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会ひたくて 逢ひたくて踏む 薄氷
I want to see
And to meet you
– Madoka Mayuzumi
Countdown
Music pulsed from the speakers, people jumping up and down shouting out each number—thirty-nine. Thirty-eight. Thirty-seven, the music beating out seconds.
Alone in the corner of the club, slumped against the wall, thinking, trying to remember the year that was nearly over. How apt it was to be single now, just as I had been when before I arrived.
Several times, I’d been by myself, standing on a bridge, not by intention, but I would just happen to be there, or be on the rooftop, and I was feeling sorry for myself; there was the urge to jump.
A mass of legs. Square-heeled feet stamping, eye level, grey pants or black stockings, plaid skirts, a blue laser carousel, speeding, faster.
Ten. Nine. Eight.
January 1991
семнадцать. The Mule Fifteen. The Language Divides