chapter sixteen

fuzzy

"Do you think they know that they're madly in love yet?"

I went on pretending as if I hadn't heard the two boys, looking around the shopping street as Tetsu and I walked past a group of street performers consisting of a fire-eater, a juggler, a clown (who I tried to stay as far away from as possible) and some guy on stilts.

A little further down the road and we came to a square of sorts, music playing form speakers up ahead. Tetsu grinned, taking my hand and gently spinning him a round. A soft Japanese Alternative song played overhead, and the chipper guitars in the background reminded me vaguely of The 1975.

"What are you doing?" I asked, reluctant to begin dancing in front of a group of people. I don't dance, have never and will never embarrass myself like that in front of a group of strangers.

"Dance with me, Gilly." The way Tetsu said my name, the way his eyes sparkled. With a face like that, who could say no.

I shook my head. "I don't dance, Tetz."

"Well, today you do." He took Steve the axolotl from my hands, passing it to Dan. "Watch this for us, will you?" He asked the other boy, taking both my hands and pulling me closer to the music.

"Me? No, you take it." Dan frowned, passing Steve to Chiharu.

"Why do I have to do it?" the younger boy complained.

"Because unlike me, you actually look like a child."

Chiharu pouted. "This is bullying."

"Not if it's true." Dan smirked.

Now, let me tell you the reason that I don't dance: not only am I very self conscious, I'm really bad at it. As Tetsu gently spun the two of us in circles ( and then just me ), I kept looking back to make sure that nobody was staring at us. My white skirt twirled with the momentum, and I kept worrying that I was going to step on Tetsu's feet.

That happened twice.

"I'm so sorry." I said through laughter, a smile starting to form on my face. "Now you see why I don't do this very often."

Tetsu laughed. "It just takes practice."

"And I take it you've had lots of that?"

The boy blushed "My mom taught me."

'Oh, did she?"

The song finished, and we stopped dancing, our faces close. Almost instantaneously, I thought back to the night we spent in the bathhouse.

This time, I was going to make the move.

I pushed onto the tip of my toes, looping my arms around his neck and pressing my lips to his. He held me close, one arm by my waist, the other around my back.

We had barely kissed when my phone went off.

Fucking hell.

I reached into the pocket of my suede jacket, sinking back onto the soles of my feet. Awkwardly, Tetsu avoided my gaze, much like I was avoiding his as I sent a quick text back to my mom, reminding her that I'd call later. It must have been early hours of the morning back home, and she was probably out with a few of her friends from the museum curation board, one of the many things she'd taken up since Yuki died, putting her anthropology degree to good use.

"I'm sorry about that." I said quietly, directed at Tetsu.

"It's no big deal." I could see in his eyes that it was.

"Gilly, you dropped your keys." Dan said, pointing at my feet.

Keys? The rental keys were on the kitchen counter. We'd taken Dan's truck out to the shopping street.

I looked down at my foot, where a set of keys was lying.

The keys Tsukomo gave me.

"These were my dad's." I said, turning the metal keyring over in my hands. "Tsukomo gave them to me, he said they unlock something down by. . . he didn't give a name, just said it was where the Container Fight was."

"Oh, I know where that is." Chiharu nodded rapidly, his chin resting on the stuffed axolotl's head. "Everybody does."

"That looks like a motorcycle key." Dan said, pointing to one of the many keys on the ring.

"No shit, Sherlock." I mumbled in English. "Can we go figure out what this is for?"

Tetsu grinned. "Hell yeah."

___

The site of the Container Fight was actually just as it sounds: a large port-side concrete slab stacked to the brim with multicolored shipping containers (and there was also like a skateboarding ramp set up in the middle, no idea what that was about) with labels from all around the world.

For some reason, I remembered the trip we took to Great Wolf Lodge in Texas. I still had no idea why we hopped states in order to go to the resort when we had so many decent ones in New Mexico, but I was five and not complaining about an all inclusive resort and water park. Every night in the lobby, they used to do a story night around this large plaster tree with the glass elevators built into it. Dad used to take me down there every night before I went to sleep, and after the busy vacation days spent at the water park, or the mini golf course, I was almost always asleep by the end of it, and he'd have to carry me back to the room.

I don't know why I remembered it. Maybe it was the numbers on the Dallas shipping label on the container that matched the key in my hand, matching the messily scrawled numbers on the key's label.

"This is it." I said quietly, sliding the small metal key into the padlock

Tetsu and Dan helped me heave open the heavy metal doors, painted a vibrant forest green. The hinges creaked, like the container hadn't been opened in years. And maybe it hadn't. Yuki could have set this up before he left Sannoh, in which case it would have been untouched for upwards of twenty years, or he could have set it up five years ago when he was in town for Tatusya's funeral.

The container was practically empty, too big for the one thing it held.

"No fucking way." Chiharu mumbled, staring at the object head on.

A solitary motorcycle sat in the middle of the container, one I recognized from every picture my father had ever taken with Mugen.

His original Harley Davidson, a late model released just before 1990.

Dan reached out to brush his fingers over the body work, and I slapped his hand away, gently touching my own, paler hand to the cold metal. "Holy hell."

"This is incredible." Tetsu remarked, settling at my side. "And I think it's safe to assume that he wanted you to have it."

I knelt down to take a better look at the engine, the floor of the shipping container cold against my bare knees as I ran my fingers over everything, stirring up a fine layer of dust. Until my fingers caught on something. Confused, I switched on my phone flashlight for a better look. The spine of a small, fake-leather bound notebook was wedged in between two of the components. Using both hands, I managed to set the book free, skimming pages as the members of DTC strained to look over my shoulder.

"That's my dad's writing. This looks like a journal or something." I turned to look at the boys behind me. "I think I found the answers I came here for."

NOTES!!

likely gonna double update bc im excited for the next chapter-