Book Girl and the Famished Spirit Read online

  In the midst of it all, Amemiya was swinging a golf club, destroying everything in the room. She was dressed in nothing but a white nightgown.

  She bit her lip so fiercely that it bled and tears rolled from her eyes, which flashed with fire, as her sticklike arms swung the club around to shatter a clock or the flat-screen TV.

  The sight of her made my hair stand on end.

  Amemiya?

  Kayano?

  No, this was definitely Amemiya—

  There was blood on both of Amemiya’s arms, her feet, and her face. She must have been cut by the flying glass. But she grit her teeth, seemingly oblivious to her injuries, and attacked a porcelain doll wearing a fluffy old-fashioned dress.

  The doll’s head flew off! Then she swung her club down on the doll’s body, beating it to pieces as if she were cracking open a watermelon.

  Two other clubs lay broken on the floor.

  “Leave it, Hotaru!”

  Ryuto caught Amemiya from behind and took the club from her. He flung it away.

  Amemiya clawed at his face like a cat, struggling. “Let go of me!!”

  “What’s wrong, Hotaru? What happened?”

  Her eyes bloodshot, Amemiya screamed in a ragged voice, “Go away! Don’t come back here! You’re dead! Stay away! Get out! Why did you come back? Your body’s not here anymore—this body is mine! Go away! Stay away from me! Don’t ever come back here!”

  Ryuto wrapped his arms around her and drew her to his chest, rubbing her back firmly.

  “Calm down, Hotaru. It’s me, Ryuto. You recognize me, right? Hotaru?”

  “Hotaru? Yes—that’s me. I’m Hotaru! I’m not Kayano! I’m not my mother!”

  “That’s right, you’re Hotaru. I’ll prove it to you. You’re Hotaru! Hotaru Amemiya!”

  Amemiya shook her head wildly.

  “No, you’re wrong. I’m Kayano. Kayano has to atone for her crimes. Kayano destroyed everything. She destroyed his heart… It was so sad. He cared only for her, and so deeply… No, that’s not true! He was the one… who destroyed everything. He took everything from me and turned me into a ghost. He stole the light from me, he stole the sun, and he shut me away in a world of darkness. He killed my father and Aunt Reiko!”

  Terror came over Amemiya’s face, and she started shuddering.

  “So scary… his eyes… He’s always watching me… I’m scared. I hate him. My story changed because of him. I can’t eat anything anymore. I don’t feel hungry. I hate him… but I can’t fight him. I’m afraid… so, so afraid…”

  I looked again at the broken dishes on the sideboard.

  White stew plates, bread platters, a transparent salad bowl, blue glasses…

  Thin slivers of carrot stuck to a stew plate and dressing spilled out of the broken salad bowl, leaving a brown stain on the table.

  The dishes were empty.

  Someone had eaten a meal here. And not long ago.

  “I’m scared, Ryu… I’m scared.”

  Amemiya finally said Ryuto’s name. It seemed like her crying was more controlled now. Ryuto stroked her back and hair, speaking to her gently.

  “It’s okay, Hotaru. I’m here. I’ll protect you. Okay, Hotaru? If you trust me and let me help you, I won’t ever betray you.”

  Amemiya wrapped her thin arms around Ryuto and pressed her small face into his chest and wept.

  “Ryu… Ryu…”

  I stared at the scene before me in a daze, as if I were watching events happening in a whole different world.

  My mind slowly emptied, and my body became transparent. I thought I might fade away like mist. A stabbing pain accompanied this sense of alienation, of tiny needles deep in my heart.

  I didn’t know what was going on or what had happened to Amemiya, but…

  It must have been terrible, but…

  I didn’t need to be here…

  The two of them were phantoms to me—just as Kayano had been that night in the chemistry lab, when I had been unable to do anything but watch as she left—and to them I was just a bystander, an invisible man.

  I couldn’t stand it. My chest tightened. There was nothing I could do about it.

  I quietly left the room.

  After dinner, I lay in bed and listened to a sad ballad on my headphones.

  As I gazed up at the ceiling, I remembered how Ryuto had held Amemiya’s thin body in his arms and how Amemiya had clung to him, sobbing.

  It had been very beautiful—but it was also heart-wrenchingly bleak.

  Because I had been unable to hold the girl I liked as Ryuto had…

  Konoha, I don’t think you would ever understand.

  Miu had smiled sadly that day, on the roof of our middle school, when she quietly told me that.

  Then she had fallen away backward, while I stood there and watched.

  I don’t think you would ever understand.

  You would never understand.

  I hadn’t been able to do anything. My legs had failed me, my heart had seized up, and I’d been petrified. I couldn’t even reach my hand out to her.

  Each time I thought back to that day, my world turned upside down and terror gripped me. It was as if the world went dark every time.

  If I’d been able to take Miu in my arms and comfort her like Ryuto had done, my story would probably be different.

  But how was I supposed to encourage or comfort someone who was suffering?

  A person’s pain and suffering belongs to that individual—they don’t belong to me. If I don’t know what’s bothering someone, I can’t offer them any convincing encouragement or quick-fix comfort! I’m not that amazing!

  But maybe that’s just an excuse for my own cowardice…

  When Ryuto suggested going to visit Amemiya at her house, I thought it would be better to tread lightly. It wasn’t out of consideration for Amemiya; I just didn’t want to get caught up in some big scene.

  And I knew why I hadn’t been able to stop Kayano from leaving. I felt that if I intruded any further into these girls’ hearts, I wouldn’t be able to turn back. I’d been afraid and my legs had turned to jelly.

  Even if I could go back to the past, wouldn’t I just do the same thing over again? Wouldn’t I just watch Miu fall away again?

  My throat tightened, letting a whimper escape. I rolled onto my side and balled my fist in the edge of the sheets.

  I realized that my body was covered in sweat and my breathing had become ragged.

  I desperately filled my mind with images, knowing that I had to think about something else.

  A buzzing classroom, my classmates chattering excitedly, quiet Akutagawa, Kotobuki glaring at me and pursing her lips, and then Tohko sitting with her knees drawn up on a metal folding chair and happily flipping through a book.

  As if guided by the sound of rustling paper and slender white fingers, my memories returned to the past.

  Yes—something like this had happened before.

  During the summer of my first year of high school.

  There’d been a heat wave that summer. The sunlight beat down mercilessly, as if trying to warm the earth after the long winter.

  Those days had been hot enough to make anyone a little crazy.

  At lunch, I was in front of the crowded lunch stand when suddenly I couldn’t breathe. I gave up on buying any food and staggered away from there.

  These attacks always came on me suddenly, as if they were a flock of crows swooping out of the sky and pecking me with their beaks. My fingers convulsed, and a rasping sound like the note of a broken flute escaped my throat. I couldn’t breathe. All noise suddenly disappeared from the world, and all I could hear was the thudding of my heart echoing inside my head. My body felt heavy.

  What am I going to do? Not in public… Was it because I was thinking about Miu? I just remembered how she liked custard rolls. Now what? Should I go to the nurse? No—I don’t want anyone to find out about these attacks. I just started high school and finally got back my old life. My clas
smates all think I’m a nice, normal guy.

  I don’t want to stand out!

  I sought out a place to hide my pathetic behavior, moving desperately.

  Sweat was dripping in beads from my forehead and neck when I reached the book club’s room in the western corner of the third floor. When I opened the door, I saw Tohko eating, surrounded by old books piled high like grave mounds.

  She was sitting immodestly on a metal folding chair, with her knees drawn up to her chest despite the skirt of her uniform, turning the pages of a paperback book in her lap, and her throat danced as she swallowed.

  The tiny room was full of dust, and fine motes tumbled dreamily in the light that streamed through the windows. Tohko’s black braids spilled over her shoulders, and her long, drooping lashes cast a faint shadow over her clear eyes.

  No matter how often I experienced it, the sight of her tearing a page out of a book with her thin fingers and popping it into her pink mouth was always creepy. But this time, as I stood gasping in pain, the way Tohko looked as she ate struck me as something peaceful and sacred.

  In the midst of the golden dust, my weirdo club president with her sailor suit and braids was eating her “lunch.”

  She looks so very placid and joyful as she eats her books. So happy and dear and kind…

  Tohko looked up and saw me.

  By that time my breathing was more or less regular again, but the sweat on my skin suddenly turned cold and I felt a chill. My shirt was stuck to me uncomfortably, and I’m sure my face was as colorless as a candle.

  Tohko’s brow furrowed in concern. “What’s wrong, Konoha?”

  “Nothing… at all.”

  My throat trembled, but I forced my voice out.

  I couldn’t decide if it would feel better to leave right then or to fall to my knees and start crying. Tohko was probably confused when I just stood there trembling. There was something sad and pensive in her clear black eyes as she stared up at me.

  I don’t know what she was thinking, but finally she held her book out to me, its pages shredded, and asked, “Do you want some?”

  “I can’t eat that.”

  I answered her instantly.

  The tension in my heart relaxed, and I felt like my legs would give way beneath me.

  “Sure? This book is really good,” Tohko murmured dejectedly, but her arm was still stretched straight out to me.

  I moved closer and asked, “What are you reading?”

  Her face lit up.

  “It’s a short story collection by Kunikida Doppo. He was active during the turn of the twentieth century and was an admirer of the English poet Wordsworth. He left behind a lot of flavorful stories with backdrops painted as lyrically as his poems. His most famous work is ‘Musashino,’ which I want you to promise me you’ll read. The descriptions of the landscape the narrator sees as he strolls through Musashino stretch out serenely, and it has sentences that are a little long, so it might be kind of hard to get into at first. But when you bite into each word one at a time and imagine the landscapes in your mind as you read, then you start to feel like you’re walking with him through the groves of Musashino, listening to the calls of birds and the breeze.

  “You can’t rush through this book. You have to read it slowly and savor each word, as if you’re resting on a moss-covered rock in a pure, silent wood, eating some of the best rice you ever tasted sprinkled with salt. Don’t stuff your face with it and gulp it down frantically. Instead, take it bite by bite, working in from one end. Then the sweet, familiar, rustic taste will seep over your tongue slowly, and before you know it, you’ll be full.

  “Yeah, that’s the kind of writing in ‘Musashino.’ ”

  Tohko’s pale eyelids drooped, and she recited in a clear, springy voice, “… ‘Those who find themselves lost on a walk in Musashino should not lament it. No matter the path, if he follows where his feet guide him, there are quarries there that must be seen, heard, and experienced. The beauty of Musashino may be hunted out at first simply by walking aimlessly the many thousands of roads that run through it.’ Isn’t that wonderful? This part is extradelicious. It’s like fragrant salty fish inside the rice.”

  I accepted the book, which was made lighter by having half of its pages torn out, and flipped through it.

  “ ‘Musashino’ isn’t in here. You ate it.”

  “Oops. It was the first one. I always eat the best-tasting parts first. But, but, but—‘Poetic Images’ is still in there! It’s also romantic and super A-plus-plus recommended. And ‘First Love’! That one is cutely heartwarming. It’s the story of a smart-mouthed fourteen-year-old kid who goes to start a fight with an old scholar in his neighborhood. The last line is as tart and sweet as a cherry. And see, there’s also ‘Warmer Days.’ This story is the same writing style as ‘Musashino.’ It’s another great story packed full of lyricism reminiscent of Wordsworth.”

  Without realizing it, I had sat down next to Tohko, each of us holding one side of the eviscerated book, turning the pages as I listened to her expound on it.

  It felt as if we were sitting together in a wood in Musashino with a gentle wind blowing by, thumbing through a book together and crumpling up its pages to eat it together.

  When lunch was over and I went back to class, my stomach was full and content, although I hadn’t eaten anything.

  I lay on my bed, thinking.

  Tohko had comforted me that day.

  Tohko hadn’t asked what was bothering me or hugged me or slapped me on the back and given me a pep talk.

  She had just stayed by my side.

  There was salvation to be found even in something that small.

  It didn’t have to be amazing or difficult. Just turning the pages of a book together…

  I just wanted to find out what Tohko’s author was like.

  Ryuto’s words popped into my mind, and I felt my ears burning.

  I wasn’t that great, and I’m sure Tohko saw me as nothing but an upstart kid who wrote snacks for her.

  Like I saw Tohko as my troublesome club president who ate books.

  Probably… definitely…

  “I wonder where Tohko went with Kotobuki… I wonder if she’s still angry at me…”

  I gazed up at the ceiling, murmuring to myself.

  Just then, my mother opened my door and came in.

  “So you were listening to music. I thought you might be. I’ve been calling you from downstairs. There’s a phone call for you. From a girl named Amano.”

  I leapt quickly out of bed. “Thanks, Mom.”

  I yanked my headphones off and took the cordless phone from her. My mother crinkled her eyes and left the room.

  “Hello? This is Konoha.”

  “Hello?”

  Huh? She sounded so down.

  Her voice was as frail as a chimpanzee’s that had been sick in bed for three days. It surprised me. But then Tohko said something even more surprising.

  “I’m at the police station. Can you come and get me? Please?”

  Chapter 5 – The Book Girl’s Report

  “So I was walking with Nanase when these scary old guys started talking to us… I was sure they were propositioning us, so I smacked one of them in the face with my bag and we ran away. Then they got even scarier and started chasing us, so we tried to jump over a wall. But then Nanase’s foot slipped and she fell…”

  Tohko was sitting in a metal fold-up chair in a room at the station, her hands clasped in front of her knees and her body scrunched up. Her face was flushed as she told me and the detective about how she had been taken into custody.

  “I may be a book girl, but even I couldn’t have imagined that people who looked like crooked loan collectors were detectives.”

  “So sorry we looked crooked to you, but you forced us to get even tougher when you whacked us with your bag.”

  An older detective popped his head in. I could see how his hard-bitten face had made Tohko want to run away as soon as he spoke to her. He had a me
aty face and build, and if he had a fake sword, you could have mistaken him for the villain in a pro wrestling match.

  “If I see a couple of girls in school uniforms walking through a disreputable neighborhood like that, I have to speak to them as part of my duties, you realize? But then I get a bag swung at my head!”

  “… I’m sorry.”

  She slumped so much that her braids brushed the ground.

  Why in the world had Tohko been walking through a sleazy place like that?

  And what had happened to Kotobuki?

  Tohko slumped down even further when I mentioned her.

  “They took Nanase to the hospital. She broke something, and they said it’s going to take a month for a full recovery…”

  Whoa. I was speechless. The detective scolded Tohko.

  “I told you to call your guardians. What are you trying to pull, calling your buddy instead? Get your family over here, pronto.”

  “That’s probably a good idea, Tohko,” I agreed gently.

  But Tohko shook her head fiercely.

  “N-no! I can’t ask Mrs. Sakurai to come and pick me up from the police station.”

  Was that Ryuto’s mother? I could see how someone would have trouble asking that of the people she boarded with.

  “Do you want me to ask my mom to come?”

  “We can’t do that, either. It would destroy her image of me as a steadfast, reliable mentor. I already can’t ever call your house again.”

  She had picked an odd time to start worrying about appearances, though I did recall my mother complimenting Tohko before on what a polite young woman she was.

  “Then what are you going to do? They’re not going to let you go home in my custody.”

  “Don’t you have any adults you can call on at times like this? Any old archaeologists who are still young at heart?”

  “No, I don’t. And even if I did, he would be excavating ruins in the Amazon and would only come back to Japan once every four years, max.”