I Fell In Love With A Girl Who Died Before I Was Even Born

Fifth period History had become an entirely new kind of monster—an undead one that smelled like a dumpster fire of rancid cat litter, rotten eggs, and something even darker and less describable.

Of course, Skuzz the zombie had decided his permanent seat was right beside mine, forcing me to inch closer and closer to the window, silently praying that Menrei-sensei had left it open today.

Thankfully, she had.

Even Yuki, who couldn't smell, lingered by the window instead of taking her usual spot next to me.

Ghost privileges, I suppose.

"Yo, how you doin', dawg?" Skuzz asked, his grin flashing blackened, flaking teeth.

I looked over and immediately regretted it, gagging at the sight.

"Hey, you know what? I saw your fight earlier," he continued, leaning closer. "You did pretty good, all things considered."

I offered him a weak nod of thanks and pretended to be engrossed in the lesson.

"So," he continued, undeterred, "I gotta ask, how're you even walkin' right now?"

I gave him a sideways glance. "I'm not."

He snorted with laughter, sending a glob of yellowish-grey phlegm splattering to the floor.

"Oh hell, is that part of my brain?" he asked, leaning down to inspect it.

I tried, desperately, to ignore him.

But when his eyeball fell out of its socket and swung like a grotesque pendulum, my stomach did an involuntary somersault.

Skuzz giggled as he casually jammed the eyeball back into place with a disturbingly moist pop.

"Nah, false alarm. Just somethin' I ate earlier."

Yuki grimaced openly. "Ew. You're disgusting. You're dead, Skuzz. You don't even need to eat."

He shrugged cheerfully. "Old habits, right? High five!"

He raised his hand in expectation. Thankfully, I hesitated long enough for it to detach and flop onto the floor with a sad slap.

"Ah, whatever. That was loose anyway," he muttered, scooping it up and stapling it back onto his wrist with his oversized stapler.

"You wouldn't happen to have any duct tape, would you? You know what they say about duct tape…"

I gave in and turned toward him fully.

"Um… if you can't duck it—" I began.

"Handyman's secret weapon!" he finished, proudly.

Then his expression shifted, becoming oddly serious as he gestured toward my leg.

"Look, my eyes might pop out occasionally—sometimes I gotta grab a fresher one, helps keep a new perspective, y'know? But, seriously, dawg, you sure you're alright? That orc barely flinched, and you kicked him like your life depended on it."

"I'm fine," I repeated, sharper this time.

He raised half an eyebrow, the other half had detached sometime earlier and reluctantly moved on.

"You given any more thought to our undead school?" he whispered conspiratorially.

I had.

"Yeah, but I don't understand why you need me. Why not go directly to Hina if your idea's so great?"

He crossed his arms indignantly.

"First off, you think Suiren-sensei wants to see me in her office again? Believe me, less is more when it comes to me and authority figures. But here's the kicker: we don't actually need her."

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My internal alarm bells began to wail.

"What? She's the provost of Crescent Moon Academy," I said. "Of course we need her."

He flashed the smile of someone who just discovered a loophole in reality itself.

"Only if we wanna do it here, officially, at Crescent Moon. Which, don't get me wrong, would be dope, but let's not put the cart before the zombie horse."

I narrowed my eyes suspiciously. "What's your point?"

Skuzz dramatically pointed toward Yuki.

"We only need her. Your ghost girlfriend's technically old enough to be a teacher. If she signs off on this little undead startup, then we're golden. We just need a place to meet. Library, coffee shop, abandoned warehouse, wherever. It's basically, 'if the ghost signs, they will come.' Ya dig?"

I glanced at Yuki, who stared silently out the window, watching skeletal branches sway like she wasn't paying attention, but I knew better.

At the front, Menrei-sensei, wearing today's smiling courtesan mask, began her lecture. Her delicate, lacquered voice floated gently across the classroom.

"Imagine, children: 4,400 ships, the fleet of Kublai Khan. They sailed from China, Korea, and even Mongolia. But that hardly mattered…"

Skuzz nodded appreciatively. "Ah, this old chestnut. It's a good one."

I ignored him.

"The two fleets united on August 12th, 1281, at Hakata Bay," Menrei-sensei continued, fanning herself theatrically. "Three days later, they prepared to attack 40,000 samurai. Outnumbered by about 100,000 men. You could say it wouldn't have exactly been a fair fight."

She giggled softly behind the painted wooden mask.

Suddenly, a sickening squelch yanked my attention back to Skuzz.

His side had split open, disgorging a tangle of dark, necrotic innards onto the floor.

"Mind giving me a hand, dawg?" he asked sheepishly. "Just...grab a handful, shove 'em back in, and I'll staple up the gap."

I looked down at the floor, and immediately wished I hadn't.

"Oh, geez, Ryu, dawg, I had no idea you had a weak stomach," Skuzz tried to apologize.

I nodded, but I couldn't look back over at him.

"Hey, you know, it's not like I'm the world's biggest Crescent Mood Academy fan. I mean, I might go here, right? But do you think I'm going to ever actually graduate and then what? Get a job somewhere?"

What the hell was he talking about?

"Like, think about it for two seconds, Ryu? I've been going to this school for, like, years. I ain't gonna leave. I ain't gonna 'live among humans' or whatever crap comes out of Hina's mouth about yokai and humans. You know why I'm here, really?"

I tensed as I heard his insides sloshing around, spilling some more to the floor, and he leaned a little closer.

"I'm just killin' time. You know? Before it all just… rots away."

I glanced over and I swear, his smile was so damn earnest for a second. Before one of his blackened teeth wiggled by itself and I had to look towards Yuki again.

"Just say what you mean," I whispered, trying to listen to the history lesson again.

Skuzz reached onto the floor, scooped up a handful of his guts, and tried putting them back inside.

I don't want to get into it.

"Look at it this way. If I were busy with something else… like, hypothetically, an unaccredited night school for the undead at the local library, I suppose I wouldn't have to come to Menrei-sensei's dumb-ass history class."

I could feel the displeasure of the masks around me.

I turned towards Yuki in the window. She wasn't listening to Menrei-sensei, Skuzz, or me.

She looked bored. Lost in her own world.

"It'd give her something to do too. She'd be a great teacher, Ryu. Hell, I bet she's even taught you a thing or two."

I casually glanced over at Skuzz, processing everything he'd said about the undead, killing time, and Yuki being a teacher somewhere.

"It was then that their prayers to Ryujin, the mighty storm-dragon of the ocean were answered. He unleashed the full wrath of the kamikaze, the holy wave. Divine retribution for the Khan's pride. How dare he think he could touch the land of the yokai?"

Skuzz was busy trying to stuff the last bit of his guts back into the tear in his side before they popped back out again.

"I guess I can run the idea by Yuki," I said. "I'm not about to say I'm okay with it without letting her know that she's supposed to teach… the undead? Is she teaching other ghosts?"

Skuzz nodded.

"Of course. Yes. You need to run this past Yuki. She's pivotal in all of this. I mean, what kind of a monster to you think I am?"

A horrible one. A rotten, putrid…

I sighed.

Yes. And he was trying to give Yuki something to do other than float around with me.

"Ryu?" I suddenly heard Yuki. "Menrei-sensei's talking about a quiz. This might be important."

I looked over where she was floating by the window.

She'd turned back around to face the class, and I was so glad she'd been paying attention for me.

"Yuki," I began.

But before I could finish, Menrei-sensei's voice cut me off.

"Kazeyama-san? Is there something interesting by the window or are you just choosing to daydream during my class?" she asked.

The students around me chuckled, even Skuzz, the undead wasteland.

"Sorry," I murmured. "I was listening to you talking about the samurai watching the waves overturn the Mongol's boats during a storm. I was thinking about what a cool heavy metal music video that would be."

I expected her to yell at me.

Instead, she was quiet for a moment.

"You were listening to me?" she asked, surprised. "And you were imagining that what I was saying was not only interesting, but cool?"

I shrugged. I mean… kinda.

"I think it'd help if Iron Maiden or Judas Priest did the music, but yeah."

She tilted her head.

"Judas Priest? Kazeyama-san, what year do you think this is? 1984? Are you feeling okay?"

Skuzz spoke up just then.

"Menrei-sensei? I can pretty much confirm that Kazeyama took several blows to the head by an orc earlier. He's a sick man."

She nodded.

"Oh. Well, okay then. That makes sense. Iron Maiden, really? Kazeyama-san's been listening to Somewhere in Time too much."