Ink

“Creepy sketches? That’s definitely criminal activity,” he said, madly tracing kanji onto his palm.

My cheeks blazed red. “Forget it. It’s stupid,” I said, and he dropped his hands to his sides as he shook his head.

“It’s not stupid if he’s bothering you,” he said.

“He’s not bothering me. I mean, he is, but—” The words tangled as much as my thoughts. What exactly was he doing? “Sometimes it’s like he’s picking on me. And then other times, he looks like he’s scared of me, or like I’m in on some kind of secret.”

“Ah,” said Jun. “Now that, I understand.”

“So?”

“He likes you.”

I snorted. “You’re way off base, keiji-san. He even has a girlfriend.”

“I guess I’m losing my touch.” He laughed. “That just seemed like the obvious answer.”

Then he stared at me intensely and started to lean in.

“What are you doing?” I said, my pulse racing. How was this happening? His eyes were soft and dazed, like he was looking at me while half-asleep. The blond highlight tucked behind his ear escaped and fanned over his cheek, the longest strands brushing the corner of his lips. He reached his hand out toward my hair. I flinched and tried to back up, but I was on my bike and huddled against a wall. There wasn’t anywhere to go.

I felt the soft brush of his fingers through my hair, and then he leaned back.

“Cherry blossom,” he said, the pink petal pressed between his fingers. He let it flutter to the ground as we watched, and then he looked up at me. “So beautiful,” he whispered.

My heart might possibly have stopped for a second.

And then Tomohiro whizzed past with his unmistakable hair slicked to the sides of his head. Jun must have seen the urgency on my face because he turned to watch him go by.

“Ah,” he said, and I wondered if I imagined the hurt in his voice. “He’s here, the boy who draws things. You’re flustered again.”

“I’m not flustered! I’m just—”

“I know, I know. But I’m late for practice, so I’ll catch you later, okay?”

Yeah, right. He smiled as he walked away, limping a little under the weight of the sports bag. I watched him go, wondering if I imagined it. So beautiful. He meant the cherry petal—right?

No time to think about it. Tomohiro veered toward the walkways and I was on his tail, coasting down the hill and looping around pedestrians. This was my chance to finally figure it all out. What he was hiding, why he was pushing me away. Sure, there was the I’m-a-jerk component, but after the fight in the park, there was more than that. There had to be.

The city thinned as we moved forward, and then I really got nervous. Maybe he was onto me. Maybe he was messing with me again, because I didn’t see anything out of the ordinary here. I half expected him to stop his bike and look back at me with a smug grin and a slow clap.

But then a tipsy Roman bus snorted along the street, and relief washed through me. He was just following the bus route.

A mass of trees in fresh bud spread in front of us like an emerald beacon amid the city streets, and I realized where we were headed.

Yuki had told me about it—Toro Iseki, an excavated archaeological site in the thick of Shizuoka City. A chain-link fence surrounded the area, and suspended from the barrier was a big orange sign with kanji I couldn’t quite read—but there was a big picture of a bowing, apologetic workman with a hard hat, so I got the idea.

Tomohiro coasted along the side of the fence, his fingers strumming the chain links as he went. He leaped off his bike and pushed in on the side of the fence. It lifted from the rail and he ducked under, pulling his bike through the gap. When he disappeared into the trees, I pedaled up to the loose fence.

There was a thin trail on the other side—not very noticeable, but I had spent every summer in the forests of Deep River, and clear as day I saw the stomped-down grass and broken branches.

A slip of ripped paper fluttered in the grass, with little torn holes like it was pulled from a notebook. Something had been scribbled on it. And I bet it was Tomohiro’s.

I peeked around me, my heart pounding. Even when friends egged me on, there were lines I never crossed. I couldn’t believe I was even considering breaking into a restricted area.

I stared at the tuft of forest, the trees bursting upward. I knew Tomohiro was there, and I had to know what he was doing.

I took a deep breath. Hot adrenaline raced into my fingertips and down my tired legs.

I pushed the chain-link fence in and ducked under.

The tension prickled down my neck and shoulders, but nothing happened. The park was silent except for the chirps of strange birds grating against each other.

I bent over and lifted the scrap of paper, rubbing the grainy notebook page between my fingers. With a deep breath, I flipped it over. Scribbled, panicky lines had somehow woven together into the end of a dragon’s tail, curved with shaded-in scales. Tufts of hair and ridges sprawled from the tail in sharp, ragged scrawls of ink.

I squinted as I stared at the paper. Something was off—the proportion maybe, but part of the tail looked funny. One spike looked too long, but then it looked fine again, and then another patch of scales seemed out of place. I scrunched up my face, trying to figure it out, as a gust of wind almost blew it out of my hand.

The tail flicked from one side of the paper to the other.

I dropped the scrap, my heart pounding.

I stood there, unsure what to do. Should I let Tomohiro know I was here and make him explain? I’d probably come off as a wacko. Not that spying on him from afar was any better, but it’s not like I’d planned this out well. I just wanted to know what the hell he was up to. I shivered as I thought of the pregnant girl’s eyes on me, the horrible moment that had started all this weirdness. I had to know the truth.

The forest wasn’t as dense as it had seemed, and a few meters ahead the trees thinned into the clearing of Toro Iseki. My breath caught in my throat as I stepped forward.

Bathed in the pink of sakura, the white of late ume plum blossoms and the vibrant greens of fragrant spring leaves, walking into the silent ruins of Toro felt like walking into an ancient painting. The floating petals rained on the thatched rooftops of the old Yayoi houses and collected in the grasses around them.

Tomohiro sat beside one of the huts, his knees tucked up and a black notebook balanced on them like a canvas. His hand arced over the paper quickly, black spreading across the stark white page. Every now and then he had to stop to blow the cherry and plum petals off his work.

I hung beside the trees on the edge of the clearing, watching him.

Without lifting his head, he said into his drawing, “You might as well sit down instead of standing there gawking at me. It’s annoying.”

Heat coursed through my cheeks, and my ears burned with embarrassment.

When I didn’t reply, Tomohiro stopped drawing. Still not looking up, he moved his hand to a spot on the ground beside him and patted it. “Sit.”

I smirked. “What am I, a dog?”

He looked over and grinned, the breeze twisting his spiky hair in and out of his deep brown eyes. I almost melted on the spot.

“Wan, wan,” he barked, the Japanese version of a dog’s noise. I nearly jumped back at the sound of it, and his eyes gleamed with twisted delight. “I’m the animal around here, right?” he said with a smirk. “Don’t sit if you don’t want. I don’t care.” He turned back to the page.

I took a deep breath and stepped forward, walking slowly toward his back, curved over his drawing.

My eyes flicked nervously to the drawing, a sketch of a wagtail bird. The drawing was beautiful, but I was relieved to see it didn’t move around.

Tomohiro shook his head.