Christopher Golden - A Winter of Ghosts

Kara swallowed the emotion thatthreatened to well up inside of her. She nodded. "Yeah. We do."

The three girls turned andstarted up toward the dormitory together. As they approached, Kara noticed thatMai and Wakana had not entered the dorm but were waiting outside, watching themapproach. Mai wore an expectant look, but Wakana had the most awful hauntedexpression in her eyes.

"Someone wants to talk,"Sakura sniffed. Her tough-girl mask had slipped during the blizzard, but now itreturned.

Kara pushed aside her sourfeelings toward the girls and left the path, trudging through the snow to jointhem. Miho and Sakura followed and the five of them faced one another beneaththe tall windows of the dormitory.

"You saw something,"Kara said, fixing Wakana with a hard look.

Wakana flinched, frowning."How did you know? Did you see him too?"

Kara glanced at Mai, whosearrogance had completely vanished. She looked frightened, just as she had whenthey had all faced the Hannya together, and that was good. They might not befriends, but in sharing the secrets they did, they had become allies, and Maitended to be far more ordinary and human when something had scared her.

"Him?" Miho replied."You mean Sora?"

Mai frowned. "Sora? No. She. ." and then she let the words trail off, glancing at her roommate."They didn't see it."

"'It' or 'him?'"Sakura asked. "Make up your mind."

"See what?" Karaprodded, her frustration growing. She wanted to be inside, to put on warm, dryclothes, to find out what had become of Hachiro and Ren. "If you'retalking about ghosts — "

"You did see him!" Wakana said.

Sakura and Miho started talkingat the same time, still trying to make sense of what Wakana was telling them. Maihad just said they hadn't seen Sora, and if they had encountered his ghost,their reaction would have been entirely different. So if not Sora. .

"Jiro?" she asked,thinking again of Hachiro's experience on the train.

"Are you just being cruel?" Mai snapped.

Wakana seemed to wonder the samething. She wore a hurt expression as she replied. "Not Jiro. Daisuke. Isaw Daisuke."

Kara stared around at theothers, mind whirling. Jiro, Daisuke, and then Sora. The ghosts of dead boys.

"What the hell is going onaround here?" she asked.

But nobody had an answer.

Kara followed Miho and Sakurainto their dorm room, grateful to be alone with her friends. Mai and Wakanamight be linked to them because of the unnatural events that had unfolded atMonju-no-Chie School over the past few seasons, but none of them were willingto pretend that their connection to each other was anything like friendship. Karahad no interest in joining forces with them to try to figure out what was goingon, and she knew the feeling was mutual.

When she and Miho and Sakurareached the dorm, the foyer had been full of students who were awaiting pickupby their parents, most of them discussing the missing boys. Those who knew Karaand Hachiro were dating had fallen silent and watched her curiously as shepassed, as though they expected her to break down or something. She hadexpected the stairs and corridors to be quieter, with most of the boardingstudents resting or getting warm, but instead they had walked through agauntlet similar to what they had faced downstairs. They were all buzzing withnervous energy and needed to talk.

When Miho closed the door,shutting the rest of the world out, Kara let out a long sigh. She knew that sheand her friends needed to talk, but she had no interest in discussing the day — or the fate of Hachiro and the other boys — with the girls talking behindtheir hands in the common area down the hall.

Once they'd all hung their jackets,Sakura stepped out of her sodden boots and stripped off her pants. Her legswere pale and dappled with white and red splotches and she rubbed themvigorously before peeling off the rest of her clothes. In seconds she stood inonly her underpants, entirely unself-conscious about her body.

"I am going directly topajamas," she said.

"What about dinner?" Miho asked, trying not to look at her.

"I can have dinner in mypajamas."

Miho gave the tiniest shake ofher head to show that she didn't approve. Sakura ignored her, pulling on along-sleeved t-shirt and a pair of pajama bottoms covered with some kind ofschool symbol that Kara thought came from one of the manga that Sakura loved toread. She tugged a sweatshirt on over that comfortable ensemble and then turnedto Kara.

"What do you want to wear?"

"Anything soft and dry."

Sakura started tossing clothesat her — t-shirt, sweatshirt, pajama pants — and she laughed as shesnatched them out of the air. It was good to laugh, but immediately she feltguilty, knowing the guys were still out there on the mountain.

"Pajamas," Sakurasaid, arching an eyebrow at her roommate.

Miho rolled her eyes and turnedaway from them. She had been working on her shyness for months, but some thingsshe could not change. Modest to a fault, she kept her back turned as shedisrobed and quickly pulled on dark green pants and a beige sweater. Her hairhad been made wild by the storm but she brushed it out and put a clip into it.

"You look ready to go on adate," Sakura said.

"And we look ready for anap," Kara added, as she tugged on the borrowed pajama pants.

Sakura flopped onto her bed."I would love a nap, almost as much as I would a cigarette."

The dorm rooms were all small. Twobeds, tatami mats, two tiny desks, a small futon, built in closets and amirror. Kara folded up her cold, damp clothes and put them in a pile underSakura's desk and then settled onto the futon.

Miho slid into the chair at herdesk. "So, are we going to talk about this?"

Sakura lay on her side, legspulled up beneath her. "Nap first, talk later?"

Kara frowned at her. "Sakura,how can you joke? They're still up there! Sora is — "

"You don't know that."

Miho crossed her arms, almosthugging herself. "What else are we supposed to think? Hachiro saw Jiro'sghost, Wakana saw Daisuke, and on the mountain, Kara and I both saw. . wesaw him, but he wasn't there."

A knock came at the door andthey all looked up, but for several seconds, no one made a move to answer it. Whenthe visitor knocked again and they heard a girl call "hello" from theother side of the door, Miho rose and opened it to find Reiko, from thecalligraphy club, standing in the hall.

"What's wrong?" Mihoasked.

"Nothing," Reiko said."Miss Kaneda asked me to let all of the third floor residents know thatdinner is going to be served an hour early tonight. They want to get somethinghot into us, she said."

Kara had thought she wouldn't behungry at all — a cup of tea to warm her, perhaps — but at theprospect of imminent dinner her stomach started to growl.

"Excellent," Mihoreplied. "I'm sure a meal will do us all good."

"Thank you," Karasaid.

"Some people are alreadydownstairs," Reiko added. "I'll see you all down there."

When she left, Miho closed thedoor and leaned against it, looking at Kara and Sakura. "Don't think we'rehurrying down to the cafeteria. We need to talk about this."

"I agree," Kara said.

Sakura had not moved from herfetal position on the bed. She lay there with her eyes open, but did not lookat them when she spoke.

"What are we supposed totalk about?" she asked. "Okay, there are ghosts in Miyazu City. Maybeit has something to do with Kyuketsuki's curse and maybe it doesn't. How doesthat help the boys?"

A note of despair filled Sakura'swords. Emotion she had been holding back spilled forth and she sat up, lookingfrom Miho to Kara and back again, eyes pleading. "How do we help them?"

There came yet another knock onthe door.

Sakura glared at it. "Goaway!"

"Sakura? Miho? It's MissAritomo. Is Kara there with you?"