Cynthia Kadohata - Kira Kira

I said, "Seems pretty ridiculous to me!" I looked to Lynn for agreement, but she frowned at me.

Amber had brown hair, which she said she was going to dye blond when she turned sixteen. She had brown eyes instead of blue, which was a tremendous disappointment to her. She stuck out her pinkie when she held a cup. And, worst of all, she was making Lynn weird. For instance, Lynn had started to wear lipstick when our parents weren't around.

Many days Lynn tried to get me to spend time with her and Amber as they walked in the living room with books on their heads, told secrets while sticking out their pinkies, or giggled in front of the mirror while experimenting with makeup. Amber hated camping, so now Lynn didn't want to go camping. The thing was, I still loved camping. I think Lynn's feelings were a little hurt that I didn't agree with her about camping anymore. I felt strange not agreeing with her.

One day when we were eating roast chicken, I ripped the thigh from the drumstick with my hands. Our parents were at work. Sammy followed my example and ripped a chicken leg in two.

I said, "Let's see who can put the most food in their mouth at once!" Sammy and I filled our mouths.

Lynn said, "Katie, that's not very ladylike."

I couldn't answer because my mouth was full. Sammy and I thought that was pretty funny. When I'd finally swallowed everything, Lynn looked worried. She wiped food from my chin and said firmly, "Katie, you know you're not going to be able to act like that much longer."

She brought her plate to the sink and left the room. I knew that Lynn was actually trying to help me. Usually when she was trying to help me, I didn't mind. In fact, usually I was eager to please her. But this time I didn't speak to her all the rest of that night. That was the first time I ever shunned her for a whole night. I was waiting for her to apologize, but she never did because she didn't even notice I was shunning her. The next day she wanted me to practice walking across the room with her and Amber, but after awhile I was bored and said so. This hurt her feelings, which made me feel bad.

One weekend it turned out that Gregg and another cute boy from Lynn and Amber's class were going to be going camping near the same place where Uncle Katsuhisa used to take us. Lynn and Amber begged Uncle to take us camping that weekend, and he agreed. The thought of Amber going camping was a bizarre thought indeed. It was hard to picture her sitting around a campfire with a book on her head. She and Lynn wanted the whole family to go camping, for authenticity. That is, they wanted the boys to believe that the whole family just happened to be going camping at the same time and in the same place as the boys just happened to be going camping.

My parents had started to work more and more. They used to go camping sometimes, but they never thought about having fun anymore. My father was exhausted from working ninety hours a week. My mother was exhausted from working overtime whenever she could. So they didn't go camping with us that weekend for Lynn and Amber's Great Boy Hunt.

Uncle, however, brought his whole family, even my Auntie Fumi, who hated camping. She had grown chubbier, and she didn't like the outdoors, maybe because it might muss her beehive hairdo. The whole time we drove, she stared worriedly at the sky, even though there were only a few white clouds.

We parked the truck near the campgrounds and hiked about a mile. Auntie Fumi looked worried the whole time. She kept staring into the forest, as if she thought a tree might fall on her. But she never complained—it wasn't her nature. For a while as we walked I tried to talk to Lynn and Amber, but they were obsessed with a cute dress they had seen in a store. Instead, I walked hand in hand with Sammy or pushed his stroller over the bumpy ground. He thought Amber was stupid too.

When we found our campsite, my cousins David and Daniel and I helped Uncle pitch the tents. Then he put us in charge of starting a fire. He went into the tent with Auntie. David said they were trying to make another baby. He said they did it all the time. I wasn't quite sure what he meant. But years ago when our parents were trying to make Sammy, Lynnie had told me never to go in our parents' bedroom without knocking. She didn't tell me not to listen at the door, however, so I knew trying to make a baby was hard work that required a lot of effort and grunting.

I turned my attention to starting the fire. It took me several minutes to keep the match from blowing out in the wind, and then the match almost burned me, so I flung it away. I guess when I flung it, it landed on a sleeping bag, because the next thing I knew, David was shouting, "Fire!" David was a devil like me, at least that's what Uncle liked to say. David seemed excited about the fire. He helped me throw all of our drinking water, as well as all of our sodas, on the sleeping bag, which sizzled and smoked. Finally, when it was charred but wet, we tried to hide it behind a tent since we didn't want Uncle to see it. Then we set our minds to starting a fire again. But in a moment Daniel pointed at the tent, and we saw smoke snaking from the back.

When we ran behind the tent, smoke billowed into our faces. We tossed mounds of dirt on that weird sleeping bag. Amber and Lynn sat behind the tent, probably telling secrets. They watched the whole event with mild disdain, but I thought I saw a certain yearning in Lynn's eyes, as if maybe she would rather be setting fire to sleeping bags than sticking her pinkie out and telling secrets.

When Uncle and Auntie finally emerged from the tent, Uncle sniffed the air and frowned. Smoke coiled through the air. David and I tried to look innocent. Uncle stamped on the dirt over the sleeping bag until finally the smoke stopped. He started to get annoyed, but then Auntie said to him, "They're just children."

Uncle needed to walk back to the truck and drive into town to get us water, sodas, and a sleeping bag. To his credit, he only yelled at us for a short time about burning the sleeping bag. When he got back from town, he started the fire, which seemed to cheer him up. Then he announced that he was going to shoot us some rabbits for dinner with a bow and arrow. David, Daniel, and I begged to come. Uncle said we could all watch from a distance if we wanted. He said he could shoot a rabbit from thirty yards. Auntie (holding Sammy), my cousins, and I followed Uncle, with Lynn and Amber following us. They walked arm in arm and whispered the whole time.

We came upon an opening. Uncle Katsuhisa suddenly knelt and moved stealthily forward. Auntie's eyes glowed with pride. He put up his palm to still us, and we stopped. He'd apparently sighted a rabbit that I could not see anywhere. I surprised everyone, including myself, by shouting out, "But Bera-Bera is half rabbit!"

That disturbed Uncle's concentration. He turned to me and opened his mouth, but Auntie spoke first. "She'll be quiet next time." She pulled me to her. I was embarrassed by my outburst. Lynnie and Amber would think I was being a baby if I was worried about a stuffed animal. I didn't even know where Bera-Bera was anymore.

I could feel Uncle Katsuhisa move into another zone, he and the bow becoming one. I felt queasy. We walked awhile more, and then he let loose of the arrow, and it screamed forward, piercing its mark cleanly. For the first time I saw the rabbit, still and bloody. That was the last thing I remembered. The next thing I knew, the faces of Lynn, Auntie, the twins, and Sammy were looming over me as I lay on my back. I sat up and saw Uncle holding three rabbits. Their ears were exactly as long as the ears of Bera-Bera. The trees started to spin as I looked at the bloody rabbits. Someone said, "There she goes again!"

When I opened my eyes once more, Amber was squealing and giggling. Two lanky boys were joking with her. One of them had red hair and about a million freckles. The other had hair as yellow as a dandelion. Amber was practically slobbering over them. Lynn leaned over me. "I know where Bera-Bera is," she said. "He's safe in the closet."