“Jibanyan! JIBANYAN! Choudai!” Sotaro tries to snatch it from me. I hold it up high and out of reach.

“That’s right! Jibanyan, can you say hello to our new friend Sotaro? Hello, Sotaro,” I say in a gravelly voice. “Nice to meet you! How are you?”

“I’m fine,” he screams with passion. “Thank you!”

I bring the puppet to my ear. “What’s that? You want to give Sotaro a high-five? Okay! Good job, Sotaro! Hey, Jibanyan, let’s sing Sotaro the ‘Hello Song.’ What do you say?” I make the puppet nod. “Hello, hello hello hello, hello hello hello, hello hello what’s your name?”

Sotaro drops to the floor. He snores like a chainsaw, pretending to sleep.

“What’s that, Jibanyan? His name is Sotaro? Well, hey there, Sotaro, how are you? Jibanyan, let’s say hello to Sotaro and ask him how he’s doing! Hello, hello, hello, and how are you? I’m fine, I’m fine, and I hope that you are, too! ”

Sotaro rolls around on the floor and sticks his tongue out at me during the rest of my usual song-and-dance routines. I give up. “Okay, Sotaro, let’s sit down for storytime!”

Sotaro throws all my books and toys out of my teacher box. His mother watches from outside with no aversion to what’s going on. After struggling to read my bilingual picture book of Japanese folktales to him, Yoshino comes in with her own box of magic tricks.

“Good job, Sotaro-kun!” Manager says when Yoshino opens the door. “‘High touch’! Good, good! Now, Sotaro, please give Yoshino-sensei and Cybelle-sensei ‘high touch’!”

Sotaro whacks the hell out of Yoshino’s hand, then reluctantly turns to me. I let him wind up and move my hand away on purpose.

“Whoops! Try again!”

He stumbles, laughs, and tries again. When he makes contact, he immediately checks his hand. There’s nothing there but he wipes it on his pants, anyway.

“Ah, Sotaro is shy,” Manager says. “But, he did a good job with ‘high touch’! Good job, Sotaro!”

Is that what we’re calling it? A good job? Okay. Whatever. It’s fine.

Manager asks Sotaro’s mother in Japanese what she thinks. She cocks her head, hums a little sound, then nods and mutters something. The manager claps his hands. He thanks her and bows half a dozen times. We have a new student. Fantastic. Guess now Misaki will have someone to teach.

Manager then takes us aside to congratulate Yoshino and me in Japanese on a job well done. His mother was very impressed with my patience. To save face, Yoshino follows his command and translates, “Sotaro enjoyed your lesson.” Manager goes on another lengthy explanation about what kind of lesson Sotaro’s mother might be interested in and asks Yoshino to talk to her about her options. There’s no mention of sticking Sotaro into any of my classes. Thank goodness. At least now I can eat.