Kami Cursed (Dragon and Phoenix) (13 page)

*****

The crowd in the
hallway seemed worse today.  I shuffled toward my locker, pushing people out of
the way.  “Sorry,” I muttered.  But I don’t think anyone really noticed. 

For once, all
eyes were not on me.  There was something going on a few lockers down and
everyone was gawking.  I couldn’t care less.  I put in my locker combination and
rattled the door- the magic trick to get it to actually open.  I was stuffing
my math book into the dark, mysterious reaches of my messy locker when Ryuu
appeared at my side. 

“I wonder what’s
going on,” he muttered.  I was surprised that he was interested.

I glanced at him
to see a strange, strained expression on his face.  His brows were drawn
together and his eyes looked lighter, which made me feel suddenly uncomfortable. 
I was beginning to think that beautiful amber color wasn’t just a trick of the
light. 

I closed my
locker and turned to gaze down the hall.  I couldn’t really see, there were too
many people.  “Who cares.  For once in my life, it has nothing to do with me. 
I’m going to eat lunch now before they realize they could be over here making
my
life miserable.”

I started to
shove off, away from the crowd, but Ryuu tugged at my arm.  “C’mon.  I wanna
see who’s over there.”
My shoulders slumped and I let out a sigh.  He was set on it, so there was no
way I was talking him out of it.  “I really don’t think we should go poking
around.  It’s probably that Vanessa girl and her minions.”

Ryuu turned to
me and I couldn’t help moving my feet in response to those pleading eyes.  “Fine. 
But what’s the big deal?” I whined as he dragged me along. 

He hunched his
shoulders and didn’t look back at me.  “Something feels weird.” 

Uh-oh
.  “What kind of
feels weird?  Like evil curse weird or just normal everyday weird?”

He shook his
dark head.  I nearly bumped into him when he stopped walking.  We’d somehow
made it through the crowd.  A girl with short, dishwater blonde hair and
mismatched clothes was sitting on the floor.  A few people were there with her,
one of them a teacher.  She held a bloody tissue pinched over her nose and her
thick glasses lay on the floor beside her, near her scattered book bag.  One
lens was shattered. 

“What the
heck?”  I looked around, trying to figure out what had happened. 

“Vanessa pushed
her.”  Andrea’s voice was really close to my ear and I jumped.  I glanced back
at her. 

“What?  Why
would she hurt Jenny?”  Jenny should have been off limits- even for Vanessa. 
She was really shy, and she got the best grades in our class.  She also had a
mild form of autism.

Ryuu was still
in front of me.  His shoulder twitched and he put one arm across his stomach
like he was going to be sick.  “It’s one of them.” 
Fan-freaking-tastic
.

I sidled up to him. 
“C’mon, I’ll take you to the office.”  I slipped an arm around his waist and
gave Andrea an apologetic smile.  “Blood,” I lied, rolling my eyes.  “He can’t
stand the sight of it.”

Ryuu shuddered
and I steered him away from the crowd.  We sat down on a bench outside the
office and I peered at him, concerned.  “Are you okay?  What happened?”

He took a deep
breath and sat up.  He didn’t look pale like he had after he ran into the man
with the cane, but he didn’t exactly look well either. 

“I’m fine.  It
just surprised me is all.”  He brushed his hair out of his eyes and sat up
straighter.  “There’s a cursed object around here somewhere.  I can feel it.”

I sighed.  “Are
you sure?  I mean, Andrea said it was Vanessa.  Bullying people is kind of what
she does.”

His dark eyes
met mine and I knew I was in trouble.  “But, Jenny?’

I nodded.  He
was right.  This went above and beyond.  “So you think Vanessa is possessed or
something?”

Ryuu frowned. 
“I don’t know.  I’ve never even talked to her.  But I think we need to keep an
eye on her and figure out what’s making her act this way.”

I sighed.  “You
realize we have finals pretty soon?”

He grinned at
me.  “Sure.  I’m not worried.”

I pushed him and
stood.  “
I
am.  I need to study.  I don’t have time for this crap.”

I
met Ryuu in the
school library.  He was engrossed in a book and didn’t look up as I slid into
the chair next to him.  I was surprised to see that he was actually studying
for school, and not reading some moldy old book about tree spirits or something. 

I leaned close
to read over his shoulder.  “I thought you didn’t need to study,” I whispered.

He turned his
head to look at me, his nose inches from mine.  “I need to study if I’m going
to skip a grade.”

His breath was
warm on my cheek.  I sat back and tucked my hair behind my ear.  “You’re still
stuck on that?”  Ryuu had confessed to me that he planned to skip ahead. 
Unnecessary work, if you asked me.  “You really think you can do it?” 

He had been a
straight A student when we were little, but in the time since my curse his
grades had slipped.  His plan was to ace his finals and tell the teachers that
he had just been bored all these years, hoping they would feel that he needed
more challenge.  He said that he just wanted to get out of school faster so that
he could hunt down kami.  I think the real reason was that he just wanted to be
in the same grade as me.

I took out my
notes from Biology class and rummaged around in my bag until I found a purple
highlighter.  Ryuu stretched and flipped the page in his math book.  “This will
be a piece of cake,” he said confidently.  “Kid’s stuff.”

I raised my
eyebrows and highlighted a note about mitosis.  “Oh yeah, sure.”

Ryuu laughed and
I looked up to find him grinning at me.  “You know, if you fail and I skip
ahead we’ll be in the same grade.”

I picked up my
marker cap and threw it at him.  He didn’t flinch when it bounced off his
forehead and went rolling under the desk.  “Don’t even joke about crap like
that,” I hissed.  “If I get anymore behind than I am now, I’m gonna drop out!”

He chuckled and
crawled under the desk to retrieve the plastic cap.  When he re-emerged he had
stopped laughing at me.  “You’ll be fine,” he said handing me the cap.  I
refused to feel guilty about the small red mark that was appearing on his
forehead. 

“You’ve been
working hard.  Just give it your best.”  He settled back into his seat.  “If
you fail, it won’t be your fault at all,” he glanced up, but kept speaking.  “That
would be crap-for-brains’ fault.” 

I followed his
gaze to find Wyatt heading our way.  “Stop it,” I hissed, kicking him under the
table.  I hoped Wyatt hadn’t heard, but judging from the tight set of his mouth
when he sat down next to me, I knew he had. 

Wyatt scooted
his chair up to the table and smiled at me, completely ignoring Ryuu.  “So, do
you want to do your tutoring session here today or would you rather go
somewhere without so many little kids around?”

I put my head on
my arms and resisted the urge to tear my hair out.  Ryuu packed up his stuff
and stood.  He petted my head with a cool hand.  “Don’t worry Kit, I’ll see you
at home.” 

I picked up my
head in time to see him giving Wyatt a superior look.  The blonde glowered
after my friend until he was out of sight.  “I really hate that kid,” he
grumbled.

I shook my
head.  “He’s just trying to annoy you.  You’re both idiots.”

Wyatt glared at
me, but one corner of his mouth twitched as he tried not to laugh.  “If I’m
such an idiot, I guess you don’t need me to help you study then.”  He put a
hand on his bag and started to stand up.  I panicked and grabbed his arm. 

“No!  Stay.” 
When he eased back down into his chair, I relaxed.  “I am
not
repeating
tenth grade.”

In fact, the
sooner I got out of here the better.  I couldn’t take high school much longer.

*****

Ryuu and I
exited the library in a depressed mood.  We had decided to search the local
library for any instances of weird stories involving cursed objects in the area,
thinking it might give us some clue about what was making Vanessa act like such
a peach.  This past week had been a record-setting week for pranks and
bullying.  A freshman who’s locker was just down the hall from mine had all of
her stuff stolen.  We found it in the courtyard the next day.  Her books were
shredded, backpack destroyed, and hate messages were emblazoned across the
picnic tables.  Of course, Vanessa was never punished.  Somehow one of her
friends always ended up taking all the credit. 

Our search
turned up zilch.  Nothing even remotely exciting had
ever
happened in Pine
Rapids. 
Ever
.

 “Well, I didn’t
think we’d really find anything,” Ryuu admitted.  “It’s probably something
she’s keeping on her- a piece of jewelry or clothing or something.  Her little
sister seems just fine.  If it was something in her house, it seems like the
whole household would be affected.”

I nodded.  “You
know, Andrea said that Vanessa’s always boasting about stuff her dad buys her-
jewelry.  I wonder if it’s one of those things.”

“Probably.  But
I did want to know if there was any kind of history around here.”

I laughed.  “In
Pine Rapids?  You know nothing exciting ever happens around he-”

I rounded a
corner and walked right into someone.  He let out an
oof
and I fell on
my butt.  A thick hand reached down to pull me up, but when I went to take it
the guy jerked away.

“You!”  Ryuu
sounded shocked, and a little scared.

I stared up at
the burly man.  He had dark hair that was going grey at the temples.  It was
thin and hung to the shoulders of his suit jacket.  He wasn’t wearing a top hat
today, but the old carved cane in his hand kind of gave him away.

I scrambled to
my feet and put myself between him and Ryuu, who looked like he was about to
try something stupid again.  The man laughed.  “Little boy!  We need to stop
running into each other like this.”  His voice was jovial, but it somehow
sounded like a threat. 

I didn’t know
what to do.  I didn’t have my bat with me.  And even if I did, what would I
do?  Dash up and smack the cane out of his hand?

The man pushed
by us and kept walking, but he spoke over his shoulder as he passed.  “Not
everyone wants saving, little boy.”

 Ryuu stood
there, fists clenched, shaking.  His dark eyes swirled with a glint of gold. 
Crap
he was creepy right now.  I shifted from foot to foot, not knowing what to do. 
Ryuu pressed the back of his hand to his mouth and looked like he was about to
get sick. 

“Well, that was
fun,” I said shakily.  The whole situation was making me jittery.

Ryuu dropped his
hand.  He was still staring down the street.  “We’ve got to follow him.”

He took off
after the man, who had already turned a corner and disappeared.  With a groan,
I dashed after him.  “What?  Are you crazy?  Even if we do find him, I don’t
have my bat.  Plus, I don’t even know how to make it work again.  What are we
going to do?”

Ryuu just kept
loping along, his eyes searching.  I followed along, wondering how he knew
where he was going.  He turned a corner and kept pounding along like a
bloodhound on the scent.  “It doesn’t matter.  If we can get the cane…”

I rolled my eyes
and pelted along with him, trying to get him to stop.  “You heard what he said,
he doesn’t
want
our help.” 

We ran several
more blocks until we ended up right back where we’d started.  I stumbled to a
halt as Ryuu sank down on a wrought iron bench, gasping.  “We’ve just been
going in one big circle!”

He pounded a
fist on the bench.  “I can
feel
him.  He’s around here somewhere!”

I sank down next
to him and tried to catch my breath.  “Look.  It’s probably a good thing we
didn’t find him.  We aren’t ready for this.”

Ryuu’s eyes met
mine.  “You need to carry your bat.”

I sighed.  “I
know.  I’m sorry.  I just felt stupid lugging the thing around.”

He stretched and
stood.  “It’s okay.  At least we know he’s around here.  This probably means he
lives in Pine Rapids.  So all we have to do now is be prepared.  We’ll come
back tomorrow and see if we can find any antique canes in the stories.  And we
can start looking for antique stores.  Maybe someone will remember selling it
to him.”

I took his hand
and let him lead me home, remembering the malignant intent that seemed to lurk
behind the big man’s jovial voice.  I just hoped he didn’t decide to come
looking for us first.

“Ryuu,” I said
quietly when we got to my house.  “I think we should leave him alone.”

He opened his
mouth to argue, but I held up a hand.  “Did you hear what he said?  He
knows
what we were doing.  And he doesn’t want help.  You know what that means, don’t
you?”

His shoulders
slumped and all the fight went out of him.  “Yeah,” he sighed.  “He knows what
that thing is, and he’s keeping it with him on purpose.”

I nodded. 
And
he knew that Ryuu could see. 

*****

“It’s not like
this kind of thing comes with a user manual,” Ryuu said testily.

I sighed, not
blaming him for being short with me.  We had spent all morning trying to figure
out how to destroy the coin, and I knew he was just frustrated.  I ran a hand
through my short hair, liking the feel as it tumbled about my shoulders in a
wavy mess.  I didn’t know if what I was about to say was going to go over well.

“Well… that
might not be true,” I said hesitantly.  I met Ryuu’s eyes determinedly.  “You
said it yourself- that your grandmother had always been a little odd.  That
your mom even refused to talk to her because of it.”  Maybe there
was
a
user manual.

Ryuu raised a
dark brow at me.  “You want me to ask my obasaan for help?”

I shrugged. 
“What other options do we have?”

He shook his
head decidedly.  “No.  We don’t know for sure that she or her mother actually
had any sort of spiritual powers- that’s all just guesswork on my end.  And I’m
not going to go around telling people what we’re doing.  They’ll lock us up.”

I frowned at
him, wondering why he was so against this.  I doubted very much that Ryuu’s
family would have us institutionalized- though the thought did make me shrink a
bit mentally.  I didn’t want to end up back at Birch Hill.

 “Look, what’s
the worst that could happen?  We ask her, she laughs at us because she thinks we’re
just silly kids.  But if not- what if she actually knows something?”

Ryuu opened the
door and shooed me in.  “No.  We’re not bothering that old lady.”  His face was
childish, but his tone of voice was very adult, and very final.

“Fine,” I sighed,
following him to his room. 

I waited until
he went to use the bathroom, then I riffled his desk for a post-it note and a
pen.  There was an old box sitting next to his desk.  He was using it as a
make-shift trashcan, by the looks of it.  But when I lifted the flap, I found
exactly what I had hoped for, a postage label with an address on it.  I hastily
stuffed the post-it in my pocket and started picking at the label instead.  It
came up without too much effort, tearing away a little of the brown paper of
the box with it.

When Ryuu
returned, I was sitting on his bed with my notebook in my lap, frowning over my
notes, the little scrap of label burning a hole in my pocket. 

That night when
I got home, I took out some paper and wrote a letter.  It was hard to decide
where to begin, so I just wrote down whatever came to mind. 

Dear Ms. Nakatomi,

I am a friend of
Ryuu’s, here in the U.S.  He doesn’t know I’m writing to you- he’d probably be
upset with me if he did, but I just couldn’t help myself. 

I think Ryuu is
special.  He can do special things, and I’ve found that I can too.  I hope you
know what I mean- but if you don’t, then please just ignore this letter from a
couple of kids.

If you do know
though, I think we could use some help.  I’m worried about Ryuu.  I don’t want
him to
get hurt
have to do these things alone, but I don’t know what to
do to help.  Hopefully writing you was something.

I know this all
probably sounds like nonsense.  If it does, then please just have a good laugh.

Sincerely,

Katherine

P.S.  Thank you
for always sending things to Ryuu.  I know it might not seem like it, but I
know he appreciates having something to help him remember his parents.

I didn’t let
myself read and re-read the letter, as I was tempted to do.  Instead, I put it
in the envelope and took it out to the mailbox right then.  I felt both stupid
and excited.  She would probably think I was crazy.  But what if she didn’t?

For the next
couple of weeks, I spent far too much time checking the contents of our mailbox
and asking Dad if we’d gotten any letters.  Nothing came, though, and I finally
accepted that my silly letter had been seen as a joke.  Ryuu was right, there
was no one who understood what we were doing.  We would have to figure it out
on our own.