The Old Man with a Wen as retold by Erin Shigaki


	The old man stood before the colorful group of oni and shook with fear. He had never seen oni in person; he had only heard of them in stories passed down by the villagers. The oni stood talking and grunting amongst themselves. They were appraising the old man. At last, one oni stepped forward and said, "Old man, you must dance for us! Dance for us or pay the consequences!" When the music started up again, the old man swallowed, closed his eyes and began to do his best jig. The oni were not disappointed. "Very good!" they clapped. "Such talent! So light on your feet! Such graceful hand movements!" And the old man danced for -- and with -- the oni late into the night. When at last dawn began to color the sky, the oni circled the old man and said, "You must come again tomorrow night to show us more dances. Until then, we will keep your wen. We will not give it back to you until you come and dance again." And with that, they magically and painlessly took the big bump right off of the old man's face; thinking it attractive and that therefore it must be very valuable. The old man bowed respectfully to the oni and skipped straight down the mountainside, overjoyed to have lost his disfiguration. When he arrived home and relayed the story to his wife she was both relieved to see him safe and delighted to see her old husband looking so handsome without his wen. The couple's neighbor next door also had a gruesome wen on his cheek. When he heard the tale of the oni he grew excited and hatched a plan. "I could lose my wen the very same way!"		he thought, and set out for the very same hollow tree and hid, waiting for the partying oni to come. Sure enough, they soon assembled and the second old man leapt from the tree unannounced and began to dance. Sadly, this old man could not jig half as well as the first old man. He stumbled and flopped and did not inspire any praise from the oni. Finally, they shouted, "You are no good! Last night you were a genius! You must leave here and never show your face to us again!" The largest oni produced the wen from the first old man and stuck it onto his other cheek with a loud suction-like noise. With that, the oni chased the second old man out of the forest in tears, two wen flapping on his face instead of one.