The Book of Heroes

  Yuriko knew her father was trying to cheer her up. Her mother sat nearby on the couch, nodding. Let’s all be as cheerful as we can be.

  That’s impossible, Yuriko thought, but she swallowed her words. There was no point telling her parents something they already knew. And she knew they were only trying to make her feel better.

  One small relief was that the grandparents had all gone back to their homes. If they were there, there would be more crying and shouting and siding with her mother and annoying her father. That was how it had always been, before any of this had even happened.

  I wish our relatives wouldn’t shout all the time.

  Hiroki had said that once.

  And Mom’s and Dad’s parents don’t get along with each other at all.

  Yuriko was probably still too young to understand, he had told her.

  But Hiroki understood. So why did he do something that was sure to bring them around to grumble and whine?

  Just living here “like normal” meant that Yuriko would have to go back to school. She should have expected it, but still it was a shock when her mother asked if she was ready to return the next week. No, maybe not a shock per se; school was just a totally foreign concept. It was as if her mother had told her she was going to the moon. She couldn’t imagine herself sitting at a desk in a classroom, taking notes.

  How would her friends act?

  How should she act?

  Back in reality, time marched on, and on Friday afternoon, Mr. Katayama paid a visit to their home. He flashed an exaggeratedly large smile when he saw Yuriko. “Everyone’s worried about you. I had some of the other girls in class take notes for you, so don’t worry about that. You won’t fall behind.”

  Then Mr. Katayama started talking to her mother. Yuriko was asked to go to her room.

  “I’ll just be talking to your teacher for a bit.”

  They closed the door to the living room.

  Yuriko was walking toward her door, when she changed her mind.

  Hiroki’s room.

  She hadn’t been in there once since they had returned to the apartment. Her mother was always there, and when Yuriko was watching television or reading a book, her mother would slip off into his room and cry. She tried to hide it, but Yuriko still knew. So she had stayed away. She didn’t want to see her mother like that, and she knew it would be worse for her if she knew Yuriko had been listening.

  Hiroki’s room looked exactly the way it had when Yuriko peeked in on the day of his disappearance, with one difference. Someone had taken the jacket off his chair and folded it on the bed. It was like trying to spot the difference between two seemingly identical pictures. Hiroki’s room before, and Hiroki’s room now. The biggest difference, but also the easiest one to miss, was that Hiroki wasn’t there.

  Yuriko sat lightly on the coverlet next to the folded jacket. The bed sank only a little bit beneath her.

  A car drove by outside the window, loud music belting from it. It was a sunny day. Just like the day when Hiroki had disappeared.

  Yuriko sat by herself, listening to the music.

  It was then that it suddenly occurred to her—the way you suddenly realize that you’ve left something important behind—that she hadn’t cried once. She had almost cried any number of times, but never like her mother cried. Not even when she had seen tears in her father’s eyes.

  Why? I’m sad. So why can’t I cry?

  Maybe, she decided, I’m in shock. Don’t people go all hollow inside when they’re in shock?

  Yuriko fell back on the bed, lying on the quilted coverlet her mother had made. The bedsprings squeaked.

  The coverlet smelled of her brother.

  How could someone disappear, leaving nothing behind but a jacket hanging on a chair and a smell? How could they not find him no matter how hard they looked? Things like this weren’t supposed to happen.

  Yuriko looked up at the ceiling and slowly closed her eyes.

  I don’t believe it. It can’t be true.

  How could something like this happen to her family? How could a life she had taken for granted get smashed to smithereens in the blink of an eye? She never knew how important it all was to her until it broke.

  Something welled up inside. Yuriko got ready, steeling herself for the sobs that were to come. Part of her had been waiting for it. Crying would save her. With each gasp she could spit out a bit of that black lump she felt inside her chest.

  But nothing came. Yuriko gritted her teeth.

  Why?

  What came instead was this question. Why? Why? Why? Why did her brother stab his friends? If he was having some kind of trouble, why didn’t he say anything about it? If he ran away, why didn’t he tell even his family where he was going? Why didn’t he call them now?

  I’m mad, Hiroki. I’m really mad.

  Yuriko lifted her feet off the floor, rolled over, and curled up in a ball on the bed. She felt suddenly sleepy. That’s right. I’ll just go to sleep. When I wake up, maybe this nightmare will be over. This has all been a really long nightmare.

  When she closed her eyes, the smell of her brother from the coverlet filled her head and her mind. She breathed in deeply. It felt good. Yuriko was more tired than she had imagined. Her body needed rest. I’ll just sleep. Sleep…

  A scene spread out before her closed eyes, dimly at first.

  This was a dream too. Or the fragments of a dream. The feel of the fabric beneath her, the warmth, and the sleep that filled her head brought back a dream she had dreamt before. The scene was familiar—like a breeze flipping through the pages of a book, giving her just a glimpse, then receding.

  When did I last see this place in my dream? A week ago? Ten days ago? It might have been longer ago than that. Her brother was in the dream. She saw him in his room through a crack in the door. Yuriko stood in the cold hallway outside. The door was open only a few inches—

  The lamp on the bedside table is on. Hiroki is over by the window, kneeling. There’s someone standing next to him, facing him, a large black silhouette. He’s curled up at the figure’s feet.

  It must’ve been the middle of the night. She had wanted to go to the bathroom, so she had dreamt of going there, and on the way, by accident, she had looked into his room. It almost felt like spying to see him and the shape in her dream.

  The silhouette was large, looming. Bigger than a regular adult and round and swollen like a balloon. There was something on its head. A ring of pointed spikes—like a crown. That was how it looked to Yuriko in her dream. She’d thought it a very strange dream at the time. Or maybe it was a very strange thing to see, and that was why she remembered it as a dream. She was half asleep anyway.

  Wait. If I was half asleep, does that mean I wasn’t sleeping?

  I was dreaming, wasn’t I?

  She remembered how the hard floor had felt cool beneath the soles of her feet. She had walked with her toes curled. The bathroom seemed impossibly far away. And she had to leave.

  Now he’s kneeling before the big figure with a shape like a crown on its head.

  That’s right, he’s awake. Maybe he’ll look in my direction. Maybe I should tell him I’m going to the bathroom. Because I drank too much milk before going to sleep.

  He’s bowing up and down now, bumping his forehead on the floor. Now he’s whispering something. He’s singing. He’s talking to the silhouette. He’s making an offering.

  Then Yuriko heard the song again, except this time it was coming out of her own lips as she lay curled up on the bed. It was an unfamiliar song with a strange melody, in a language she had never heard. Yet she found she could sing an entire verse.

  Her lips stopped moving. The song ceased. Yuriko, still lying on her side, opened her eyes wide.

  What was that?

  It was the song her brother had sung in her dream.

  Why do I know that crazy song? Why did my mouth just sing it like that?

  “Little miss—”

  She heard the beating of faint w
ings, soft and delicate—like the wings of an insect in late summer when the nights are chilly. Except it was spring, so maybe it was the sound of a newly hatched insect beating its wings.

  “Yes?”

  Funny. The wings sound like they’re saying something.

  “Little miss. Oh, miss? Get up.”

  Yuriko shot up from the bed. For a moment she sat there, perfectly still. Nothing was moving in the room. The window was closed, so not even a breeze rustled through the curtains.

  Yuriko looked up at the fluorescent light on the ceiling. The light made a faint buzzing sound. Maybe that’s what I heard.

  “I’m not up there, miss.”

  Now the beating of the wings was growing louder and sounding more and more distinctly like words.

  “Miss, look over here,” the beating of the wings said. “The bookshelf. I’m on the bookshelf.”

  Yuriko sat perfectly still, turning only her head, very slowly, in the direction of her brother’s bookshelf. The bookshelf stood against the wall next to Hiroki’s desk.

  “That’s it…right over here. Come over.”

  That’s not the beating of wings. That is a voice. It’s talking to me.

  Frozen like a painter’s model, Yuriko moved only her lips. “Who’s there?”

  There was no answer. Yuriko sat still, her ears straining to hear the voice. Outside, a car drove by.

  “Who are you?” she asked again. Another car passed.

  There was no reply. Yuriko began to relax. I was dreaming again.

  “That’s…a tough question to answer,” beat the wings.

  This time, Yuriko jumped off the bed and ran straight for the door, but her socks slipped on the flooring. She lost her balance and slammed into the door with a crash. Stars exploded behind her eyelids.

  “Miss! Don’t be frightened. I’m not scary, really.”

  The beating of wings returned, and now Yuriko’s head was throbbing. The voice sounded like it was laughing, and kind of in a hurry. But it was right. It didn’t sound scary.

  “You’re a ghost.” Yuriko sat on the floor rubbing her head where she had hit the door.

  “I am most definitely not a ghost,” the beating wings replied quickly. “I don’t have a single thing about ghosts written in me, either.”

  “Written in you?” What does that mean? Now Yuriko was growing even more confused. The voice wasn’t making any sense. Maybe I misheard it?

  “It means I’m a book, miss. So stop loafing around there on the floor and come over to the bookshelf.”

  It did say “written.” It means actual writing in a…it’s a book?

  Yuriko found she lacked the courage to stand, so instead she crawled over to the foot of the bookshelf. She crawled with her back arched, rather gracefully looking up.

  The shelves were packed with all kinds of books. There were reference books and dictionaries, picture guides to animals, and comic books. Her brother liked manga about sports heroes. There were a few mysteries tucked in there, some of which Yuriko had borrowed, but she’d found the type to be really small and hard to read. She didn’t understand a lot of the stories, either. When she told her brother this, he laughed and said it was probably too early for a shrimp like her to be reading mysteries.

  “Second shelf from the top,” the mysterious voice said. “Pull out the books in front. I’m hidden behind them.”

  The books on the second shelf included Space from the Hubble and Stargazing and things like that. Yuriko remembered that her brother had gone through an astronomy phase the year before. He’d begged their parents to buy him a telescope. Though their father usually bent to this kind of request from him, this time he hesitated. Telescopes were pretty expensive, he’d said, and besides, her brother was busy with baseball practice, and didn’t have any time. If he started stargazing every night, when would he sleep? Dad had wanted to know. That had been the end of her brother’s future career in astronomy.

  Yuriko pulled out one of the books, a colorful photograph on its cover, then pulled out another, placing them in a neat stack on the desk beside her. Behind them she found another row of books about sea life. (Her brother’s interests, with the sole exception of baseball, tended to be fleeting.)

  She had pulled five books from the shelf when she found between Dolphins: Sages of the Sea and Let’s Go to the Aquarium! a worn-looking book, bound in red leather. It looked entirely out of place, which was why she noticed it. The spine was about an inch thick.

  “That’s right, miss. The red book. That’s me.” The mysterious voice sounded relieved, and brighter, like it was trying to cheer Yuriko on.

  Yuriko extended an index finger and went to touch the cover of the red book, but stopped just before her finger made contact. I wonder what the title is? The letters on the cover—if they were letters—looked like some kind of code. They were stamped in gold and were pretty worn. In places, they seemed to have been rubbed away entirely.

  “What’s your title?” she tried asking. Her finger trembled in the air.

  “If you have to ask, I’m guessing you can’t read it. But if you want to know what’s inside me, I’ll tell you. I think you’d call me a…a dictionary. That’s right. I’m a dictionary with a very special means of employment.”

  “A special what?”

  “A special way to use me.”

  Yuriko’s finger hovered.

  “Didn’t I just tell you I’m not scary? I mean, I guess I understand why you might be startled, but scared? Still, I couldn’t just sit here and watch you…”

  Yuriko lifted an eyebrow. Watch me what?

  “Look, pick me up. It’ll be a lot easier to talk that way.”

  Yuriko withdrew her finger. Her hands clenched tightly into fists. She was trembling. She heard herself swallow. Gulp.

  She closed her eyes, then opened them and quickly yanked the red book off the shelf.

  A second later, she tried to toss it to the floor. In her hand, the book was light as a feather, and slightly warm. It felt like…like human skin! As she jerked her hand, trying to toss it, she felt the cover warp, wrapping around her fingers, clinging to her.

  It felt disgusting.

  “Eeeeew!”

  “Gentle, please! I’m an old book, you know. I don’t even want to count the cracks in my binding these days. And don’t even get me started about the glue.”

  Yuriko looked down at her hands and found that the book was still there, cradled gently between her fingers.

  “Why don’t you have a seat?” the book suggested. “You can just put me on that desk over there. Then open me and put your palm flat on my page.”

  “Open you to where?”

  “Oh, any page will do.”

  Yuriko sat down in her brother’s chair as she was told and placed the red book on the desk. It did look pretty beaten up.

  She opened the book to the very middle; the pages settled to either side. They were covered with letters—the same code-like writing as the faded letters on the cover. The paper was yellow with age, with a few holes here and there.

  “What an old book,” Yuriko whispered. After wiping the palm of her hand on her jacket, she gently placed it on the page.

  She felt a sensation like the page was stroking her palm. Just like the cover had, the paper felt warm.

  “I see,” the red book said. “You’re younger than you look, ain’t you, little miss?” Now the voice sounded normal, a plain human voice, not like the fluttering of wings she’d heard before.

  “H-how can you tell?” she stammered.

  “I can tell.”

  “I’m eleven years old, you know.”

  “As you count the years, yes, I suppose you are. Tell me, how old is your brother?”

  “Fourteen.”

  “He’s pretty young too, then, isn’t he?” It sounded like the book was scoffing.

  Yuriko frowned. “My brother’s not a kid. Maybe he’s not grown up, but my parents said he will be soon. He’s…” She searche
d for the phrase. “He’s a young adult.”

  A difficult age, she had heard her parents say once. But then they smiled. Nothing bad would ever happen to Hiroki.

  “No, no, he’s young enough. Believe me.”

  The book’s voice was coming to her through the palm of her hand. It wasn’t like she could hear it with her ears. More like the voice was echoing in her mind.

  “Are you a book fairy?”

  A book fairy. A book spirit.

  “Fairy? That’s an interesting word. Where did you learn that one?”

  “In movies and folktales and stuff.”

  “Ah, yes. Stories. I’m a story too, you know.”

  “I thought you said you were a dictionary.”

  “I’m a dictionary and a story. There’s a story in everything written in me. Of course, the stories came first.”

  The book’s voice vibrated gently to her through the page. Even though the book was old and dirty and falling apart, she found to her surprise that it didn’t bother her in the slightest to touch it. Or touch him—the book was definitely male, though Yuri wasn’t sure how she knew this.

  “Look, miss, I’m sorry. I hadn’t meant to talk to you at all. I knew nothing would come of it, see? But you sang the song, so—”

  “I did what?”

  That strange song. The one that my mouth sang all by itself.

  “I’ll bet you don’t even know what that song is.”

  Yuriko nodded. “I heard my brother singing it in a dream,” she explained. She described the dream and what she’d seen.

  The book trembled beneath her fingers. “Oh, so you did see it. Then maybe I was right to talk to you. Yes, that was definitely the move to make.”

  The book sounded a bit too satisfied with himself. Or maybe “itself,” Yuriko thought. She was talking to a book, after all. “It was a weird dream,” she told the book. “And it’s even weirder that I remember the song.”

  “But you don’t know what the song means?”

  “How could I?”

  “I suppose it’s just as well that you don’t.”

  The red book stroked the palm of her hand again. Yuriko wasn’t sure exactly how he could do something like that, but that was how it felt.

  “Little miss. Never sing that song again. You’d be better off if you just forgot it entirely.”