I remember being really small.
Too small to see over the edge of a table.
There was a snow globe.
And I remember the penguin that lived inside the globe.
He was all alone in there, and I worried for him.
"Don't worry, Kiddo. He's got a nice life," my father, the late Haru Hinata, said. "He's trapped in a perfect world." He shook the snow globe and showed me. "See that, Natchi?"
I remember being given a camera for my 17th birthday, by my stepfather. He was from America. I loved the way a photo could capture a photo before it was gone. That's what I wanted to be when I grew up. A wildlife photographer. I imagined when I was older, I'd be tracking wild elephants and rhinos. But for now, I had to make do with Laurie. She was my 7 year old stepsister, by the way. Lauren Elena Hinata-Moore.
I remember going with Malcolm, my stepfather, and my friend, Koyuki, to the sinkhole at Yamamoto's farm. There was something about the way the earth could swallow things whole.
And I remember the girl who lived there. Anana Yamamoto. I had been suspicious about her name at first, thinking she was a stupid frog, but she didn't seem to be, and she seemed pretty peaceful as well. The kids at our school said she was weird, and now I know she was different. She saw things others couldn't. She was different in other ways, as well.
And I remember the worst thing that ever happened to us as a family. The day my little sister stopped breathing.
"Somebody help! Mama? Where are you? Mama?"
I looked outside. A group of kids were surrounded around Laurie's body.
"Malcolm? Fuyuki?" I called. No one answered. Not even the platoon.
I ran to the crowd, and said, "Laurie! What happened?"
"She swallowed a twig!" Laurie's best friend, Tetsu Kobayashi wailed. I looked at my stepsister. Her eyes were closed, her body motionless. Her lips and fingers were turning blue.
I ran around until I found Malcolm's car. I quickly snapped the seatbelt, and sped off with Laurie in the backseat. It was stupid, mostly because I hadn't bothered getting my license yet. I drove, with tears in my eyes as my ears filled with squeals of the tires, "Watch out!"s and "Are you crazy?"s from other cars.
I handed the little girl to a paramedic at the hospital, and he quickly put her on a stretcher and on oxygen.
"What's her name?" the medic asked.
"Moore Lauren!"
He nodded, and whisked her away.
I sat in the hospital room, whispering, "Laurie, you're okay. You're okay."
And I remember the light in my family's eyes. The platoon's as well. The platoon had become Laurie's best friends, next to Tetsu.
We weren't those people. Those unlucky people, to whom bad things happened for no reason.
"You know, the Buddhists say, 'If you save someone else's life…"
Oba-chan predicted I would live a long and happy life, because I'd saved my sister.
Akina Hinata was wrong.
My name is Natsumi, like the season. Surname, Hinata-Moore.
I was 17 years old when I was murdured, on December 6, 2008.