The weather forecast is the yardstick for going out, and there was no grand reason or purpose for choosing a day marked with gray icons where rain clouds were certain. It was just an act I tried to relieve something, which eventually hardened into a habit. I wrapped my skin in clothes and placed myself in a park where umbrellas came and went. The folding umbrella pushed to the end of the bench acts like a lost item, but it is clearly mine, and its reason for existence should be to block this rain, yet most things in this world are merely done out of courtesy.

It's the same for the moments when complaints finally cross my lips and turn into an incomprehensible conundrum. No matter how much I cover them with my hands, the falling raindrops will streak my cheeks, and we, helpless in the face of unrestrained naturalness, can do no more than cook up plausible excuses. Pretending to be fine is easy. Because everyone who hasn't realized that is like a downpour, it's always my kind that survives first. People who, having filled their bellies with sighs, would become jellyfish and reach a remote island even if this place were a vast ocean.

So, the reason I'm telling you this is...