Relax, I'm A Ninja Read online

  “I don’t think I’m going,” I said. Amy’s smile dropped. I grabbed my backpack straps and reminded myself to keep it together.

  “C’mon, man! You gotta come!” Todd punched my shoulder. I noticed he was wearing his expensive sneakers again. Eva had said she liked them at the party. They’d been chatting a lot online since then, and it was a constant barrage of “Eva said” every time we talked.

  “It won’t be the same without you.” Amy pursed her lips. I stared at her. How could she want me to take another girl?

  “Eva said Sarah doesn’t have a date yet,” Todd mentioned right on cue.

  Eddie nodded. “You should take her! You guys got along good at the party.”

  “She’d love to go, even as friends,” Amy said. It was weird, but I saw her thinking. Sarah knew that Amy liked me—she wouldn’t mess.

  “Um, sure, maybe I’ll do that. Sarah’s…nice.” The word I actually thought was “smelly,” but she really was nice.

  “Awesome! This is gonna rock!” Todd pumped his fists. “Eva said she’ll probably wear red—should I wear red too?”

  I shrugged.

  “It’s dorky to match too much, right?” Stu looked to Amy, and she nodded. I didn’t feel like talking. I couldn’t care less about this dance or Sarah Parkins. But this was the first time my friends were going to a dance with dates. It was like we were suddenly less nerdy. I had to admit that was cool, even if I couldn’t go with Amy.

  The bell rang, and the guys headed off to math, leaving Amy and me alone. I looked at her for a moment, trying to figure out what I could get away with. I had to touch her, so I punched her shoulder. “Let’s get going.”

  She laughed a little. “Okay.”

  “The whole dance thing will be awkward,” I said as we walked through the main hall. Greenburg would have been too elegant were it not for the black lockers. They stuck out like a sore thumb against the carved molding and intricate ceiling.

  “I think you might be surprised.” She bumped my arm. “I have plans.”

  “Plans? What plans?”

  “That would ruin the surprise!” When she laughed it sounded a touch maniacal.

  “Fine, I’ll wait.”

  “That’s a good boyfriend,” she whispered as she snuck a hand squeeze. She walked through the classroom door, and it took all my willpower to tear my gaze from her.

  When I walked into history, I froze. Courtney Petersen was alone. It was a miracle—or maybe Logan wasn’t back from break yet. I didn’t think she could get tanner. That Caribbean sun must have had special powers. This was my chance, so I moved to the empty seat next to her.

  This time I would ask her straight up to tell me about the Akuma, if that’s what the evil ninja was. I figured maybe that was their Clan name or something. It made sense to name themselves after a demon if they were evil enough to use dark arts.

  “Akuma no hanashi,” I said.

  Her breath caught. “How?” She didn’t actually vocalize the word, but I read her glossy lips.

  My palms were sweating, but I smiled. “Told you I’m not stupid.”

  She glared. “Not stupid, but obviously ignorant.”

  “You could help me with that.”

  She shook her head slowly, and then she opened her mouth to say what might’ve been the most important thing to come out of her yet. I waited on the edge of the seat, but it didn’t come.

  “Ahem.” Mrs. Sanders fake coughed, and we turned to look at her sour face. “Do you two mind if I start class?”

  “Oh, go ahead.” I gestured for her to continue, not realizing it might look like I had an attitude.

  “Thank you, Toshiro, I’ll be sure to get your clearance each day.”

  I forced back the eye roll and went to my seat.

  Courtney looked over several times during class. Her expressions changed too fast. One minute calm, the next confused, the next angry. For some reason, I felt like I had her right where I wanted. The answers were in my reach. I wouldn’t let up for anything.

  ***

  After I took Amy home for the night, I went to Courtney’s fancy patio roof. It was a small, refined spot in the back corner. I didn’t hide. I sat right in one of her lounge chairs under a large, green umbrella, passing the time by thinking of Amy.

  I could think about her all day. She rocked the ninja thing. She didn’t blink at rappelling off the Golden Gate Bridge (one of the few occasions ninjas wear orange). Even Marty still complained that we’d never actually have to do that, at which point my dad would give one of his favorite sayings: The snake does not always strike, but is always prepared to.

  Every time Amy and I sparred she got closer to beating me. That night she’d almost pinned me. I still couldn’t believe how fast she’d reversed her momentum. It shouldn’t have been possible for her to improve so quickly. The idea kind of bothered me, but it also motivated me to push harder in training. In a lot of ways she made me stronger.

  It had only been a few days since her birthday, but I was starting to wonder if there’d be another great chance like our almost-kiss on the roof. It would have been perfect. It seemed stupid to kiss her out of nowhere when we cuddled on the couch or stood on her doorstep. Maybe I was being dumb, but I wanted it to be an earth-shattering moment.

  A light thud sounded behind me, and I forced myself not to turn. I wanted to appear confident. So what if that evil ninja ran away from Courtney?

  Her footsteps were slow and soft—undetectable to someone untrained. She closed in, but I still didn’t turn. Her clothing shifted on her right side. I raised my hand and blocked.

  “Is that how you treat visitors?” I asked. While she focused on my block, I pulled out a poisoned shuriken. I slid it through the gap in the chair, placing it near her knee; the Serpent Scale poison would paralyze her momentarily.

  “Unwelcome visitors.” Her sword came around my neck. “Leave or die.”

  I pushed the shuriken so it touched her knee. She flinched. “I’m sure you don’t enjoy being paralyzed.”

  Releasing her sword, she sighed. “You’re wasting my time, Tosh.”

  She headed for the roof door, but I wasn’t done. I hopped off the chair, ran fast, and then flipped over her to block the door. “No, you’re wasting your time. You could have told me weeks ago.”

  Courtney laughed. “Tell me about your Clan, then.”

  “What? No way. I’m not asking for that. I just want to know what that thing was.”

  “It’s one and the same. Leave.” She tried to push me out of the way, but I didn’t move.

  “No. I deserve answers.” I stared her down. She was still too pretty, the kind of pretty that made you weak. Even if I’d mostly gotten over my crush, her eyes still pulled me in. I shook it off. Amy was pretty and nice.

  She put her hands on her hips. “Oh, you do? Why is that?”

  “Because! This is something important. I can’t help but think I’m involved.” Too much had happened in too short a time—Amy’s recruitment, Dad acting weird, evil ninja killing people. Two of those things seemed to be directly related to me. I couldn’t help but wonder if the last one was, too.

  She came right up to my face. Well, as close as she could get at five-two. “If you were important, then you’d know what was going on. You’re just some no-name mercenary. Honestly, you’re better off. So stick to your little jobs and leave the important stuff to people who are trained to handle it.”

  I didn’t back down. “You don’t think I’m trained?”

  “Not like I am.” She exuded confidence, and it pissed me off.

  “I could beat you.” I didn’t entirely believe that, but I told myself she’d just caught me off guard last time. I knew what to expect this round. Besides, I’d gotten stronger. If I could get my dad in the stomach, I had to be able to beat her.

  She laughed hard. “Sorry, I didn’t know you were so funny.”

  I clenched my fists. “All right, Courtney. I’ll make you a deal. You beat me
, and I’ll leave you alone. I beat you, and you tell me one thing about that guy we saw. No weapons.”

  “You love to get beat up, don’t you?” she stalled.

  “Well?”

  The glint in her eye told me she’d already decided to fight, but she looked down like she wasn’t sure. I moved out of the way when she tried to punch me. Her fist went into the door, making a loud thud. She shook her hand and scowled. “Okay, you’re fast.”

  I didn’t move. Courtney stood slightly forward, waiting to pounce but unsure of how to approach. She reminded me of a hawk waiting for the perfect moment to dive bomb.

  She lunged at me, but I grabbed her arm and spun her around so her back faced me. When I tried to kick her hamstring, she dodged and hooked her leg to trip me. I let her. Sometimes moving with an opponent is easier than fighting. She tried to stay standing, but I wrapped my arms around her and took her down.

  I had her pinned, but she jabbed her elbows into my sides and got free. We stood to face each other again, and now all her confidence was gone. I smiled.

  “How did you do that?” she growled.

  “Do what?” Did she really think I was an imbecile? If there was one thing I knew I could do, it was fight.

  She charged again, and I blocked her exceptional blows. Courtney was definitely well-trained, maybe over-trained. But it was all in her head—not her heart. She hated fighting. I could feel it. She thought of her moves in advance, where I let my instincts take over.

  Finally, an opening. She tried to kick me in the stomach. I grabbed her knee, ducked her uppercut, and then yanked her forward so she lost balance. She hit the roof hard, and I locked her in place. After about ten seconds of struggling to get out, she screamed. “I don’t lose!”

  “Now you do, Courtney, meaning I get the information.” Beating her was a serious confidence booster. If the evil ninja ran from her, maybe he would run from me.

  “Get off,” she seethed.

  “Nope. You owe me information, and I don’t trust that you’ll give it to me if I free you.” Her lips stayed shut as she stared me down, but I was done with her games. She’d lost. “Don’t make me pull out my Serpent’s Scale. Maybe holding your sword ransom would be better incentive.”

  Her eyes went wide. You don’t mess with a ninja’s sword. “The Akuma eat kami to gain power.”

  Kami? I knew what that meant: spirits. Sometimes it was translated as “gods” in English, but that wasn’t quite right. It was vaguer than that. Kami was the supernatural in something or someone, the part people couldn’t see but somehow knew was there. I wondered if that was what the green vine was.

  “What kind of power do they get from kami?”

  She shook her head. “You said one thing, you got one thing.”

  I swore. I did say that, and I kept my word. So I let her go and held out my hand to help her up, which she didn’t accept. She stared at me like she expected an argument, but I didn’t have anything else to say if she wouldn’t give more.

  “See you at school.” I didn’t know why I saluted, but I did. Maybe it was my way of rubbing her defeat in her face.

  Her features softened. “What are you? You’re the best fighter I’ve ever faced.” She took a few steps closer, swinging her hips more than normal. Was she hitting on me? She looked good, but I pushed past it. She wanted information, that was all.

  I shrugged. “Oh, I’m just some no-name mercenary with no training.”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  “Too bad.” Truth be told, I wasn’t sure who I was anymore, and it seemed like no one wanted to tell me. I jumped from the ledge and onto the roof of a neighboring house. I half expected her to follow me, but she didn’t.

  As I ran the rooftops back to my house, I thought about what she’d told me. The Akuma gained some kind of power from eating kami. That was probably why Courtney and her Clan fought them. There were still so many questions to be answered, but I felt empowered by the knowledge I had gained.

  When I slipped through my window, I heard my parents’ voices. They were discussing something in sharp, semi-raised tones. It was the closest I’d ever heard to yelling in our house.

  “He is smart, Hisako. He knows there is something going on. You can’t protect him forever.”

  “He needs more time. More training. We can’t risk his life yet.” I couldn’t breathe. My mom spoke perfect English, talking like she knew all about the ninja thing.

  “You didn’t see him at the Clan meeting. He hit me. Me. And he’ll only get better. Amy pushes him, motivates him. They are it, and they need to know before they go too far.”

  It? It what? My heart wouldn’t slow down no matter how deeply I breathed. My parents had been keeping something huge from me. My mom was a freaking ninja! I felt betrayed, and yet insanely curious about what they were saying.

  “They’ll be fine with more time. They need to connect before we tell them. My forces can hold off the Akuma,” Mom said. Connect? Her forces? My mother, the woman who screamed at Japanese game shows, had forces?

  “They have connected, I can assure you.” There was a slight growl in his voice that I didn’t understand. It sounded like he didn’t want us together, but didn’t he just say we were “it”?

  “You mean they’ve—?”

  “No!” Dad sighed. “I’ve told you a thousand times it has nothing to do with that. It’s deeper.”

  “If they haven’t, then we have plenty of time. Just train them.”

  There was a long pause before my father answered. “Fine, but it won’t last long. He saw that Akuma try to take kami. Whether we tell him or not, Toshiro will figure it out eventually.”

  I probably should have stormed into the room and demanded to know what was going on, but I crawled into my bed instead. I could barely wrap my mind around the information. They were both ninjas, and if they didn’t want to tell me, they wouldn’t. I simmered with anger as I replayed their words in my mind. Even if they were doing it for my own good, my parents had been lying to me my whole life.

  Who could I trust if I couldn’t trust them?

  17

  My mom’s short black hair bounced in loose curls as she shook her head at the bumbling contestants on TV. It used to be funny. Now it felt like she was mocking me. I couldn’t talk to my parents after overhearing their conversation. I resented them for deceiving me, and I decided to find out what they were hiding on my own to spite them. I didn’t even feel guilty about it.

  Mom made me mad, but I was angrier at myself. I should have seen it. Of course she won all those shows! What a simple and ridiculous cover. She was such a good ninja that I lived with her and didn’t know. The thought knocked the air out of me—I didn’t know a real thing about my own mother.

  More than anything, I couldn’t understand why she hid her identity. That hurt the most. Even if she didn’t tell me about her “forces” or what she did with them, couldn’t she at least have told me she was a ninja?

  Amy laughed and spread her hand over my stomach. I rubbed her arm and pulled her in closer. My mom didn’t react. I could be as physical with Amy as I wanted, and Mom didn’t bat an eye. At least Dad reacted like a normal parent. He would tell us to knock it off if he saw us. I thought a lot about their conversation, how creepy it was that my mom seemed to want us to go further.

  I’d been testing the waters for a few days now. The cuddling made my mom smile too much, and she kept telling Amy to come over whenever she wanted. Last night I let Amy stay until two and we fell asleep on the couch. Mom just nudged me awake and told us—not me, us—to go to my room. It was like she was purposely giving us the opportunity.

  I looked down at Amy. Whatever they were talking about applied to her as much as it did to me. I wanted to protect her and I couldn’t. She had to suspect something huge was happening.

  We were it, whatever that meant. I had to tell her everything I knew. I could trust her.

  My dad was out for the night, and I’d discovered Mom o
ften disappeared once I was “in bed.” That was when I could talk to Amy without anyone hearing. She yawned—perfect opening.

  “You tired?” I stroked her silky hair. She wore it down more often now.

  “I don’t want to go home,” she pouted.

  “I didn’t say home. Ma, we’re going to bed.”

  “Okay, goodnight!” She waved us off without looking away from the TV.

  Amy’s eyebrows arched so high I swear they hit her hairline, but she followed me to my room.

  “What the hell?” she said.

  I put my finger to her lips. “Something’s going on.”

  “No kidding.”

  “I can’t tell you until she’s gone. So you’ll have to pretend you’re okay sleeping with me…like really sleeping…not …” My face heated up. This should not be so awkward with my own girlfriend.

  She smirked. “Sure, I can pretend. Why would I ever want to sleep with my boyfriend?”

  Amy jumped on the bed and I gulped. Dude, I was scared. How was I supposed to pretend to sleep? I didn’t expect to be facing this scenario for another few years. She pulled off her hoodie, revealing a green tank top.

  “Coming?” She seemed to hold back a laugh.

  “Uh, yeah.” I pulled off my own sweater and got in. We stared at each other. “I don’t know how to do this.”

  She giggled and pulled the covers over us. “Are there rules?”

  “Aren’t there?” I wished there was some kind of instruction manual at least.

  “I don’t think so. We’re only sleeping, right?” She laid her head on my pillow and looked at me, a soft smile on her lips. “Come here.”

  I took a deep breath and lay down. I wasn’t even touching her—we’d cuddled closer on the couch—but everything seemed different in a bed. Expectations? Maybe that wasn’t the right word. I didn’t want her to think I was pushing her there. I respected her. We’d just started dating.