Who calls it a love? /それを愛と呼びますか？[English version]

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この作品(↑)の英訳になります。

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Who calls it a love?

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Chapter 1

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"I was terribly disappointed. When you listen to my stories, you are always distinguishing what you want to hear from what you don't want to hear. Do you have the right to decide whether my words are important or not? "

I seem to have made her angry again. I was oblivious of taking a walk with her at night two weeks ago. 

I don't want to make an apology, but I couldn't readily make out what she wanted to talk about when she suddenly told me that she walked hand in hand with me. 
If she had told me "two weeks ago when we had dinner and took a walk together," I might have been able to remember.

"Can't you remember anything unless you try to remember in earnest? As you are not interested in me, you can't understand what I'm driving at."

I was almost going to say "Even when I'm really interested in something, I will not be able to remember the whole story," but I remained silent. Instead of answering back her words, I am always apologizing to her. 

As is always the case with her, she never listens to me. But she demands that I should listen to her, which irritates me. 

I don't expect anything from her. I don't want her to talk about this and that. What I want her to do is "do this, do that." Were I told to do this and that, all I have to do  would be just to follow her instructions.

I grumbled a lot. Sorry. 
I wonder what is love. It might be better to be alone when I want to do what I want to do. Although it is fortunate to have someone to talk with, you are forced to listen to his or her story even if you don't listen to it. You can't skim the cream. 

Simply put, love is like a zero-sum game. Or rather, demerits outnumber merits. 

I can't , for the life of me, walk away from her. Is it a love or not? Is it just a dependence? 

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Chapter 2

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I happened to meet her at the gym several years ago. At that time, as we both would often go to the gym, we became aquaintances with each other though we were merely on greeting terms with each other. 

Some day when we ran side by side, she accosted me, saying "How about talking with me outside? " This was the beginning of our dating. 

"That sounds great. We have only seen each other wearing tracksuits."

"I agree with you. Let's go somewhere one of these days."

From then on, we came to communicate on LINE or on the phone. After a month or so, we decided to go to the beach together. 

"OK, please take the last car of the 9:00 train. Then, I'll take the same car."

Following her words, I took the last car and waited for to come. I wondered if she really would come. She was the last person to break a promise. But I couldn't imagine that she and I would have a good time together because we had never met each other at a place but the gym. 

I saw her coming into the train at the second station after I took the train. At  a glance, I couldn't recognize her, but she was there. The mere thought of her coming to me soon made me happy. 

After a while she came to me. She was pretty. I have ever only seen her naked face at the gym. I saw her wearing a skirt for the first time. 

"Hello! "

"Hello ! You are extremely pretty. "

"Thank you. Even if you don't think so, I'm glad."

"I'm not telling you a lie. You are really, really cute."

She answered with a smile, saying "I feel happy that I was told 'pretty'."

I don't remember what we talked about in the train in detail. We might have talked about the passing scenery through the window in the train.

After an hour or so, we arrived at the destination. We could see the beach from the station and began to walk toward the beach.

I have never visited sea for a long time. I have never seen the beach together with anyone."

When did she go around the beach last? 
Who was the man she came with? 

I wanted to ask her, "Did you see the beach with your ex-boyfriend?" But I didn't ask her the question because I feared  such a question would disturb her. Instead I asked her, "Have you ever come to the beach alone?"

"Yes, I have. I sometimes visit sea alone. Don't you think your problem is trivial when there is sea in front of you? Of course you can't solve your problem just because you see the horizon. But you can feel as if your heart has been washed."

"I might have caught your meaning. As far as I can see, there's nothing that impairs my sight when on the beach. I can feel the vastness of the Earth. My existence on this planet is very tiny compared with the vastness of it."

"I feel the same with you. The mere thought of the vastness of sea makes me feel how little my problem is."

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Chapter 3

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From then on, I came to often have dates with her. The fact is that each date was just to have a dinner after taking some exercise, to go to see movies, to wander around the pets' section in the home-center and the like, though.

Some day after a month or so, she said to me, "I don't want to go home tonight. It having been Saturday, I had a spare time. Shortly afterwards, we were in a love-hotel. We kissed, held each other, and had sex."

The next morning she said, "Let's break up."

"How come?"

"I think the day will come when you feel a burden when you are with me. So it is better to break up with you now, feeling happiest."

"Do you dislike me?"

"I have just told you what I wanted to tell you. Generally speaking, a man feels happiest when he have kissed her girl-friend or when he have had a sex with her. After that, he will just follow the law of inertia. I have known that from my long experience. So it is best to break up when I feel happiest. Both of us won't be hurt by so doing."

"I can't understand why we have to break up when we feel happiest."

"You don't have to understand me. What I've said has just come from my instinct. I know I won't be understood and I don't want you to understand me. Though I am you first girlfriend, you are not my first boyfriend."

"How many boyfriends did you have in the past?"

"Such a question of yours terribly irritates me. I will never ever tell you how many I have through sex with men. You are kind and I won't hurt you. You can get away from me now."

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Chapter 4

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Then, we left the hotel. It has alrwady gotten bright.

"Lastly, let's walk again together."

"Yey, let's"

I held her hand and began to walk with her.

"Oh, it's already the season of hydrangea. I feel as if this year had just begun a few days ago, though."

There were a lot of miscellaneous hydrangea along the mountain road. 

I don't think this is the best day of ours. I want to nurture our love for the rest of my life.

"What is a good relationship? What does it mean? Your ideal girlfriend is, I think, a girl to talk with, to have a date with, to have sex with,right?"

"I love you because I love you. I love you, so I want to stay by your side. That's the way I love you."

There was silence, and then she said, "You are pure. I forget such a feeling. I always associate the word 'love' with 'ego'. Your idea that 'I love you because I love you' sounds great. I love it."

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Chapter 5

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From then onward, we became on dating terms. Out love resulted in what she told me. We grumbled, went anywhere together, and had sex occasionally. But we were satisfied. We never thought of marriage although she asked me, "Have you ever thought of marriage?"

"Yes, I have. But I think it better not to marry. Marriage creates, generally speaking, a disaster. Or at least, it creates more difficult problems."

"When either of us wants to break up, it is better to. If we marry, we will be forced to consider how to share or divide our belongings, how to educate our children and the like. We have to listen to the opinions of others. Of course human bondage is precious, but bondage is bondage. We'll be stuck. Can that be called love?"

After all, both she and I haven't yet found solace in marriage. We share with each other the notion that the purpose of marrage lies not in bondage but in living a life day by day. This is the way of ours.

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Chaper 6

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Seven years have passed since then. We are still lovers. Sometimes we mentioned marriage but have never thought of marriage in earnest. 

"Many years have passed since we first met. When we slept together for the first time, I thought about breaking up with you. But strangely enough, we still meet each other. I have no regret."

"I have never wanted to break up with you."

"Thank you very much."

"I am of the same opinion with her. That morning I didn't have so strong a determination to love her. What motivated me to love her was loneliness."

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Chapter 7 

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"I'm sorry to have called you late at night. Are you free now?"
I heard her on the other end of the line.

"What?"

She was silent for a few seconds, but she began to speak again in a small voice.

"My period has been three days late. I suppose I'm pregnant. This has something to do with you, so listen to me It's an important story."

When I was told her story, I thought it was true. But I was not happy.

"I will have an abortion, but I wanted to talk with you about it. At present, I'm not quite sure."

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Chapter 8

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A week has passed since she called me. But I didn't try to communicate with her.

I justified myself by thinking that I should wait for her call I had nothing to say to her. But in fact, I just might have thought her a mere nuisance. 
Just as she told me when we began dating with her, I wanted to date with her not because I was interested in her but merely because I was lonely. It was not until I was told about her pregnancy that I was inevitably forced to make a decision. 

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Chapter 9

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"I went to the hospital. I am pregnant." 
When she spoke to me, I couldn't utter a word.

"I don't want you to tell a lie, but you can't tell me 'Bear my child'." 
After she gave a sign, she began to speak again. 

"I have no intention to blame you. To tell you the truth, I was not glad when I made sure I was pregnant. What I thought first of all was that I must break up with you."

"Please bear our child," said I in spite of myself."

She said to me as if she had ridiculed me, "I will bear my child without fail. You strogly hope so, right?"

I was foolishness itself. I was lacking in a sense of responsibility. I had to be silent. 

"I'm sorry. I don't want to embarrass you. Whether I will bear my child or not, that depends totally upon me. But when I decide to have an abortion, I will need your approval. As there's some time left, I want to think about it thoroughly.."

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Chapter 10

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We parted that day without coming to any conclusion. I have a job and some money sufficient enough to bring up a child, so does she. 

The problem with our child is that we will not be able to have a date freely. 
Am I not in love with her? 

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Chaper 11

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We had had no communication since then. Almost a week was going to pass away. 

"Have you heard of the railroad accident nearby?"

"No, not yet."

Something told me that was a bad news related directly to me. I tried to communicate with her on LINE, and then on phone, but there was no answer.

Two days after I heard of the accident, I found a letter in my mailbox of my house. 

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Chapter 12

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About when you read this letter, I will have gone to another world. I hate being bound up with the fetters of love.

I made an apology to my girl in my womb, but I decide to die together with her. 

I tried to bear her and tried to dream of a happy life with you, but in vain.

All I could do was that both you and I would live an unhappy life together.

Does it have a meaning of great value that we will live no matter what happens? Keeping living a life with a heavy burden is no more than stressfulness itself. 

Who on earth has decided that life outweighs death? 

All that we can listen to is the words that living people utter. Were we able to listen to the dead, we would surely listen to the opinion insisting that death far outweighs life. 

For these ten days, I had wandered around graves and shrines where the dead are sleeping and paid attention to the insistences of the dead They say they feel happier after their death.

The living is always competing with one another and everybody incessantly tries to find out his or her advantages over others. In contrast, the dead cares for nobody. 

After an individual has passed away, he or she will leave his or her own soul on the earth and his or her body will result in being divided into pieces. 

The dead can fly anywhere and enter anybody's mind. So they can understand all including vanties and truthfulnesses within their minds.

During my life with you, I couldn't read your mind nor your heart. These days, I have been toying with the idea that I look into everybody's mind and abyss by discarding my flesh.

I have not yet known what it is like to live a life in hell, but I am very much excited.
I have never gone through such an excitement.
That's the reason why I will die. 
Never ever look for me. 
Good-bye for ever.

Sincerely yours

Who calls it a love? (Fin)

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#短編小説
#それを愛と呼びますか
#忘れられない恋物語
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#恋愛小説
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#英語
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