Chapter 22
"I told you a little bit earlier, but actually today, before the first class started, Minegishi-san's mother and Minegishi-san came to the classroom.They then handed out pencils to Minegishi's classmates and told them that Minegishi-san was transferring to another school. "
At that moment, Ryosaku felt a shock like thunder and knew that his premonition had come true. Teacher Suzuki continues.
"Minegishi-san, the whole family, including Minegishi-san's grandmother who is here, has decided to go to visit her father in southern Kanto.
Minegishi-san, the whole family, including Minegishi-san's grandmother who is here, is going to visit her father in southern Kanto.
After a short greeting, she and her mother exited the east entrance and walked toward the school gate. I'll come a little later too.
They bowed to me at the school gate, and they both started walking, but then Minegishi-san stopped and looked back at the fifth-grade classroom where Ryosaku-kun was teaching. . And she just stared for a while.
She looks very sad...and lonely.
Ryosaku-kun, what exactly happened, please tell me...”
Before Teacher Suzuki could finish speaking, Ryosaku ran out of the classroom and ran outside through the east entrance, still wearing his floor shoes.
Then he passed through the school gate and ran for a run along the same route he took every day while holding hands with Mieko.
Many happy memories with Mieko flash through his head.
(Mieko-chan...Mieko-chan...Mieko-chan...!)
Ryosaku runs towards Mieko's house, screaming in his heart and desperately holding back the urge to cry.
There is no sign of anyone in the house. The crude wooden sliding door at the entrance was also locked and locked.
...Ryosaku suddenly noticed a small piece of paper fluttering in the wind on the glass of the sliding door. It is attached to the glass with sellotape.
There was a message written on it that seemed to have been scrawled.
『Ryosaku-kun, goodbye. 』
It was unmistakably Mieko's handwriting. That Tanabata day...the handwriting of his beloved Mieko who wrote Ryosaku a modest message of love on a strip of paper...
When Ryosaku read it, he held the paper with the message close to his chest as if he were hugging Mieko, and cried openly in public.
