The beginning of the mystery is a newspaper. The first is a newspaper, the next is also a newspaper, and the next one too, and then the next one would be a cookie.

Which means this. One winter day, after returning from school, I opened the newspaper for some reason. I skimmed through the social section, sports section, and the next section without finding anything particularly interesting, and when I opened the local news section, there was a headline in the corner of the page that read “Kira City Native Wins Art Exhibition Award.” It said that a local artist, Shima Taiga, won the Black Bear Award at the San Francisco Biennale with his work <Gaze and Shell>.

On the article, it was written that Mr. Shima graduated from Funado High School in this city and is 47 years old. It did not explain what <Gaze and Shell> is or how prestigious the Black Bear Award is. There was a photo of him, and he had a gentle smile that was completely unrelated to the sternness one might associate with an award-winning artist.

At first, I couldn’t decide how to react to this information in a Petit Bourgeois way. On one hand, I thought it was small-minded to completely forget about something that had nothing to do with me, while on the other hand, I felt it was quite appropriate to take pride in the success of a senior from my high school who was recognized worldwide. I couldn’t come to a conclusion on this either-or situation, and without feeling the need to conclude anything, I forgot about the article at that moment.

After half a month, I encountered the name Shima Taiga again. When I arrived at school, there was a school newspaper on every student’s desk with the headline “Our School Graduate Wins Art Exhibition Award” written in large letters. It seems that the newspaper club chose to take pride in Mr. Shima’s award.

According to the article, the Biennale is an art exhibition held every two years. It mentioned that the Venice Biennale and São Paulo Biennale are world-renowned, and then explained that the San Francisco Biennale is an honor next to the highest award, the Gray Bear Award.

As expected, there was no photo of the award-winning <Gaze and Shell>, but it was understandable that the school newspaper club couldn’t obtain it. Instead, they used a photo from the graduation album, which appeared to be a face shot of him in a school uniform. If Shima Taiga is 47 years old, this would be a photo from nearly 30 years ago. I wondered if they had obtained permission from him for the publication…… I couldn’t help but think about that.

The third time I encountered the name Shima Taiga was during the fifth period of that day. As soon as the class started, Mr. Hirata, the Japanese history teacher, held up the school newspaper with a beaming smile and said:

“You guys, have you read this?”

Mr. Hirata is usually a stern-looking person who teaches about the Fujiwara clan’s tyranny with indignation and teaches about the fates of Raikou and Sanetomo while choking up, and after staring at the school newspaper for a while, he continued with words full of emotion.

“Shima was a classmate of mine. I wondered what he was doing without attending the alumni meeting, and it turns out he has become quite successful. You guys probably don’t understand, but at this age, it’s just nice to know that someone who had been out of touch is alive and well.”

Since Mr. Shima is 47 years old, Mr. Hirata is probably around the same age. In fact, I thought he was a bit older. Mr. Hirata continued with a beaming smile.

“This guy was in the art club. As they say, ‘A straw shows which way the wind blows,’ those who grow up are different from the beginning. However, not all those who are different from the beginning will grow up. There are also those who were ordinary in their youth but grow up later. This is about math. Are you guys good at math?”

Watching Mr. Hirata, who was more talkative than usual, I was thinking about the right to be happy. Mr. Hirata joyfully spoke of Mr. Shima’s global success as if it were his own, and his tone when talking about their relationship was even somewhat boastful, but I didn’t find it unnatural. So, if I were to take joy in Mr. Shima’s success in the same way and act boastfully towards someone else, would that also make sense? Wouldn’t the thin relationship between Mr. Shima and me create an ugly situation like an animal borrowing the tiger’s power? Mr. Hirata slapped the school newspaper with the back of his hand.

“He was a strange guy. I remember he was fast. Yes, he was quite fast. It’s nostalgic. But I’ve never seen his work. Mr. Koumura, the art teacher, is also in the same grade, and I’ve seen Mr. Koumura’s paintings, but I don’t remember seeing Shima’s. What a pity.”

Where would the threshold be for being allowed to rejoice in someone else’s success as if it were your own? Do I have the right to rejoice in the success of a fellow alumnus like Mr. Hirata? While thinking about this issue, I listened to Mr. Hirata’s story. In the afternoon of the fifth period, lulled by the warmth of the heater, I was absentmindedly pondering such things.

Also on the following Friday, I encountered the name Shima Taiga again. The name was mentioned by Doujima Kengo from the newspaper club, and the location was in the hallway on my way home. However, it wasn’t that Shima Taiga’s name came up all of a sudden. When Kengo saw me, he exchanged a standard greeting and then scratched his head a bit awkwardly before saying:

“Hey Jougorou, I don’t know if it’s okay to ask you this, but…… could you introduce me to Osanai?”

There’s always a certain level of tension between me and Doujima Kengo.

Kengo thinks of me as a roundabout deceiver, and I think that pretending not to notice such a true thing is a form of kindness. I can’t really say we’re close. It was quite unexpected that Kengo would ask me to mediate with Osanai-san.