Time in Nagano flew by fast, I was still getting used to my new surroundings. The guilt still stayed, leaving a bitter taste behind but at least it wasn't eating me alive anymore. At kindergarten I was finally opening a little by little to Wakana and others. But I still couldn't bring myself to act like the original Eijun did. I was still more distant and sometimes I had my head in clouds, but for now it was good that I started to accept the current situation. But well…it wasn't so surprising, the real Eijun was way too cheerful and positive and I saw and went to the truth way too many things to still want to act like that and maybe… I just didn't want to, maybe I wanted someone to notice me back then… but the past is the past.
And it's not like any other there knew how Eijun was supposed to act right? So it doesn't really matter if I become less talkative and more distant.
Now I was playing throwing and catching balls in the backyard everyday with one of my family members. That was enough for now, as a 5 year old i couldn't do much. And I definitely didn't want to start working out yet. There is no way in hell I would want to be a bulky and muscular kid. If I could, I would prefer to keep my physical body build toned. with muscles but not much, even tho I was now a guy my womans' heart stayed behind leaving some types to stay.
But even now and then I sometimes missed the feeling of the textbooks, the sound of the pen on the paper or the smell of the pages. But I had to build my mentally first. Players had to be both with a strong body and mental health. That's why I wasn't rushing. Of course I wanted to fully finish the dreams of my past life but i was given another chance to live and i dint want to just forget about who Eijun could be if I didn't take over and…becoming a baseball player sounded kinda…interresing?
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Now I was back at the kindergarten, forced to go play with the kids but then I realised…it's not like I have to act like a normal child, I can just act like "me". So I just went back inside and washed the sand off my hands and went to grab a book. I finally found a loophole in the mindset I thought was the correct one. From that day forward I spend most of my time reading or drawing. I did play outside but only for catch and throw.
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Now few years have passed and now we are in the third grade of elementary school. Finally started doing some more extravagant exercises. I was now taking a short walk in the nearby forest everyday or running there. It depended if I went alone or with someone else. I was also now at school so I could study but of course with all the knowledge from my past life the classes became real boring once I realised I wouldn't learn much for now.
I also started to teach wakana, nobu and others a little bit of baseball. I remembered I knew that Eijun didn't go far in middle school because he didn't have a good teacher or team. BUt now it was different, with my knowledge I could go further this time. I knew it wouldn't be much but I wanted to challenge myself.
It wasn't a proud moment for someone with the mind of a perfectionist. Our first training session was well…a disaster. I stood in the center of the field, watching Nobu attempt to swing a bat and nearly knock his own teeth out because he lost his balance before the swing. "Nobu, you're holding it like a broomstick!" "Don't cross your thumbs or you'll say goodbye to your wrists the moment you actually hit something!" Nobu looked like he was on the verge of tears. His grip was completely wrong, and the bat seemed to weigh a ton in his small, shaky hands. Beside him, Wakana and the other kids were struggling just to catch the soft tosses Grandfather Eitoku was throwing. It was comical balls bouncing off chests, flying over heads, or rolling through legs because no one knew how to actually close the mitt.
"What am I doing…?" "This is illogical. I'm wasting precious developmental years teaching children how not to injure themselves with a piece of wood... I could be reading about macroeconomics, but instead, I'm making sure Nobu doesn't swallow his own tongue from the effort."
For a moment…? I felt incredibly lonely. I missed the world where things just worked, where people understood instructions the first time. I looked at them and saw only chaos. I kept my distance, refusing to emotionally invest in this mess. But then Wakana walked up to me, holding her mitt out. Her eyes were wide and determined, even though a ball had just clipped her shoulder a minute ago. "Eijun… will you show us? Really show us? No one else explains it the way you do." That simple request made my heart soften. I let out a heavy sigh and stepped in, starting with the absolute basics, how to seat the hand in the glove, how to squeeze the fingers so the leather "bit" the ball.
The second I took a ball into my own hand to demonstrate, I forgot about everything. There was only the mechanics of the motion. "Watch my feet," he said, his voice dropping into a calm, steady rhythm. "Baseball isn't about strength, it's about balance." After I demonstrated it to them I let them practice alone for a while. They needed to find the style they were good at after understanding the basics.
When Nobu finally, for the first time in his life, caught a ball in the pocket of the mitt with a sharp, echoing pop, I felt a strange, unplanned surge of pride. Is this how parents feel about their children growing…?
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It's been 3 years since then, and now we are in the sixth grade. During that time I taught them how all the basics they needed to know if they wanted to play, we spent almost every day together. Some of the girls seemed to talk behind Wakana's back but she didn't seem to care or was still too young to understand but she seemed happy so just let it be, how bad could it have gone after all?
"We are going to be in middle school soon so we will be finally able to play a real match" I said randomly as we all were going back home, eating ice cream.
"A real match!?" Nobu nearly choked on a chunk of his ice cream, his eyes lighting up with an intensity that made me feel a flicker of unease.
"Like, a real stadium? With an umpire and everything?!"
"Calm down…we still got time before that and Akagi middle high still doesn't have a baseball team yet so we will have to make one first. Well it won't be hard since we all are going there so we just need to wait till the new school year."
"We'll be the Akagi Team!" Nobu declared, thrusting his wooden ice cream stick into the air like a sword. "Eijun will be the Ace, I'll be the catcher, and you, Wakana, you'll hit all the home runs!" I watched them, feeling the two worlds inside my chest collide once again.
"..." "If we're going to do this" I said, my voice suddenly losing its childish lilt and becoming unnervingly serious, "then we aren't just 'playing. We are going to train as if our lives depend on it. No slacking. No excuses. Do you understand?" Nobu straightened his back as if he were taking a military oath. "Yes, Captain!" "I'm not the captain" I muttered, a sudden wave of doubt washing over me. What am I dragging them into? I thought. Am I really going to rewrite this story from the ground up?