Disclaimer: I do not own either Oregairu or Shadows, and in no way do I intend to disrespect the authors of both works by writing this. I am just merely borrowing their wonderful worlds in order to create a shitty one for myself, so it does not count as disrespect, I guess.
Before I left Japan to study college in America, the two of us promised each other that we would read the same books for each and every month as a token of our love, which we sealed with a kiss on the second floor of the special building, a small balcony parallel to the window of the Service Club.
It was a beautiful starry night, and our high school graduation at the same time. We both wore our graduation apparel, a contrasting white on the pitch black darkness of the night. He flashed me a smile, a very gentle one, and it was at that moment when he revealed that he had been working on a novel for over a year and was planning to be an author someday.
I was overjoyed to hear that. I mean, this severely indolent person, working on a novel behind my back for a long time? At first, I thought he was kidding, but when he said he was writing it for me all along, all of my doubts evaporated like steam clouds in the air, and with a courage I could not remember having, I threw myself at him and we kissed.
It was my first, and in books, men and women always "embraced passionately", but I had no idea how much passion to use, so I put my arms around him and mashed his lips into mine by pressing the back of his head closer. It was a very awkward kiss, but god did it felt so right. My eyes were sealed shut but I could still see it, the starry sky. While we both expressed our love passionately for the very first time, it looks like the stars were smiling back.
Our reading list was ten books per month, five picked by him and five by me, and we made a reading schedule so that, although apart, we would have the same things on our minds at the same time and would think of each other. We each picked the loftiest book we knew of, all of which were varying from philosophy to psychology, so we could have great thoughts as we read.
At first, everything went well. We became a pair of people madly in love, exchanging calls and emails everyday, chatting about each other's tales and discussing everything of common interest. Those were the high moments, we were both content and happy, even when apart.
But it didn't get far.
College workload ate everything, and the time when the only thing I was able to read during free times were revising sheets for next week's exam. Summer was cramped with internship duties, and I even left a copy of On Liberty on a subway once, coming back only to find an empty bench. Little by little, my time reading his books— no, our books diminished, until I stopped reading entirely.
My copy of Plato's The Republic was in my suitcase, and I fished it out only to feel guilty for letting him down so badly. There was a time when I wrote him an email about love, studded with Greene's quotes picked up from Plato's, but I deleted it since it was so shameless and false.
After months of receiving nothing from my side, all while he was dedicatedly sending me regular emails every week, he finally called, and in the second he asked, "Do you still love me?" I felt like I did— no, I certainly did, but evidently not enough to flip the cover page of the book he had chosen for me and become someone worthy of love, so I dropped the call without replying.
The weekly regular emails stopped.
The time came when I finished college, but I stayed in America, managing the international branch of my family company. A few years later, I happened to accidentally overhear Nee-san talking about him with her friends.
He had married someone after publishing his eighth book.
I visited the bookstore near the campus I used to attend, purchasing a novel with his name printed on black Japanese characters below, and walked home while hugging it tightly against my chest.
I could not stop myself from remembering him every time I read a single sentence. He didn't write an afterword, and I was briefly reminded that he swore to never write one when we were young.
The balcony of my apartment at fourteenth floor had become my most frequented spot, be it summer or winter days. I would take a seat near the railings and read one chapter every night, momentarily glancing at the starry sky and tearing my heart apart for realizing they would never smile back.
I think of him everytime I stood in this place, recalling the sweetness in his lips and the softness of his hair, all of which that had been etched in the back of my mind. It felt like a dull memory, and it saddens me the most to realize that I could no longer even remember his face.
There had been a point in time when I lablelled him as my life, but now that he was gone, where exactly had my life went? When I started to think about it, it didn't take long for the answer to arrive.
"Do you love still love me?"
The moment I decided not to respond was the moment I lost my life. By staying silent, I crushed it with my own hands alongside my heart. I should have responded, I should have reassured him how deep my love was for him, with or without reading those books. But how could I dare to do something so shameless when I could not even fulfill the promise we made?
The promise. That, which we sealed with a kiss on the second floor of the special building, a small balcony parallel to the window of the Service Club. All this time, I had been aware why I was always spending time in my apartment's balcony. I was trying to remember that moment. That time when I leaned my waist on the metal railings while he pressed his body against me.
Since the stars would never smile back, I directed my misty eyes below instead. I missed him and every single moment when we were still in love.
Just one jump is enough to bring all those times back.
Note: I'm so depressed. Please send me lewd photos of your waifus to cheer me up. Anyway, I am so sorry to those who are expecting an update on my other stories (if there are even). My head is pretty messed up at the moment and I'm finding it hard to write something that can at least satisfy myself. But I can assure that I am working on them, so please bear with me.