Victim II: Beautiful Dreamer

When Momiji woke, she stared at the wooden ceiling questioningly, wondering where she was. As she sat up and pulled off the covers, she noticed that the place where she was, was not her home. The late afternoon sun glowed hauntingly through the rice-paper panels of the sliding doors. Shadows of a twisted and crooked old tree fell across the hardwood floor, like some ancient demon groping out to catch her with its gnarled hands.

Shuddering despite the humidity of the spring, she felt her way along one wall, assuring herself stability. Finding herself hungry, she looked and noticed a small bowl of white price and a round cup of amber tea waiting temptingly for her on a table at the far end of the room.

This surely couldn't be a dream, could it? She wondered what she was doing, eating the food, sleeping in a strange place. Used to the constant bawling of her younger brother, the eerie silence of the temple seemed to deafen her senses; everything she saw was blurred around the edges, as if she were looking through a dusty lens. However, she was glad to be alone. With both parents bustling about the house and her brother around, she never got a minute alone. However, she was also wary of the fact that she would become fiercely bored with no one to talk to.

As she finished eating, Momiji got up to explore. Opening the sliding shoji doors and stepping out onto the wooden deck, she surveyed the yard. How dull it was; the garden just like the garden that had belonged to her grandmother. She'd seen when they'd flown to Japan for her funeral the summer before last. The neat lawn stretched out to a high stone fence—it was so high she could not see over it—lined with maple trees, their bowing branches sweeping the ground when the wind blew. A stone pathway curved across the grass, and she followed it, wondering where it might lead to. As she rounded the corner of the temple, following it, something caught her eye: at the far back end of the garden was an enormous cherry tree, the likes of which she'd never seen before. It's dark brown back contrasted beautifully with the ethereal pink of the blossoms. Petals rained down with a sudden, cool breeze; she caught one in her hand, feeling its smooth, plush surface with the tip of her finger. Yet even that light touch was enough to sever it. Letting it go with the wind, she turned and watched it waft slowly back the way she'd come, cajoling, beckoning her to follow.

The branches of the tree reached out and touched the house; the shadows she'd seen on the floor were from this tree. In the shadow, it had been bare and hideous, gnarled and uneven, but when she looked up at it, not one branch was uncovered. The petals were like whiffs of clouds, barely tangible, too thin to be caught in the shadow.

A slow creaking noise like a wintry and decrepit rocking chair shook her from her musings. Momiji turned and saw an old swing. It was merely a splintered wooden board hanging from the high branches by long, tattered ropes. Though it swung back and forth as if someone was dragging their foot, apathetically watching the raining petals, no one was there.

It was just the wind... No. There was no wind. Deciding to leave it, she came across a pond on which the setting sun glinted, little embers dancing on the ripples. There were no fish, yet the water moved as if they were swimming within it. How peculiar. Again, Momiji decided it the unfelt wind's doing, and left.

She stepped in through the door she'd left, about to straighten the covers of her futon-bed—however, it was already done. Had she made the bed? She couldn't remember properly, but she was almost sure she hadn't. Had this really not been her home all along? Did she really have a younger brother, and parents? Of course not. She had no grandmother either, and hadn't for a long time. They had all been killed, and for some reason, she suspected herself.

That was wrong, wasn't it? She couldn't have killed them. Why did she remember two lives?

Giving up wondering, Momiji noticed that she could not even occupy herself by clearing her meal, for it, like the bed, had already been dealt with. In the place of the cup was a hand-mirror, and there were ribbons where the rice had been. This was such an odd place; though, when she picked up the mirror, half-expecting to see the reflection of someone else, it was her own face staring impassively back. Her plain face, framed by straight dark-brown hair, was perfect; yet, the darkness cast by the dying light highlighted the crevices on either side of her nose, in the crooks of her mouth, around her eyes, making it temporarily appear as a grotesque skull.

Momiji fixed her hair up into two buns, one on either side. She didn't know why, and she'd never put it up like that before, but it just seemed right. Somehow, she felt unsure of everything she just thought. It was almost as if someone had pulled her out of her world, playing her in a doll-house, assuming to her the cote of someone else. The more she thought about it, the more she realized that that was exactly how it felt.

Ignoring that, for it was a very disturbing thought, Momiji looked around for someone to do. Where the bed had been, but was no longer, she saw something glistening, like dust highlighted by the beams of light through the crack in the door. She thought, for a second, that it looked like the shape of a person. When she blinked, it was gone.

Mystified, she reached out one slender finger and felt the air, as if thinking she could touch it. She felt nothing. However, in place of the bed, there was a pair of traditional socks and sandals, which she donned, then turned to see if anything else had changed. The door to the garden was opened wide, and once again, the drifting petals inveigled her to follow their path. She knew it hadn't been like that when she'd come in, and she knew that the shoes hadn't been under the bed; but since she couldn't come up with a satisfying explanation, she ignored both happenings, once more entering the outside.

Under the near-twilight sky, everything tinted with the mirror image of flames, the garden seemed magical. The cherry blossoms glowed, like ghostly lanterns, bobbing up and down in dreamlike discord. The wind blew lightly, taking the ribbons in her hair by their hands and waltzing with them; but now, as she looked, the swing was still. Completely still. The wind blew her hair, rustled the grass and swept the maples' branches, and yet, the swing hung motionless.

It was as if that invisible person sitting on it was staring straight at her now, watching her as she stared back at it. No petals passed through the space it would have occupied had it really been there, and, in wonder, Momiji touched that space. As if she had just awoken, the swing began blowing with the wind, and everything was as it would have been in a normal garden. She sat upon it, staring up in the labyrinth of crosshatched branches, contemplating her adventure.

How foolish it was for her to believe someone was really there, invisible, watching her from where she now sat. Surely, it had all been her imagination. Same with the fish, the happenings in the temple, and the specter she'd seen in the dust. The massive trunk had merely been blocking the wind's path; the surface of the water was too reflective, too dark to see through; she was becoming forgetful; and her eyes weren't focused.

With a sigh, Momiji looked back at the house and saw something, faintly, standing half in and half out of the temple doors. It was like the shimmer of sunlight traveling the path of falling dust, spelling out the shape of a person.

The harder she looked, the fainter it grew, and the more ambiguous it became. Soon, she couldn't tell it from the air, and, after blinking, she found that it was no longer there.

She rested her head on one of the ropes supporting the swing, wishing it to support her as well. Closing her eyes, she wished that since she could see nothing, this new, peculiar world would fade away. Why wouldn't it just fade away?!

When Momiji woke up, she saw the familiar pattern of a wooden ceiling overhead. From it hung a ceiling lamp, and its dusty glow lit up the small room. Rubbing her eyes and sitting up, she realized what a strange dream she'd had. What was it, exactly? For some reason, she could no longer clearly remember. It was like the specter, half there and half not.

A warm hand curled around her shoulders, drawing her towards it. She looked up into the eyes of a blonde-haired young man whose hazel eyes were warm and inviting. She recognized him instantly—he was the clearest thing she'd seen so far. Smiling back, Momiji rested her head on his shoulder. How rude of her to have fallen asleep! This was her life; she could hear her brother in the next room crying, and the rushed footsteps of her parents, and her friends' laughing, and she could see the Technicolor light from the TV on the wall, her shadow thrown against it. An old photo of her grandmother and grandfather hung on the wall, and in its reflection, she could see herself. Wearing neither the kimono, sandals nor her hair in buns, Momiji was momentarily startled. But why? She would never wear any of that. She was just a normal high-schooler.

Momiji didn't know how long she had been asleep; she couldn't even remember being tired. Maybe she hadn't fallen asleep, and had just blinked. Yes, that was it. Stretching, she kicked off the wooden shoes, for she liked not the clomping sound they made against the floor. Somehow, she was sure it would disturb someone. But, there was no one besides here there, right? She couldn't see or hear anyone else. Why had she thought that?

What was wrong with her?

Since she couldn't recall what the temple was like, or if she'd ever known—for, despite the fact she was sure she'd lived in it her whole life, she could not recognize it—Momiji climbed up a convenient ladder she'd not seen before, and explored the upper stories. When she reached the second story, it was full of dust and old boxes too tight to open. A line of footprints sat beside her own, and they looked incredulously similar, yet older. Paying them no mind, she again ascended the ladder. The third story, too, was full of boxes. She was about to climb up another level, but a faint shadow of someone whom she was sure was the mirror of herself, staring in her direction, seated in front of an altar, caught her eyes. Again, as soon as she saw it, it began blending in with the scenery, and was quickly lost. Had it only been a ghost of herself she'd been seeing? No. The other shapes, the ones in the dust, had been different. They weren't the same...at all.

Kneeling down, she examined the altar and the colorless photos upon it. All of the people were Japanese, similar enough to her in appearance to be thought family. Most were old, but some were not, like her younger brother. 'Younger brother'? She wondered where that thought had come from. She was all alone. Everyone else was gone; she'd killed them. There was only her, alone in this temple.

The sound of things shifting startled her, and she looked back towards the ladder, but only to find no one there. Wondering what was coming over her, Momiji decided that she'd done enough exploring. She wanted to rest on the swing. When she was halfway down the ladder, it abruptly disappeared, and she fell down—though, to her relief, it was only a good two or three meters' drop. Though she was without injuries, she felt odd. Looking over to where she had set her sandals, she noticed they weren't there, and, again, the shoji doors were opened. So odd, it was; as if she was lagging behind herself, and the unknown dollmaster whom had moved objects to her convenience before was now moving them to the convenience of a her in the future.

Ignoring that strangest of thoughts, Momiji came outside with just the socks on her feet. She would have sat down on the swing, but it was there again.

She was there again, sitting on it. It was, indeed, herself, but she couldn't possibly find reason for her being in two places at once. Yet again, when she recognized it, the ghost disappeared. Hesitantly, she sat down in turn on the swing, and rested her head once more against the frayed rope.

"I had the weirdest dream," said she to the young man with the kind eyes, "though I don't remember it anymore. It was just here, yet now I can't think of what it was."

He smiled and held her close, whispering, "It's okay. Just try to watch the movie; it really isn't boring enough for you to keep falling asleep." She nodded and turned her head to do his bidding, but she found herself unable to focus. Everything became blurry and faded away, darkening like nightfall, until she was sure that it was only a dream.

She was now sure it was a ghost, the thing she saw who looked like her. Equipped with nothing, she tried to think of where to find it. If it were the ghost of someone very much like herself—if not herself—where would it go? To where she would go, but before her, indeed. So where would she go to find it before it left? Wouldn't it always be ahead of her? She wracked her mind of the questions' answers, but found none. Giving up, she began wandering around, for that had worked before. Maybe she would run in circles; then, she could catch up to it, right?

As she circled the cherry tree, Momiji found a knife lying in the bed of petals, inconspicuously, somehow, for she hadn't seen it the lap before. However, it was picked up before she was even close to it, and, panicked, she began to run. How stupid, she was. The ghost was intangible, untouchable with even a knife; what use would it have been even if she had gotten it? However, her having it would have given her more hope than suspecting it to be in the ghost's hands.

Not quite knowing what to do, or even if she was truly or rightfully scared, Momiji stood, watching the knife come down upon her. The future self had found its target—what it believed to be the ghost—and had stabbed it with the knife.

Whether it really was boring or not, they never finished the movie. Since he was strong enough, he blonde boy carried Momiji's body from the house, followed by the frail mother, still undone by the death of her late husband and his family. The doctors of the hospital said that Momiji was in a coma, forever sleeping, forever caught in a separate world. Though she still lived, they said the chances of her ever waking were smaller than none. Soon after hearing the news, her mother died and her younger brother was adopted by a caring neighbor.

Now, there was no one to hold a funeral for her, for she was as dead as she'd ever be, and they were all dead as well.

But if they had been there, they would have remarked sadly—not knowing anything else to say—that she was, and forever would be, a beautiful dreamer.