Hardboiled & Hard Luck

Ultimately, though, it's living people that frighten me the most. It's always seemed to me that nothing could be scarier than a person, because as dreadful places can be, they're still just places; and no matter how awful ghosts might seem, they're just dead people. I always thought that the most terrifying things anyone could ever think up were the things living people came up with.

She was still there inside me now, just as she always was: a life put on hold, a memory I didn't know how to handle.

Time expands and contracts. When it expands, it’s like pitch: it folds people in its arms and holds them forever in its embrace. It doesn’t let us go so easily. Sometimes you go back again to the place you’ve just come from, stop and close your eyes, and realize that not a second has passed, and time just leaves you there, stranded, in the darkness

The ritual of our daily lives permeate our very bodies.

I had been walking in silence for so long,I had almost forgotten what my own voice sounded like.My knees were tired;my toes were beginning to ache.

Actually, time had always been passing. I had just managed to avoid thinking about it very much. It would be hard for me to recapture that feeling—life wasn’t so easy anymore. Small things pricked my heart. In those early days, I lived in a world of overwhelming sensations; it was like I had just fallen out of love.

Things that don't matter at all to one person can hurt another so deeply it seems as bad as dying.

Because the sky is high and lonely, and it makes me feel very alone, and that makes my heart dance, and then I feel stronger. But at the same time, there’s this energy in the air; it’s a time of waiting, before winter really sets in.

And it’s true, I thought, interesting things do happen, even in the midst of the blackest nights. And when you take a spill, you can always rise up from it with something good in your hand.

I’ll wait until then—I won't forget you. I don’t want things to end like this, only having known you during this strange time. But right now, I just can’t think about the future.

September’ by Earth Wind & Fire and Yūmin’s ‘Autumn Travels.

People tend to think they break up because they get tired of the person they've been with—that it's someone's decision, either yours or theirs. But this isn't really true. Periods in our lives end the way seasons change. That's all there is to it.

Il cuore di ognuno di noi stava cercando di accompagnare in modo tranquillo la vita di mia sorella che se ne andava. O meglio, si stava avvicinando a malincuore in quella direzione. Procedeva con sicurezza su quella strada, tranquillamente, come quando l'autunno avanza cedendo il passo all'inverno.

He doesn't look like a gangster, but then he's not the office worker type, either...some kind of entrepreneur maybe, or, - wait, I've got it! He looks like he writes manga! Either that or a chiropractor, I guess.

Was war das denn bei Ihnen für ein Gefühl? Als Sie mit jemandem in so einer Situation waren, wo Sie sich gegenseitig verletzt haben, dass die Fetzen flogen?" fragte sie, wobei sie die Augen auf meine richtete, aber ihre Welt war so randvoll mit sich selbst, dass sich nichts mehr darin spiegeln konnte.

Did anyone ever imagine, back in the old days, that eventually a day would come when people and their brains would each die a separate death?

Her life was like a pale shadow of life, given form by innumerable layers of anguish.

...the loss of one ordinary worker is enough to send emotions rippling through the entire staff of a company. And the traces of that emotion would never disappear.

La guardai fissa. E in quel momento capii che in realtà non c'era mai stata una volta in cui i miei pensieri l'avessero raggiunta. Lei era sempre stata immersa profondamente dentro di sé, proprio come adesso, e non aveva la minima intenzione di rendere partecipe qualcun altro del suo modo di essere. Io potevo al massimo vederlo. Proprio per questo mi piaceva guardarla. Chizuru era una creatura che sembrava fatta della stessa fragile sostanza della vita, creata da innumerevoli strati di sofferenza.

Il tempo si allunga e si contrae. Quando si allunga, come una gomma ci imprigiona all'infinito nelle sue braccia. Non lascia liberi così facilmente. Ci troviamo risospinti nel luogo dove eravamo prima, o abbandonati nel buio, dove non si sposta neanche di un secondo, ignorando i nostri sensi tesi e gli occhi serrati.