My family used to be extremely poor and we never got anything we wanted.
The clothes I wore were hand-me-downs from neighborhood kids, and the only snack I had was icing sugar.
Even so, I was allowed to receive compulsory education.
However, all my study materials were hand-me-downs.
I had no complaints about that, but there was one thing I didn’t like.
It was a study desk that was given to me as a hand-me-down.
The desk was a hand-me-down, but it still had the luster of a new one.
When I opened the drawer, I could smell the fragrant aroma of the wood.
I liked it so much that I spent a lot of my free time reading books on it.
About a week after the desk arrived, I had a strange experience.
I was sitting in my chair as usual, reading a book on the desk, when I felt a cool sensation on my right leg.
I shifted my foot a little so that it did not touch the cool thing.
After a while, the cool thing touched my foot again.
I felt sick, so I kicked the cool thing with my right foot and pushed it into the back.
Then I felt a strange, squishy sensation on the tip of my foot.
My eyes were on the book on the desk, but my consciousness was focused on my toes under the desk.
I gently moved my right foot to check the surface of the squishy thing.
The squishy object was uneven and had holes in some places.
Some parts were soft, some parts were hard, and I had no idea what it was.
My toes touched the surface of the squishy object in a nudging motion, finally reaching the top.
I felt the sensation of many thin, thread-like things there, and I knew what my feet were touching.
I gently bent over and looked under the desk.
There was a pale boy. My toes were touching the boy’s head.
I was so startled that I fell back in my chair.
But my face was facing the boy under the desk.
He, too, was looking at me, not moving an inch.
Unable to stand up, I crawled out of the room.
I immediately went to my father and told him what I had experienced, crying.
But he didn’t believe me at all.
Even if he did, we didn’t have the money to buy a new desk, so I couldn’t replace it.
In the end, I continued to use that desk throughout my elementary school years.
When I was studying at the desk, I often felt something cool on my feet, but I tried not to look under the desk because I was afraid that the boy would be there again.
I was afraid.
I was sure he was there, but I tried to pass it off by not looking.
When I entered junior high school, I asked my mother about it.
I asked her who gave me the desk I was using.
She looked a little puzzled and then said
“I got that desk from my neighbor Wataru’s house.”
Wataru-kun was the same age as me and we went to kindergarten together.
A few days before I entered elementary school, Wataru fell into the river and died.
Wataru, who was very smart, had already started studying before he entered elementary school.
While studying at that desk, he must have been excited about the school life that was about to begin.
After I learned what happened, I was no longer afraid of Wataru-kun under the desk.
I decided to study as much as Wataru-kun.
After that, Wataru-kun sometimes touched my legs.
When Wataru-kun touched my legs, I thought he was encouraging me to study harder.
Wataru-kun’s encouragement supported me and I became able to study well.
A little later, baseball became popular at junior high school.
I wanted to join in, but I didn’t have the money to buy a bat and glove.
I asked my father for help, as I always did.
He said, “Wait a few months.”
A few months later, he gave me a bat and glove.
Again, they were hand-me-downs, but I didn’t care.
I joined the baseball team and enjoyed myself to the fullest.
But one day, one of my friends looked at my glove and said,
“That’s Yoshiro’s glove, isn’t it?”
Yoshirou was a classmate of mine who was a member of the baseball club in junior high school.
He was a talented baseball player and had been a regular member of the team since the first grade of junior high school.
However, Yoshirou died recently.
It seems that he fell into the river on his way home and drowned.
When I learned that the glove I was using belonged to Yoshiro, I thought to myself, “I’m going to play baseball for Yosiro.”
At that time, I suddenly thought.
Yoshirou and Wataru look alike in some way.
They both died young, and both had the same cause of death and the same place of death.
And I was given their mementos.
Is there such a coincidence?
A few months later, I asked my father for a favor again. This time, I asked him for a video game.
My father said, “Wait a few mounths,” as usual.
Two weeks later, he gave me a video game.
Again, it was a hand-me-down.
Just before I received the video game from my father, I remembered an article in the newspaper.
A neighborhood junior high school student had drowned in a nearby river.
A chill ran through my body.
That night, as I was studying in my room as usual, something touched my toes.
For years, I had thought that something was Wataru-kun, who had died, encouraging me.
The truth was different. That something was desperately appealing to me.
I am still unable to look under the desk.
