt and navy blazer, a green-and-blue tie and navy pants—and he leaned against the pillar near the bench.
His body was turned away from the clique, and they seemed a little pissed that he was talking to me. From the smile on his face, I wondered if that was the point.
“You go to Suntaba?” he said, pointing at my uniform.
“Yeah,” I said.
“You must speak Japanese well, then.”
I smirked. “I wouldn’t say that.”
He laughed and walked toward me. “Can I sit?” he said.
“Um, it’s a free station.”
“What?”
“Nothing.” Okay, so when did hot guys from other schools start trying to pick me up on train platforms?
He leaned in a little, so I leaned back.
“Don’t let them get to you,” he mumbled. “They’re just airheads anyway.”
“Them?” I said, looking over at the girls. They pretended they weren’t staring, which only made it more obvious.
“Yeah,” he said.
“It’s fine,” I said. “I’ve been through worse.”
He laughed again. “Rough day?”
“You have no idea.”
“Jun!” one of the girls squealed at him—an ex he was trying to make jealous, maybe? He leaned in closer and winked like we were coconspirators. And then a little chime flooded the station, and the train roared past, the brakes squealing as it slowed.
I grabbed my bag from my lap and we lined up by the giant white arrows on the f loor. The cars opened up and we filed in. I grabbed the metal rail by the door so I could make a quick getaway at Yuniko Station. It’s not like I didn’t appreciate attention from Jun the ikemen—and was he ever gorgeous—but I just needed some space to myself to think.
The doors closed behind us and the train lurched forward.
But in the crowds outside the window, I saw a tall figure in the Suntaba uniform. With copper hair and a puffy bruise on his cheek.
I stepped back as the train jolted, nearly knocking me over.
It pulled slowly out of the station, barely moving along the platform.
“You okay?” Jun said behind me.
Impossible. Why would Yuu Tomohiro be here when I’d watched him walk the opposite direction? He looked different when no one was watching, like his features had softened. He waited in line for a Roman bus, emerald-green with an old motor that made the vehicle bump around as it idled. When it was his turn to get on, he actually stepped to the side with a smile and helped a gray-haired lady behind him up the steps.
Was I hallucinating again? That did not just happen.
Then I lost his face in the crowd, and the train reached the end of the platform, speeding up as it snaked across the bustling city.
“I’m fine,” I said when I found my voice again. “Just saw a guy from my school over there.” I waved my hand vaguely at the window, but the sight of the bus was long gone.
“Tomodachi?” Jun said. “Maybe koibito? ”
I choked. “What? No! We are not friends. Not even close.”
Jun smiled. “You just looked f lustered, that’s all.” He tucked a blond highlight behind his ear, rubbing his earring between his fingers.
“Because I’m tired,” I said a little too sharply. “It’s nothing.”
“Ah,” he said, giving the earring a tug. “The rough day you mentioned.”
“Right.”
“Sorry,” he said, dropping his hand into his blazer pocket.
In the corner of the train car, the group of girls was still whispering about us. Jun stood beside me, silent as he stared out the window. I felt a little guilty shutting down the conversation, but I couldn’t help it. My thoughts were a tangled mess.
I watched the buildings blur outside the window as the train sped past.
What was I thinking, climbing a tree and yelling at Yuu like that? So much for a fancy exit—I’d just dug a deeper social hole to curl up and die in. And I couldn’t stop thinking about the smile on his face, as if we were in on the same joke. He’d looked harmless enough helping that woman onto the bus.
But that’s not how he’d looked staring at me from the gate.
Chapter 2
“Okaeri,” Diane said in a singsong voice when I opened the door.
“I’m not saying it,” I said, kicking the toes of my shoes against the raised floor until they slipped off my feet.
“Oh, come on,” Diane whined, appearing around the corner. She’d draped her navy-and-pink-flowered apron over her teaching clothes, and the smell of curry rice wafted from the kitchen. “If you want to learn Japanese, you have to use it all the time.”
“Not interested,” I said. “I’ve been speaking it all day. I need some English right now.” I strode past her and collapsed onto the tiny purple couch in the living room. It was ugly, but definitely comfortable.
“So how was school?”
“Fine.” Other than the part where half the school looked up my skirt.
I picked up the remote and started flipping through variety shows. Bright kanji sprawled across the screen in neon pinks and greens, quoting outrageous things guests said. Not like I could get the joke, of course.
“It’s curry rice again. I got held up with the Drama Club meeting.” Diane stepped into the kitchen and lifted the lid of the pot, the spicy fragrance wafting around the room as she stirred.
I flipped the channel, looking for something English to watch, some reminder of the fact that I was still on the same planet.
“And how was cram school?” The rice cooker beeped and Diane shuffled over to turn it off. I leaned back so my head faced the kitchen upside down.
“It was crammy,” I said.
“Could you at least set the table?” She sighed, and then I felt guilty.
“Sorry,” I mumbled. I flipped the TV off and tossed the remote onto the couch, setting plates on either side of the flimsy table.
I hadn’t known Diane much before Mom’s funeral, but she’d never struck me as the motherly type. She’d spent most of the service shoving hors d’oeuvres at everybody with a fake smile, like she was a balloon ready to pop. She’d insisted on my calling her just Diane. I think “Aunt” emphasized the fact that her sister was gone, and made her feel like we were some sort of dysfunctional family, trying to keep going after the fact. Which, of course, we were.
She’d picked me up at the airport with the same over-excitement, waving wildly at me to make us even more of a spectacle. “Katie!” she’d screeched, like this was some kind of fun vacation, like we weren’t terrified of each other.
The bullet-train ride made my ears pop and sting, and once we got to Shizuoka, I stood out even more. There were a lot of gaijin in Tokyo, but in Shizuoka I rarely saw anyone foreign.
Diane lifted the lid of the rice cooker, and steam swirled out, fogging up her glasses. She reached for my plate and paddled the rice on, and then dumped a ladle of curry on the side.
“Great,” I said.
“You mean ‘ itadakimasu. ’”
“Whatever.”
“So any new friends yet, or are they still being shy?” Diane sat down and mixed the curry and rice together with her chopsticks. I pushed my rice into a sticky mound and dug my fork into a carrot.
“Ano!” I said to get his attention, squeezing my eyes shut as I said it. The clicking of his shoes stopped. Around us the noisy chatter of other students buzzed in my brain, fading into background noise like ringing in my ears. All I could focus on was the silence that had replaced his footsteps, the sound I imagined of his breathing.
Now what? I wanted to ask why he’d been staring at me, why everything felt off when he was there. And about the drawing, the memory sitting unsettled in my gut. But how could I ask him that? He’d think I was nuts. The limits of my Japanese shoved against me, which only proved his point and pissed me off more. What was I thinking to confront him? And what exactly could I say that wouldn’t make me look like an idiot?
A moment passed, and I heard a single laugh under his breath. Then the click, click, click of him walking away toward the eastern wall. The clicking suddenly sped up, and I turned to look. He ran at the wall, leaping up the stone face and grabbing the branches of the momiji tree above, slipping over the wall and out of sight.
I’d let him do it again, let him tip me off balance for the second time in five minutes. I shuddered with anger as I stared at the branch, still swaying, dusting the wall with maple leaves.
The branch.
I didn’t spend my summers hiking in the woods for nothing.
My shoes pounded against the cement as I raced toward the wall. Students backed out of my way just in time, breaking apart their little groups out of curiosity about what I was about to do next. Slippers were about to take a backseat.
I threw my hands around the tree trunk and pressed my feet against the slippery bark. My book bag clattered to the ground as I reached for the branches, hoisting myself up.
Leaves and twigs tangled in my hair, but I climbed higher and higher, until I cleared the wall and the street on the other side came into view.
I scanned the sidewalks for the Suntaba uniform—there, behind the line of salarymen. He was combing a hand through his copper hair, his blazer draped over his arm.
“Yuu Tomohiro!” I shouted at the top of my lungs. He jerked to a stop, but didn’t turn around. I stared at the curve of his shoulder blades under the white dress shirt as he breathed in and out slowly.
Then he turned, looking up in slow motion when he didn’t see me on the street.
“That’s right, Tarzan, look up!” I screamed in English. “You’re not the only one around here who can make an exit!” My lungs burned with adrenaline as I watched him stare at me.
I couldn’t help it. The grin spread across my face, knowing I’d beaten him at his own game.
He waited a minute, completely still, and I wondered if he hadn’t understood a word I’d said. Not that it mattered.
He’d still get the point. I was the winner.
“What do you have to say now?” I shouted.
Still nothing.
And then he slowly raised his arm, his finger pointed.
“I can see up your skirt,” he said.
Oh god.
I’d totally forgotten I was wearing my short uniform skirt.
Crap, crap, crap!
I twisted to look down at the ring of students gathered around the tree trunk. They were starting to giggle, and if they hadn’t been looking up my skirt before, they definitely were now.
A couple of squealing girls reached into their bags. They better not be bringing out cell phones to immortalize my humiliation.
I let go of the branches with one hand to press my skirt tight against my legs. I turned back to look at Yuu. He was smiling, beaming even, like this was some sort of amusing moment we were sharing. Like it was just the two of us. And worse, the smile made my stomach twist. Then he beat his fists against his chest a couple times Tarzan-style and turned, walking out of sight.
My fingers tightened around the branch. Why did he act like two different people? A giggle from below and my anger surged up again.
All right, Mr. Creepy Sketch Guy. You want war?
You’re on.
The maze of Sunpu Park calmed me down a little. It always did, with the twisting hedges and the murky moats in deep channels. An old castle towered over the eastern side of the park, but I didn’t see much of it on my way home. I headed south over a long concrete bridge above the water teeming with koi, and then twisted past the underground walkways to Shin-shizuoka Station.
I scanned my pass, and the little metal doors slammed into the sides of the barriers to let me through. I walked slowly to the platforms, my eyes squinting at the signs of scrolling kanji.
The train was coming in three minutes, so I sat on one of the light blue benches and rested my bag on my lap.
I noticed a twig caught in the wool of my skirt, and I pulled it from the fabric.
“Why did I do that?” I groaned, slumping my chin on my bag. As if fitting in wasn’t hard enough, I had to go and climb a tree to yell at a boy and flash my underwear to half the school population.
Maybe I should be sick tomorrow.
A group of girls suddenly rushed in front of me, laughing as they punched out texts on their cell phones. One of them tripped over my foot, and her friends caught her by the shoulders as she stumbled.
“Sorry!” I burst out, tucking my feet as far as I could under the bench.
The girl looked at me for a minute, and then the three of them shuffled away, mumbling loudly to each other. Their green-and-blue-tartan skirts showed me they were from a different high school, so why should I care if they were being snobby? I wanted to stick my tongue out but stopped short. It was too much—I didn’t fit in at school, and I couldn’t even blend in at the train station. How the heck was I supposed to survive here anyway? Without Mom, without anything familiar. The tears started to blur in my eyes.
I heard a muffled greeting as a boy called to the girls. They didn’t answer him. Typical. Rude bunch of—
He said hello to them again. They still didn’t answer. What was their problem?
“Domo,” he tried again, and this time I looked up.
His dark eyes caught mine immediately. He had black hair that flopped around his ears, with two thick blond highlights tucked behind them. His bangs trailed diagonally across his forehead, so they almost covered his left eye. A silver earring glinted in his left ear as he nodded at me.
Wait. He’s talking to me.
“Hi?” I managed. It came out like a question.
He smiled. He wore the same uniform colors as the girls—
a white dress shirt and navy blazer, a green-and-blue tie and navy pants—and he leaned against the pillar near the bench.
His body was turned away from the clique, and they seemed a little pissed that he was talking to me. From the smile on his face, I wondered if that was the point.
“You go to Suntaba?” he said, pointing at my uniform.
“Yeah,” I said.
“You must speak Japanese well, then.”
I smirked. “I wouldn’t say that.”
He laughed and walked toward me. “Can I sit?” he said.
“Um, it’s a free station.”
“What?”
“Nothing.” Okay, so when did hot guys from other schools start trying to pick me up on train platforms?
He leaned in a little, so I leaned back.
“Don’t let them get to you,” he mumbled. “They’re just airheads anyway.”
“Them?” I said, looking over at the girls. They pretended they weren’t staring, which only made it more obvious.
“Yeah,” he said.
“It’s fine,” I said. “I’ve been through worse.”
He laughed again. “Rough day?”
“You have no idea.”
“Jun!” one of the girls squealed at him—an ex he was trying to make jealous, maybe? He leaned in closer and winked like we were coconspirators. And then a little chime flooded the station, and the train roared past, the brakes squealing as it slowed.
I grabbed my bag from my lap and we lined up by the giant white arrows on the f loor. The cars opened up and we filed in. I grabbed the metal rail by the door so I could make a quick getaway at Yuniko Station. It’s not like I didn’t appreciate attention from Jun the ikemen—and was he ever gorgeous—but I just needed some space to myself to think.
The doors closed behind us and the train lurched forward.
But in the crowds outside the window, I saw a tall figure in the Suntaba uniform. With copper hair and a puffy bruise on his cheek.
I stepped back as the train jolted, nearly knocking me over.
It pulled slowly out of the station, barely moving along the platform.
“You okay?” Jun said behind me.
Impossible. Why would Yuu Tomohiro be here when I’d watched him walk the opposite direction? He looked different when no one was watching, like his features had softened. He waited in line for a Roman bus, emerald-green with an old motor that made the vehicle bump around as it idled. When it was his turn to get on, he actually stepped to the side with a smile and helped a gray-haired lady behind him up the steps.
Was I hallucinating again? That did not just happen.
Then I lost his face in the crowd, and the train reached the end of the platform, speeding up as it snaked across the bustling city.
“I’m fine,” I said when I found my voice again. “Just saw a guy from my school over there.” I waved my hand vaguely at the window, but the sight of the bus was long gone.
“Tomodachi?” Jun said. “Maybe koibito? ”
I choked. “What? No! We are not friends. Not even close.”
Jun smiled. “You just looked f lustered, that’s all.” He tucked a blond highlight behind his ear, rubbing his earring between his fingers.
“Because I’m tired,” I said a little too sharply. “It’s nothing.”
“Ah,” he said, giving the earring a tug. “The rough day you mentioned.”
“Right.”
“Sorry,” he said, dropping his hand into his blazer pocket.
In the corner of the train car, the group of girls was still whispering about us. Jun stood beside me, silent as he stared out the window. I felt a little guilty shutting down the conversation, but I couldn’t help it. My thoughts were a tangled mess.
I watched the buildings blur outside the window as the train sped past.
What was I thinking, climbing a tree and yelling at Yuu like that? So much for a fancy exit—I’d just dug a deeper social hole to curl up and die in. And I couldn’t stop thinking about the smile on his face, as if we were in on the same joke. He’d looked harmless enough helping that woman onto the bus.
But that’s not how he’d looked staring at me from the gate.
Chapter 2
“Okaeri,” Diane said in a singsong voice when I opened the door.
“I’m not saying it,” I said, kicking the toes of my shoes against the raised floor until they slipped off my feet.
“Oh, come on,” Diane whined, appearing around the corner. She’d draped her navy-and-pink-flowered apron over her teaching clothes, and the smell of curry rice wafted from the kitchen. “If you want to learn Japanese, you have to use it all the time.”
“Not interested,” I said. “I’ve been speaking it all day. I need some English right now.” I strode past her and collapsed onto the tiny purple couch in the living room. It was ugly, but definitely comfortable.
“So how was school?”
“Fine.” Other than the part where half the school looked up my skirt.
I picked up the remote and started flipping through variety shows. Bright kanji sprawled across the screen in neon pinks and greens, quoting outrageous things guests said. Not like I could get the joke, of course.
“It’s curry rice again. I got held up with the Drama Club meeting.” Diane stepped into the kitchen and lifted the lid of the pot, the spicy fragrance wafting around the room as she stirred.
I flipped the channel, looking for something English to watch, some reminder of the fact that I was still on the same planet.
“And how was cram school?” The rice cooker beeped and Diane shuffled over to turn it off. I leaned back so my head faced the kitchen upside down.
“It was crammy,” I said.
“Could you at least set the table?” She sighed, and then I felt guilty.
“Sorry,” I mumbled. I flipped the TV off and tossed the remote onto the couch, setting plates on either side of the flimsy table.
I hadn’t known Diane much before Mom’s funeral, but she’d never struck me as the motherly type. She’d spent most of the service shoving hors d’oeuvres at everybody with a fake smile, like she was a balloon ready to pop. She’d insisted on my calling her just Diane. I think “Aunt” emphasized the fact that her sister was gone, and made her feel like we were some sort of dysfunctional family, trying to keep going after the fact. Which, of course, we were.
She’d picked me up at the airport with the same over-excitement, waving wildly at me to make us even more of a spectacle. “Katie!” she’d screeched, like this was some kind of fun vacation, like we weren’t terrified of each other.
The bullet-train ride made my ears pop and sting, and once we got to Shizuoka, I stood out even more. There were a lot of gaijin in Tokyo, but in Shizuoka I rarely saw anyone foreign.
Diane lifted the lid of the rice cooker, and steam swirled out, fogging up her glasses. She reached for my plate and paddled the rice on, and then dumped a ladle of curry on the side.
“Great,” I said.
“You mean ‘ itadakimasu. ’”
“Whatever.”
“So any new friends yet, or are they still being shy?” Diane sat down and mixed the curry and rice together with her chopsticks. I pushed my rice into a sticky mound and dug my fork into a carrot.
