[-Chapter Three-]
"Do you know that I haven't been over your house in almost a year, Koto?" I asked randomly. The walk over to his front porch—all one hundred feet from the village mud pit—had been a terse and silent one. I didn't know what to do about it, because both of my friends were unhappy and more than anything I wanted them to be happy.
Well, I wanted Koto to dump Risu and come crawling to me, but since I couldn't have that, I would settle for their happiness. If I pretended hard enough, I could almost convince myself that I was glad they were together.
"That's why we arranged this venture." He sounded too upbeat and happy to believe his own words, but I didn't have time to analyze that. We came to a stop in front of Koto's house, a well-built and sturdy structure that put my ramshackle home to shame. The building had obviously been constructed in recent years—no more than two hundred years ago.
When "the problem" first arose—no one named it, because that was bad luck—many of the old houses had been burned. Then the monsters came, destroying much of what was left. I lived in a post-monster era home, built out of the remnants of other buildings. It amounted to four walls of rotten and scorched wood. It was tiny and cramped, but it was a roof over my head. Koto's, on the other hand, had a nice front porch and a solid front door. The wood was of the finest quality, too. If I remembered correctly, he even had his own bedroom.
"We shouldn't be doing this," Risu protested.
"Nonsense," Koto snapped. "She can handle it."
"She's too impulsive."
"Hey!" I protested hotly. Were they seriously going to talk about me as if I wasn't even there? And I was not impulsive! They both ignored me and walked right on into his house without knocking, which I guess was okay for them but I felt a little insecure doing that. I hadn't been there in a while: how would his parents react? I forced my blank mask over my face and strode in. Though I hadn't walked the wooden floors in almost a year, I knew the route to his room as if I'd traveled there daily.
It took me through the kitchen, where his parents sat eating… whatever meal was appropriate at this time of day. I didn't eat meals too often; it kept me skinny but always hungry and I couldn't be bothered to name the few meals my family could afford. It was called food, if anything, and then it was gone.
"Hikari!" Koto's mother came over and hugged me, but I could see the unease in her eyes. "What are you doing here?"
"What she means is that it's been too long," her husband corrected easily. "You should come over more often, Kari. We miss your ray of sunshine in our lives." I found myself laughing: Koto's parents had always been like a home away from home for me; we had grown close when I was younger and used to visit every day. This time, though, something was wrong. The air was thicker, filled with tension. "Well, I'm sure Koto is waiting for you in his room…" He jerked his head towards the one door left ajar and I moved on. Their eyes pierced my back until I was out of their eyesight.
I stepped into Koto's room, not sure of what I would find. It wasn't that much different from what I remembered it to be: hardwood floors, a sturdy bed with an actual frame and a thick quilt, a chest of drawers to hold his clothes that wouldn't fit into his closet, and some abstract painting on the wall that we'd completed when we were five years old. There was a map, relatively new, covered in white dots.
"What's that, Koto?"
"Map of the world," he answered. I studied it: a giant land mass, the only one on the planet. It was oddly off-center, though, with large stretches of ocean above, below, and to our left. Koto had also labeled—mistakenly, I assumed—odd places in the middle of the Ocean: North Pole, South Pole, Southern Air Temple, Gates of Azulon, Ba Sing Se, The Serpent's Pass… All sporadic dots in stretches of blue. I found our town, Gaoling, at the southern tip of the land. Somewhere to the north was Omashu; all I knew about that abandoned city was that Koori nearby. Another label, this one slightly larger: Cave of Two Lovers. It was all gibberish to me.
Makoto and Arisu were sitting perfectly still on the edge of the bed, as if terrified that I would go into some sort of shock. I didn't understand why until I realized that they were staring at a Pai-Sho table in front of them.
"Nice, Koto," I announced. "But I didn't have you pegged for the Pai-Sho kind of guy."
There it was again, that significant look between Risu and Koto. "I picked it up in the last year."
"About the same time you started camping," I observed lightly. My heart was thumping erratically again, but not because Koto had all of his attention on me. No, it was the atmosphere that existed throughout the household: tense, apprehensive, and uncertain. I had the feeling that it was directed at my presence. I had the feeling that everyone here knew something I didn't. Whatever it was, however, I was completely in the dark. That frustrated me: I just wanted to know.
My eyes wandered to the Pai-Sho table, desperate for a distraction. I had no clue as to why this Pai-Sho table was so important. I barely even played Pai-Sho. It seemed incredibly boring and pointless: why would I play Pai-Sho when I could work and make sure that Aiko could eat a meal tomorrow? I had been looking forward to spending my day off talking with my friends, and instead I discovered that they were hiding something from me. Something big, it would seem.
"So…" I began to break the silence. "How do you play?"
"There are many strategies," Arisu said. She was so stiff and formal, as if I weren't her best friend and we hadn't laughed over countless things together. It was confusing. I didn't let it show on my face.
"I prefer the White Lotus strategy," Koto added evenly. The disbelieving look that she shot him threw me over the top. I couldn't take this weird feeling that I was getting: nervousness and traces of fear roiling around in my stomach. How could I feel that way here? In Koto's room, where we'd made forts and played at sword fighting like Yuudai and basically lived together for fourteen years? I got up and excused myself. I left the room, but I couldn't bring myself to go back to Koto's parents and their staring eyes. So I waited just outside the door, breathing and trying to calm myself down. I was trying to steel myself so that I could face my friends… what was going on?
His voice, mingled with Risu's, floated to my ears through the doorway. "…don't see why we can't—"
"It's too dangerous, Koto! We're not even supposed to discuss it among ourselves!"
"She can handle it, I'm telling you!"
"She's too impulsive. You know it and I know it. I know you miss her, Koto. I miss her too. But we can't drag her into this. She would put herself in danger, and she would put all of us in danger."
Was this my best friend talking about me like that? Her voice had an unfamiliar edge to it, something that I never heard. I wondered, not for the first time that day, exactly how well I knew my friends.
"I'm leaving tomorrow," he snapped.
"What?" She was angry, incredulous.
"I'm going to go talk to him and see what he has to say."
"I can't believe you could be so stupid! What am I supposed to do if—"
"You can handle it," he reassured her. "This is what you've been training for, Arisu. If he comes back while you're still here, you will be able to handle it. You know what you have to do. Get him out safely, get him to us. Besides, what are the odds he'll show up here anyway?"
It wasn't doing me any good to listen to a conversation that I didn't understand, so I walked back in. They were both sitting in the exact same positions, as if nothing had changed. But I could read Arisu's face like a book. She was angry, and betrayed. Her eyes didn't show it—the new creases on her forehead did.
"Is something wrong?" I asked.
"I'm going camping tomorrow," Koto told me. I noticed that right away, that he told me and not her, because Arisu already knew about it. A voice in the back of my mind whispered that it this no camping trip.
A/N: Weekly update Wednesday! :) So here we are, and I finally have a review to answer!
Thanks so much, Tainted! I really do appreciate the virtual cookies and constructive criticism ^.^ Also, you were right with regards to the smile "escaping" her lips during the Prologue.
Who do you think Arisu and Makoto are talking about? What is the mysterious "problem" Hikari mentioned at the start of the chapter? Any and all guesses are welcome, just send a review my way!
Finally, thanks to all of my silent readers out there. Even if you don't want to speak about it, I appreciate your interest!