A headful of skye, p.14
A Headful of Skye, page 14
It sounded like the headteacher had made an effort to help, even if the complexities were beyond her understanding. Taking time out from running a boarding school to tutor someone in mindfulness seemed generous.
“It really can reduce stress…” Mayu hedged.
“Don’t you start.” Shaking her head, Skye’s body language closed off.
To fill the silence, Mayu started humming the first song that came to mind. Giggling, Skye’s attention refocused on the scenery. “I wish stars really were glowing crystals.”
“Me too. But maybe we’d only try harder to mine them.”
“Yeah, my mum and dad would.”
The starlight pulsed. The brightness ebbing and dimming.
“My parents tried hypnotherapy once.” Skye sounded vacant. “It just put me to sleep.”
A reply was on the tip of Mayu’s tongue, but nothing came out. Her stomach crawled with something, a nausea she couldn’t place. The stars seemed dizzying now. Spinning and pulsing, all gathering together they colluded into one point, and Mayu felt heavier.
“Skye…” But it sounded more like a gasp as she fell, or as Skye rose higher. “Skye!”
Mayu wrenched herself free of the fatigue clutching her limbs, and she finally stopped falling. She hit the bottom of a well, the walls so dark she feared straying left or right. She only knew there was a plinth of rock in the middle of the well because Skye stood on top of it, miles above Mayu’s head, illuminated by a violet galaxy.
Drowsiness hit her again. Mayu staggered, unable to shake it from the back of her head, like a virus attacking her ability to see. Think…balance. She just had to return to Skye. Get back to her before things got out of hand again.
Studying Skye as she ambled toward the plinth, she saw the girl staring at a single star. It hovered above Skye’s head, out of reach, and she stood beneath it, still as stone.
“Where is it?”
That voice. It was down in the well with Mayu. There, a flashlight. Searching for her—for something. The beam of light swung back and forth, coming around the plinth, and the man growled again, “Where is it?”
16
Mayu tiptoed across the crumbling, rocky well—around the plinth and away from the searching beam of light. She staggered, swallowing bile, and blinked hard to regain some kind of bearing.
Figuring her best bet was to sneak up on her hunter, Mayu hurried after him, hoping it would keep her out of the beam of light. The rough base of the plinth grew a little more distinct in the glow of his flashlight, revealing jagged edges and handholds. She’d get a little closer to the man before trying to climb it to give herself a better head start before he looped around.
Mayu got near enough to see the creases ironed into his white shirt and his perfect, starched collar. His questioning bounced off the stone and whispered between the shadows, over and over, rising and sinking in volume like the tide.
Breathing through her mouth, Mayu focused on Skye. She lowered into a deep crouch and then jumped with all her might. The heavy, sickening fatigue dragged her down, and Mayu only made it up a few feet. She landed on the sides of the plinth, her feet scrabbling against the rock, kicking loose a river of stones. They clattered into the well.
“Where?” the man hissed. The beam of light whipped toward the sound.
Trembling, Mayu jumped again. The rock cut into her hands when she landed this time and she gasped. The noise echoed around and around, her one breath filling the black well like a siren. She pressed close to the rock and shut her eyes, as if he’d never see her if she couldn’t see him.
The man shuffled closer, each footstep deliberate and unhurried. “You will tell me the truth,” he rasped.
Each breath was harder to inhale, the very air pressing down on Mayu’s head. Digging her nails into handholds, she looked up at Skye again—so far away. But she’d moved. Skye’s hand was stretched upwards, reaching for the solitary star above her head.
Mayu’s hands lit up, bathed in artificial light, the rock around her illuminated in the hunter’s flashlight. Her heart thundered, turned into a slamming drum.
“Where is it?” he cried right below her. At her.
Not glancing down, Mayu lurched upward, jumping in short, scrabbling bursts. Panting followed after her, angry and laboured.
“Where is it?”
Where was what?
So close to Skye, all she had to do was make everything vanish and calm down. But the man, he sounded ravenous, seemed so real. Get away first. Think later. Focus on Skye’s hair fluttering in a wind not possible in outer-space.
With one last jump, Mayu touched the top of the plinth.
The man’s hand closed around her ankle. “Where is it?” he snarled, and yanked her off the rock. His hand was ice on her skin, manacled to her as they fell.
They hit the bottom and Mayu kicked to get free, twisting and flailing on her back. He grabbed her other ankle and Mayu screamed.
“Let her go!” yelled Skye. The girl peered down into the well, glowing white from head to foot, like she’d eaten the star above her head and turned into one herself.
The man crawled up Mayu’s legs, his fingers digging through her jeans. She saw his face at last and almost recognised it through the mania transfiguring his expression. His eyes were wide and mad, blue as summer sky, and his nose strikingly aquiline. His cheeks were sallow and hair greying above the ears. He wanted violence. He wanted answers she didn’t have.
Desperate for anything, she lurched at him and clawed slashes into his cheek—bright red streams of blood. He let go with a howl. Flipping onto her front, she tried to fly, but only rose a few inches before the man caught her ankle again, his fingers cutting her jeans to ribbons.
“Let go!” Skye sounded near.
His hands seized the back of Mayu’s neck.
“Where is it?”
What? What had Mayu taken, or lost? Was this really about Yūta’s ashes?
As he wrenched her onto her back, she gasped, her gaze filled with someone else behind him. Skye: plummeting to the ground, ablaze with light, her hands outstretched for Mayu as the man’s hands wrapped around her throat.
Just make it end, Mayu thought, kill me. But that was no way to leave Skye.
Dredging the last of her energy, Mayu kicked and scratched until she heard the man howl once more. He sat up, cradling his face, and Skye plunged into Mayu’s chest.
The girl wrapped her arms tight around Mayu as the floor stretched beneath them like a trampoline, stretching taut until it snapped. At once, the fog in Mayu’s head cleared. They fell, silent, eyes shut and hiding in each other’s firm grip. Until second by second, the wind stopped roaring in Mayu’s ear and she realised Skye had gone limp. Her grip on the girl tightened as if pinning a precious rag doll to her chest.
She opened her eyes to a beautiful view of the galaxy.
“Thank you,” she said into Skye’s hair.
“I can’t feel my legs,” she replied, shaking. “Who was that?”
“I don’t know. What does he want?”
For a moment, she only heard Skye breathing into her shoulder. “I don’t know. I really don’t. I wanna go back to Earth.”
Mayu brushed her own long hair out of her face, letting the tension inside unravel with slow, steady breaths. “Great timing, I’ve just seen our transport on its way.”
“Where?” Skye let go and tipped backwards, stretching into all kinds of lazy shapes trying to spot it.
With a long ‘meow!’ a glowing white cat zipped between them. It sent Mayu and Skye drifting apart.
“Are you kidding?” Skye yelled.
“And you doubted me!”
A shower of cats blazed past them like shooting stars, and she heard Skye groan.
“Come on, you know what to expect this time.”
One of the cats circled around Skye and stopped in front of her face. It wiggled its tail in offering. Grimacing as if she’d rather have after school detention, Skye reluctantly took hold of it.
The cat shot off, Skye screaming, leaving a trail of stardust.
Snorting, Mayu found her own cat and cried out as it streaked forward. She had to admit, these cats were damn fast.
She hurtled towards the panoramic Earth, trailing in Skye’s wake. They burst through the ozone layer and Mayu let go of the cat’s tail. She carried on firing towards the planet and willed herself to gain speed with Skye. When they were level with each other, Mayu saw the terror in Skye’s eyes.
“Just let go,” Mayu shouted.
“Then what?” Skye snapped.
“Fly! We can do it this time.”
“Into the bloody ground?”
“Don’t worry, I’ve got you.”
Shaking her head, Skye let go of the cat and Mayu dropped back to take hold of the girl’s ankle. Their rapid descent began to ease, but not fast enough. The ground came closer and closer…
“Mayu…” Skye’s hair billowed around her head, but not enough to mask the train tracks that the pair of them were diving towards. “MAYU!”
“You’re fine,” she shouted back, tugging as hard as possible.
“THIS ISN’T FUNNY.”
Unable to stop herself, Mayu laughed, and she halted their fall a good five metres off the ground.
“You see,” Mayu panted, “I told you.”
Skye sagged, arms dangling towards the ground, and she groaned. “You’re bloody mental.”
17
Mayu set Skye down on the station platform and landed next to her, staring out at the suburban landscape. Many of the houses were single story buildings with amateur mosaics drawn in chalk on their walls. The vivid, cheerful view soothed away the horror of that man in the well until only the rush of falling back to Earth mattered.
“It’s good to get the heart racing!” said Mayu, scraping her hair into a bun.
“Yeah, I think it’s only healthy when you’re exercising, not panicking for your actual life.” Skye crawled over to the waiting bench and slumped into a seat. She started giggling. “That was crazy. Wow.”
“I knew you’d warm to the thrill of possible catastrophe,” Mayu teased.
“No, you’re still on your own with that one.”
Skye dropped her head back and stared up at the clouds, and Mayu took the opportunity to turn away and cringe. She massaged her forehead, feeling a feverish headache. They were hiding too much from each other and triggering deep-seated fear, both terrified of either accepting something or confessing a painful truth, of being seen for who they really were and what they’d done—something needed to give.
What did her subconscious want? What was it looking for? What was the significance of the one recurring question? Part of it had to originate from Skye’s subconscious but searching for answers could be dangerous.
Putting her smile back on, Mayu looked up and down the train tracks, admiring the countryside and squat houses nearby. She could smell home cooking, laundry, and gardening, and—
Mayu did a double take.
Standing on the tracks heading out to the wide world was Yūta with his hands in his pockets. He pulled one hand free to wave at her, smiling. He gazed at her fondly and slipped his hand back into his pocket.
Her field of vision narrowed onto him, filled with warmth and longing.
A scraping, clanking hiss rattled the tracks as a train approached from some distant city, but Mayu didn’t turn to look. They’d travelled to this train stop so many times to visit her family—she wanted that time back, needed to feel his hand in hers as the train dropped them off and left in a gust of wind.
Mayu started walking.
“Don’t follow him!” Someone grabbed her hand and yanked. “Stop. I’m fading!”
Refocusing on her surroundings, Mayu looked down at Skye and saw the girl’s arms had gone a little translucent.
“Sorry. I’m back.” Mayu swallowed, pushing the warmth further away. Skye’s arms solidified again.
“You should stay away from him,” Skye whispered.
Even so, Mayu watched Yūta walk away and vanish. Tomoya’s last words to her had been that she could look after Skye as a team, with her husband, so long as she didn’t use real memories as a base scenario. Once they were away from this town, she’d have to try.
The train screeched into the platform, filling her view, and Skye rushed to the edge. Mayu pulled her back.
“Are we getting on?” asked Skye.
“Do you want to?”
Skye looked at the polished, neomodern train with a hint of adventure in her eyes. “Where does it go?”
“No idea. Shall we find out?”
They climbed aboard the nearest carriage and stared at the passengers inside. A different coloured balloon was tied to the back of every seat, each one bobbing into its neighbour as the train set off again. The carriage itself was spacious, with plenty of leg-room and a wide central aisle.
“All the seats face inwards,” said Skye.
“That’s your observation?” replied Mayu.
“Well, the balloons are nice, but the seats. They’re the wrong way round. And the triangles hanging from the ceiling…”
“What are you talking about? Have you never been on a city train before?”
“Of course I… A city train? I…of course. This is just a weird train.”
Biting her tongue, Mayu gripped a support beam and watched Skye head for one of the seats. As she made to sit, a yellow balloon sailed down and hit her on the head with a ‘boing!’
“That’s my seat,” it said.
“What?” Skye jumped upwards, smacking the balloon away.
“Well, I never,” it cried. “Such a rude child.”
The other balloons muttered in agreement. Skye only acted surprised for a few seconds.
“You’re not even sat on the seat,” she said, pointing to the vacant chair beneath the yellow balloon.
“Oh! Point out my bodily disabilities even more, why don’t you? Can’t sit. I’ll bet you wouldn’t say that if I was lined with aluminium and painted like Mickey Mouse.”
Mouth hanging open, Skye looked back at Mayu as if to say, “Is this for real?” Mayu shrugged. She cupped a hand over her mouth and whispered, “Just go with it.”
Skye shook her head in disbelief, spreading her arms wide, then slouched and gave the balloon a hard look. “Where may I sit?” she asked. “All of you have taken the chairs.”
“Have you no respect for your elders?” wailed the yellow balloon.
“I highly doubt—”
Mayu hissed across Skye’s retort, and the girl threw her arms up.
“This is stupid. It’s just a balloon.”
Their floating rubber passengers muttered in horror. Ignoring them, Skye plonked down one seat along from the yellow balloon. They sprang on her. All the nearest balloons whacked and thumped and bashed against any bit of Skye they could reach. Even the balloons situated on the other side of the aisle soared into the fray.
With an angry cry, Skye burst free from the rainbow cyclone, swinging her arms. She batted most of them away until the last of the balloons returned to their chairs. Mayu stifled a laugh; Skye’s hair stuck out in a wild, statically charged mess.
Unimpressed with Mayu’s reaction, Skye skulked to the other end of the carriage, sank to the floor, and sat with her legs crossed around one of the support poles in the aisle. This girl just couldn’t take a hint.
Gauging her balance, Mayu approached a blue balloon on the opposite side of the carriage from the yellow one and bowed deeply to it. “Excuse me,” she said. Skye peered over her shoulder, thinking Mayu was addressing her. Her eyes narrowed when she saw Mayu talking to the blue balloon.
“I’ve travelled a long way today and I’m completely exhausted,” Mayu went on. “I’m sorry to ask you, but may I have your seat for five minutes?”
The blue balloon grumbled a little. “Well, I suppose, since you asked so nicely.”
Mayu bowed again. “Thank you very much. I’m sorry to cause you trouble.”
“No, no,” it sighed, untying itself from the back of its seat. “I get off soon anyway.” Its string released and the balloon sailed up to the ceiling. Mayu sat down and watched as it shuffled against the racks and support handles, making its way to the carriage door.
Smiling, Mayu looked back at Skye and quirked her eyebrows. Skye turned away, hugging the pole with her face stuck in a sulk.
At the next station, the train pulled into a tiny countryside platform. More balloons occupied the waiting area, their strings tied to various weights to anchor them down. The doors opened and the blue balloon sailed out, disappearing from view as it floated directly upwards.
Three more balloons detached themselves from seats, making for the exit, and three more tried to board. Skye stumbled to her feet and dived for one of the vacant chairs. Crying out in disgust, all the balloons on board smacked and bashed against her again.
“Come on! They’ve gone,” Skye yelled. “It’s mine now!”
One smacked her in the eye and Skye cried out in anguish. Mayu winced. In all the confusion, the train set off again and the new passengers found the empty seats. Skye hunkered down on the floor, arms over her head, until the balloons finally stopped their assault.
Letting out a miserable sigh, the girl crawled back to the support beam and wrapped her limbs around it, hiding her red eye in her sleeve. Mayu shook her head. All Skye had to do was ask nicely, or to apologise.
Mayu closed her eyes. If she pretended to be sleeping, Skye might try to find a seat without offending anyone. Perhaps she felt ashamed, knowing that Mayu was watching. Apologising was hard, she knew that.
Mayu sat there for a while, sunlight flickering over her eyelids in splotches of brilliant yellow, orange, and black. Eventually she heard Skye heave up onto her feet. Patting and strained sighs followed—she was probably stretching and patting the floor-dirt off her backside.
A series of shuffles. Then:
“Excuse me,” said Skye, “I’ve been sat on the floor for a long time. May I have your seat for five minutes?”
