Nomad Soul

There are children playing under the sakura trees in Ueno Park in the winter, and I watch them from the shelter of a slender trunk, a tangle of black branches. The rays of the sun are weak through a crack in the clouds, and I wait, shielding my eyes from the sudden pink flush of afternoon light.

It begins to snow but the children play still, ringing around the guardian tree like wreaths of flowers. Some, their faces upturned to the white flakes, await it with rapture in their smiles, eager longing in their eyes. Their garments float on the chill wind like gossamer. I watch as one little boy bends, watching the snow build in mounds like anthills across the dead grass, and ever so slowly, he brings his face toward the earth, closing his eyes.

Hello, I want to say. How does it taste, the snow? Can you feel it tingle on your tongue, like the last remnants of summer melting away into nothing? Does it flow, cool and wet across the back of your throat like the rain?

The little boy turns his head and his eyes move across the space where I am, across the trunk of the tree and the patch of dry ground on which I stand. His gaze slides past me, hollow, empty. I take a step forward, but he is already moving, standing, running to join the ethereal wreath of white-robed children that throng around the old, black tree.

One of the children stops in mid-step, head bent toward me. You are not one of us, the motion says. Who are you? I reach out a hand toward her. She uncurls her own tiny fingers, placing her palm to my palm, but her hand passes through mine as if there is nothing, empty air, and her eyes are vacant as she presses her icy lips to my human flesh.

I watch as she moves away from me, and she is already fading from my own mind as I move to stand among them, taking my place as I should have taken it long ago. As the sunlight fades, their numbers seem to swell, flickering into existence until they cover the vast, empty gray field, all fluttering sleeves and trailing hems and flowing strands of black hair. Their faces blank, their eyes void of all love and hatred, their empty hands outstretched in supplication, and in answer, the ancient tree creaks in the wind.

I know that the one I seek is not here, has never been here, but I have come all the same. It is acceptable to them, at least, because they have not yet driven me away. For it is blood that links them, and it is my blood that makes me known to them as a kinsman, as one who shared the terror of that last terrible moment, because my blood also lies buried underneath the sakura tree.