Before the Coffee Gets Cold

. A sleeveless kimono jacket hung on the back of her chair,

white short-sleeved dress

a song she used to sing as a child, and they agreed to go in.

She had arrived at the meeting place in an elegant pale-pink dress with a beige spring coat and white pumps, having caught the attention of all the men she had passed on the way there. It was a new look for Fumiko. She was such a workaholic that, before her relationship with Goro, she had owned no other clothes but suits. Suits were what she had worn on dates with Goro as well – after all, they mostly met after work.

was a woman who combined intelligence and beauty. But whether she realized this was a different matter.

career-driven woman.

She reached for her coffee, from which all heat had now gone. With the sweetest part of the experience lost, it sent her mood plummeting further.

A place for shady deals

This is something I cannot say to your face, so I wrote it in a letter.

When Kazu finished reading, Kohtake and Kei looked up at the ceiling and began to cry loudly. Kohtake understood why Fusagi had handed this letter to her, his wife from the future. From the letter, it was clear that he had guessed what she would do after she found out about his illness. And then, when he came from the future, it became clear to him that, just as he predicted, in the future she was caring for him like a nurse.

If Hirai had been in Fumiko’s place, she would have just broken down in tears. ‘Don’t go!’ she would have screamed. Of course, they would have been crocodile tears. Tears are a woman’s weapon. That was Hirai’s philosophy.