Land of the Undead
Prologue
Riku and I have been friends ever since I can remember. Our families have known each other for generations. Both of our families moved from Japan to a city in California, U.S.A. the same year, and Riku went to the same school that I did. We never really fit in, and were always the odd-ones-out, just because we were different. We had dark, jet black hair and deep, dark brown eyes. All of the kids here had brown, blonde, or even orange hair, with green, blue, or hazel eyes. We were resented for our differences, but we didn't care, we always had each other.
I really shouldn't say "always", because he was absent from school a lot. He and his family were a bit short of the "average American family". Starting with that they weren't American. But even by the standards of my family, they were different. They went on these "trips" about once a month, usually on a weekend, but sometimes in the middle of the week. They would normally be gone for only a few hours, but when he would return from the "trips" he always seemed more . . . energized. If I asked him what he did while he was gone, he would just try to change the subject, as if he was trying to hide some type of weird secret. A few years later, when we were in high school, I learned what that secret was.
I really shouldn't say "always", because he was absent from school a lot. He and his family were a bit short of the "average American family". Starting with that they weren't American. But even by the standards of my family, they were different. They went on these "trips" about once a month, usually on a weekend, but sometimes in the middle of the week. They would normally be gone for only a few hours, but when he would return from the "trips" he always seemed more . . . energized. If I asked him what he did while he was gone, he would just try to change the subject, as if he was trying to hide some type of weird secret. A few years later, when we were in high school, I learned what that secret was.
