I had liked drawing and looking at pictures since I was in elementary school.
However, my drawings were not as well received by others as my spelling. I never trusted human language, so my spelling was just like a clown’s greeting to me, and it delighted teachers in elementary school, junior high school, and beyond. However, I was not at all amused by them, but only by the pictures (except for cartoons, etc.). The school’s models were boring, the teachers' drawings were poor, and I had to try to devise my own methods of expression in a completely random way.

However, Takeichi’s words made me realize that my previous attitude toward painting had been completely wrong. I had been naive and foolish to try to express what I saw as beautiful as it was. Takehito taught me the primitive rules of the art of painting, that is to say, they do not depend on human intentions in the slightest. I hid it from my female guests, and little by little, I began to work on my self-portrait. 　I was surprised at how gruesome the picture turned out to be. I secretly affirmed that this was my true identity, which I had been hiding deep down in my heart, and that although I smiled cheerfully on the outside and made others laugh, I actually possessed such a gloomy heart, and that it could not be helped. I did not want anyone but Takeichi to see the picture. I did not want him to see the gruesome depths of my clownishness and suddenly become petulant and alarmed, and I was also afraid that he would not recognize me as I really was, but would see me as a clown with a new sense of humor and make a big joke of me. I put it away in the back of the closet. 　I also kept the haunted method to myself during art class at school.

I also kept the haunted method to myself during art class at school. 　I did not use the “haunted” method, but used the same ordinary touch that I had always used to draw beautiful things in a beautiful way. 　I had always shown my fragile nerves to Takeichi without hesitation, and I showed him my latest self-portrait without worry, and he praised it highly. 　You will be a great painter! 　Takeichi’s prediction was that he would become a great painter. 　Takeichi, a fool, had these two prophecies, that I would fall in love with him and that I would become a great painter, engraved on my forehead. I wanted to enter an art school, but my father had already told me that he planned to send me to a high school and make me a government official at the end of my life. I was told to take the entrance examination from the fourth grade, and since I had had enough of the cherry blossoms and the sea, I did not advance to the fifth grade, but took the entrance examination to a high school in Tokyo without completing the fourth grade and passed the examination. I asked the doctor to write a diagnosis of pulmonary infiltration and moved out of the dormitory to my father’s villa in Uenosakuragicho. I could not live in a group by any means. I also got chills when I heard people talking about the excitement of youth and the pride of young people, and I could not follow the high school spirit. The classrooms and dormitories felt like a cesspool of distorted sexuality, and my near-perfect clowning was of no use to me there. 　My father stayed at the house only one or two weeks a month when there were no assemblies, so when he was away, it was just the three of us, the old couple who looked after the villa and myself, in the spacious house, with myself taking occasional days off from school and not even bothering to see Tokyo (I finally decided to visit the Meiji Shrine, the bronze statue of Masanari Kusunoki, and the Sengakuji Temple).

My father stayed at the house only one or two weeks a month when there were no assemblies, so when he was away, it was just the three of us, the old couple who looked after the villa and myself, in the spacious house, with myself taking occasional days off from school and not even bothering to see Tokyo (I finally decided to visit the Meiji Shrine, the bronze statue of Masanari Kusunoki, and the Sengakuji Temple). ) I spent all day at home reading books and drawing pictures. When my father came to Tokyo, I would hurry to school every morning, but there were times when I would go to the painting school of Shintaro Yasuda, a Western-style painter in Sendagi, Hongo, and spend three or four hours practicing sketches. I felt as if I was in a special position, like an auditing student, when I left the high school dormitory. Throughout elementary school, junior high school, and high school, I was never able to understand the concept of school loyalty. I never even tried to memorize the school song. 　At an art school, an art student introduced me to liquor, cigarettes, whores, pawnshops, and left-wing ideology.

At an art school, an art student introduced me to liquor, cigarettes, whores, pawnshops, and left-wing ideology. It was a strange combination, but it was true. 　The student, Masao Horiki, was born in downtown Tokyo and was six years older than myself. He had graduated from a private art school, and since he did not have a studio at home, he continued to study Western-style painting at this art school. 　Can you lend me 5 yen? 　We only knew each other’s faces, but we had never spoken a word to each other until then. I stammered and offered him five yen. 　All right, let’s have a drink. I’ll buy you a drink. It’s a good drink, isn’t it? 　I couldn’t refuse and was dragged to a kafue in Horai-machi, near the art school, and that was the beginning of my friendship with him. 　I’ve had my eye on you for a long time. That’s it, that’s it, that’s it, that’s it, that’s it, that’s the look of a promising artist. Here’s to a sign of our closeness! 　Isn’t he a beauty, Kinu? 　Don’t fall for him.

Here’s to a sign of our closeness! 　Isn’t he a beauty, Kinu? 　Don’t fall for him. Thanks to his arrival at the school, I am, unfortunately, the second most beautiful man here. 　Horiki was a dark-skinned man with a handsome face, wearing a proper suit and tie, which was unusual for an art student, and his hair was slicked back with a pomade. 　I was unfamiliar with the place, so I just kept crossing and uncrossing my arms and smiling wryly, but after a couple of beers, I began to feel strangely liberated and lighthearted. 　I was thinking of applying to art school, but …… 　No, it’s boring. That place is boring. Schools are boring. Our teachers are in nature! 　Our teachers are in nature! 　But I had no respect for what he said. I thought he was an idiot, a poor artist, but a good partner to play with. Although they were different from me in form, they were certainly the same in the sense that they were completely detached from human activities in this world and lost in confusion. He was essentially different from himself in that he did the clowning without being aware of it, and was completely unaware of the misery of the clowning. 　I always despised him, thinking that he was only playing with me, that we were only dating for fun, and sometimes I was even ashamed of my friendship with him, but as I walked with him, I was eventually overcome even by this man.

I always despised him, thinking that he was only playing with me, that we were only dating for fun, and sometimes I was even ashamed of my friendship with him, but as I walked with him, I was eventually overcome even by this man. 　At first, however, I thought this man was a good man, a rare good man, and even I, who was afraid of people, let my guard down and thought that I had made a good guide in Tokyo. I was actually afraid of the conductor when I got on the train, afraid of the ushers standing in a row on either side of the scarlet-carpeted stairs at the main entrance of the Kabuki-za Theater when I wanted to enter the theater, and afraid of the waiter standing quietly behind me in a restaurant, waiting for my plate to be served. When I was paying the bill, my hands were so clumsy, and when I handed over the money after making a purchase, I was so nervous, so embarrassed, so anxious, and so fearful that I felt dizzy, the world went black, and I almost went half-crazy.