Happiness is something that you have to choose of your own volition, through your own words and actions, by letting yourself feel joy and excitement, by cherishing the people important to you, and cherishing yourself.
I had that same dream again. Whenever I had that dream, I always felt as though my own heart was asking: Are you happy right now?
Whenever I had to answer that question, I made sure that my principles of happiness had not changed, then puffed out my chest and nodded.
When I was a child, a sharp young girl who always said arrogant things, I was unable to think of the people around me, and I had no friends or allies. But luckily, that little girl had people to guide her and, thanks to them, she was able to grow up.
I still remembered those people who guided me.
Skank-san. Minami-san. Granny.
Bit by bit, I came to learn the meaning of the word “skank,” and the kind of job she likely had. That Minami-san wasn’t really “Minami-san.” That there was a plane crash on the day of my class observation. What Granny meant when she said I had the power to see the future.
They had all come to save me. And I, a little girl, was able to save them in return. That was probably why we met.
As I grew older, I understood the truth behind all those mysteries, but I wasn’t sad. I still loved all of those women, and that was why I made the choices that I had. I wanted to be like Minami-san, so I used a notebook for my work even now. I wanted to be like Skank-san, so I moved into a building painted the same color. I wanted to be like Granny, so I practiced making sweets. But I still couldn’t do magic.
In the end, I was never able to meet those women again.
I didn’t know if I could become as wonderful as any of them, but lately my face, which once looked just like Minami-san’s, had started to resemble Skank-san’s. I was sure that, some decades from now, it would come to look like Granny’s.
But my life belonged only to me. I could choose my own happiness.
Happiness wasn’t something bestowed upon you from without. It came from within. You chose it and created it with your own hands.
I had that same dream again. Whenever I had that dream, I always felt as though my heart was asking: Are you happy right now?
When it came time to answer that question, I always remembered Granny’s final words:
Life is something that belongs to you right now, while everything shines with hope.
✦ ✦ ✦
I set a chair down beside him in the studio, in a spot that would not interfere with his work.
“I’m just signing it,” he said, laughing at how close I was sitting.
I laughed and replied, “I had that same dream again.”
I had never explained the dream to him, but he did not question it. With his pen in hand, he marked the lower righthand corner with his signature. It was something he had started using in junior high. A phrase that meant the opposite of how his own name might sound to a foreigner’s ears—Kiriyuu, “Kill You”—something which might give them a fright.
“This one’s for the exhibit, isn’t it?” I asked.
“No,” he said, looking at the drawing of rapeseed flowers in full bloom. “This one is for you.”
This was his version of a proposal, I knew. Isn’t it a bit soon for this? We only just became lovers, I thought, but I knew that he had packed all the feelings we shared into this painting. However, when it came to such important things, I preferred to hear it in words.
“Coward,” I said.
He laughed and said the words properly.
How did I respond to his proposal?
What became of us since that day, even now still sitting at each other’s side, is strictly under the rose.