Stories

AYANE AND THE GHOST

– 1 –

Ayane was sitting in a good position at the Fukuoka Dome with her three colleagues. The baseball game between the Fukuoka Hawks and the Yomiuri Giants would begin soon. Ayane was looking forward to the game, even though she wasn’t really that much of a baseball fan. The trip and the tickets were a year-end gift from her employer, a renowned computer company in Kagoshima. She turned to her three colleagues. “I bet 1,000 yen each that the Fukuoka Hawks will win the game 10-8”. They stared at her in disbelief. Keiko then said, “No chance for Fukuoka, the Giants have won every game this year by a wide margin.” “You’re on,” Ayane doubled. Keiko and Shouta immediately shook hands. “What about you, Thomas,” Ayane asked. “No, I don’t want you to lose your money so easily,” he refused. Thomas, an Australian on a year of practical training in Japan, already spoke Japanese quite well.
In fact, the game ended 10-8 for the Fukuoka Hawks, a big surprise for everyone.
“How could you have known that?” Keiko and Shouta didn’t understand. “Just a hunch,” Ayane replied. She received a few strange looks for that. With the 2,000 yen from the two, she invited everyone to a ramen meal after the game. But let’s look back.
Ayane was born in Kobe shortly after the terrible earthquake that killed thousands. Fortunately, nothing happened to her parents’ house, except for a crack in the living room wall, which was harmless, and quite a bit of broken crockery. She was just a baby back then.
Life went on. In secondary school, the teachers saw that Ayane was a bit different. She questioned the teachers’ statements when it didn’t seem logical or right to her. Of course, they didn’t particularly appreciate this. Even then, she wanted to understand things, not blindly accept what she was given. Her classmates couldn’t keep up. Ayane always knows everything better, they soon said. Ayane can’t adapt, and similar things she got to hear. In her class she only had one friend, Shizue, who stood by her. Shizue was often teased, other students made fun of her. Because she was kind-hearted and somewhat reserved, they assumed they could trample on her. One student, Masaru, was often mean to her. Ayane took him on. Intimidated, he stayed away from Shizue after that. It was better to leave Ayane and her friends alone if you didn’t want any trouble. That’s how Ayane got through her school and university days. She never had a boyfriend. She was into one, a real handsome one, of her classmates, but it seemed as if the young boys were afraid of her attitude. That was probably due to the education and general cultural understanding in her country.

– 2 –

Ayane had already noticed in middle school that she was a bit different from the others. When she thinks back to that time, there was another friend besides her. One day, Ayane began to see something incredible. Yes, it was a ghost, another friend besides her. She had asked the ghost about her age and name, but apparently she didn’t know. She only knew that when Ayane was in middle school, she was an older sister, 20 years older than her.
At first, Ayane was quite afraid of the ghost, who could see things that the people around her could not, but she gradually got used to it and at some point it began to have a fairly significant impact on Ayane’s life. As I mentioned earlier, the ghost asked her many questions in middle school, and when she asked the teacher instead, she herself became wiser. This continued when she became a college student, but sometimes she would talk to the ghost as if it were talking to itself, leading to her being labeled a strange person. However, thanks to her daily conversations with the ghost, Ayane was wiser than when she was alone, and she was not afraid of going to college or getting a job. This ghost has another feature: sometimes it predicts small things about the future and tells us about them. This happened at the baseball game at the beginning of the story.

– 3 –

After years of hard study, Ayane finally found a permanent job at a well-known computer company in Kagoshima. She was really good at it, keeping up with the latest developments. She was motivated and worked hard, and soon she was held in high regard by everyone.
She got along very well with her colleagues. They often did things together. But she was not satisfied with herself. She had put on a little weight, mostly from the fine food in Kagoshima. So she decided to go jogging regularly. She soon started running laps in a nearby park.
One evening, after an intense day at work, she ran for another half hour. Towards the end, she sank exhausted onto a bench in the park.
“You shouldn’t overdo it.“ Only now did she really realize the old man sitting next to her on the bench. He was still good-looking for his age, looked agile, had a deep, pleasant voice.
”What do you mean,“ asked Ayane?
”Don’t overdo it with jogging, better watch your diet,” was the answer.
Ayane looked at the old man in disbelief. “How do you know that, what do you want?”
“Why don’t you go have a coffee with Thomas one day and read a newspaper again,” he replied. Then he stood up, with a mischievous smile, handed her a newspaper from his coat pocket, and walked away. Ayane sat on the bench, still puzzled, then she put the newspaper in her pocket. She had no idea what the old man actually wanted. Soon she jogged back.
The next morning, it was Saturday, Keiko came over. They drank coffee and chatted about their work. Since Ayane had to leave soon for a tennis lesson, Keiko also set off. On her way out, she saw the newspaper lying near the door. “Ah,” she said, “Chiyonofuji has won the Tokyo Sumo Tournament after all.” Ariane shook her head, “No, the deciding match isn’t until tomorrow evening, they don’t know that yet.” “But it says so in the paper,” Keiko showed her.
Ayane opened the paper the old man had given her for the first time.

– 4 –
Ayane was shocked when she saw the results of the sumo matches of the future. Who on earth was this old man? How could he know something about the future? No matter how much she thought about it, she just couldn’t understand. Ayane is someone who likes to pursue things, so she decided to go back to the same park and face the challenge of meeting the old man again. She walked under the same conditions at the same time and eventually sat down on a bench. But the old man didn’t appear. She went home and pondered why she hadn’t met him. What was different this time compared to the last time? Ayane had a hypothesis. What was different from the last time was that she hadn’t eaten any candy in the park. In fact, it had been a souvenir from a friend who had recently traveled to Europe. When she took one out of her backpack, the candy package read “Time Travel.” Ayane couldn’t believe it, but she decided to eat the candy in the park once again. She did, and then a different woman appeared on the bench compared to last time.

– 5 –

Ayane thought a lot about her encounter with the mysterious woman on the bench. She wanted to tell someone about it soon because it seemed so unreal to her. She also continued to think about the old man, wondering who he might be. In her mind, she searched among her friends and relatives, but it made no sense. “Chiyonofuji did it again,” it said on the front page of the daily newspaper. She read the article, didn’t understand it—perhaps some imaginative reporter—then her eyes fell on the date on the newspaper. It was dated the following Monday, so the day after tomorrow—she didn’t understand. How was that possible? She flipped through the pages. There were sports results, business news, political stories, everything from the weekend. Someone had obviously gone to a lot of trouble for a joke. She put the newspaper aside.

The following week, she was bombarded with work. Thomas helped her as best he could. They increasingly completed assignments together as a team. Once, he asked her if she would go for coffee with him sometime this weekend! She looked at him, wide-eyed and astonished. When she didn’t respond, Thomas immediately withdrew. She called after him, “Yes, yes, of course.” He turned around, looked at her with a smile, and nodded. Towards the end of the week, she found time for another run. After a few kilometers of intense running, she approached the bench in the park she had been to for the past few weeks. From a distance, she saw the old man sitting there, and she hadn’t eaten her last Time Travel Candy. Hesitantly, she sat down next to him. “Don’t overdo it,” he said again. She looked at him, “Who are you?” He just smiled at her. “Thomas is your future,” was his reply. He stood up, handed her a newspaper from his coat pocket. “You should play the lottery,” then walked away.

– 6 –

The following day, it was the last one before the weekend, she actually played the lottery. In the old man’s newspaper were the numbers, 6 correct, to win 100 million yen. She marked these on the lottery ticket, as well as 6 other random numbers. It cost 600 yen for both tips, and she thought she might as well give it a try. She did not expect to win.
On the weekend itself, she met Thomas for coffee as agreed. They drank and ate cake, and chatted casually about their work.
Over time, however, Thomas became increasingly quiet and Ayane noticed. “What’s wrong?” she asked. Thomas became embarrassed. Well, he then mentioned that Keiko had recently asked him if he had a girlfriend. Do you want one, she had asked. Yes, Thomas said, but as a foreigner it’s difficult here. I think many people still don’t want foreigners in their family. “Do you have a crush on someone?” Keiko didn’t let up. Yes, he replied, but I don’t stand a chance. “Have you tried it, why don’t you invite her for a coffee and then you’ll see”. Keiko sounded convincing.

“And did you invite her for a coffee and asked,” Ayane asked. “Yes, I did but probably not understandable,” he replied. “And what was the answer?” She looked at him with wide eyes.
He plucked up all his courage and looked her in the eye. I don’t know yet, he said. “She is sitting here with me at the table drinking coffee,” ”I don’t know how she’ll answer.”

– 7 –

When Ayane checked her lottery ticket over the weekend, she was shocked to discover that she had won 100 million yen. She couldn’t believe it. In the end, she decided to keep the money for herself, invest it somehow, and continue her normal life.
The week after her run, she ran into the old man again. “This is the last time you’ll see me,” he said to her.

“Why me?” she asked.
“You have the mark,” he said, pointing his index finger at her forehead. Then he stood up and walked away.

She got along better and better with Thomas. Soon they became a couple. Later, they emigrated to Australia, started an IT company, and soon they were a family.

END