Live Up To Her Faith
By Laura Schiller
Based on: Shugo Chara
Copyright: Peach Pit
Saionji Wakana
Grade 5, Star Class
Essay Topic: My Dream For The Future
Dear Sensei,
I don't mean to flatter you or be presumptuous, but since you told us to write honestly and that you would keep these essays private, I will be honest. My dream is to become a teacher, just like you.
I know people laugh at you whenever you trip in the hallway and scatter papers, or because you don't tuck your shirt in. But I see the little things you do – how you stay behind after school to tutor kids who are having trouble, how you're never too busy to explain, and how your enthusiasm catches on with the whole class. I could never understand long division before you explained it, and even Amu-chan's stopped complaining about Japanese literature since you started reading out loud with your funny voices.
You are my role model, Sensei. When I grow up, I want to help young people and make their lives brighter just as you have done for us. Keep up your good work, because even when we don't show it, we all admire and respect you very much.
Yours sincerely,
Wakana
Nikaido Yuu lowered the sheet of close-written paper onto the desk, clasped his hands and bowed his head. He had been correcting these essays for years now and they tended to get repetitive – fireman; pastry chef; ballerina; undecided, etc. Now and then he came across a genuinely well-thought-out one like Hinamori's ("My parents say that children's dreams contain infinite possibilities, so I've decided not to limit myself to just one") or Fujisaki's ("I want to treasure the time when my dreams are still dreams") like the proverbial needle in a haystack. But he had never – never – read an essay like this before.
He felt humbled to the very core of his being. For this little girl (he saw her in his mind's eye: blue-haired, bespectacled, excellent grades but rather shy as a public speaker) to choose him as a role model! She couldn't know the dark places of his heart. She couldn't know just how unworthy he was of such innocent trust.
A year ago, he would not have hesitated to corner Wakana in a dark hallway and suck the life out of her in the form of her heart's egg. He would have carried it to Easter's laboratory and crushed it in his machine. A year ago, he had been a shell of a man, consumed by bitterness over his own broken dream, unworthy to call himself a teacher. On some days, he felt he still was.
Hinamori Amu had saved him – with the help of Suu, the most loving and generous Shugo Chara ever created. Thanks to them, Nikaido had been set on his own journey of atonement – to teach at Seiyo Elementary, for real this time, and nurture children's dreams to make up for those he had destroyed.
Here was the proof, on paper and in purple ballpoint pen, that Nikaido Yuu – the loser, the joke, the monster – was finally doing something right.
"Dear God," he whispered, "Help me to live up to her faith in me. Help me to keep on."