Chapter Thirty-Four Ren
Chapter Thirty-Four
Ren
Telling Violet I’m going to join up was the hardest thing in the world. But maybe that’s not right. Maybe loving her is the hardest thing in the world.
Because it isn’t enough.
Love, that is.
I can’t save her from this place and what it’s doing to us.
I can’t undo being torn from our homes. I can’t bring her father back or stay here and keep her safe.
My ever-present rage turns to despair, because even though I’d do anything for her—stab a man, stab myself, stab reality—it can’t save anyone, change anything, stop anything.
My love for Violet is so big, it can’t fit into words.
But if love is so big and strong, why does it make me feel so damn weak?
The next day, I walk to work, an origami flower in my pocket. I’ll set it on her windowsill, as I always do, and then see her later at the library. But just as I set it down, the door opens.
Violet steps out.
She’s wearing a dark green dress and her feet are bare. The wind runs through her hair. Sends it this way and that. She looks like a goddess and a girl at once and I could stare forever, if I wasn’t so worried about her getting hypothermia.
“What are you doing? It’s freezing.” I shuck off my jacket and hurry to wrap it around her. I bundle it close about her shoulders, but her feet and legs are still bare. Her toes turn pink as she stands on the planks. “Aren’t you supposed to be at school?”
“I skipped yesterday. Brace yourself—maybe I’ll be late today.” Her face is tired, but there’s a bit of light in her eyes that I didn’t see yesterday. “You’re supposed to laugh.”
“What?”
“Remember? You laughed at my delinquency back when we first met. I thought I was rebellious.”
“I remember.” Even wrapped in my jacket, she still shivers.
I can’t handle it. I swoop her up in my arms, right off the ground, and hold her against me, trying to warm her as best I can.
I start walking, but I don’t know where I’m going, only that I need to keep her warm and near.
She folds into me, knees drawing up, face buried in my neck.
I’m still walking, only without the foggiest idea of where I’m going.
“The library,” she whispers, pointing over my shoulder.
I follow her directive, and we go inside.
No one else is there. A new shipment of books has arrived.
They’re on the shelves, in stacks on the floor, in boxes.
Several are on a table. I set Violet down in the one clear spot on the table because I don’t want her bare feet to touch the cold, rough floorboards.
Without thought, I take one of her feet in my hands to warm it.
We weren’t outside long, and she’s wrapped in my jacket, but her toes are freezing.
Suddenly, she draws her knee in, reeling me to her.
She leans back on her hands and her leg hooks around my waist. My arms come down roughly on either side of her, my balance thrown off.
She’s beneath me, a vision, a fantasy, a dream, liquid and lounging back, eyes burning into mine.
I hardly manage to steady myself with the body that I suddenly can’t feel because I’m just all fire right now and nothing else.
The long, sloping line of her leg presses me tightly to her.
It drives me mad. I shift my weight onto one arm and reach back with the other, running my hand along the length of her leg.
The arched surface of my palm fits perfectly against the curved indentation of her thigh.
I’m on fire and fire needs oxygen, but damn.
I don’t have a single breath in my lungs right now.
“I love you, Ren.”
“I love you, too, Violet. I love you so much. I—I—” My mind is slipping. I don’t know how this beautiful girl is before me and saying she loves me. It’s the most stunning confusion I’ve ever experienced, maybe even more so because I believe her. I’m not afraid of it. Not anymore.
Our mouths meet. One kiss builds into another.
Books tip over and fall off the table. I lean over her as she lies on the table, and she bridges against me and Lord help me, I don’t know if I’m up or down, inside or out.
Stupidly, I lift my hands to cradle her face but since I’m bent half over the table, I topple forward.
I manage to fall to the side, half on the table, half off.
She turns her head to me. Her body is shaking.
I don’t understand for a moment and then I realize.
She’s laughing.
I start laughing, too. We lie among the books, and our laughter fills the library.
It’s only a few minutes before she needs to get back so she can go to school, and I need to get to work.
I carry her to her barrack. Then I’m walking to work, but it sure as hell doesn’t feel like it.
I’m floating. Not sure how I’ll leave her when the time comes.
I try not to think about it. I try to only stay in that kiss for as long as I can.
Hell must’ve frozen over, because I’m willingly seeking out Boser.
He’s been busy dealing with the fallout from the uprising—all sorts of new protocols have been handed down from the powers on high—so he hasn’t had the time to harass me.
Or maybe he’s extra-wary because there are more eyes on him right now and he’s biding his time.
But I’m taking matters into my own hands.
Fact is, I’m leaving.
I won’t be able to protect Violet from him when I’m gone.
So if I have to go, so does he. Akira wasn’t super-clear about the ritual, but he said it summons sleep devils and that they don’t like to be controlled.
Well, Boser likes control more than moths like sizzling themselves on the bare light bulbs hanging all over this place.
Maybe if I arrange an introduction between the two, Boser might just screw himself.
I hover near the administration offices and watch people come and go. I’m on edge and sweating by the time Boser steps out.
“Hey, Boser,” I call. He blinks, startled, and then motions me to the side, away from everyone else. There’s as much of an asshole expression on his face as ever before.
“Hamada,” he says. “It’s been too long. Does this mean you have a spell for me? One that summons a spirit?”
“I do, but I can’t show you, not out here.” I hope I’m doing the right thing. If this backfires, he’ll be more pissed than ever and that won’t be good for Violet. But it’s my only chance. “I’ll meet you behind barrack twenty-seven’s latrines tonight. It’ll be worth your while.”
Boser smiles, and I swear it’s the first genuine smile I’ve ever seen on his lips. It makes my skin crawl.
“Tonight. I’ll see you there. And you better not screw with me, Hamada.”
“Me?” My grin is as fake as a three-dollar bill. “Never.”
Mama knows I’m joining up, but she hasn’t said a word about it, not even tonight as I gather my few things together into a duffel bag, compliments of the administration.
I’ll be leaving in a few days for a training camp in Shelby, Mississippi.
Cosette watches from her crib, which the Wozumis gave us when Akiko grew out of it.
Cosette is doing so much better now that she has the right milk.
Hardly fusses at all and is actually developing some chub. I’ll miss that gremlin so much.
“Here.” I look up. Mama stands behind me, holding something out. “It’s from Joe. He said to give it you when you left for the war.”
I take it. It’s a long strip of fabric. Red stitches march across it. Joe Nomura is embroidered in red against white fabric, along with black Japanese characters of a Buddhist chant.
“What is it?” I ask, staring.
“A senninbari,” Mama says, lingering. Her earrings quiver from her lobes, tiny blue gemstones set in silver.
Recently, she’s taken a propagation class and glass bottles with stems are everywhere.
She gets annoyed they aren’t growing fast enough.
“I guess mothers make them for their sons when they go to war. Joe’s mother gave it to him when he joined the Great War.
It’s supposed to protect soldiers in battle. ”
“When did Mr. Nomura give it to you?” I ask, perplexed. We weren’t eligible to join when he left.
“Before the riot. I was angry, because I told him you’d run away to the war if you could.
You’ve always wanted to run away.” I take a long, slow breath, trying to think what’s best to say.
I don’t want to leave on bad terms. “Joe knew you’d join up, but he told me it wasn’t because you were running away. ”
Abruptly, she turns to Cosette, who coos in her crib, and picks her up. She doesn’t say anything else. I stare at the senninbari. Then, slowly, I fold it up and put it in the duffel bag.
Night comes fast. There isn’t much artificial light behind barrack 27 latrines, but the moon is a big yellow eye.
It stares unblinkingly down from a field of winter stars as I round the corner, body stiff, jaw so tight it aches.
Flushing toilets, running showerheads, and voices filter through the latrine. Boser is already waiting.
“I heard you enlisted,” he says by way of greeting.
I notice he has a pistol strapped to his waist, the same one he wore after the uprising.
He spits at my feet. “You’ll be off somewhere in Europe, getting shot at like the good old American boy you truly are, instead of an inheritor of divine magic. Why’d you do it?”
“The dental care,” I snap, not about to have a heart-to-heart with the guy. “Do you want the spell or not?”
That gets him focused. His eyes flash in the darkness, coming alive with excitement.
“You say it summons spirits?” he asks. “Ones that are…malleable?”
“Yeah. They make dreams come true and shit like that.” I’ve folded the letter Akira gave me into an intricate origami triangle. I take a deep breath and recite the instructions the god wrote under his message. “You cut yourself and bleed on this. Then you say okirō.”