by Rin Chupeco
I respond by dangling the Kewpie doll in her direction. Kagura was quick to explain to me how the ningyō dolls often used in the miko’s rituals are more a matter of aesthetics and formal tradition rather than of necessity. Any doll will do as long as it’s got all its body parts intact.
“You scared of this little thing?” Two years ago, my level of freak-out would have surpassed Callie’s. “I thought you girls loved playing with dolls.”
“Not dolls with evil spirits trapped inside.” Callie swallows. She arrived in Washington, DC, the day before, and we’ll be leaving for Japan tomorrow. “This cannot possibly end well,” she says again.
“Shush.”
Dad is working late, so we’re going out for burgers—right after a quick detour to the nearby cemetery. Callie keeps fidgeting because she’s not used to the smell and the graves, but I’ve done this before. “It won’t be long now. She always comes like clockwork.”
Several minutes roll by, and she appears soon enough. A little old lady materializes out of thin air, hobbling down the road. I wait for her to stop beside a grave several feet from where we’re hiding. She looks down at the tombstone with a peculiar expression on her face, which I’ve learned from experience is just the calm before the storm.
“I don’t see anything,” Callie whispers. She hasn’t seen anything for years, but she still insists on coming along on each hunt I make while she’s visiting, as if her presence can deter horrible things from happening.
“Shush.” Normally, I would leave incorporeal elderly ladies alone, choosing to target the spirits that have real malice in them. But this one is different.
Sure enough, the earsplitting howls start as the old woman begins venting her anger at the tomb’s occupant. I cover my ears and groan. Her unearthly screams are the reason I found her in the first place.
“Tark? What’s wrong?”
“Shush.” I creep out and play the file I’d recorded on my cell phone. Sonorous, melodic chants fill the air. I can’t master all the mantras Kagura and the other mikos have learned since their novitiate days, but I’ve found playing a recording of the hymns they sing works just as well. It doesn’t matter that they’re Buddhist chants and the old lady’s clearly an angry, white American. Kagura says it’s the energy that flows through the song that makes all the difference.
The old woman turns her bulging black eyes to me and shrieks. The chants wrap around her transparent form, making her immobile and helpless. I raise the Kewpie doll, and like a magnet, she is pulled toward it, heaping endless insults at me even as she struggles against the unseen tow. I reel back from the recoil as the doll sucks her in—
She was hiding underneath her kitchen table, clutching her baby tightly to her chest, as gunfire sounded through the clearing outside. She closed her eyes, mouthing wordless prayers as the toddler squirmed and screamed, the sound lost amid the roaring of cannons. Bits of wood and ash rained down from the ceiling. The whole house shuddered and still she prayed—hoping her baby would survive this battle, this war, hoping she would survive. Anger at both the Union and the Confederation alike—
—staggering, but Callie’s hands on my shoulders help me regain my balance.
“I felt some kind of wind,” she murmurs as I stop the recording. “Did it…?”
I show her the doll. Its eyes are now a rolling, endless black. I take out my knife and waste no time plunging it into the doll’s small body, ending the ritual.
“Fantastic. Can we burn it now?”
“Nope.”
“Why not?”
“She’s over a hundred years dead. Civil War era probably, given most of the inhabitants in this graveyard. She called me a little coot.”
“Did you do that Vulcan-Jedi mind-meld trick with her too?”
“First of all, I do the Vulcan-Jedi mind-meld trick with everything I trap. Secondly, you do realize Vulcans and Jedi come from two completely different movies, right?” I stuff the doll into my backpack. When we return, I’ll add it to the growing pile of other similarly possessed dolls that are in my suitcase along with my clothes, toiletries, and books. The first time I made the trip to Japan with compromised dolls in tow, I actually worried if customs inspected visitors’ baggage for sentience. They didn’t. “Any spirit that’s been around more than a hundred years is harder to get rid of, so they’ll have to be burned at Obon.”
Burning the dolls traditionally takes place during the Nagashi-bina Festival in early March, but few places in Japan practice this anymore, so the Obon festival works just as well. Because it takes place in July, when I’m not around, Kagura usually performs the task in my place. Just thinking about her sends another stab of worry through me.
“And how many of these hundred-year-olds do you have at the moment?”
“Eleven.” There’s a decided dearth of exorcists in the United States today, so ghosts have been accumulating over the years. “I’ve been saving this one for your arrival.”
“Well, thank you so much. Can we leave now? That angel statue’s been looking at me weird.”
I spend the walk back to the car pointing out other statues that are looking at her weird, much to her irritation.
As I drive, I tell Callie about the old ghosts I’d caught this year: the redheaded little girl I found crying by the Lincoln Memorial, the no-faced woman wandering near a small Asian grocery, an old man haunting an abandoned house three blocks down. She doesn’t say much until we’re seated at Denny’s and halfway through our orders of country-fried steak and shrimp.
“I’ve been doing a lot of research about this Aokigahara Forest.” Callie eyes me, nibbling at her fingernail. “Tark, it’s known in Japan as a popular place for people to commit suicide. But there isn’t any information about a village inside it. Are you sure about this?”
“You’ve been asking me that ever since you’ve arrived, Callie. Trust me on this one. How about a more mundane question, like ‘How’s school?’ or ‘Why are you getting more handsome every time I see you?’”
“Never.” Callie slurps at a milk shake. “But I will ask how school’s been. The police still there?”
I lower my fork and scowl at my plate. “Not much. A couple of boys are still under investigation for the murder, but I don’t think the things McNeil’s done will ever see the light of day. I don’t think any of the girls are going to file a lawsuit against his family, especially because he’s the local hero.”
“How have you and Okiku been? Normally, I’d need a crowbar or a crucifix or something to keep you two apart, but I’ve barely seen her since I arrived.”
Okiku is the only ghost Callie can see nowadays. She isn’t sure why this is, but I’m assuming their shared personal ordeals may have something to do with it.
“She’s still around.” I can feel her inside the kitchen, counting orders and burgers.
“What about that heart-to-heart I suggested?”
“I already tried. She didn’t take things too well.”
“Oh?”
“It was kind of my fault.”
Callie rolls her eyes. “I’m shocked. I really am. How do you get into an argument with a ghost exactly?”
“I compared her to someone else.”
“A girlfriend?”
“Of course not!” But Callie catches me reddening.
“Oh ho! So there’s a girl involved!” She claps her hands in glee. “Who is she? Is she cute? When do I get to meet her? Do I get to meet her while I’m here?”
“Kendele’s not my girlfriend, and you’re not meeting anyone because break’s started, so there’s no way you get to embarrass me in front of people.”
“Ooh, so her name’s Kendele. Did she make Okiku jealous?”
“Do you even know how ridiculous that sounds? Okiku’s my…” I trail off, trying to figure out what Okiku is to me. I’ve never really thought about that. It’s always just been something I’ve taken for granted. She’s got her bloodlust and her unending need for vengeance—but I also
know her as the young girl by the window, watching the daylight each morning. “It’s complicated,” I finally say, echoing what I’d told Kendele. “She’s special.”
“You didn’t tell your girlfriend about Okiku, did you?”
“Absolutely not! And she’s not my girlfriend!”
“Then what’s wrong with Okiku?”
“I might have inadvertently compared her to that woman without meaning to.”
This shuts Callie up for a minute. Finally, she exhales noisily. “Well, if you’d compared me to her, I’d be pretty pissed off too.”
“Thanks,” I say.
“Just trying to make you feel better.”
“You’re not very good at it.”
Callie’s smile fades. “Maybe I’m just trying to make myself feel better. I’m worried about Kagura too, Tark. I hope she’s okay.”
“Yeah,” I say, and we fall silent for a few moments, thinking about the shrine maiden and about all we owe her for the debts we may never be able to repay. “I hope so too.”
***
I meet with Kendele only once before leaving. She’s hanging around the lawn the next morning, waiting for me.
“Are you stalking me now?” I ask, glancing back warily at the house to make sure Callie isn’t watching.
She smirks. “You wish. I was running errands, and this is my route. And now that you’re here, I wanted to see if you were okay after everything that happened last week.”
“You didn’t need to—but thanks.”
“Wanna hang out?”
“I have a plane to catch later.”
“Oh.” She looks disappointed. “Where are you going?”
“Visiting friends in Japan with my cousin. It’s kind of a thing we do every year.”
“Maybe next time then,” Kendele says, smiling at me before walking away. I watch her leave, still not sure about her motivations. I’ve never had any close friends, definitely no girlfriends, but she’s making me rethink everything I’ve missed out on, making me wonder what else I may have missed.
Kendele pauses at the end of the block and turns. “This is the part where you’re supposed to run after me,” she calls back. “Ask me for a rain check.”
“Huh?”
“Ask me for a rain check, dummy.”
“Uh…how about a rain check?”
“I’ll hold you to that.” She laughs and turns away again. “So dense.” She says that loudly, in case I couldn’t hear.
I head back to the house and find Okiku studying me from the window of my room. She gives me a small smile and disappears.
***
Callie and I meet Saya at the Shizuoka Airport after a brief layover at Shanghai. It’s always disorienting to see her and Kagura out of their shrine-maiden outfits. Saya wears a thick blouse and a long skirt, which exudes a much different aura than Saya in a red hakama and her white haori.
“You’ve gotten so tall, Tark-chan!” she exclaims, cupping my face with both her hands. “And Callie, even more beautiful now! I wish we could have met again under better circumstances.”
“You are looking lovelier than ever, Saya-san,” I tease. Japanese people tend to be very reserved, even with friends, but Saya surprises me by hugging me tightly, then latches on to an equally startled Callie.
She fills us in on more details as her Toyota Prius chugs through the green landscape to the small inn that Kagura runs with her elderly aunt. “She’s been missing for nearly a week,” Saya informs us, fingers drumming worriedly against the wheel. “Kagura’s aunt, Fujiko-san, is nearly wild with anxiety. Many international news crews have arrived at Mount Fuji, and the local police are not used to this attention. The American crew that came here to film is more popular than we thought.”
This is true enough. News about the inexplicable disappearances of Adams and the Ghost Haunts team have been coming through mainstream American media, though Kagura was never mentioned by name.
“We’re going to find her, Saya-san,” Callie says fiercely. “We’re not leaving Japan until we do.”
Saya smiles at us in the rearview mirror, though the worry continues to crease her brow. “I hope so. It is too late to join the rescue efforts at Aokigahara today, so I propose that we go to the Kamameshi Ryokan and leave for Mount Fuji in the morning. I believe Kagura’s aunt would like to speak with you two first anyway.”
I nod. She’d know best what’s going on.
The Kamameshi Ryokan is a quaint inn offering some of Honshu’s fabled hot springs. Kagura’s aunt, Fujiko Kaji, is waiting for us by the entrance, looking much older than her sixty-five years. Still, the smile she bestows on us is warm and genuine.
“We are so happy to have you both here again, Tarquin-san, Callie-san,” she says. “Kagura has been looking forward to your visit for weeks.” The corners of her mouth turn down at the reminder that her niece is missing. The Ghost Haunts crew also stayed at the inn, and I know she’s blaming herself for their disappearance as well.
“We’re here to help as much as we can, Auntie,” I tell her in my best Japanese. My proficiency has improved over the years, and with the possible exception of my somewhat atrocious accent, I can passably converse in the language. “Tomorrow morning, we intend to go to Mount Fuji and volunteer.”
“Then you must rest well tonight,” Auntie insists. Ever the perfect hostess, she continues, “I know you both insist on paying for your stay each time you visit, but it is my turn to insist that you do not. Your help is payment enough.”
We are shown into our rooms. As in most traditional inns, there is very little furniture in mine, except for a small dresser and a comfortable-looking futon. Some sumi-e paintings are dashed across the wall. A sliding door is all that separates the room from a large hot spring simmering outside, its steam snaking through the cold, brisk air like an ascending dragon.
Auntie bows as I step into the room. “I hope you and Tarquin-san will feel comfortable here, Okiku-chan.”
Auntie has never seen Okiku, though Kagura has told her about my ghost’s presence. I don’t know how much Auntie knew about Kagura’s previous duties as a miko serving at Chinsei, but she never seems bothered by Okiku’s presence, addressing her just like she was another one of the inn’s guests.
“If you need anything else, do not hesitate to ring the bell—or ask Tarquin-san to do so for you—and call for me.”
After Auntie leaves, I change hurriedly into a blue yukata decorated with small, white irises and look around for Okiku. The sliding door has been pulled back slightly to allow a little steam from the spring to drift into the room, and she is sitting beside it, her now-human face almost contemplative. She’s never voiced it aloud, but I suspect Okiku enjoys these trips. Hot springs were something of a luxury back in the older days, I’ve read, and servants would never have been able to afford such visits.
“It is good here,” she says, staring out over the dark water and watching the small ripples.
“Very,” I agree and then hesitate. “Are you still angry with me, Ki?”
She pauses, mulling over the question carefully before turning to me with a small smile on her pink bow mouth. “It is of no consequence,” she says before turning back to ponder the rising steam and the darkening night.
***
Auntie was a well-known chef in Osaka before moving to the Yamanashi Prefecture to run the inn, and dinner is a testament to her skill. Her specialty lies in the kaiseki-ryōri, with each dish carefully selected to complement both the menu and the season and then artistically prepared.
The first course is baby carp simmered in a ginger sauce with salmon roe, black beans in a sweet dressing, and shrimp rolled in kelp. It’s followed by large prawns in fried dumpling strips and rolled omelets with pieces of ginkgo nuts for garnish. I am pretty proud of Callie and me. Not once do we attack the food and swallow everything whole like the hungry barbarians we know foreigners like us can be.
By the time the next course arrives—simmered vegetables with
slices of tofu and a rice ball steeped in a thick daikon soup base—we’ve come to the conclusion that Auntie does not want to talk about Kagura while we eat. All it takes is one look from me, and my cousin understands that I’m not willing to talk to Auntie or Saya about the whole McNeil thing either. Instead, we chat about the new improvements to the hot spring baths, Saya’s work at the museum, and Callie’s studies in Boston.
All the while, more food arrives—sweet, red mochi rice that arrives in its own round ceramic bowl, miso soup with an unexpected hint of pumpkin, grilled strips of squid in special vinegar, and raw salmon so fresh I can almost taste its heartbeat. We are effusive in our praises, and a quick, appreciative smile dances across Auntie’s face at our enthusiasm.
“There is something I would like to show all three of you,” she says after dinner. We follow her out of the dining room, down the narrow corridor, and into a small room that I immediately realize is Kagura’s. Japanese rooms are supposed to be sparse to the point of austerity, but books line nearly every wall. Still others are relegated to neat piles in one corner because the shelves can no longer accommodate more.
Most of the books are about Japanese history and ancient philosophies, and many appear to be treatises on Buddhism and Taoism. Kagura has been helping her aunt run the Kamameshi Ryokan for the last two years, but Kagura has also always been the complete epitome of a shrine maiden.
“Kagura has always been a bright girl, so I do not always understand the things she is involved in,” Auntie confesses. “But the night before she disappeared, before she was to show the American crew around Aokigahara, I saw her looking through there.” She points to a small trunk tucked away in another corner of the room. “I have not touched her room since, but I think you three may have a better understanding of what might have happened.”
“Did Kagura say anything to you before she left?” Callie asks as I kneel before the trunk.
“She was worried. She said there was a reason her father had not been successful with his research. Kagura’s father is my brother-in-law, Kazuhiko Kino,” Auntie explains. “He was a noted historian who specialized in folklore and local legends in the Honshu area. The legend of the Aitou village was his particular specialty. He’d been obsessed with the stories ever since he was a boy. Many historians do not believe the village exists, citing a lack of proof, but Kazu always believed. He even claimed to have been to Aitou, but he never gave details. Whatever secrets he kept, he was always adamant that the village exists. I do not think any of his colleagues believed him though.”