I Ache, Therefore I Am | [A Tanuki's Short Story]
The world is filled with serenity.
Our school is a miniature garden,
like a blueprint drawn by God.
Desks arranged without a single deviation.
Clocks where even the sound of the second hand is synchronized.
The light shining through the stained glass
is calculated down to the angle at which it falls on the floor.
Here, we play a perfect harmony.
The sound of turning textbook pages.
The gesture of running a pen.
Everything is smooth and beautiful,
as if following a prescribed manual.
Within that harmony, she alone
was the only noise inside me.
She suddenly narrows her eyes and looks out the window.
That slight change in expression.
The flicker of shadows cast by her long eyelashes.
The trajectory of her hand tucking her hair, tracing a curve unlike anyone else's.
I watched all of it,
as if to burn it into my retinas.
In that moment, a dissonance arises only in my world.
Deep in my temples, tiny sparks of nerves scatter.
A sharp, hot sting.
I remember this sensation.
The name of a forbidden fruit
I found in a corner of the information archive.
I believe it was called 'love'.
It is an original sin etched into the soul.
It is recorded as a blasphemous emotional error,
signifying expulsion from paradise.
Every time I think of her, the sin punishes me.
***
At lunchtime, she lifts a spoon to her mouth.
As I am captivated by the slight moisture on her lips,
a knife of light flashes behind my right eyeball.
Jagged gears appear at the edge of my vision,
slowly beginning to erode the world.
The scenery distorts, colors peeling away.
Ah, it's happening again.
An unprocessable malfunction has begun.
***
The elderly teacher calls me an 'anomaly'.
During our regular interviews,
he says it as if peering into my soul.
"Your thoughts contain too much noise.
You need to optimize your thinking."
At the same time, I offer a white pill.
When I take it, like a calm water surface,
my thoughts become flat.
Not just the pain, but the craving for her,
and the contours of the world, everything blurs away.
A painless prison.
During that time, even the realization that I am alive
was in a state of being paralyzed.
That is why I stop taking them.
Because I wanted to reclaim the touch of life,
so intense it felt like it would break me.
***
The hallway after school.
Sunlight filters through the stained glass,
creating a seven-colored river on the floor.
On the other side of the river, she was standing.
The casual words exchanged with friends.
Her shoulders swaying happily.
Each one of those things
is a revelation to prove my existence.
Beautiful.
The moment my soul screamed that,
a storm was born inside my skull.
A vise tightening around my brain.
In time with my pulse, throb, throb,
someone is pounding on the walls from the inside.
I can barely even stand.
Swept away by a flood of senses,
I fell to my knees right there.
Even so, I do not take my eyes off her.
Because this pain is,
more than anything, the proof of my love for her.
Because this burning heat is,
the blood-stained proof of being 'human'.
Something that cannot be reduced to data,
something that no one can analyze,
my own story. My own stigmata.
I scrape the floor with fingertips trembling from pain,
and somehow manage to lift my body.
I must convey this inexplicable impulse to her,
this sweet agony.
To you, the only reader
of the story that is me.
I take a step forward.
The nerves throughout my body scream.
One more step.
The sounds of the world vanish,
and only the throbbing pain dominates my thoughts.
She noticed something was wrong with me, and
knitted her brows in concern.
That expression was my final supper.
Thank you.
Because you were there, I was able to become myself.
Ah, but.
Must I carry this pain and think of her tomorrow, too?
Will I continue to be scorched by this heat the day after tomorrow as well?
How long must I endure the mass of this loneliness?
What should I do about this stagnation of the soul?
My thoughts are fading.
Thinking of her, enduring the pain,
resisting this harmony.
Everything is equally heavy.
As my consciousness faded, every thread snapped.
Ah, I don't care what happens anymore.
It's too much trouble.
I participated in this project here ⬇️
#UnrequitedLoveLiteratureClub
#MigraineLiteratureClub
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🔻[Celebrating 100 posts!] I've reached 100 note posts and co-managed magazine entries! Introducing member articles with gratitude | [A Tanuki's Story]
🔻Conveyor belt sushi that you can't cut your losses on | [A Tanuki's Short Story]
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