Chapter 5

Next morning she woke with a contented attitude.  She could see the warm sun creeping in under her sky blue curtains and making gossamer patterns on the pale yellow wall opposite.  The birds were singing just as loudly as they ever had, and she could smell the faint, sweet scent of roses and other flowers floating in on a gentle breeze through the half-open window.  She could tell the day was going to be bright already, and this added to her enthusiasm.  Not to mention the fact that Nezaki had said they could stay in her house so long as he could stay as well, which, of course, was fine with her.

She was getting rather curious as to what was going on though; if he would just tell her; but maybe he didn’t know.  Maybe it wasn’t that he was reluctant to tell her, maybe he actually didn’t know but felt embarrassed about it and didn’t want to let on.

Nanako stretched and smoothed her fringe down.  She had better get up before the day wore on too much, she didn’t want to miss the opportunity of such a lovely day and besides, it was nearly ten.

Flinging back the covers she rummaged in her wardrobe until she found a pale green top and some pink shorts to go with them.  Throwing these on she trotted down the stairs to find herself something for breakfast and decide what she wanted to do for the day.

Nezaki was already up, sitting on the beige couch, his feet propped on the mahogany table and lazing back with one arm behind his head.  In his lap rested a book, its blood red cover contrasting severely with the black of his jeans.  He was that interested in the book he didn’t even notice her come down the stairs.

Nanako crept up behind him and lent over his shoulder to catch a glimpse of what was so interesting.  However, she couldn’t read a thing.  It was written in a language she had never seen before; written in symbols and strange letters that stood a sharp contrast to the yellowing pages.

“What is this?” Nanako asked.

“Nothing that needs to worry you,” Nezaki answered, “It’s just a book from my homeland.”

“Interesting story?”

“It’s a history book.  I’m trying to figure out what exactly it was that happened twenty years ago.”

“Twenty years ago?  What do you mean?”

“That’s when all of this started.  I remember when – never mind.  Like I said you needn’t worry about it.”

“Can I go for a walk?” now she was asking his permission to do things?  Why did she bother?  He wasn’t going to let her, but she had to try, it was such a lovely day and she didn’t want to spoil it by getting into an argument with him either.

Nezaki looked at his watch, “Sure, but make sure you’re back by eleven.  That’s when they come out.”

“The lowba?  They can’t come out before eleven?  Why not, they got a curfew?”

“They do some sort so ritualistic ceremony between seven and eleven, they won’t miss that,” he sounded almost disdainful, as if he was scoffing at them for being so pathetic.

She slipped on some flip-flops and walked out of the door.  The sky was a pale blue and the birds were still singing sweetly in the trees up above.  She didn’t know where she was going or why, perhaps for some breakfast, she just had to have some independence for a while.

Walking down the street, her flip-flops making a slapping sound with each step, she began to think about her friends and how she would like to tell one of them what was going on.  Nobody had actually said that she couldn’t tell people what was going on, but common sense told her that if she did tell someone they would be thrown into the middle of the horror of all this, what ever this was, and she just couldn’t do that to any of them.

“A penny for -” she felt someone grasp her shoulder.

“What the…?” she jumped and spun to face whoever the intruder was, “K – Kenji?”

She couldn’t believe it was actually him.  Kenji had moved away a year previously, and she had never expected to see him again.  He had moved that far away that he hadn’t even said where he was going, but now he was here, stood right in front of her, his head cocked slightly to one side, his light brown hair falling lightly across his right eye and the same cheeky smile as he had always had.

“Yeah.  You miss me?” he hung his head forward so his hair fell as a curtain, “probably not, you probably didn’t even notice I was gone, ha?”

“Don’t be stupid! I did miss you, of course I did!  Especially in the last month or so,” she hadn’t meant to say that, but she had always told him everything and a habit like that was too hard to kick to just drop it straight off.

“What’s that mean?” his head snapped up, suddenly interested.  Same old Kenji, always rooting for the juiciest gossip or the hottest, most interesting secrets about everyone and everything.

“N… nothing, just that I was… err… that I was feeling lonely, especially in these last few weeks,” she giggled to try and dismiss the subject but he wouldn’t drop it, as usual.

“Come on, lets go back to your place, I think we need to talk,” he grabbed her arm and started to pull her back in the other direction as fast as she had just walked out.

She had to think fast now, she didn’t really want to have to explain why another was residing in her house, and all alone, on top of everything else and besides, she had just escaped, she didn’t want to go back just yet.

“But Kenji, I… err… we don’t want to go back to mine, we should go to the park or something, it’s too nice a day to go and get stuck inside.”

“No, come on, what are you hiding?  There wasn’t anything that I didn’t know about you at one point and I’m sure we can go back to being the same, can’t we?”

She sighed resignedly and allowed him to lead her.  She didn’t know what exactly he would think about her living alone with a boy, but she supposed she could come up with an excuse if she had to, and what else could she do without him realising that she was hiding something big?  Not a lot, Kenji knew her too well, he would cotton on and then she would be in even worse trouble because he would want to know why she hadn’t told him in the first place and she didn’t need him prying any deeper than he was already about to.

Kenji dragged her up the front path and straight in through the front door, nearly colliding with Nezaki who was coming out of the living room to head up the stairs.

Nezaki spun on his heels and made a noise which closely resembled a snarl.  Raising his hands in tightly balled fists he made a move to hit Kenji until he noticed that Nanako was stood directly behind him which made him pull up short.

“Who’s this?” he didn’t drop his hands and the look of feralism that was in his eyes scared her a little.

“This is Kenji, it’s okay, he’s one of my best friends,” she wasn’t sure what was going on, or why he had reacted so violently, but it was starting to worry her, perhaps she should have thought of an excuse not to come back.

Nezaki glared straight at Kenji and then stalked off up the stairs with a backward glare, the target of which she wasn’t exactly sure.

“Who was that? Do you live with him?” Kenji looked annoyed, an emotion he very rarely showed.

“Yeah, his name’s Nezaki, don’t mind him,” she tried to pass it off lightly but she wasn’t sure Kenji had bought it.

“Come on,” he pulled her towards the living room, “you have to tell me all about it, and whatever else is going on.”

Whatever else was going on?  Did he know her that well?  Seems he did.  This was going to be hard, and why had the two boys taken such a sudden dislike to one another anyway?  Were boys this territorial?  She couldn’t recall Kenji ever being hostile to anyone before, and who knew about Nezaki, she hardly knew anything about him herself, she only had his word that he was telling the truth and the evilness he had elicited just then had scared her.