Shadow by Amanda Sun

Author:Amanda Sun [Sun, Amanda]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Mythologie, Young Adult
Publisher: Harlequin TEEN
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Seven

Katie

We were crammed into the plane like sardines. I could barely cross my legs without bumping the seat in front of me. It didn’t seem like a very glamorous way to start a new life, but then again, I didn’t really want to be starting over anyway.

I’d been at the gate half an hour early because Linda had worried I’d miss my flight. Maybe she’d really just been afraid that I’d never leave.

I stared out the plane window as New York drifted away. Had it really been five months already? I couldn’t believe I’d made it so long without Mom, like some kind of twisted new record. But there was no going back at the end, no way to stop counting the days.

This was my new life, whether I was ready or not. I just had to wait quietly for time to heal the wounds. So far, time just pressed on them until I felt like I was suffocating.

Half an hour into the air and already my world was foreign. Almost everyone on the plane was Japanese. That or expat English teachers returning from brief visits on American soil. Across from me a pair of senior citizens took off their shoes and pulled comfy slippers from their carry-ons.

“Tea, miss?”

I looked up. The stewardesses stood over me, a pitcher of cold green tea poised in one hand, a stack of plastic cups in the other.

“Um, no thanks,” I said. She nodded and then the brief moment was over, and Japanese flowed off her tongue as she asked the next row and the next. A blond man two rows in front of me answered her in Japanese, and it dawned on me that she’d spoken English to me as a courtesy. I was supposed to be speaking Japanese now. It wasn’t like I hadn’t studied my brains out since October—what little brain that could focus—but I felt small, suddenly, small and lost in the Japanese around me. So much for lists of fruits and vegetables and animals. I hadn’t really learned anything after all.

“I’m doomed,” I said to myself, slipping my head into my hands.

For a while I flipped through the movies, then the TV stations. There was a Japanese variety show where a jumble of guests discussed times they’d tried to blurt out two words at once, creating new combo words. Apparently it was hilarious, because they all giggled and the audience applauded. I stared at the bright kanji scrolling across the bottom of the screen. I could read a lot of them individually, but I couldn’t put them together. It was like trying to put together some awful puzzle when I only had a few of the pieces in my hand.

I shut the TV off and looked out the window. My breath caught in my throat—the land had already disappeared, and sunlight gleamed off the ocean below us. Just like that, my life had slipped away.

I’m sorry, Mom. I’m leaving you after all.

It was stupid, maybe, but I couldn’t help it.

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