[Every morning, I race a ghost.
It waits at the summit. Some days it pulls me forward. Other days, it tries to bury me in the rocks.]
I wake up at 4:17 AM.
No alarm. My body knows. It always knows.
The room is dark except for a dull orange glow bleeding through the window—streetlights below the ridge line. The blanket's heavy with sweat. My body aches in that way that means something real happened yesterday.
My legs throb, especially the right quad. Tight from the fall on the shale slope.
Good.
I sit up, press my feet to the floor, and let the chill bite my soles. The cold is always there in this house, even in summer. It climbs up the bones, slow and steady like frost on stone.
Grandpa's already up. I hear him in the kitchen, pouring tea. His steps are light, barely a whisper on the old wooden floorboards. He never asks if I'm running. He doesn't need to.
I am.
I brush my teeth in silence. Pull on my windbreaker, check the zipper. Lace up the shoes—still damp from yesterday's descent. There's a tear on the outer mesh, right foot. I should replace them. I won't.
By 4:36 I'm outside, standing at the base of Mount Karu.
No one else in the town would be awake yet. The mountain looms above the treetops, a jagged black line against a sky that hasn't decided whether it's night or morning.
The silence here is thick. The kind that presses on your ears and makes your heartbeat sound too loud. The wind hasn't started yet. The crows haven't begun screaming.
Perfect.
I take my first step off the pavement and onto dirt.
The run begins.
The path starts easy: soft forest floor, pine needles, the faint curve of a hunter's trail. My legs settle into rhythm. Arms low. Breathing steady. The first five minutes are always a lie—they make me think I'm strong.
But then the incline kicks in. The forest tilts. Rocks grow underfoot. The soil turns to roots and damp stone.
I pick up speed.
Running up a mountain is stupid. I know this. Every cell in my body screams it. But that's the point.
Most people think the mountain is about conquering nature. But they're wrong.
The mountain doesn't care if you make it. Doesn't cheer when you reach the top. It just watches. Silent. Still.
If you fall, it doesn't notice. If you die, it won't remember.
So I run.
Fifteen minutes in and the incline sharpens again. This part they call "the Teeth"—jagged outcroppings of rock like broken molars. The wind moves here. Fast and mean.
I nearly slip on a flat stone. Regain my balance. Feel the adrenaline hit my chest like a fist.
Something howls in the trees to my right. Not a dog. Not a wolf. Something else. Maybe a lynx. Maybe nothing.
I don't slow down.
My mind starts to wander, as it always does around the twenty-minute mark.
Memories come in fragments. A cold hospital room. A fire. A voice calling my name from across a ravine. All half-formed. All out of order.
I shake them off. Focus on the path.
Dead pine needles. Scree. Moss on the left boulder. I name every detail out loud to stay here, in this moment:
"Left side is moss. Right is clean. Water's recent. Mud's soft. Step higher. Shift left foot. Balance center."
My voice is rough and low, barely more than breath.
That's when I spot it: a claw mark on the tree up ahead. Four lines, deep and wide. Fresh.
Bear? No. Too narrow.
Probably a cougar.
It's watching.
I run faster.
After thirty minutes, my legs begin to go numb. That's good. Pain means distraction. Numbness means I've gone deeper.
Most people hit their limit here.
That's where I start.
When I reach the Ridge Line, the wind knocks into me like a shoulder tackle. I drop low, crouching against the gusts. The sky is bleeding now, sunrise cracking through gray clouds. My lungs burn.
There's a voice in the wind. Or maybe it's just memory again.
"You don't have to go all the way."
I know that voice.
My mother's. From when I was five. Right before they left. Or disappeared. Or died.
Grandpa never gave a straight answer. Just kept running.
I press on.
From here, the summit is another forty minutes. But I won't go all the way today.
Not yet.
I just needed to touch the ridge. To make the mountain see me again.
I kneel, press both palms to the cold rock. My breath clouds in front of me. The wind drops. Silence.
For a moment, the pain fades.
Then I stand, turn back toward home.
Halfway down, I hear him.
Grandpa.
Not his voice—his footsteps. Soft but sharp, like dry leaves being crushed in rhythm. I glance over my shoulder. He's not far behind, maybe two switchbacks down.
He's watching. Not catching up. Not calling out.
Just watching.
As always.
I never ask him why he watches.
He never tells me why he doesn't stop me.
By the time I reach the bottom, the sun is up. Not high—just enough to make the dew on the grass look like broken glass. My shoes are soaked. There's a fresh tear in my sleeve from brushing past something with thorns.
Blood beads on my forearm. It stings, but I leave it. Part of the process.
Grandpa doesn't come inside right away. I hear him pause at the shed. He always checks the old harnesses and ropes, like he's still expecting to climb the vertical wall above the second ridge. Like he's still twenty. Like nothing's changed.
When he finally comes in, I'm already in the bathroom, cold water hitting my shoulders. I don't lock the door. He never enters.
The house smells like miso and sweat. Mostly sweat.
I walk to school.
There's a bus. But I walk.
It takes forty minutes downhill, past the cemetery, through the edge of town, then across the old suspension bridge where the metal groans louder every year.
Most students show up at the gate half-asleep, earbuds in, dragging their feet. I walk in with my shoulders already burning, shirt clinging to my back, eyes sharp from the cold air.
They look at me like I'm insane. I probably am.
The classroom is warm. Too warm.
I slide the window open a crack and sit by it. Second seat from the back. Same spot every day.
Kara's already there. She doesn't speak to me, but she always glances twice. Not like she's curious. Like she's trying to solve a riddle.
I stare out the window. The mountain's still visible through the gap in the buildings. Distant now, like it's pretending it doesn't know me.
Homeroom is noise. Teachers babbling. Desks squeaking. Paper shuffling.
I drift.
Sometimes I imagine what it would be like if I just got up and walked out. Just left the school, the town, the fake conversations. Ran until my legs gave out.
Other times I picture falling asleep and never waking up. That'd be easier. But it wouldn't make me stronger.
Strength is all that matters.
Fifth period, Biology.
The new teacher, Miss Riva, writes on the board with long, slow strokes. Her handwriting's clean, like it belongs in a textbook. The lesson's about ecosystems. Mutualism. Predators and prey.
I raise my hand.
She looks surprised. No one expects me to speak.
"Yes, Zeil?"
"What happens if both species are predators?"
The class goes quiet.
She smiles. It doesn't reach her eyes.
"Well, in that case, it depends who's more desperate."
I nod once.
Kara writes something in her notebook. Her pencil moves faster than normal.
Lunch is loud again. I eat on the roof.
Rice, egg, pickled radish. Standard. Nothing extra. I don't need extra.
I sit with my back against the stairwell door and close my eyes for six minutes.
That's all I can allow. Six minutes of stillness.
The rest belongs to movement.
After school, I don't go home.
I run the base trail—half the mountain, low incline, mixed terrain. It's meant for tourists in the summer. In winter, it gets shut down. I run it anyway.
On the edge of the trail there's an old rope swing. Frayed. Barely holding together. Tied to a cedar that must've been here before electricity came to this town.
I stand on the ridge above it and look down.
There's a name carved into the trunk.
Shun.
The name shakes something loose in me.
That was my father's name.
I haven't heard it out loud in years.
I hear a twig snap behind me.
I spin. Fast. Ready.
It's Kara.
She's in a hoodie and leggings. Her face is pale, breath short.
"You... actually come up here," she says.
I don't answer.
She steps closer. Not afraid, just careful.
"I followed you this morning. From the bridge."
I narrow my eyes. "Why?"
She shrugs. "You're the only one in this town who does anything real."
I stare at her.
"You shouldn't be here."
She nods. "I know. But I couldn't stop thinking about it."
I don't know what to say to that.
She sits on a fallen log. Her legs shake from the climb.
"I thought you were just... intense. But this..." She looks at the trail, at the trees clawing at the sky. "This is something else."
I sit beside her. Not close.
The wind shifts. The trees creak. The mountain hums low in its throat.
Kara doesn't speak again. She doesn't have to.
We sit until the sky starts turning violet.
When I get home, Grandpa's already on the floor, stretching his legs, fingers clasped around his soles.
"Lower back's tight," he says without looking at me.
I drop my bag and mimic the pose. My hamstrings scream. I push anyway.
"She followed you," he says after a pause.
I don't ask how he knows.
"She'll get herself killed."
I nod.
"But maybe not."
That catches me off guard.
He leans back against the wall, cracking his neck.
"She reminds me of someone."
"Who?"
He doesn't answer.
Later that night, I lie on the tatami and stare at the ceiling. It creaks like ribs under weight.
Tomorrow, I'll run higher.
Tomorrow, I won't stop at the ridge.
Something's waiting beyond the next switchback.
I don't know what.
But it's calling.