Mika found the next week surprisingly normal considering all that had happened previously. A slight difference could be seen in Ayako, who had found a new determination to best Kaito in absolutely everything. This always ended in her failure, but that hadn’t dampened her spirits. If anything, it only added fuel to the fire. Mika also noted that Kaito had taken to staring out the window more often with a distant look on her face. He continued to come to school and interact normally with his peers, but Mika got the feeling he hadn’t fully decided to stay yet. The thought of him suddenly disappearing made her heart flutter with anxiety, but the only thing she could do was demonstrate to him that the three had, and would continue to keep, his secret.

Overall though, little had changed between the four, for which Mika was incredibly grateful. The days continue to pass as normally as they always had until it was Friday at last. In light of the day, the trio was in an exceptionally good mood and the conversation drifted toward their plans for this evening and the weekend.

“Hey!” Ayako interrupted Kana and Mika who were discussing which books to read over the next couple of days. “Have you guys heard about the old school house at the back of the school property?”

Kana and Mika halted their conversation and glanced at each other before turning their attention to Ayako. “I haven’t,” Mika said as she shook her head.

Meanwhile Kana nodded – there was nothing about the school that she didn’t know.

“They say it’s haunted,” Ayako told Mika. “I heard Tanaka Ayame from class 2-B talking about it the other day. Apparently she and her friend were dared to go into the building last weekend. Tanaka-san said it was eerie from the start, and as they went in, they started hearing moans coming from the walls. Right after, her friend fell down the stairs. She broke her arm from the fall, but she swears she was pushed down by some invisible force.”

“Ayako,” Mika asked wearily. “Where exactly are you going with this?”

“We should go check it out!”

“Ayako that’s foolish,” Kana reasoned. “It’s considered dangerous because the building is half rotten. Walking in there carelessly could put all of us in danger.”

“Don’t you want to go see a real ghost though?” she asked excitedly

“Ghosts don’t exist.”

“Wouldn’t you have said that about beasts a week ago? But look where we are now!” Ayako threw her hand upwards to gesture to the lump laying on top of the roof.

Kana’s gaze drifted warily up to Kaito. “We shouldn’t be talking about that here.”

“It’s fine, it’s fine.” Ayako waved away her friend’s concern. “There’s no one else up here anyway.”

“If there was something like a ghost, Kaito probably would’ve noticed it, right? Right?” Mika spoke up, directing the first question to her friends and the second to Kaito.

“Hm, it’s hard to say. I’m not exactly well versed on all of the supernatural entities that may or may not exist in Japan,” he responded.

“So, it’s settled then! Let’s go check it out tonight!”

“You’re too adventurous for your own good Ayako,” Kana sighed, but she realized that protesting would do nothing to dissuade her ambitious friend. Kana could either accompany Ayako, or Ayako would tackle the adventure on her own. Once she had set her mind to something, it was nigh impossible to talk her out of it. And so, later that night the three girls and one uninvited guest rendezvoused at the closed school gate.

“Why are you here?” Ayako asked, glaring at said uninvited guest.

“Cause I wanna be.”

“Go home! You’re not wanted.”

“How cruel.” Kaito mocked a wounded tone. “This is far more exciting than sitting in my apartment alone on a Friday night. Besides, I’m just as curious about it as you are.”

“You’re so stubborn!”

“Look who’s talking.”

“Now, now you two,” Mika said. “There’s no need to fight about it. Maybe we should all just go home.”

Kana supported her words with a nod, but the instigator of the adventure ignored the both of them as she said, “The main wall would be impossible to climb over, but in the back it’s just a chain link fence so it’ll be easy to climb. Let’s go!”

The roads didn’t form a perfect block around the school, and to get to the back, they had to circle around to a park and then maneuver through a dense line of trees and hedges to reach the fence. The top of the fence was a bit over their heads and heavily rusted, but Ayako didn’t pause as she latched onto it and scurried to the top. “Don’t worry. It’s safe,” she declared as she jumped down on the other side.

“Even if it is safe, it still doesn’t look fun to climb,” Mika ventured as she glanced over it. She was dubious about her climbing skills, but grabbed onto the thin metal and pulled herself onto the fence. With a grunt of effort, she moved up another pace. Slowly but surely she made her way up, and by the time she reached the top bar, her muscles were vibrating from effort and adrenaline. Steadying herself on the top bar and preparing for the downward drop took the longest, but at last she arrived safely on the other side.

Kana followed right behind Mika while Kaito brought up the rear. Tensing his muscles, he leapt off the ground and soared over the fence in one fluid movement.

“This adventure doesn’t need a show off,” Ayako hissed at him as he came to a gentle landing beside her.

“Who me?” he questioned in a teasing tone. “I thought you were in a hurry to get your little escapade started so I used the most efficient method for clearing the fence.”

“You… Wipe that smirk off your face!” While Ayako’s face contorted in anger, a taunting smile covered his.

Kaito ignored the girl as he stared off into the trees. “That’s it over there right?”

The sun had already dipped past the horizon, but its dying glow cast just enough light for the girls to see the corner of a wooden building in the distance. The rest of the structure was hidden by the thick trees.

“That should be it,” Kana confirmed. “The only other part of the old school is the club room, but it’s on the west side of the property and we just entered from the east.”

The four wove their way between the miniature forest of cedar trees before they arrived at a clearing. The grass around the old school building was up to the girls’ mid-calf, but once again, it didn’t slow Ayako down as she dashed forward to look at the wooden structure.

“It’s even more dilapidated that I thought it would be,” Kana remarked as she cleared the last line of trees.

“It seems as though it could crumble at any moment,” Mika agreed with a nod as she glanced over the rotten wooden boards. The roof on one side had begun to cave in; many of the windows had been broken, and those that weren’t, were so full of dust that it was impossible to see through. Green moss created a patchwork across the roof and walls. “A-are you sure you really want to go in Ayako?”

“It should be okay, I think…” she replied, as she moved toward the door. She rattled the handle a bit, only to find the door locked. “What? No way!” She jiggled it harder, before proceeding to jerk it backwards and forwards more roughly.

Mika and Kana were just about to take a collective sigh of relief when they heard a loud crack. Both of them jumped at the noise - Mika a bit higher than Kana - before turning to look back to their friend.

“I got it.” Ayako pointed at the now busted door, and held up the knob that had broken off completely in her hand. A chunk of wood still dangled off the end of it.

“Only this girl would brute-force her way in by completely breaking the door,” Kaito remarked as he stepped past her into the building.

“You -!” Ayako broke off in a fit of coughing as the thick dust from the abandoned school house entered her lungs.

“Be careful not to inhale too much,” Kana said, coming up behind Ayako and patting her back a few times. “In fact, we should be careful not to stir it up at all. It is probably thick enough to cause spontaneous combustion.”

Another crack sounded in front of them. This time, the trio turned to find it was Kaito who’d stepped on a rotten part of the floor and snapped it under his weight. Another puff of dust was released into the air as he pulled back.

“Ah, whoops.”

“And you were criticizing me!” Ayako shouted. “Now who’s breaking things?”

“It’s not like I meant to,” Kaito retorted. “Not like you did, shaking the door until it literally fell apart.”

“How else were we supposed to get in?!”

Kaito rolled his eyes in response as he examined the floor more carefully for weakened boards. “I’ll lead,” he announced as he analyzed the safest path between the rotten wood.

“Who would trust you when you’re the one that fell first?” Ayako snapped. But even as she protested, the other two were falling into a careful line behind Kaito as he began his trek down the left hallway. Ayako was left with no other choice but to file in behind them.

The layout of the old school looked simple enough; there were two floors with the staircase located past the shoe lockers in the entryway. From the base of the stairs, a hall branched out in either direction.

“You’re excited about this aren’t you?” Mika prompted Kaito quietly enough that Kana following a couple of strides behind her couldn’t hear. She’d just caught his expression in a brief glimpse, but there was a light in his eyes that she’d never seen before.

“I’m interested,” he agreed as he rounded a corner into the first classroom. “The monotony of everyday life gets boring after a while. So it’s nice to do something a bit out of the norm.”

Mika couldn’t disagree with him there. She was anxious, but it was nice to be on a kind of adventure.

“How boring,” Ayako muttered as she stepped into a classroom. The room was vacant, save for a few old desks piled against the back wall. The teacher’s podium had been removed, but the chalkboard still hung against the front wall. Nothing about the room hinted at anything paranormal. “Let’s try the next one!”

The second classroom was even more empty with not even desks to fill the space.

“Where are the ghosts?” Ayako complained after she’d scanned the third room and found, still, nothing. “It’s completely dark now, so we should definitely see them soon right?” she spoke more to herself than to the others as she turned toward the bathrooms located on the right side of the hallway.

Using her phone as a flashlight, she opened the four stalls one by one. The doors groaned angrily as she forced the old hinges to move, but otherwise it remained quiet.

“I don’t know if I have enough battery life to do a complete scan of the whole school,” she said, scowling at her phone as she waved it in the air. “What about you guys?”

“I’m at twenty percent,” Kana stated.

“I don’t have a phone,” Mika said more slowly, horribly aware of her lack of income.

“Damn.”

“Let’s just call it off here then,” Kana suggested. “There’s no such thing as ghosts anyway.”

“I have an idea,” Mika said slowly, glancing at the old lights hanging over the sink. “Do you think the light bulbs still work?”

“It’s possible if they haven’t been used,” Kana said slowly. “But the electricity has been off in the building since they closed it down.”

“Can you unscrew it Ayako?”

“Yeah. Give me a sec.” Ayako climbed up on the small counter and reached up, unscrewing one with a small grunt of effort. “I got it, but what do you plan to do with it?” she questioned as she handed the bulb to Mika.

Mika gave a small smile as she walked swiftly out into the hallway. Kana and Ayako glanced at each other, a confused look covering both of their faces before they followed her back out to where Kaito was standing.

With a slight tilt of her head and a shy smile, she offered him the bulb.

Kaito couldn’t resist the almost puppy-dog like face she gave him - full of unspoken curiosity. With a half smile and a short chuckle, he took it and immediately a dim light filled the hallway.

“What the -” Ayako started as she looked at the two. “Is there literally any end to your weirdness?”

“Say what you want, but I’m still convinced you're the weirdest one here,” he retorted.

“You can generate an electrical current?” Kana marveled, moving closer to him as if to see sparks of electricity shooting out of his body.

“Yeah,” Kaito admitted in an off-handed tone as he shrugged away from their staring eyes. “So, we continue?”

Even Ayako couldn’t help the enthusiastic nod as she got the chance to continue her adventure. “Let’s go upstairs,” she prompted. “That’s where the other kids heard things.”

“Do you think it’s safe?” Mika questioned. It looked as though the termites considered the stairs their home base. The right half of the staircase was partially gone, and Mika had no faith that the left side would support their weight.

Ayako tested out the first stair, bouncing on it a bit excessively. It creaked and moaned, but gave no sign of breaking. “Yeah, I think it’ll be fine as long as we don’t all stand on the same stair.” She climbed up a few more, once again, testing their resilience. The further up she went, the more confident she became, reaching the top before the others had made it halfway.

Ayako had turned to comment lightly on their slowness when a soft whistle sounded from the end of the hallway. “Guys! I hear something! Come on!” Without waiting for a response, she bolted around the corner.

“Ayako wait!” Kana yelled. “Be careful! The floor might not be sturdy!” But her friend was already long gone. With a sigh of exasperation, she turned to Kaito who was trailing leisurely behind them. “Kaito, would you please go after her? I’m worried about how safe the upper floor is.”

“Sure,” he agreed with an easy nod. “Just tread lightly the rest of the way up. I can’t catch all of you simultaneously.” With that, he glided to the top in a few easy strides and rounded the corner. Kaito caught sight of only Ayako’s hair as she turned into the classroom at the end of the hallway.

He gave chase, expecting her to be on the other end of the classroom. Unfortunately, she’d stopped just over the threshold out of sight, and Kaito, caught off guard at a flat run, grabbed onto the door frame, forcing himself to a stop before they both toppled to the ground.

“What the hell -”

“Shh!” Ayako hissed as she pointed toward the window. She’d finally seen it and her heart pounded with adrenaline while curiosity drove her another step forward. Just inside of the window, a small light in a vague shape of a human was swaying back and forth as it floated just above the ground.

Ayako moved several more steps into the classroom and it gave a low groan. Another step, and a louder groan, this time accompanied by the windchime whistle she’d heard originally.

“Ayako!”

Crack.