When I was in elementary school, a guy named Yukio transferred to my class.
He was small, half-Japanese looking, and somewhat timid.
Yukio had no parents and lived with his grandma and grandpa.
The teacher didn’t tell me what was going on, but Yukio himself told me.
We bullied him at first.
We elbowed him in the back as we passed each other, cut his pencil box with a cutter, and so on.
I think it was just a silly thing.
But Yukio, though he is usually odd, when he does that. He never cried or lost his temper. He never told the teacher about it.
So it wasn’t very interesting, and we stopped bullying him. However, Yukio often missed school.
I don’t remember how much he missed in a month, but I still have the impression that he missed a lot.
At that time, at our school, a neighbor in the same class would deliver bread for school lunch to those who missed school.
It was my role to deliver the bread to Yukio’s house.
Yukio’s house was quite a distance away, but mine was the closest among our classmates, and it was on the way home, a route we often took.
Yukio’s house was a wooden cultural house, the kind of house that one would expect to find a grandparent living in.
I had never been inside. It was kind of dark, and I didn’t like the atmosphere of the house.
Whenever I delivered bread to the house, I would give the bread to Grandma and hurry home.
One day, when Yukio was absent again, I went to deliver the bread.
When I called at the door, Yukio himself came out, which was unusual. He looked pale, as if he had a cold.
Yukio invited me to come inside.
He said, “There’s ××××, let’s do it.”
The toy was the one I wanted, so I shook off the bad feeling and went inside.
When I entered Yukio’s room, I was a bit surprised.
There were stickers and stickers all over the place, some of them were mixed in with what looked like shrine charme.
There were so many stickers and stickers on the sliding door we came in.
“What the hell is this?”
“Grandpa and grandma put up the shrine charms, but that alone is kind of scary, so they put up stickers, too.”
Some of the shrine charmes looked as if Yukio had written them himself.
“Why don’t you tear up the shrine charme?”
“My grandfather would get angry if I did that…”
Yukio kept his mouth shut. That day, we played in Yukio’s room for about an hour and left.
The next day, Yukio was absent from school. The teacher asked me how Yukio was doing.
The next day, Yukio missed school again. The teacher asked me how Yukio was doing.
I told the teacher that he seemed to be in a bad way.
The teacher said, “Well…he didn’t call to tell me he was absent, so I was wondering how he was doing.””Why don’t you call him?”
“No, I tried, but no one answered. Have you seen Grandpa or Grandma?”
“I didn’t see them yesterday.”
“Well, tell Yukio to call me if he needs to take a day off.”
I played in Yukio’s room that day.
Yukio had a lot of toys.
I was a little envious and asked him about them. He replied that his mother and father had bought them for him.
“Where are your mother and father?”
“They died.” Yukio said simply.
“Why?”
“Car accident.”
I looked at Yukio, who was fiddling with his toys, and looked down at me.
I felt bad, so I changed the subject. “Will you go to school tomorrow?”
“I don’t know.”
“Are you going to be okay?”
“・・・・・”
“The teacher said to call in if you need to miss class.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Where are Grandma and Grandpa?”
“They’re in the back room.”
“Well, tell Grandma and Grandpa to call the school..”
“I can’t sleep.”
“What?”
“My mom and dad keep coming up in my dreams and calling me.”
“・・・・”
“Yukio, Yukio,” they call me over and over. It scares me, that’s why I can’t sleep.”
“・・・・”
“Yesterday, my father grabbed my arm and my father’s going to take me away.”
I was getting more and more scared and told him I was leaving, but Yukio was very insistent.
“I know you’re scared, but I have to go home now.”
“Why?”
“Because my mother will be worried about me…”
After I said that, I thought, “Oh shit!”.
Yukio turned his head and said nothing.
The next day, Yukio missed school again.
The teacher said I would go with me, and on the way home he picked me up in his car and drove to Yukio’s house.
When the teacher called at the door, there was no answer.
When I opened the front door, the teacher frowned.
I took off my shoes and went up to the house.
There was no one in the kitchen or Yukio’s room.
When I left Yukio’s room, there was a room on my right.
I thought that was the back room that Yukio had mentioned yesterday.
The teacher opened the sliding door.
As soon as he did, he stood still and quickly closed the sliding door.
In that split second, I could see the inside of the room through the doctor’s body.
I saw Yukio’s bloody face. Then, I think the teacher called the police.
I don’t remember much of what happened from that point on, but the police did come.
The next day, the teacher told the class that Yukio, Grandpa and Grandma were dead.
But he didn’t say they were covered in blood. He just said they were dead. Later, I told the teacher about Yukio’s dream.
He listened quietly for a while.
Then he told me not to tell anyone, and told me about Yukio’s parents.
The cause of death of Yukio’s parents was suicide. The family had attempted suicide.
Yukio was lucky to survive and was taken in by his grandma and grandpa.
I was not that surprised to hear that. I had a feeling that he had.
A few days later, the police called me and I told them about my visit to Yukio’s house.
I also told them about Yukio’s dream.
The policeman persistently asked me if I was lying.
I told him again and again that I wasn’t lying.
The officer asked me again and again if I was telling the truth, and I told him I wasn’t. “Did you really have a conversation with Yukio that day at that house?”
“Yes”.
The teacher who had come with me had a troubled look on his face.
The policeman waved his hand toward the teacher.
The teacher thought for a while and then said to me, “Hey, you know, you and me, we’ve been talking about you and me.
“You know, you and I went to Yukio’s house, right? That time…”
The teacher seemed reluctant to say anything.
I had a bad feeling.
Yukio and the others had definitely been dead for three days.
