Three Days of Happiness

216
by a boy and girl in middle school.
The boy innocently asked, “Mr. Kusunoki, how’s Ms. Miyagi?”
“Miyagi’s not here anymore,” I said.
The girl put her hands to her mouth, shocked.
“Huh? What happened? Did you have a fight?”
“Something like that. Don’t fight, you two.”
The two looked at each other and shook their heads in unison.
“Well, I dunno... I mean, even Mr. Kusunoki and Ms. Miyagi argue?”
“If you two get along so well but still fight, then there’s no way we
wouldn’t.”
I wanted to say “You know, that’s true.” But the words wouldn’t
come out.
Before I knew it, I was crying like a dam had burst. The more I tried
to imagine Miyagi beside me to comfort myself, the more the tears
came.
The two sat around me in my indecency and tried to console me.
Then, surprisingly, I found that there were far more people who
knew about me than I thought.
People of all ages crowded around the scene, as if to say
“Kusunoki’s doing something new.”
Shinbashi’s friends Suzumi and Asakura were there. Suzumi asked
me what had happened.
I wasn’t sure how to answer, so I told them that Miyagi and I had
fought and split up. I made up a story about how she had turned