Chapter Fifteen Ren #2
“Master!” Oda suddenly roars. “It’s the mortal boy. The one who wants to free you. Let him go!”
Abruptly, without any change in his expression, Akira’s hands open.
I drop to the ground, hard, coughing violently.
He arches back and howls. I stagger to my feet and out the barrack.
Only once I’m in the firebreak do I stop and look back.
As Akira howls, the shadow hanging over the camp thickens, the concentric ripples coming closer together.
I stare in shock and confusion. Then I turn and limp back toward my barrack.
Two figures sit on the steps when I return. Mama and Mr. Nomura. They share a cigarette. It’s late, but they are both naturally nocturnal. Mama squints at me as I get close, her gaze hooking around my neck.
“Don’t worry,” I say, drained and trying to hide the hoarseness in my voice. “It’s gone.”
Immediately, she knows what I’m saying. She takes a long draw of the cigarette and then dips her chin in a harsh nod.
“Good.”
“Yep.” I move to step around them. She catches my hand. I startle, like I’m going to jump out of my skin. Whenever she touches me, it’s to grab or slap or push. But she’s calm tonight. She simply holds my wrist, looking up at me.
“Good?” she repeats, but this time it’s a question. I stare back. Part of me longs to say no, I’m not good, and demand to know why she hid Papa’s death. But I’m too exhausted for that right now.
“Yeah, Mama. It’s fine. Everything is fine.”
“Did you lose it?”
I think about Akira holding me by the collar, my pendant hanging around his neck. Hell, maybe I should’ve just given it to Boser in the first place. Instead, I’ve lost it in every way you can lose a thing.
“Must have somewhere.”
Mama nods once again. She gives my wrist a little shake. I think it’s supposed to be comforting for once. Smoke streams out of her mouth and nose. Her necklaces sparkle around her neck in the dark. She releases me, stands, pushes past me into the barrack to fetch another Lucky Strike.
“Bad chi to lose something,” Mr. Nomura says contemplatively.
“Well, it’s worse.” It’s all I can do to sound calm. “I didn’t lose it. I think I gave it to the wrong person.” That’ll prove he’s right. I’m surprised when Mr. Nomura looks up, intrigue in his eyes.
“Gave it away?” He doesn’t say it disapprovingly. “Ah, giving away something precious is different from losing it. Might be dangerous. Might be okay. You’re like a fisherman with a line in a pond, dragging up things when others would leave them undisturbed. Maybe you’ll pull up something good.”
“I don’t think so.” I hate the despair and frustration in my voice.
“No, no,” Mr. Nomura responds. “Too early to tell.”
I notice he’s wearing civilian clothes. It’s weird. I’ve gotten so used to him wearing his military getup.
“Where’s your uniform?”
“Drying,” he says. “I washed it. Tomorrow, I’ll iron it. Day after, I’ll wear it.”
“What’s the point?” I mumble under my breath.
“Eh?” he asks. I don’t say it louder, but he already knows. “I’m a fisherman, too, Ren. I drag up things when others leave them undisturbed. I wear the uniform to remind every guard and WRA official, over and over, who we are. I wear it to remind us, too, in case we begin to forget.”
“And who are we?” My tone is sharp, but Mr. Nomura remains unfazed.
“Americans,” he says simply.
The barrack door opens, and Mama sticks her head out. She’s holding Les Misérables.
“Emi can’t sleep. She wants you to read.”
“Okay.”
We go inside. Emi is sitting up in her cot, much happier now that she’s gotten out for a bit.
I settle on a crate and pick up the book.
As I read, the story captures us in its spell.
But part of me goes elsewhere. Not to despair or rage.
It goes to the space between the trucks, where leaves brushed my neck and I kissed Violet.
It settles there, for a good while.
Before work the next day, I see Akira’s shadow in the sky again.
It drips down toward the dirt, like stalactites in a cave.
Every tip looks razor-sharp. I eye it warily as I stop by Violet’s barrack, trying to move quietly.
I know Mrs. Aratani would have me hung, drawn, and quartered if she caught me near her daughter again.
Carefully, I set an origami swan, filched from Mr. Nomura’s pile, on her windowsill.
I’ve written on the wing I need your help. —Ren. Then, I leave for the warehouse.
Violet is standing outside the warehouse after my shift ends. She has a green ribbon in her hair. It’s pretty. She’s pretty. God, she’s so pretty it makes my eyes hurt from looking at her. I swallow hard, tell myself to get a grip.
“Tell Violet she was wise not to drink any Manzanar Manhattan,” Kai says as he walks out with me, his face almost as green as Violet’s hair ribbon. He skipped school and only came to the warehouse to hide the fact that he’s hungover from Dr. Suzuki and his mother.
“Hey.” I glance up at the sky where the shadow still hovers, its pointed pillars hanging down like knifepoints. I think I already know the answer, but I have to ask him. “Do you see anything in the sky?”
Kai looks up and then lets out a hiss as a single ray of sun makes it through the strange layer.
“Mierda! Are you trying to kill me, Ren?” he asks pathetically. I suppress a laugh. “I mean, it’s overcast, aside from that unnecessary ray of sun.”
“Get some rest, Tiger,” I say, clapping his shoulder. So Kai can’t see Akira’s shadow. I’m disappointed but not surprised. “Feel better soon.”
“I’ll try,” he says as he pitifully hobbles away.
I walk over to Violet.
“You came,” I say.
“I got your message, but I don’t have a lot of time.
Mama is…well, she’s mad at me.” Violet pauses.
I think she might be upset, but instead she smiles.
It’s bold, almost like she’s daring me to kiss her again.
Her throat beckons me. For a moment, my blood races and I want to bury my face right there, where her neck curves into her shoulder.
“Yeah, last night was…” I pause. “Something else.”
“Something else?” she asks, and there’s a coyness to her voice.
I rub the back of my neck. She falls into an exaggerated stance, one hip jutted so far out that it makes me bite the inside of my cheek.
Her smile turns almost devious, pleased at my reaction.
I bow my head in case I lose my mind. Forget compliments and praise. I’m ready to worship her.
“Something good,” I say weakly because my mind is far too gone to come up with a better adjective.
“I thought so, too. We should do it again sometime.”
“Anytime, slugger.” Even though I try to keep my cool and sound unaffected, I can’t fully keep out an incredulous note. Mercifully, she changes the topic.
“So, you got wise and realized you needed my help after all.” She’s practically delighted that I’ve changed my tune. I can’t help but smile. She keeps me on my toes, that’s for sure.
“I did,” I say humbly, knowing I’ve done a complete reversal from last night.
“Are you still okay with us working together? I mean, I figure you are, considering how desperate you are to kiss me again.” I wink at her.
I’m pushing my luck, but I can’t help but try to reclaim a little dignity.
She gives a gasp of outrage. I love the sound.
I find myself fixating on the slope of her neck again.
“You’re incorrigible!” she exclaims, but her delight doesn’t seem to have diminished. She glances worriedly around at the sound of the mess hall bells. Her mother will probably be expecting her soon. “What inspired the change of heart?”
“You said freeing Akira could get us divine favors—ones we for sure know will work. Boser…well, he wants me to give him my relic, but I don’t have it.”
“Mr. Boser?” Violet’s brow wrinkles in worry. “Has he threatened you?”
“It’s more that he won’t help Emi. So I’ll do whatever I can to make sure she gets transferred to the hospital.”
“We can try.” There’s a decisiveness to Violet’s tone.
It reassures me. Makes me think we’ll actually do it.
“I’ve come to think we don’t really know who Akira is.
He never told us any titles. Most gods have special titles and connections with the creator gods.
Akira is very proud. I can’t imagine him leaving it out—unless there was a reason.
If we find out who he truly is, then I think we can figure out how to free him. ”
“Yeah? How’s that?”
“Because when a god is held captive in mythology, the key to freeing him often has to do with his transgression. If we learn who he is and what he’s done, we can sort of work backward.”
“Sounds good to me.” I pause, thinking about Akira lifting me by the collar like a dog by the scruff of its neck. My throat is still sore today. “Only he doesn’t seem to do anything he doesn’t want to. So how will we get him to tell us who he is?”
She smiles, as though she’s excited to share her plan with me. There’s this beauty to Violet—she’s always ready to learn, to strategize, to figure things out about the world.
“I have an idea.”
I head back to my block. We’ve agreed to meet up at midnight, when Mrs. Aratani is asleep. I don’t allow myself to feel hopeful, but I also don’t feel entirely despairing, either, now that we have a plan.
Akira’s shadow has mostly dissipated, and I can see the sun hovering on the mountain ridge.
I’ve always lived in Los Angeles, but being cast out here has turned me into a damn Eagle Scout.
I’m starting to tell time from the sun as it moves through the sky.
I even recognize the different types of shrubbery: sagebrush, rabbitbrush, antelope bitterbrush.
I have a theory they all end in brush because God made them purposefully to scratch the hell out of us.
“Ren! Ren!”
Jace, Abigail, and Ethan bounce up to me. Jace hasn’t returned the sword he’s borrowed from the Children’s Village, and the other two are now armed with sticks. Their weapons whip dangerously close to my face. They speak at once.