Cooled Time

A work participating in the Shirokuma Literature Club project

Preface
As I stare at the cooling coffee,
I wonder what people think about as time passes by.
Love and responsibility, hesitation and silence.
All of these, with just a slight difference in temperature,
can turn into either kindness or regret.

Main Text
I added milk to my coffee.
My stomach isn't feeling great today, so I can't drink it black.
Maybe it's because I went overboard and drank too much last night.
I haven't seen my fiancée lately.
Whenever I see her, I feel like she's going to bring up marriage,
so I end up avoiding her.
It's not that I don't want to marry her.
It's just that I want to get married when things are a bit more stable—that's what I'm thinking.
Cooled time passes by slowly.
She is past the prime age for marriage, and I feel the responsibility too.
I never know when I might be laid off from my current company.
I can't say "marry me" at a time like this.
I haven't received a LINE message from her in a long time.
Perhaps she has found someone new.
Just as I thought that, my smartphone lit up for the first time in a while.
A LINE message from her.
I felt my heart crumble at those words.
—"I got married. This will be my last message."
I realized that I had lost something precious,
only after I had lost it.

Afterword
Just as coffee cools down,
people's hearts also lose their warmth without them realizing it.
But as long as you remember that warmth,
surely, you can say that it was "love."

☕Suggested Tags：
#ShortStory #AdultRomance #CooledTime #SceneryWithCoffee #TheWorldOfMikanKatagiri

I wrote this for the Shirokuma Literature Club prompt.
Thank you for the prompt.