Keeping Pace
A story from when I was in middle school.
The other day I met with my middle school class, and as usual, I went around asking, "Don't you have any scary stories?"
The girl who arranged the meeting told me this story.
When we were in second year, we went out to a place called Nokikura Plateau for extracurricular study, but this happened on the way back home.
It began to rain as the bus was traveling the highway.
"Rain?" she thought, and when she took a look out the window, she saw something running parallel with the bus from a short distance off. "What's that?"
She tried peering long and hard, and it was an older man in a jersey who shot her a glare, running speedily through the wind without losing breath.
"Eh? That's impossible..."
That's a natural reaction, as the bus was perhaps traveling at 80 km/h, and since it was a highway nobody would be there.
She became frightened all over, and the instant she burst into tears, that older man disappeared.
I digress, but you ask what I was doing at that time?
'Isshi was tired of playing and had fallen asleep in the rearmost seat.' (laughs) So I'm told.
The other day I met with my middle school class, and as usual, I went around asking, "Don't you have any scary stories?"
The girl who arranged the meeting told me this story.
When we were in second year, we went out to a place called Nokikura Plateau for extracurricular study, but this happened on the way back home.
It began to rain as the bus was traveling the highway.
"Rain?" she thought, and when she took a look out the window, she saw something running parallel with the bus from a short distance off. "What's that?"
She tried peering long and hard, and it was an older man in a jersey who shot her a glare, running speedily through the wind without losing breath.
"Eh? That's impossible..."
That's a natural reaction, as the bus was perhaps traveling at 80 km/h, and since it was a highway nobody would be there.
She became frightened all over, and the instant she burst into tears, that older man disappeared.
I digress, but you ask what I was doing at that time?
'Isshi was tired of playing and had fallen asleep in the rearmost seat.' (laughs) So I'm told.
<Coach's Accumulation>
Isshi, since it's already been corrected it's a little hard to understand but I have some essential news to tell you soon. Speaking of "highway," what are you talking about? The way I see it, the truth is, there's someone abruptly running along a highway as usual, and she (virtually) can't do anything but "Eh?! Is that right?" The outcome is that the bus will have been going at a high speed before the rain started falling. Nevertheless... this story is like an urban legend, isn't it? One of your favourite authors, Kuro Shirou, wrote a story called "100 Kilobabaa" but there's a similar urban legend that's a ghost story. When I was a middle school student in Amasaki City in Hyogo Prefecture, in year 197X, I was already gathering stories. At that time, whether I'd call it a wild rampage, there was gossip amongst my delinquent older brothers. The scene is a road over the Rokkou Mountains, but it's restricted to riders driving their motorcycles around. They witnessed a great amount of "Stuff," the general foundation being what you have written, Isshi. After so long, it's time for the special lecture. Sit in your seat. Well, in this case even if you don't peer long and hard, I think you can comprehend "an older man in a jersey" at a glance. Although, where she "suddenly burst into tears," a person would generally close their eyes (or otherwise avert their eyes), that is to say when she was crying she may not have witnessed him "disappearing." If another person had seen him, then it's possible that they could have witnessed the older man disappearing when she cried, though... If that's not so, then saying that she burst into tears the instant he disappeared is more natural. It's a minor point but since it's related to the core of the mystery, these are exact things so they're very important you know. Incidentally, I'd say that if a single student bursts into tears inside the bus, that'll be seen as a little important, not a trivial matter. It can't be helped that you were sleeping in the bus, Isshi, but if your classmates weren't talking about it at all when you returned and you didn't know of such a momentous story until however many years later... that is the true miracle.