Koi wa Futago de Warikirenai - Volume 1 - Chapter Pr3

Prologue 3: Soliloquy of Jinguji Naori

I am an ugly person.

It is not about physical beauty or ugliness, but rather on the inside. At any rate, when I heard that my sister and Jun-kun had broken up, I uttered, “That’s too bad,” but in my mind I thought, “Now I can move on in my own way without worrying about my sister. Patience is not good for the body.”

I didn’t think, “Suck it up.” My personality is still not distorted.

I cried all night long when I heard about them dating each other. Literally, I cried all night long. I cried, my face pressed hard against the pillow so that my sister, who was sleeping in the next room, would not hear my sobs. I wondered if this was what one scoop of tears meant, but perhaps one scoop was not enough. I realized for the first time that humans are capable of shedding tears like this.

Crying makes you feel better.

If I shed a tear, I would feel better.

That was just a lie. All Lies.

It’s Eli Eli Sabachthani.

[TL note: The Hebrew form, as Eloi, Eloi, etc., is the Syro-Chaldaic (the common language in use by the Jews in the time of Christ) of the first words of the twenty-second Psalm; they mean “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me” ; Provided by a reader named in discord: Miko Ino]

I thought I had calmed down, but after a while my eyelids would sloppily break down again.

It went on like that for the rest of the night. At dawn, I contemplated that it would not be suitable to see my sister or my parents with a swollen face. I opened the door to my room and walked quietly in front of my sister’s room. I leaned my weight on the railing, went downstairs while checking my steps one by one. I wet my towel and returned to my room. I looked up and placed the wet towel over my eyelids to cool the heat.

Alone in a small room like that, I found myself so ridiculous that a dry chuckle escaped from my mouth.

This was my punishment for being so muddled.

That is why I have to endure such an experience which brought me such humiliation even if I don’t want to.

I knew that my elder sister liked Jun-kun for a long while. I knew it. Yet I found pleasure in watching Jun-kun becoming passionate and working so hard at his studies and knowing stuff, just in order to compete with me.

Oh, I am in his every breath, I thought. But even if that were true, there was no actual proof that Jun-kun did like me.

Because Jun-kun appeared lively when he would argue with my sister.

Knowing that, I couldn’t bring myself to tell him how I actually felt about him.

But I wanted to say it. I wanted to tell him. I wanted him to have his eyes only on me, and not even for a second on my elder sister.

But──if I told him that, the vague and comfortable relationship that the three of us shared ever since we were little, would fall apart. I didn’t choose ── it is because I gave up on choosing, that we have a simple and peaceful relationship.

We were just childhood friends who live next door. Our parents are close friends. Just because if things become awkward, we can’t just stop seeing each other due to the close proximity we live in, nor do we have the option to move out and live in another place altogether.

So, I decided to make a resolution.

A common one like if I get first place on a test …, but that just meaningless.

I could get first place easily if I were to squeeze my brain. That’s not even a resolution in a way.

Then, I got an idea while watching a quiz show on TV. I found an element of my resolution.

The element of my resolution was – to complete fast. This would definitely make it seem like a resolution.

I would solve the test questions faster than anyone else and aim for the top. I would not even revise my answers.

This was it. A good balance between luck and raw ability.

If I can manage to get to the top with that, I’ll tell him about my feelings for him. Yes, let’s do that.

However. I didn’t have the time to make a slow decision like that.

I was only waiting for a hundred years for the waters of the yellow river to clear.

To put it bluntly, I was just postponing facing the problem, giving this and that reason one after the other. It was just an excuse.

In other words, I was just ─ I was just being a complete coward.

The idea that I could communicate with him with test results and hobbies was nothing but just an illusion. My hubris, misconceptions, and love-seeking heart for Jun-kun was overshadowed by the fact that he had somehow chosen a short-haired elder-sister who was a member of the basketball club. I was swallowed whole by a mouth as big as a whale’s.

As if I can control listening to this heart-in-love endlessly!

I must catch this white whale with the help of this spear!

[TL note: fishing spear lol]

I waited for the right moment. I cannot stay depressed for time immemorial.

If you wait patiently, there will come a fine day to travel by the sea. Oh?, or was the term “nectar” used originally? Oh well. Anyways ─,

[TL note: The first lines mean: good things come to those who wait.]

This was the biggest incident that happened during spring break before I started attending the third year of my junior high.

And the other happened during Golden Week in the first year of high school.

Those were really and truly astonishing as well as unprecedented events even for me.

I thought, oh, so that’s how you’re going to play eh. So, what will you be playing. As the initiative was taken away from the opposite side.

Since then, Jun-kun had just confessed his feelings to me.

This is what you call a E U R E K A !

If it would have happened in the bathroom, who knows, I might have even jumped out of the bath and shouted that out loud. Not that I discovered anything new, but it was yureka for me to think of this scene that can also happen. A Greek exclamation. The word Archimedes is said to have exclaimed out loud in the past.

[TL note: yureka means eureka, but in Japanese wording.]

If you read it in English, it’s Eureka!

It will be on the test, so make sure to keep that in mind.

It won’t though.

In the Fourth grade… that is, during Golden Week of my first year of high school, I was confessed to by Jun-kun.

Well, I am not that degree of an idiot, so I had a pretty good idea how all of it must have played out. I was so excited for a while, and then when I calmed down my anger soared to the roofs. I was happy that Jun-kun confessed to me, but it was probably my elder sister who made it happen.

I mean, if not, then don’t you also think it is very weird?

Jun-kun, who had just broken-up with my elder sister recently, would in no possible way ever confess to me immediately.

Since Jun-kun liked my sister mon.

There was no room for me to come in-between those two love-birds in a relationship mon. My elder sister must have been tormented with guilt for making her move on him without letting me know, so I told her. Anyway, it’s just like her to break up just after completing this one-year anniversary. Really. What a waste.

It’s an unnecessary concern for her though. Yes, it’s really an extremely unnecessary concern for her.

Really, I can’t help but feel sorry for Jun-kun, being pushed around the clock by us twins.

But if I put that aside and genuinely think about my own feelings…, Un, since it can’t be helped, I wouldn’t mind going out with him; or such kind of feelings are there I guess. I will make the full use of the opportunity I am presented with.

The turn has at last shifted to my side. With an all-new vigour, I start thinking like that. Let’s be that type of little sister who doesn’t notice her elder sister’s intentions/motives.

For the time being, let’s go with this.

{God’s in his heaven ─ All’s right with the world.}

[TL note: the above is written in English]

By the way, I am apparently classified as a subculture girl by Jun-kun.

No, no, no, it’s not like that, I like main culture as well. How did it come to that?

Anyway, it seems like I am being treated like that. Really, I can’t accept that at all.

Also, Jun kun is also in the same boat. Be it novels, movies, manga, anime or etc he loves them so much that he would start to debate on these topics with his friends, including me … nope, not a debate, but a conversation. Well, even though I also love to argue on discussions regarding these topics, I am not writing this part of my story for arguing on these topics. I just want to immerse myself in them.

From when I was just a little girl, I grew up reading many books, watching many movies, and listening to many kinds of music.

Let me put it simply. My father was “that” type of person. Because I loved picture books and movies, my father would always put me in the middle of his line of sight. And well, the person in question thinks that he gave me a special education only for gifted children …

[TL note: his sci-fi fantastical delusive stories?]

As if all will go as per your desires! You S-F geek.

I pretended to be fooled and consumed every book, DVD, and CD in my father’s library.

For a daughter, cheating on her father is just a piece of cake. For, the father would never despise their daughter.

After being dumped by me, his next target became Jun-kun. Jun-kun listened intently to his father’s stories, which were far from being a fountain of knowledge. Day in and day out, he directed his ears towards him.

As a result, a disciple was born who strongly inherited my father’s taste.

Jun-kun fell into the dark side of the Force. I won’t forgive this father, ever. Damn that Darth Sith Lord.

[TL note: Ref. to Star Wars]

So let me say this once and for all. Jun-kun is basically that sub-culture fanatic in the group.

To begin with, When dating my elder sister, he’s the extremely far gone guy who would invite her to the symposium of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency as his date destination, and when it became a topic of discussion regarding the universe, he is that guy who would say “the space is the final frontier” with a very serious face at that, when it became a talk about our favourite music, he is the guy who can say it with a very normal face that “Kraftwerk cannot be missed out on”. And after all this, please enlighten me from where he got the right to call me a subculture girl. Jun-kun is much more of a mass of subculture fanaticism than me, you know.

And yet, Jun kun would never be called a sub-culture fanatic by anyone around him. Ah truly, it’s such a pain in my arse.

Is it related to the difference in persuasive power?

Because Jun-kun always ranks at the top of School?

No, no, rather I am also proud to say that I too have never slipped out of the top five spot in my grade ranking you know.

And if I am allowed to say this once and for all, at the end of the day, Jun-kun is indeed a good and fine subculture bastard.

Oh, this is basically, the talk about my first love, here.

Well, even if you take out this “first love” marker, what I am talking about is Jun-kun as a friend, as a comrade-in-arms, as a fellow hobbyist, and basically that type of friend all in all. That is why, I have never ever felt bored when spending time with Jun-kun even for a moment.

And that’s why I think about him, probably.

I wonder what kind of conversations my elder sister had with Jun-kun. Or so.

What kind of communication did she have with Jun-kun? Or so.

I wonder what kind of date was this dressed-up lump of advice going on and how they flirted with each other. Or so a time span unknown to me, a time span of theirs’ only to themselves.

Well, I can imagine what they might have been doing, but that knowledge was only limited to imaginations only.

How did she date and flirt with a boy who looked like he was walking around dressed in his skins? A time just the two of us that I don’t know.

I can sort of imagine it, but it is only my imagination.

Every time, my sister would always stay ahead of me.

Be it about making friends, or about clothes becoming too small to wear, or even about the case of wearing a brassiere.

And also, even about getting her own lover. And also, about kissing.

Every time, my elder sister seemed to walk ahead of me.

I just follow the path that has been set there for me. I, as the younger sister, had it easy, just needed to walk on that highway, that was all.

Although, I had no feeling of being inferior or anything. I am me.

I have my own way of winning.

In the case of the test scores, at present, I am much higher than her, and even in regard to comparing breasts, mine are bigger than hers now.

I have my own way of doing things. Just as the style of flow while working and finishing the craft differs from craftsman to craftsman.

Penguins? No, no. It’s not that I cannot fly or that.

I am a nighthawk. It’s only the beginning that’s hard; they have it hard to see. In the end, they become a star. Don’t you think so too?

You can squint your eyes unable to withstand my brilliance. Nothing is hidden from me, seeing from the higher ground, both of you.

It’s useless to hide anything from me, okay.