If it weren’t for the silver hair I ended up with, I might have doubted that the whole adventure actually happened. That it wasn’t some dream I’d had while battling the flu.
Anyway, when we arrived home that day, we expected to see the house still wrecked from the earthquake and tsunami that had happened a few days earlier. But everything looked to be in good shape. Instead, something else was waiting for us.
Shea stood in the kitchen, chatting with my grandmother. Both of them were laughing as if she’d gone out for milk and, I don’t know, gotten stuck in traffic for a few minutes. Like it was not a big deal.
All the joy I’d felt at saving my father from the demons (not to mention the world, too, ahem) drained out of me in a big, practically audible whoosh, like air escaping a slashed tire.
I stared at the woman, not knowing who she was at first. Or—if I’m being honest—knowing who she was and wishing I didn’t.
My father let out a whoop, swept her into his arms, and smooched her like they were on the cover of one of those gag-worthy romance novels. Minus the shirtlessness, thank goodness. “Shea!” he cried.
I just stood there like I was playing freeze tag. Who is this? my head asked over and over again. Does not compute. Fatal error. Fatal error.
Your mother, my gut answered, but I didn’t want to believe my gut. It didn’t seem real. I stared at her some more. A gale-force wind couldn’t have blown me over.
When my parents finished their clinch, Shea turned to me with a wide smile. “Xander.”
My nose began running as if someone had turned on a spigot, and my eyes burned with salty tears. I felt my lips quivering and my throat shaking like a maraca. I wanted to run away and I wanted to hug her at the same time.
“Xander,” Shea repeated. “Baby. Mo chroí. I cannot believe it. My little lad, all grown up.” She took a step toward me, holding out her hands. Her long white fingers looked as delicate as a porcelain doll’s. And about as realistic.
I opened my mouth to say something. Anything. Hi. Long time no see. What the heck are you doing here? Why did you leave me?
Maybe even Don’t you know how much you hurt me?
But my vocal cords wouldn’t work. Instead, a garbled noise, the sort of sound you make before you’re going to be sick, burbled out. I clapped a hand over my mouth.
She reached me in a single step and wrapped her arms around my shoulders.
I stiffened. It might as well have been a random woman off the street hugging me. Then I inhaled her scent—a mix of flowers and green grass and orange slices—and I knew, without a doubt, who she was.
It was my mother, all right. And I wanted nothing to do with her. I shoved her away. “No.” It came out of my mouth like a moan. “No. Where were you? Where have you been? I thought you were dead!”
Dad stepped toward me. “Xander, let us explain.”
“No.” I held out my hand, and both of my parents stood still. “How dare you?” My voice was low and steady now. I pointed at Shea. “What makes you think we want you back? That you can just walk in here like nothing’s happened? I’ve got news for you. We’ve been fine this whole time.”
“Xander!” Dad’s voice dropped an octave.
“We don’t need you!” I continued. “In fact, maybe you did us a favor.”
Dad glared at me. “Do not speak to your mother like that.”
Shea touched him on the shoulder. “It’s all right,” she murmured in her sonorous Irish accent. “Let him have some time.”
“I don’t need time. What I needed”—I blinked back my tears—“was a mother when I was growing up. In the past!”
Her face crumpled as if I’d hit her with a brick. Good. I turned and ran upstairs to my bedroom before I could start feeling bad about it.
They’d given me an hour to calm down before my father knocked on my door. I lay on my bed staring up at the ceiling, trying to figure out how all this had happened. How I’d become Momotaro and fought demons and gotten silver hair and my mother back, all in one fell swoop.
Before that, life had been so boring. I kind of missed boring.
“Xander?” Dad tiptoed into the room. His face was both wrinkled with worry and full of joy. A happiness I hadn’t seen in him since forever. “Son, this is a good thing, your mother coming home. Believe it or not.”
I swiveled away from my father, staring at the wall.
Dad sat on my bed and patted my back. “Xander, I couldn’t tell you this before.” He drew in a breath. “There’s a lot to the story you don’t know.”
“What?” I wiped my nose on my sleeve. “Did you do something bad to her to make her leave?” I said it, but I didn’t believe it for one second.
“Of course not,” Dad confirmed. “Your mother had to leave for your safety.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I moved away from Dad’s hand. “Was she in the witness protection program or something?”
He hesitated. “In a way. You see, your mother—she has this…well, this light about her. A glow.”
“Ew.” I rolled my eyes. “I saw you guys kiss. I don’t need to know about that. Please.”
“No.” Dad laughs a little bit. “I mean your mother has a literal light. One the oni can spot.”
I rolled over so I could stare at him with my best poker face. What on earth did he mean?
Dad fiddled with the blanket. “You know how I’m a Momotaro? Was, I mean? You’re the Momotaro now because there can only be one at a time.”
During our journey, Dad had explained that his powers were gradually transferring to me. As mine grew stronger, his would fade away.
“Yeah.” A surge of pride went through me. Momotaro. The one who had bested those monsters—the snow woman, the kappa, the oni eggs, and, of course, Jinx’s dad.
Dad nodded. “Well, your mother’s not exactly normal, either, Xander.” He seemed to be having trouble figuring out the words he wanted to use. “She’s a fairy.”
“What?” I bolted upright, almost jumping clear off the bed. My head must have looked like it was about to spin off its axis. “A fairy fairy? Like Tinker Bell?”
Dad laughed and pushed his glasses up his nose. “Not the teeny-tiny kind. No, Shea’s part of the tall folk, who traditionally protect Irish land.” Dad cocked his head at me. “Before you were born, your mother only glowed when she was using her powers. She could control it. But after you came, her glow became stronger. Brighter every year. She had no control over it anymore. By the time you were four, it was becoming a real problem.”
I sat down next to him.
“The oni can see this glow, Xander. We were worried she was becoming a beacon. So she left. To protect you. So they wouldn’t find you before you were ready.”
I considered this, turning it over and over in my head like a coin. “But why did her glow appear only after I was born?”
Dad’s shoulders moved up and down. “We don’t know, Xander. Some connection to her baby? The joy of motherhood? It hadn’t happened to her other relatives, though. We think it may have something to do with the Momotaro powers interacting with hers.”
“But didn’t the oni already know where you were, Dad?” I raked my fingers through my hair. I wasn’t sure this was making sense. Maybe it never would.
Dad’s mouth flickered into a smile. “I’d stopped fighting oni before I even met your mother, Xander. They no longer cared about me.”
I grabbed Dad’s arm. “But now they know me. Is she still glowing? Could they find us now?”
Dad nodded. “Yes, but they already know where we are. You have your powers. You can protect yourself, and we can help.” He put his hand on my shoulder. “We were going to wait until you turned thirteen to tell you. But it didn’t go as we’d hoped.”
I snorted. “Understatement of the millennium.”
Dad sighed. “I know, son. We did our best.” He swallowed audibly. “We managed to buy you some time, at least.”
I looked at Dad’s creased
face, and I couldn’t help but gulp, too. “So does this mean the oni will never stop coming after me? My whole life?”
He hesitated, as if he was thinking about the best way to break the news to me. “Correct,” he said at last.
My stomach already knew the truth. I clenched my hands against the knot under my belly button. “What are they going to do—form an army and march up to the house?”
“Well,” Dad said slowly, “they might just continue their work in the human world. Cause World War Three, more global warming. And hope you don’t do anything about it.” Dad lowered his eyes for a moment. “I’m afraid that’s what happened with me, Xander. I wasn’t a strong Momotaro. You see, I thought there was another way. That I could find better, more permanent answers in the lore, buried somewhere in the stories.” He took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. “As a result, things got out of hand. Perhaps I should have been more on the offensive.”
I understood then why Dad had become a professor of folklore, so he could immerse himself in fairy tales and stories. My stomach hurt even worse. “What you’re saying is you expect me to go out there and launch some kind of war against the oni?”
His mouth twisted. “You will have to defeat their king, Ozuno. Eventually,” he added hastily, as if that would make me feel any better. “First we must train you and see what powers you have.”
I drew my knees up to my chest. “And what’ll happen if I don’t? Will the world end?”
“The oni have spent many years growing in strength and number,” my father answered. “If this continues, the world won’t end. But it won’t be the same.” He drew in a shuddering breath. “They feed on discord and suffering, Xander.”
It was like every single fear I’d ever had had gotten tangled into one huge knot. I wanted to hide under my bed and explode at the same time. I grabbed Dad’s arm. “If all this is true, then what difference would it have made if Mom had been here the whole time?”
“A big one. You might not be here, talking to me. Had they known about you before now, they would have tried to take you out before you discovered your powers.” Dad pressed his forehead against mine so I could see my eyes reflected in his, light blue inside light blue. “Xander, please don’t blame your mother for all this. I know it’s a shock, especially after our whole adventure. You need time, that’s all.”
I reached up to rub my eyes and realized my hands were wet. Look at that, crying and I didn’t even know it. “It’s just…” I faltered, trying to figure out what I was feeling. Nothing, I decided. Though I was crying, I felt numb inside. “She’s a stranger, Dad. I don’t know that woman. What if she’s changed? You have, and I sure as heck have. Everybody except Obāchan has. What if she doesn’t…” I couldn’t continue.
“I’m sure you have nothing to worry about. Give her a chance.” Dad wiped my tears away with his thumb. It felt rough, like a cat’s tongue. “For me.”
So I’ve been trying, for Dad’s sake. Really I have. But whenever I see Shea, I don’t just see the lady standing before me. I see every mother-son event at school when I had to go with my grandma instead. I see way more nights than I want to remember when I cried myself to sleep because my mother wasn’t there to sing to me. I see me waiting for the mail carrier every day, and his small pitying shake of the head when he didn’t have a letter from her.
Letters aren’t beacons. They’re paper. She could’ve sent something. A postcard. A carrier pigeon. A message in a bottle. A telepathic message—what good is being a fairy if you can’t send something super cool like that?
But, oh no, she never bothered. Instead, she traipsed back to Ireland and was the veterinarian on her family’s horse farm, birthing foals, blacksmithing horseshoes, and taking care of the land the tall folk are supposed to protect. I would have liked to have visited, to meet the grandparents and aunts and uncles I hardly know anything about.
And judging from the looks of her, from how completely not sorry and unaffected she is, wrinkle-free and glowing, she had a grand old time without the burden of her son and husband weighing her down. She was like the Irish Beyoncé doing her single ladies dance across the pond.
“Xander.” My mother’s voice is sharp.
I blink and shake myself out of my thoughts.
Shea is holding out a plate of bacon and eggs at my eye level. “Are you hungry, love?” She puts the dish on the table, and I say nothing, just lift my fork and shovel a mouthful in. “A thank-you would be nice.” Her accent grows thicker with each word.
“Arigato gozaimasu.” I bow my head so low my forehead smacks the table. She flinches. “Thank you. I am most appreciative of this wonderful breakfast you prepared with the food that my father has paid for.”
She inhales noisily, annoyance rising off her like steam from a fresh-baked cake, then turns back to the stove and cracks two more eggs into the frying pan.
Good. If she can feel just a tenth as bad—or even a twentieth as bad—as I felt all those years, then maybe, just maybe, we’ll be even.
I take a piece of bacon and shove it into my mouth. It’s overcooked, dry, too salty. I spit it into my hand and throw it at Inu, who catches it more surely than a major league outfielder.
I regard the rest of the bacon on the plate, and my stomach flips. Obāchan’s bacon is always perfect. I open my mouth to tell Shea that she ought to take cooking lessons from my grandmother.
“Xander.” As if on cue, Obāchan shuffles into the kitchen, shooting her warning evil eye my way. “Look at all this work your mother has done. I hope you appreciate it. Good morning, Shea.”
I clamp my mouth shut and nod.
“Good morning, Aya.” Shea is the only one who calls my grandmother by her first name. My mother turns off the burner under the bacon pan and wipes her hands on a kitchen towel. “It’s no trouble at all. Happy to do it.” She gives us a smile. “I’m going to go wake up your dad.” Shea disappears.
Obāchan shakes her head at me, and I know she’s heard everything I said. “She’s really trying, you know.”
I shrug. Inu leaps over to Obāchan, his whole body wiggling as if he hasn’t seen her in thirty years. “Sit,” she commands, and she waits until he does before she pets him. “Good boy.” She settles into a regular dining chair with a sigh and a grimace. “These old bones are feeling mighty old these days.”
I hop up and go to the cupboard where we keep the medicine. Obāchan’s got at least five dozen different bottles and tubes that nearly spill out when I open it, but I find her Tiger Balm for sore muscles. “You want this, Obāchan?”
“Thank you.” She smiles at me, her face oddly smooth even though she’s older than any grandparent I’ve ever met. Meaning she won’t tell me how old she is.
I make sure my mom’s not coming back into the room and lower my voice. “So, tell me, did you and Ojīchan welcome my mother into the family? You weren’t worried about Dad marrying a fairy?”
She laughs. “Your father never asked for our opinion. He didn’t tell us until they’d been married for half a year.” Obāchan takes a paper napkin from the center of the table and folds it absently as she speaks. “I trusted your father to pick a good woman. Ojīchan was worried, of course, not knowing how a fairy would affect a Momotaro….” She bites her lip, lost in some sad memory. When she looks up, her eyes are bright. “Shea was the best thing that ever happened to your father. She was the one who convinced him to call us. Before that, he and your grandfather hadn’t spoken to each other for years. They never did make up….” Obāchan blows out a breath. “Ah. What’s done is done.” She crumples the napkin and throws it at me playfully, then changes the subject. “You are up awfully early. Still having nightmares, eh?”
“Yup.” I eat a tasteless piece of bacon. My head feels like it’s full of lead. “All I want to do is crawl back into bed. How am I ever going to finish Dad’s training if I can never get a full night’s rest?” My eyes fill with tears. That’s another thing. Not sleeping makes me way more emotio
nal than usual. Now I can see why keeping people awake is a method of torture.
“Your father will understand, Xander.” Obāchan scratches under Inu’s chin, and he closes his eyes in bliss.
A shuddering sigh escapes me. “Obāchan, I don’t know if I can deal with this whole hero thing. How will I ever be able to sleep, knowing the oni could be coming after me at any second?” This is the first time I’ve spoken the fear out loud. Instead of dispelling it, though, it makes it worse.
Obāchan puts her hand on top of mine. “I know it’s scary. But you cannot worry about the oni bothering you any more than you can worry about a wildfire or getting hit by a car.”
Great. More things to be anxious about. “Gee, thanks.”
“Xander, anything could happen at any time, oni or no oni. You’re as safe as you ever were. The difference now is that you know about the oni. And you have powers to use against them.”
I stick my fingers into my hair, making it stand up. “Obāchan, I know you think you’re helping, but you’re not, actually.” I wonder if I could move someplace else. Like Canada. Or Antarctica. Some new place to hide.
Obāchan blinks at me several times. “I’m going to do something for you, Xander. You grandfather would tell me not to interfere, but I didn’t interfere with your father and it made things worse.”
“You mean the whole oni-growing-stronger thing?” I wipe my tears away, hoping she hasn’t noticed them. “Yeah, I kind of agree.” If my dad or grandfather had defeated the oni, I wouldn’t have to deal with any of this.
She mutters something to herself in Japanese, then reaches into the neckline of her kimono and takes off a red string hanging around her neck. A green pendant dangles from it. “I dug this out of my closet for you, Xander. A baku charm. It’s jade.”
It looks like an elephant, except it has no big ears. Maybe an anteater with a long nose. “What is it? An oni?”
“No. More like a yōkai. A supernatural creature, not a demon.”
“What’s it do?” In stories, yōkai aren’t necessarily bad. Many are benign, or playful.
“Put it under your pillow,” Obāchan says, taking a piece of dry bacon. “When you have a bad dream, call to it: Baku, baku, come eat my dream. Then you won’t have another nightmare that night.”
Xander and the Dream Thief Page 2