She opened her eyes and let out a loud meow.
Okaasan was wearing an apron now, royal blue with white splotches—a traditional wrinkly tie-dye style. On the stove, an egg bubbled in the fry pan, sunny side up, and a bowl of steaming rice sat nearby. It looked like I was having a Japanese breakfast, although she wouldn’t call it that. When I was younger, I thought everyone ate rice three times a day.
It wasn’t until I’d started junior high school that I got the nerve to ask Okaasan to stop packing anything weird in my lunch: no rice balls wrapped in seaweed, no sandwiches with ketchup smiley faces. There’s nothing more humiliating than opening your An-pan-man cartoon lunch container to find a carrot-stick man with a boiled egg for a head and a mayonnaise happy face looking up at you. Even your best friends laugh you out of the room. For some reason, remembering that made me sad now.
I sat at the table and watched her work. Her hands moved fast, her knife slicing through the skin of an orange. Dad kept them razor sharp, which was the only job he had in the kitchen. Okaasan stood on her toes to grab a cup from the lowest cupboard. Her shiny hair hung down her back in a single loose ponytail. I hadn’t noticed earlier, but she was wearing dress pants and a nice blouse, which meant lunch and shopping downtown were in her plans for the day.
I was still feeling shaky. As I looked at her, I realized some of that anger, however irrational, still remained.
She set my breakfast and her cup of tea on the table and sat across from me. I took a bite with my chopsticks, chewed slowly, and enjoyed the taste of the soy sauce mixed with the runny yolk.
“Delicious,” I told her. We both knew I was sucking up.
“You’re welcome,” she said as she filled her cup from a small pot. She watched me eat for a while before she set her cup down. “How was the game last night?”
“The Giants won and the food in Grandpa’s private suite was amazing. Mack gorged like a pig.”
She smiled, but it didn’t last. “Tell me about your dream.”
I continued to chew, stalling. I didn’t know where to begin or how much to say.
“I’m sorry about that,” I said after I swallowed. “I was a total jerk.”
She nodded and a faint smile appeared on her lips.
“You know the Izumo-taisha Shrine, in Japan?” I said.
“Of course. I often went there as a young girl.”
“That’s what I was dreaming about.” I described it, but when I mentioned the massive red posts, she got an odd look on her face.
“You saw three trees tied together and painted red?”
“Yeah” I said. “Everything seemed so real. I guess that’s why I freaked out when you woke me up. Sorry.”
She placed her cup back on the table with a loud thud. “The grand shrine at Izumo doesn’t have a long staircase, and it’s certainly not high off the ground. I took you there enough times, you should remember that.”
“Wasn’t I, like, five or something?”
She considered that and shook her head. “This is impossible.”
“It was just a dream, Mom.”
She studied my face for a moment and then stared down at her teacup. I could tell she was upset because her hands shook as she rubbed the ring on her right hand.
Something clicked.
“Where did you get that ring?”
She glanced down at her finger and moved her left hand to cover it. As she did, she frowned, revealing small lines around her mouth that I hadn’t noticed before. “I’ve worn this for years.”
“Yeah, but where did you get it?”
“My mother gave me this when I graduated. The silver is from the Iwami-Ginzan mines, near Mount Sennoyama.”
“Which mother?”
“My birth mother.” She looked at the ring, and then our eyes met. “Only the women in my family clan wear this. It meant something to me once—an honor of the highest order. Now it’s just a reminder of another life.”
“Shoko has a ring like that.”
Okaasan sucked in a quick breath. “That’s impossible.”
I studied her face. “I told you before—you and Shoko are a lot alike.”
“So we Japanese girls are all the same?” She stood and took her cup to the sink, as if she were running from me. She began to wash the dishes, banging the pots in the sink.
“Remember I told you I was sensing things?” She didn’t answer. “Well, it’s more than that now. I can feel energy, even feel people’s emotions, I can project energy, and I get a tingling in the back of my neck when there’s some kind of threat nearby.”
Her hands gripped the edge of the sink.
“Are you OK?”
“No, I’m not.” She turned to look at me. “Even if you take after me … this isn’t possible. You’re a boy.”
“Shoko said that, too!” I stood up and faced her. “That exact same thing.”
She hesitated. “I think you should stay away from that girl.”
“Why?”
“Because she’s changing you.”
CHAPTER
16
As I trudged up the Arbutus Hill, I played the morning’s events over in my head. The more I thought about it, the more I realized Okaasan was hiding something from me. She and Shoko definitely had the same ring, and the similarities between them were too obvious to ignore.
I stopped and looked back toward my house. I knew Shoko was trouble, but she was also part of some larger mystery involving my family. I needed to see her again, but I didn’t even know how to contact her.
I started to jog up the hill.
Mack was standing by our lockers, looking into his with disinterest, when I ran up and slammed into him. It was like hitting a wall. I bounced off and hit the lockers with a bang.
“Morning,” he said. “How come you’re late?”
“My mom’s fault.”
We both ignored the second bell as I told him about the dream and Okaasan’s reaction to it.
Mack leaned back against his locker. “Dreams are movies in your head, man—garbage in, garbage out. You do all that martial-arts crap, so no wonder you’re having crazy dreams. But that doesn’t make it real, right?” He got a dreamy look on his face. “I had this dream a couple of weeks ago. A brontosaurus was chasing this hot cave babe and me through the jungle. Her tiny fur top kept slipping off as we ran. Nice.”
“A hot cave babe?”
He nodded. “What I’m saying is, it ain’t too likely I’m gonna see a dinosaur or a topless babe running through the jungle, is it?” He paused. “Well, I won’t see a dinosaur anyhow.”
“Where do you get these ideas?”
“A new poster I’ve got in my closet. You should see it.”
“In your closet?”
He grunted. “Gotta hide it. You remember what happened when my dad put that bikini calendar in the garage?” His mom had poured gasoline on it and burned it in the street in front of their house. The fire department even came. “You see why I want your mom to adopt me?” He looked away. “Anyway, I’ve gotta go, man.” He shouldered his backpack and walked away. “See you at basketball practice.”
I got home after seven and found Okaasan in the kitchen preparing for a late dinner. Dad wasn’t home yet. I felt nothing from her, good or bad. She was peeling a yam with smooth strokes, but as soon as I tried to sense her energy, she jerked and dropped it. Her hand went to her temple and she looked at me.
“If you’re going to stand there, you can cut these carrots.”
I reached for a knife.
“Wash your hands first.” She began to peel again, her face a mask of concentration while I started on the first carrot. She glanced over. “Smaller please.”
“Yeah, yeah.”
After a few minutes of silent work, she said, “Your grandpa called. Someone broke into his house yesterday.”
My hands froze in mid-cut. “Really?” I tried to keep my voice neutral and get my hands moving again before she noticed.
“
They opened his safe, and apparently there are only a few people who even know it’s there. Do you?”
I swallowed hard. “He showed me inside it years ago.”
“The burglar used your code—your fingerprint—to open the safe, but the security cameras weren’t recording, and the guard on duty doesn’t remember anyone going into the house.”
I closed off every thought in my head and concentrated on the carrot in my hand.
She stopped working and stepped back from the counter. “You’re thinking about carrots? What do you know about this?!”
I glared at her. “Stop doing that!”
“Tell me what you know, Junya!”
I hesitated, but guilt churned my stomach like bad food. I hated lying. “Shoko and I were hanging out yesterday afternoon, and there was a book I needed to return to Grandpa’s.”
Her eyes widened. “You were there, with Shoko?”
I started cutting again. “We went inside and put it back.”
“How did you get in and out without anyone seeing you?” Her voice had an edge now, anxiety turning into fear.
The carrot pieces were the size of peas and getting smaller.
“I talked to the guard and told him to erase the camera footage.” I turned to look at her. “And I opened the safe.”
Her face went from surprised to furious in under a second. “You idiot!”
I spun to face her. “And you’re a liar!”
Okaasan slapped my face.
The sharp crack froze us both for a moment. Then she backed away and something flickered in her eyes, just for a moment.
I stared. “You’re afraid of me?”
She pointed to my hand. I held the knife in a throwing position, my arm cocked and ready—I didn’t remember doing that. The knife slipped from my fingers and hit the floor, its point embedding in the wood.
Okaasan stared at the knife, still wobbling in the floor, and then her eyes rose to mine. “I’m afraid for you.”
“Mom … You know something. You have to help me out here.”
She dropped into a chair. “Tell me everything that’s happened in the last few days.”
I told her enough to explain some of what had happened.
“So that’s where he keeps the gold?”
“Yeah. It’s a shame to keep a collection like that hidden away.”
“Did you see the map?”
“The treasure map?” I had to think for a moment. “There was a rolled piece of leather. I didn’t look at it.”
She thought for a moment. “So you didn’t touch anything?”
I shook my head. “I’m still alive, aren’t I?”
She looked confused. “What does that mean?”
“Shoko pulled a wakizashi on me. She said if I touched the gold she’d kill me. She thinks it’s cursed.”
Okaasan closed her eyes and nodded. “I see.”
“So that sounds normal to you? I thought she was a ninja assassin or something.”
Okaasan’s eyes remained closed. She was thinking hard. The effort showed on her face. “Did Shoko say why she wanted to see his journal?”
I nodded. “She wanted to see if Grandpa wrote anything about her mom. They were in love once, apparently.”
Okaasan’s mouth dropped open. “Oh my God!” she exclaimed. “Shoko’s mother is Tomi?”
“How do you know that?”
A short silence ensued. “He named his yacht Tomi,” she said. “It’s obvious that woman was once very special to him—”
“Would it be so frickin’ hard to tell me the truth here? Just once.”
Her mouth twisted, as if she was struggling with something she’d never prepared for. “I knew Tomi a long time ago.”
“In Japan?”
She nodded. “We went to the same … school.”
“But isn’t Tomi way older than you? She knew Grandpa when he was young.”
“We weren’t in the same grade.” She looked at me. “Why did Shoko become interested in you?”
“At first she was just using me to get to the journal, but I guess I became her new assignment or something.”
“How do you know that?” She looked incredulous.
“She told me. They made her come back because she awakened me.”
“That explains everything!” She grabbed her face. “You should’ve told me this sooner! You said she tried to kill you?”
“Only because I tried to touch the gold.”
A few of the puzzle pieces fell into place. If Shoko was an assassin, that explained a lot, including the traveling. It was a trick, an illusion. Ninja were famous for that.
Okaasan heaved a deep sigh. “No, no, this is OK.” She sounded like she was talking to herself. “If she was supposed to kill you, she would’ve done it on your birthday.”
“How do you know all this?”
She stared at me, her face blank.
Then it hit me. “Oh, God.”
“Junya, I—”
I grabbed her hand. “It is the same! You and Shoko … you’re the same!”
She slapped my hand away. “I wear the same ring, but I am not like her.”
“It’s not just intuition you … we … have. It’s some kind of magic, right?” I tried to piece it all together. “Can you travel?”
“What do you know about that?”
“Shoko moved us out of Grandpa’s house somehow and she brought me here. She called it traveling.”
She raised her hands to cover her face. “What else do you know?”
“I know nothing, except that you’ve been lying to me since the day I was born!” I stood up, confused but furious. “You knew about Tomi. You knew Grandpa took the gold. Did you expect someone to come for it—for me?” Tears blurred my vision as I backed away from her. “Is that why you’ve been training me? You knew somebody would try to kill me and you never warned me?”
She stood up, her hands on her temples, but I turned away. My head felt like it would explode.
“Junya, calm down,” she whispered. “It’s not like that.”
I was at the door now, jamming my feet into my running shoes.
“You need to stay with me.” She reached out for me, but I pushed her away.
“Get away from me!” I turned and ran out the door.
CHAPTER
17
By the time I got to Sacramento Street, my lungs were screaming for air and my sides ached. I stood with clenched fists, bent over, panting, and considered my options: I could head east toward Grandpa’s, south into the unknown, or west toward Mack’s house.
I chose west.
Mack’s mom peered through the curtain when I knocked, but she didn’t open the door. I was about to leave when I heard yelling, so I sat on the steps and waited.
Mack came out a minute later, shrugged into a jacket, and slammed the door behind him.
“What’re you doing here?”
I waved for him to come along and I started walking. He trotted up beside me and grabbed my arm.
“Slow down.”
I spun toward him and he jumped back.
“Why’re you pissed at me?” he asked.
“I’m not …” I choked. I couldn’t say any more.
Mack was silent for a bit. “Did something happen to your grandpa?”
I shook my head and kept walking.
“Come on. Give me something here.”
“Please,” I whispered. “I just … need to clear my head. Then I’ll talk.”
He stayed quiet, but after a while I sensed his growing apprehension. I stopped and looked up at him.
“What’s wrong?”
“We’ve been walking for twenty minutes. Look around, man.”
I did and realized I had no idea where we were. Except for a bar across the street with a group of guys outside smoking and laughing, the street looked dark and the buildings deserted.
“I don’t care.” I started to walk again.
“Well, I do. Start talking
or you can walk home alone.”
“Whatever.”
He stopped. “Screw you, man. I’m going home.”
“Why? You’ve got nothing at home and neither do I.”
His face changed. “Just tell me what happened.”
I started to ramble, probably incoherently, about old shrines, trained killers, and weird dreams.
Mack stopped me. “Take a couple deep breaths, bro. You’re not making any sense.”
The world grew dim and my body began to shake—I think it was that tingle—but before I could react, Mack let out a yell that was drowned out by the screech of tires. Something slammed into me from behind. I flew forward and hit my head on the sidewalk.
I rolled to my knees, clutching my head. Someone grabbed my arm and yanked me up. Two shapes loomed in front of me. One hand jerked my arm down and another grasped my throat.
“Get him in the car!” someone said. “That other kid saw us last night. Deal with him and let’s go!”
My eyes opened. Mack managed two good punches before he took a fist to the face that rattled him. Two large men punched him until he hit the ground.
I caught my breath. These guys were Grandpa’s new security team.
“What’re you doing?!” I yelled. “Leave him alone!”
“Shut up!” A man shoved me toward the open rear door of a black SUV. I glanced back. Mack was on the ground, black boots driving into his body, trails of blood running from his nose and mouth. He’d rolled into the fetal position—he wasn’t fighting back anymore.
“No!”
A hand grabbed my collar and tried to shove me into the truck, but I kicked against the door frame and drove my head back. It connected and the hand let go. I spun, slammed my forearm into his neck, and kneed him in the balls. Someone else grabbed me from behind. I dropped, rolled under the door, and kicked it shut on him.
When I came up behind the man who was kicking Mack, my fury was uncontrollable. I attacked him—elbows, knees, a wristlock and a twist, a palm to his elbow. His body jerked, bones snapped. I drove a knee into his head and he dropped to the ground.
Two more men came at me. The first one collapsed unconscious, his right arm dangling like a piece of rubber. The other one grabbed me from behind in a bear hug that tightened as he lifted me off my feet. He swore at me and then yelled to the others. I let out a growl and bit into his hand. The man cried out and dropped me. There was more cursing and yelling, a rush of feet behind me. I rolled out of the way as the guys who’d been standing outside the bar attacked the men who’d jumped us.
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