“My grandfather.”
That one sentence kept repeating in my head over and over.
The young man in front of me pointed to the man in the photo, smiling beside my grandfather.
The photo was a little faded, but only their smiles were still vivid.
“...Really?”
I asked back without thinking, and the young man gave a small nod.
“There’s the same photo at my grandfather’s house.”
The next day.
Guided by the young man, I walked through a quiet residential neighborhood on the outskirts of Taipei.
When we passed through an old gate, a single-story house surrounded by trees appeared.
“I’m home.”
We were greeted by a gentle voice, and it was an old man with white hair.
When the young man introduced me, the old man didn’t move, still staring at the photo of my grandfather.
After a while, he murmured in a trembling voice.
“...Teacher.”
Just those two words filled my chest to the brim.
There was someone in Taiwan
who called my grandfather “Teacher.”
In the living room, old albums and faded sketchbooks were lined up.
With every page I turned,
there were notes written in Japanese and Chinese.
A school building.
Children’s smiles.
And a landscape painting the grandfather and his friend had drawn side by side.
“On their days off, the two of them often went out to draw together.”
The old man smiled wistfully.
“Being Japanese or Taiwanese didn’t matter. They were just dear friends.”
At those words, my eyes naturally welled up.
On the way back.
Looking up at the dusk sky, the young man muttered softly.
“My grandfather still regrets that he couldn’t fulfill his promise.”
“A promise...?”
The young man smiled a little awkwardly.
“Please ask my grandfather about that.”
Watching his back as he started walking again after saying that, I realized something.
The “promise” my grandfather left behind had only just begun.
