“You don’t need to bring a katana with you,” Lee said to break the silence, imagining how many people would stare at them as they walked into town. “No one is going to attack you here.”
“And I’m supposed to take your word for that?” Sen said. “Samurai don’t just leave their swords behind.”
“There were no samurai in October of 1877,” Lee said before he could think better of it. He regretted not taking any sedatives—they would have allowed him to catch that thought before it reached his lips and risked upsetting Sen.
But Sen only rolled her eyes. “There are always samurai, no matter what the government says. I’m training for the second rebellion. After that, the samurai will return.”
Second rebellion?Lee thought. He knew that no such thing had happened, but he worried that saying this aloud would upset Sen and make her leave.
“I suppose that’s where I’ll die,” Sen said, her gaze falling to the floor. “If I even make it that long.”
The light shifted through the window behind Sen, and for a moment, she looked almost translucent. Lee imagined her skin sloughing off, flesh falling away, bones crumbling to powder. He wasn’t talking to a girl, but a refraction of light.
There were many things Lee wanted to ask her, but he had the sense that she would say very little until she got what she wanted.
“Are you hungry?” Lee said.
Sen’s gaze snapped to him. She hadn’t expected the question, and the hard mask of fearlessness fell away for a moment, her brow furrowed. “No,” she lied.
Lee turned and opened the door to the hall, then crossedover to the kitchen, waving for Sen to follow. He went to the fridge and pulled out a bowl of cold miso soup that Hina had made the day before, portioned it into two bowls and set it on the kitchen table. People were simple at their core—you fed them and they trusted you, just like dogs.
Sen lingered in the doorway, looking palely around the kitchen. Lee pretended not to notice her hesitation and set a spoon in front of each place mat, then gestured for Sen to sit. Her gaze darted between him and the soup.
“Do you think I’ve done something to it?” Lee said. He sighed and switched his bowl with Sen’s, but still, she shifted from foot to foot and didn’t sit down. “Should I mix them together?” Lee said, his feigned hospitality wearing thin. “Drink from each of them? You saw me pour them from the same container.”
She shook her head, gazing across the shelves, the windows, the wallpaper. “Your side of the house feels strange,” she said. “There’s something different about it, but I’m not sure what.”
“There are many differences,” Lee said, setting down his spoon. “It’s been over a century.”
Sen ignored him, examining the kitchen cabinets, the clock on the wall, the messy counters. Then she faced the doorway and stilled as her gaze locked on the far wall.
“What is that stain from?” Sen asked, pointing to the stain by the kitchen doorway—the same stain Lee had seen when he first entered the house.
Coldness crept up Lee’s spine. Sen shouldn’t have been able to see the stain—Lee had scraped most of it away, and what remained was barely visible against the dark wood. Yet, somehow, she was looking straight at it.
“I don’t know,” Lee said, though his words suddenly felt like static in his mouth. “It was here when I moved in.”
Sen went rigid at his words, her gaze fixed on the doorframe, her face drained of color.
“Is something wrong?” Lee said.
Sen swallowed hard, then turned to Lee. “No,” she said, though it was a lie. “I just... I don’t like stains.”
A hot wind sighed through the open window, rustling the pages of the calendar on the wall. Lee and Sen remained perfectly still, fixed under each other’s gazes like bugs pinned to a board. The sun shifted across Sen’s face, but she didn’t flinch at the sting of sunlight skewering her left eye.
“Neither do I,” Lee said. The words felt sacred as they left his mouth, the secret he had never said out loud because no one would understand. But in that moment, Sen was his god, swallowing his prayers in silence, offering nothing in return.
Hina appeared in the doorway.
“You’re up early,” she said to Lee, reaching to pluck her apron off the hook with a smile, but her hand froze a breath away as her gaze fell on Sen. She let out a quiet sound of surprise, then quickly bowed.
Sen bowed tentatively, her eyes locked on Hina. When Hina rose from her bow, all the brightness had left her expression, her face oddly gray.
“This is Sen,” Lee said. “Sen, this is Hina, my dad’s girlfriend.”
Neither woman spoke. Silence swelled between them, even the wind suddenly breathless as sunlight shifted across the kitchen floor. The Hina who Lee knew would have been jumping up to offer Sen food. But instead, she was dissecting Sen with her glare.
“Are you two going into town?” Hina said at last, turning to Lee and smiling. She spoke in English, which was unusual when Lee’s father wasn’t there.
