A story about a village deep in the mountains. In the junior high school there, three boys always hung out together, and there was another classmate, a boy named M-yama, who was always bullied by them. One day, Y-da, the leader of the trio, suggested that they play hide-and-seek with M-yama in the mountains. In reality, the game was just an excuse to abandon M-yama deep in the forest. M-yama resisted, but they dragged him up into the mountains anyway. They made M-yama be "it" and started playing hide-and-seek. Naturally, the three of them had no intention of playing properly; they simply left M-yama alone in the mountains and went home. Figuring that M-yama would eventually find his way back home after a while, Y-da didn't give it a second thought and went straight to sleep.
That night, Y-da woke up to the sound of his family making a commotion. Thinking, "How annoying, what's all the noise about?", he asked his mother, "Did something happen?" She told him that M-yama still hadn't returned home, and the entire village was in an uproar. Y-da felt a chill run down his spine. He immediately contacted the other two boys, and just like everyone else from the village, they went out to search for M-yama in the mountains. However, dawn broke and M-yama was nowhere to be found. The only thing they discovered was M-yama's glasses. The villagers searched for M-yama for some time, but he was never found, and the search was eventually called off. Terrified of being exposed, the three of them never spoke about the hide-and-seek game.
As time passed, the three boys became high school students. The village where they lived was scheduled to be submerged to make way for a dam. The village was flooded, and more time passed. Feeling a lingering guilt about M-yama, Y-da called the other two and they headed to the site where their village used to be. As they walked along the shore of the dam, they saw a human figure floating on the surface of the water. Y-da immediately knew it was M-yama. At that moment, Y-da shouted out the words he had never been able to say to M-yama all those years: "M-yama!! I'm sorry about back then! You don't have to forgive me, but just let me say this! I'm truly sorry!" Y-da screamed at the top of his lungs, tears streaming down his face. The other two boys didn't seem to be able to see M-yama, and looked on with puzzled expressions. M-yama replied, "It's fine. Thank you for remembering me..." and slowly sank beneath the surface of the dam.
I learned later that M-yama had a weak constitution, and that invitation to play had been the very first time anyone had ever asked him to join in. Sorry for my poor writing. I don't remember all the details, so some parts might be slightly off. For some reason, when I first heard this story, I couldn't stop crying.
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