Resolve

“She told you!?”

It was a mistake to blurt this out, but I had nothing else to say in the moment. Miho had pinned me against the back wall of the dressing booth. In another context, it might have looked romantic.

“You did. Just now.”

Shit. I had just given the game away. I had never remembered Miho being this tricky before. Was it a new skill, or had she been hiding this all along?

“I would have figured it out pretty soon, anyway. I was fifty-fifty on her being a returnee or being a Northerner. But today settled it - definitely a Northerner.”

Well, Ayasa hadn’t done a great job of hiding her Northerner tendencies. I had hoped to play it off as just the follies of an eccentric rich girl, but Miho had seen through that immediately. That left scant few options. A returnee probably wouldn’t have been so confused by the simple act of shopping at a mall. The name of this one definitely implied that at least Europe - or the parts of it not behind the Iron Curtain- were familiar with the concept.

“Yeah. You’re right.”

Well, there wasn’t any sense keeping up pretenses now. Miho was too clever for any more I could come up with.

“WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?”

Miho was barely speaking above a whisper, but she was close enough to me that it felt like a yell.

“I already told you. She was in trouble and she needed help.”

“Where did you even find her?”

I struggled to come up with a plausible excuse. It was no use. Miho was already connecting the dots faster than I could spin up a new yarn. That was probably for the best. I’m sure she would have figured out I was lying before I had even finished telling her.

“Oh god- you went with Kanamaru, didn’t you?”

Evidently she had been eavesdropping on us closer than I had believed. She somehow knew Kanamaru’s plan involved going to the North.

“Yeah. I did.”

Miho wasn’t ready for me to just admit it like that.

“ARE YOU INSANE?”

This time it really was a yell- loud enough to attract the attention of the changing-room attendant, who came over to check on the Booth. Miho scrambled out an apology, being careful to draw the curtain of the booth just in time so that the attendant couldn’t see there were two of us. I’m pretty sure that would have gotten us kicked out.

“Yeah. I might be.”

If you defined insanity as doing something you know the result of and expecting a different result, I was insane. I knew on some level that Kanamaru’s scheme was high-risk with relatively low reward. I knew that Kanamaru wasn’t the kind of person that would keep his promises. Miho herself had warned me. The consequences of getting captured or even being seen would have been complete forfeiture of any profit- and potentially so much more.

And yet, that different result had happened. I was unscathed. Ayasa was here. We were both alive and carrying on our day as if we hadn’t been shot at the night before.

“So you went to the North, made some cash, and decided it was a good idea to bring her back with you?”

“I didn’t have a choice. We were both running. They shot at us.”

Miho reeled back, her face scrunched up from trying to process this.

“They SHOT you?”

“They shot at us.”

“That’s the same thing!”

No, it wasn’t. If I had been shot, I’d probably be lying face down in a ditch right now.

“We didn’t get hit.”

Miho didn’t have an immediate response to that. She leaned against the mirror on the booth wall. If it had just been me, this would have been more unbelievable than the cover story I had come up with on the spot in the diner. Real Northerners were like unicorns in the South, though. Ayasa was proof enough that our great escape had been real.

Finally, Miho had sorted through enough to continue grilling me.

“So what are you gonna do now? You can’t just bring her home like a stray cat. She’s gotta go back sooner or later.”

“I’m working on it.”

That was a big, fat lie. I had no clue what to do now. Kanamaru’s rat tunnel was definitely closed. Any official border crossing could have gotten her in even more trouble than a simple disappearance. Did Ayasa even want to go back?

“Um, Saijou?”

It was Ayasa. She was probably done changing.

The shopping expedition depleted all but about 5000 yen of the money Kanamaru had given me as a bribe fee. Miho had made sure to encourage Ayasa to pick out a few more sets of clothes as extras. Ayasa would definitely need them, but I had the feeling Miho did that just to teach me a lesson. That’s probably also why she ordered me to carry the shopping bag. It was pretty heavy for just a few sets of summer clothes.

“So, what now?”

We had accomplished our goal. Ayasa had the clothes I owed her, and maybe a few more.

“She can stay at my place another night. Not any longer, though. My parents are going to start asking questions. We’re all in a lot of trouble if they find out I’m harboring a runaway Northerner.”

Ayasa didn’t seem at all shocked that Miho had just outed her. Maybe she had been listening to our private conversation, or maybe she just knew she wasn’t very good at hiding it.

“I’ll ask Hiroki. He probably has a spare room at his place.”

“Shinji? Oh, right, he lives in that apartment.”

Miho looked back at Ayasa.

“Higashiyama, sorry about this. Touma’s an idiot.”

“No. Thank you for helping me.”

Ayasa was keeping something to herself. She looked like she wanted to say more.

Miho spun around to me.

“Bring her back to my place by- 8:00, maybe?”

Huh?

“You’re…leaving? Now?”

“My parents are both home right now. It’s bad news if she sticks around my house too long. As long as she’s out and about, and you keep an eye on her, you won’t get into any more trouble than you’re already in.”

Miho was a much better liar than I was. No wonder she had wanted to meet this early- all part of a calculated plan to keep Ayasa’s identity under wraps.

Wait, was she telling me to hang out with Ayasa? Alone? Wouldn’t that be like a-

Miho drilled her pointer finger into my chest.

“Plus, you need to introduce her to Shinji, if that’s where she’s gonna stay.”

Ah, right. Practicality above all else.

“And no funny business. She’s staying with me tonight so I’ll know if you do any creepy stuff.”

Ayasa didn’t react to this at all, though it had clearly been a warning directed at her.

“Okay, I’ll watch after her. Where are you going?”

“None of your business.”

Well, that was a way to end a conversation. Miho strode off towards who-knows-where, leaving Ayasa and I in the mall’s courtyard.

Neither of us spoke for a while.

Up above, the roar of more jet engines carried through the whole place. A dark gray military cargo aircraft made a low sweeping turn overhead. It must have been on final approach to one of the airbases on the outskirts of the city.

Ayasa broke the silence.

“Nishizawa.”

“Higashiyama…?”

“Should we go?”

“Go where?”

Home still wasn’t an option, even though it might have been more socially acceptable to bring Ayasa around in the daytime rather than after midnight. School was closed except to clubs. Hiroki might be somewhere in the city, or he might be at home.

“I’m a little hungry.”

Oh, duh. Ayasa probably hadn’t had much to eat since last night. We had only ordered soft drinks at the diner - just enough that they wouldn’t kick us out for loitering.

“Uh, we could go get something?”

I still had some money. It wasn’t enough to cover an expensive meal, but something cheap would do.

“How about Italian?”

There was a cheap Italian chain restaurant nearby. It had a reputation for being an extremely bad idea for a first date, but Ayasa probably wouldn’t know that. Plus, this wasn’t technically a date. I was just watching her for a while.

“Italian?”

Ayasa seemed confused at the concept of Italian food. Could the North really have been that bland that they didn’t even have Italian?

“Like Pasta. Pizza.”

“What about that?”

Ayasa had spied something in the food court on the edge of the courtyard. It was an American chain, slightly more upscale than the ones you’d find on the average street corner. Kind of pricey for what it was, but not enough to drain all of the rest of my cash.

“Sure. We can do burgers.”