A Whisper of Leaves

by Ashley Capes

  “It must be hard to forget.”

  “Yeah.” He removed his beanie, scratched at his head and replaced it again. “It is. I think that’s why spirits linger, they can’t forget either. Want to keep going?”

  “Good idea.” She almost asked him what he thought about the journal and everything that was going on. But he’d mention it to Kiyomi and that’d only upset her friend. Best to leave it alone. And besides, all the trouble was about to be put to rest.

  His boots crunched over leaves until they reached the dip in the earth. She slid after him into the chill hollow, then finally through the treeline and down to Lake Saiko’s shore. Daisuke unpacked food at a bench, exchanging a few words with another pair of hikers, but Riko drifted to the water. Fuji loomed in the distance, still big, still grand. The giant that Issa’s snail climbed. “A fleshy little engine that could,” she murmured.

  The lake’s surface, a cold sheet of sky, rippled when an insect touched down. Its tiny feet were suction-cup skate-shoes. Never a misstep, little buddy.

  “Riko, are you hungry?” Daisuke called. He held up a pair of small packages.

  She turned back to the table. “Not really. I wanna get it over with.”

  “Want me to come?”

  “No, thanks. I won’t be long.”

  He held her gaze. “So this was really important, to come out here?”

  “It was.”

  “Kiyomi’s pretty worried, you know.”

  “I know. But it’s okay now.” Riko said. Everything was about to go back to normal. All she had to do was return the journal and she could get on with her life. Find a new job, get things back on track. “It’s under control.”

  “I hope so. I don’t like to see you two so stressed.”

  Riko smiled, took a swig of water, snapped the lid back on and tossed it to him. “Change is coming, Daisuke.”

  She headed back to the treeline, angling toward the path from where the smoke came last time. Once beneath the trees, she rubbed her arms and stamped her feet to give her circulation a jump start. Cold engines.

  An ‘x’ cut into a tree by a mossy log led her off the trail. She climbed through the undergrowth, detouring ruts in the forest floor, scanning each pale trunk for the marks Kiyomi made last visit, until she came to the spot where she’d fallen. The leaves were still scattered; deep gouges in the soft earth from her hands remained.

  She paused, one hand on her shoulder strap.

  The suggestion of smoke hung in the air. The clearing? Maybe she should check, just to be sure. It’d only take a moment and surely, if she was being haunted, whatever spirit hounded her wouldn’t mind. And if she wasn’t, no harm anyway.

  She moved on, drawn from marking to marking, each aligned with the scent of smoke, until she stood in the small clearing where the old man had burnt leaves. A black circle stood beneath the canopy, the embers cold. Rake marks had forced the thin grass to lie flat, furrows leading toward the ashes. The scent of smoke was all but gone.

  The branches of the oak spread above in a network of smooth brown arms. Odd to see such a tree here. Elsewhere they’d been fir, but the oak stood out. There wasn’t a lot of truly level earth in other parts of the forest.

  She made a circuit of the tree. Several other piles of faint ash, some greying to white, covered the ground. Many were overgrown. Just how long had he been burning leaves here? And why? She bent by a pile, trailing fingertips through the fine ash. Riko frowned. A tiny metal pin twisted by heat. And beside it, a blackened shell of what must have once been a brooch. Birdsong fell through the leaves. She stood, leaving the brooch in the grey. Maybe he was crazy too.

  Time to finish what she came to do. She took the journal from her backpack, the cover cold against her palm, and slipped from the clearing.

  At the point where she’d fallen, Riko squatted to dig some more loam away, placing the journal in the earth. “There.” She covered it over. “I’m sorry I disturbed you. Please accept my apology, I was wrong. Sleep well, if you will.”

  Let that be enough.

  Daisuke would be waiting. She headed for the narrow trail, tension in her body flowing away, her step lighter. The book was gone. Time to straighten things out. The translation and reading would have to go unfinished. She’d learnt enough. The writer, the woman, had been unhappy. She was caught in a love triangle. Nothing unique, nothing even romantic, but she’d had a dignity. “I liked her,” she told the trees.

  Back in the clearing, Riko strode to the bench. Daisuke lay across it, hands behind his head, staring up at the sky. He sat when she dumped her bag on the seat. “Hey. All done?”

  “All done.” She smiled.

  “You seem pretty pleased.”

  “I feel like I can get things on track now.”

  *

  The drive back to Fuji-Yoshida flew by. She laughed and joked, and despite spring rain sloshing down, her spirits were high. What a pallor the threat of more ghostly disruptions had cast upon her. Dealing with her job troubles should have been enough, but even that was not a mountain. It was a hill, steep, but she was a snail. Climbing, slowly, slowly.

  She waved Daisuke off and jogged up the drive. Inside, she opened the screen to her bedroom and flung her backpack inside. In the kitchen, Kiyomi stood over the sink, humming to herself as she washed dishes.

  Riko paused in the entryway. “Hi.”

  “Hi. Did everything work out?” Kiyomi’s tone was apprehensive.

  “All done. I left it where we found it. Daisuke was great.”

  “Good.”

  She paused. “Can you still come with me to my appointment? I know you’re not too comfortable with that stuff.”

  Kiyomi spread her arms, soapy water dripping from her hands. “Of course I will.”

  Riko stepped into the hug, laying her head on her friend’s shoulder a moment. “Thanks.” It wouldn’t hurt to see someone. All she had to do was find a psychiatrist with an open appointment, discuss what happened and then get on with things. Soldier on as Mum would say.

  “When is it?”

  Quick. “Thursday.” Two days. The psychiatric community better have someone free. Riko helped Kiyomi put the dishes away, wolfed down a sandwich and slumped into a chair. She rested her cheek on her hand and blinked at the television. It was a game show – contestants hurling themselves at walls while covered in paint – quite odd, especially compared to the ‘tame’ game shows she knew as a child from Australian TV.

  “Riko.”

  She opened her eyes. “Huh?”

  “You’re falling asleep.”

  “Oh.” Riko stretched. Her head was heavy and her throat dry. She sipped at a glass of water. “Better go to bed then.”

  Kiyomi grinned. “Good idea.”

  Riko showered before stumbling into her room. She kicked her pack aside then climbed onto the bed to check beneath the pillows for spiders, then lay back. Something bright pressed against her eyelids. The lamp, idiot. Rising with a groan, Riko stopped to gape at her backpack.

  Fallen on its side, the zip was open and the contents spilled to the floor.

  Right beside her drink bottle rested the journal.

  7.

  Riko crept over and nudged it with her foot.

  The damn thing was real. “No.” She snatched the journal, fingers closing on cold leather, and gave it a shake. “Damn you.”

  Hide it.

  Convincing Kiyomi that she was on the mend was hard enough without this. It would undo everything. Riko crammed the journal down into the backpack and dumped it in the bottom of her wardrobe. Good enough for now.

  But how the hell had it returned?

  She buried it.

  Buried. Beneath. Earth.

  And here it was, not even dirty! She paced her room. Daisuke wouldn’t have touched the journal, let alone slipped i
t into her bag. And no-one else went with them on the hike. She snorted. “That leaves you, Riko.” Ridiculous. Not even a scrap of sense to that. But how to be sure? Could a person block that sort of thing from their consciousness?

  Had she really returned it? What if her mind was playing more tricks? Maybe she’d dreamt taking it back? No. That way lay madness. The dirt was real, she’d washed it from beneath her fingernails earlier. She’d been to the forest.

  Riko climbed back into bed with a shiver. Even if it killed her – or better than that, knocked her out – she had to sleep somehow. Tomorrow would be a long, long day. She rubbed her socks together to warm her feet. The journal wasn’t going to leave her alone. It was like a curse. Maybe she should finally finish reading it. There had to be an answer or a clue in it somewhere, something to help explain what was going on.

  She rolled over, reaching for the lamp, then stopped.

  Better to leave it on tonight.

  *

  The Fuji-Yoshida City Library reading room slumbered, dust motes rioting when she slumped into a seat in an out-of-the-way-corner. Her notebook came next, then the journal. A pen followed. Next was a plastic drink bottle.

  A large print of Izanagi and Izanami watched over her from the wall. Searching the Seas with the Tenkei. They hovered over a mist-shrouded ocean, Izanagi’s spear dipping toward the angry waves.

  She couldn’t stop a shudder.

  How powerfully doomed Izanagi’s search to rescue his wife from the realm of death.

  “Focus,” she muttered.

  Riko flipped open a page and gripped the pen. Stop reading. The message in light across Aunt Eiko’s ceiling had been pretty clear. But the journal wasn’t going away. And maybe here, the strange light wouldn’t find her; it was a public place.

  She took a swig of water and shuffled paper, straightening it.

  Stop stalling.

  Riko peered at the kanji. The first line of a fresh page jumped back in time. The writer recalled her childhood.

  Mother still wore the Mofuku, the black of her hair was lost in the fabric when she bent to pour tea, but I remember one day, right after Father died, she smiled. I had woven a scarf. She smiled and stroked my head. Was it the last time she truly smiled? I don’t know.

  A mourning kimono. Uncommon now perhaps, except with older women. When was the journal written? And who was the writer?

  our clothesline

  taut in the wind

  war yet to come

  Another entry mentioning the war. The more Riko translated the more she found. But which war? And then she knew:

  orange water

  the buildings

  set to tears

  Firebombing – didn’t it have to be the Second World War? She read on until the thumping in her head put a stop to her work. She sculled water and rubbed her temples, slumping back in the chair. What time was it?

  She lifted her arm. Noon. Of all the pages that would open, she had only four left – but they were among the more dense in the book. Here the writing became precise, as decisive as she’d seen anywhere else. The final entry she was able to read – there were still more than a few pages stuck together – gave more clues.

  I am still haunted. Numazu is empty without you. Memory is a powerful poison – and it goes so well with regret. If I have chosen now, finally, I pray that it is right. I must let him go. I have another love, one who is gentle and true, one who deserves all my heart. It cannot beat in so many pieces, I feel like I am hauling around a stone of fire in my chest. You I loved, but my future is here with my husband. I’ll still shed a tear for you, the husband I could have had.

  Riko had a location at last. Something else she could add to her notebook but not enough by itself. There had to be more locked within the melded pages. She collected the journal and searched the stacks of packed shelves until she found a librarian reshelving books, trolley at her side.

  “Excuse me, can you help me?”

  “I hope so.” The tall woman placed a couple of volumes aside with a smile.

  Riko explained about the journal’s condition. “I’ve tried airing it and I’ve used my hairdryer, but some of the pages are still stuck together.”

  The woman nodded. “You could use acid free paper. If you can insert it between the pages and gently move it like a saw, you should be able to open some more. May I see it?”

  Riko handed it over. The librarian flicked through some of the pages, frowning when she hit a thick clump. “Some of these will probably never be readable. But you should be able to get a few apart – I’ll bring you the paper. Are you studying here?”

  “Yes.” Riko thanked the woman. “I’m under Izanagi and Izanami.”

  “Won’t be long.” Once the woman returned with several sheets of acid-free paper, Riko got to work. It was slow going, but she was able to free more entries and even cry a small hiss of pleasure when she freed a page stuck to the inside cover. Toward the middle of the page was a name!

  Makiko Yamashita.

  Riko copied it down so fast it was barely legible. She wrote it again. The name of an older woman – at least now it was. When the journal was written, the writer was hardly an old woman.

  So what had happened to Makiko and her mystery man? And what drove her to Aokigahara? The journal wouldn’t tell her that easily. Riko stood and walked a short circuit of the reading room, stretching periodically. She’d learned a lot. Most of Makiko’s entries – the legible, useful ones anyway – were now noted in her own notebook.

  Was it enough to satisfy whatever force sent the journal back? And was it too little to further anger whatever force wanted her to stop reading?

  “Excuse me?”

  A man in a suit stood before her desk. Instead of a face, he had only a giant moth on the front of his head. Grey mottled wings and blank, black eyes. It twitched.

  Riko screamed, falling back.

  “Is something wrong?” He leaned closer and she shoved at him, snatching her belongings and stumbling for the door.

  “Wait, are you all right?”

  Riko tore through the stacks, down the stairs and burst onto the street, panting. The car. Still parked beneath a towering pine tree. Dashing across the road, Riko had the door open, seat belt on and key in the ignition in seconds. She darted out of the park, ignoring a blast of horns, and drove until her apartment building, a grey block with washing stretched across balconies, rose before her.

  She killed the engine in the driveway. God, what was happening? Where was his face? And what did moths have to do with anything? Or smoke for that matter? At least this time nothing had leapt in front of her on the drive home.

  But the...haunting still didn’t make sense – what wanted her to stop and why? All she had was a name, a love triangle and a time period.

  Wait. No. She had a city too.

  Numazu was only an hour away. Riko nodded to herself. Probably best to try a train, save getting lost. She still wasn’t great at navigation when it came to new places. Even back home, she’d get turned around driving in the city.

  After the appointment tomorrow, she’d buy a ticket and see if any trace of Makiko could be found. Maybe it was a slim collection of clues for hunting down someone who might not have lived in the sea-side town for decades now, but it had to be worth a shot. It could stop the madness – and what else did she have to try? If reading the journal caused the haunting and she couldn’t get rid of the journal...

  The only other option was telling someone everything.

  And no-one would believe a word.

  Unless she burned the book? No. It’d probably just come back. And she had to know. Why was the journal following her, what was the smoke about? Why her of all people? Was it Makiko, calling her from death?

  Riko shuddered. She gathered everything up and rushed to the door. Eyes followed her ev
ery step. Or so it seemed. But the street behind her was empty. She opened the door and locked it behind her.

  *

  The psychiatrist, Dr Kobayashi, adjusted his glasses then shifted in his creaking leather chair. Light from the high window splashed across his immaculate desk, tinting his receding hair. A pen scratched on his notepad while Riko sipped at a glass of water.

  “How do you feel, living so far from your family?”

  A new line of questioning. She pursed her lips. She’d been honest about her fears, about being haunted, but went in calling them hallucinations – not having to fake concern over their cause at least. He said very little about it, mostly listening. But this was different. “Liberated and isolated.”

  His deep voice was soft enough that she had to lean forward. “Of course, you’re quite far away from them in terms of physical distance. What do you miss?”

  “I miss my mother’s cooking, her stories. I miss being able to talk to her any time I like.”

  “And what don’t you miss?”

  “The pressure. She thinks I should be married by now. She’s very traditional and Catholic too.”

  He made a note on his pad. “And her photo was the first to fall, in your room?”

  Back to the ghosts. “Yes.”

  “What do you think that means?”

  “I’m not sure. Do you think I’m responsible but not aware? Like repressed anger or something?”

  He leant forward. “Why do you suggest that?”

  “Because I don’t know what’s happening. Can you tell me, can my mind really do things like this?” But she knew, it wasn’t her mind. There was no way. The journal was real, she didn’t imagine it. And Kiyomi and Daisuke had seen it too.

  And yet, she had to ask.

  “Certainly. The power of certain delusions can derail lives.” He held up a finger. “But I don’t think you have to worry about that. Tell me, what about your father? Do you miss him too?”