Description: Dad Comes Home It happened on September 2, close to the end of summer vacation. Since morning, no one in the house had been able to settle down. Mom was restless: cleaning, fixing her makeup again and again, running around like a Japanese dancing mouse (I have no idea what a Japanese dancing mouse is; I''m just repeating what I''ve heard adults say). Even though they were usually out on Sunday afternoons, my two sisters were home and watching a Korean soap opera on television. And even I should have been listening to my favorite music or playing a video game--or visiting those unusual friends of mine who lived nearby. But today I didn''t want to take a single step out of the house. Why do you think that was? You know, of course. Actually . . . Whoa. Before I talk about the reason, first a little about those unusual friends. Until about six months ago I had not been treated well at school or home. I always had too much free time, and I was always below average in sports and my studies. I guess you could say that the only interest I had was creating, in secret, my own figurines in my room. I used them to act out meaningless little plays, steeping myself in deluded dreams . . . that is, as I said, until about six months ago, when during the long vacation of Golden Week, I got swept up in an adventure that could blow your mind. It was through that incident that I had made my friends. And they weren''t the kind of friends you just go out to dinner with or play computer games with, either. My comrades were psychics--people with supernatural powers--who took me on life-threatening but thrilling adventures. Allow me to introduce them: First is Ayano Fujimura, the girl who sits next to me in class. She''s half Japanese; her left eye is blue-gray, her right eye brown; and she''s the most popular girl at our school, Kikyo ga Oka Junior High, bar none. Her hair has a touch of chestnut and is straight, the effect of her eyes being different colors is striking, her height is just right at five-foot-two, and her weight, well, I don''t know, but it''s probably on the lighter side of average. Frankly, half the boys in my class are in love with her. But she''s more than pretty. Ayano has a mysterious power. It''s a power called "astral projection," which basically means her spirit can cast off her body and do stuff like inhabit another person''s body, or see stuff that''s far away. In fact, my adventure of six months ago had started when Ayano''s astral projection had come into my room seeking help. Next up is Kaito Himuro. Like me and Ayano, he''s fourteen years old, but Kaito looks older. Kaito, who grew up on the mean streets of Yokohama''s Nationless Quarter, is really tall and has a bit of a "bad boy" air about him. He is a psychoburner. Apparently that''s what you call the power to convert psychic waves into heat. To put it simply, maybe you could say he''s a psychic who uses fire. Xiao Long Baim is half Chinese. Two years younger than me, he''s a seventh grader at Kikyo ga Oka Junior High. A slender, beautiful boy, Xiao Long has the power of qigong: he can use the power of qi to throw people and to heal illness and injuries. And then there is Ji Toma. He''s a genius-level psychic. Although he''s supposedly just fourteen years old like me, there were rumors going around about him and Akira Hiyama, who worked as the school janitor. What kind of rumors, you ask? Well, that they were "involved," of course! Ji definitely spent a lot of time in Hiyama''s room, and when they were seen walking around, side by side, they made a lovely couple. But I knew all about how that wasn''t the real reason they were together so frequently. Incidentally, Ji has the power of psychometry, which is like mind reading. But he also has another, even more important ability: the genuine power of clairvoyance. Now, I don''t want you thinking, "Yeah, sure he does." The reason is that, unlike those psychic charlatans you see on TV, Ji''s prescience is on-target one hundred percent of the time. This was an amazing thing. Because if he said "the world will be destroyed tomorrow," then you could be sure that''s just what would happen. But then, as you might expect, there also seemed to be things that Ji didn''t know. And in those instances where Ji, using his clairvoyance, would create a "time paradox," or a contradiction in the flow of time, his powers didn''t work. But he''s definitely a super psychic, because things flashed into his head just before they were about to happen, allowing him to do things like dodge bullets. Accordingly, of the four who had escaped from the Greenhouse, Ji was definitely the leader. The Greenhouse was a psychic training center run by a group shrouded in mystery where my friends had once been held captive. They were the first friends I ever had. But I had made two more in the course of my adventures: One was Takemaru Hidama. He''s now my classmate, and probably my best friend, but, when we first met, he was my enemy. Takemaru tried to kill me with his amazingly powerful psychokinesis--a power so extraordinary he was able to destroy the gymnasium we were fighting in. The second was Maya Kasuga. She had also once tried to kill me, but now we get along great. What can I say? A lot of things have happened. When we meet, we still playfully insult each other back and forth, but maybe she kinda, y''know, likes me . . . oh, forget I even said anything. You''ll think I''m the kind of guy who gets the wrong idea, so let''s just not go there. I was grinning at these thoughts when a feminine voice inside my head said: You were thinking that maybe I what . . . ? It was Maya. Speak of the devil. It seemed she was peeking inside my head from somewhere else. Let me tell you, telepaths can be scary! What''s a guy gotta do to be able to have a quiet think around here? What, again? I told you, you can''t just go peeping inside someone''s head anytime you want! I showed my anger without speaking aloud to her, naturally. It felt like Maya had left, but my sister Hanae, who was sitting diagonally across me, eyed me suspiciously. I cleared my throat as a cover-up, and, doing my best to make sure it didn''t show on my face, I faced Maya inside my mind and addressed her directly: It is in poor taste to peek into someone''s head. It''s an invasion of privacy. Oh, my, Maya laughed, that''s just because you''re worried about what I might see. But forget about that now. Are you doing anything today? Back at the station, I found a bakery with the most delicious sweets. You don''t have anything going on, do you? Want to go? Was this any way to invite a person out? Maya was always like this. Well, it wasn''t like she meant anything by it, but who wouldn''t be rubbed the wrong way? It didn''t make me feel so good, but it didn''t make me feel so bad, either. By the way, Maya was pretending to be someone totally different at school: Sayaka Mamidori. Using her power of telepathy, Maya could make people see her however she wanted. She had made herself look really pretty, so she was the next most popular with the boys after Ayano. Kind of sneaky, maybe. Well, if they knew what she was really like, they''d probably all back off. I mean, her face was cute, but personality-wise, she was really, really ill-natured. Well, excuse me if I have some personality problems! Maya''s angry voice resounded inside my head. She seemed a little hurt, and I couldn''t bear that. Oh, no, all I mean is, if you''d just be nice, I would think you were cuter, that''s all, I followed hurriedly. Y-you think so? What is nice like? I don''t know. Explain it to me. Explain it to you? That''s not as easy as you think. Even though I thought Maya was a pretty strange girl, lately she''d begun to grow on me . . . no, what was I saying? Ayano was the only one for me . . . Huh? What was that about Ayano? Uh-oh. Not good. Maya and Ayano fought like cats and dogs. C''mon. Is something going on with Ayano? No, nothing. Anyway, sorry about today. Can I go with you to the bakery next time? I have something going on where I can''t leave the house. Oh, I see . . . Shoot. Well, that''s okay. But you''re definitely coming with me next time. Telepathic access cut off, like someone hanging up a phone on the other end. Had I made her angry? Well, that''s the way it went. Besides, today was . . . Oh! I''m getting sidetracked. I''m always with these same people, and lately we''ve been having lots of fun. But let''s get back to the reason why I''m not leaving the house at all today. Drum roll, please. . . . The reason is . . . Dad''s coming home! Huh? What do you mean, no big deal? Well, okay, maybe so, but to me and my family, it was kind of amazing. Dad had been sent by his company to work in another city and had been living far from his family for a long time. Now he was coming home. We''d heard about it suddenly one month ago. That day the atmosphere inside the house had brightened. Dad was absolutely essential to the Hase family. It wasn''t because he did anything particularly special. Mom prepared all the meals, natch. Mom and Suzue, my oldest sister, did the cleaning. Hanae, my next oldest sister, cleaned the bathtub, and for several years now, it had been my job to change the ligh

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