Final Letter (5 Centimers Per Second)

Dear Akari,

Dear Akari,

I recall the first time I got your letter one hot summer's day, a few months since you moved. I did not know what to think. Given how often we changed schools, I knew that I had to get used to relationships that weren't meant to last. I tried to see what we had as just that. I had to. Yet, there your letter was, reaching across time and space, refusing to let go.

It took me a lot of courage to get a pen and paper in order to reply. What did this all mean? However, I could not shake the feeling that for once, maybe just once, I had discovered something that would not just poof as a tiny fragment in my heart, but would continue to be a part of me. As I read the letter, I kept hearing your voice in my head. 'Takaki-kun, please don't let it end like this,' you cried.

Reading this now, I imagine you cutely laughing. As years go by, we've both had so many different, various new experiences. How trivial this must seem! When we parted we were children, and when you wrote your first letter to me we were children, but I no longer have that excuse. Even then, remember how we used to be fascinated about all sorts of science trivia? When I think about quantum mechanics and the theory that there are a vast number of parallel universes out there for each decision we did or did not make, I can't help but wonder if there's one in which we ended up together, and what we did to get there.

Unfortunately, no matter how hard I try, I always return to the conclusion that it could not have played out any differently, not without changing everything that mattered to us. How long has it been since we last exchanged letters, and our relationship faded away like the falling petals of a cherry blossom tree? We were young. We could not handle the overwhelming feelings inside our tiny hearts and the pain that came with it. Our love was meant to be something astronomical, not an endless chain of 'how do you do's. Maybe it was wrong for me to have visited you, to have come running back to you when all seemed impossible, to have kissed you when are destined to not be together. Maybe, had the trains not been delayed, had we spent a pleasant two hours together but nothing more, I'd have the will to live the lie a little longer. Yet, the moment I felt your lips, I knew that I could not have our relationship any other way. We had been changed forever, for better or for worse. I was shaken by how much I needed you, how much I needed to hear your voice and to see you and to hold you, and in the coming months I only felt sadness. I no longer had the strength to tell you that I'd wait it out. I'm sure you must've felt it too, and for that I am sorry.

Yet, I would not have traded those memories for anything in this world.

Does it surprise you that I'm the one writing to you this time? Actually, I happened to find your address through your husband. I'm happy for you. I really am. It was something that we both needed to do. However, it's ironic how I once thought that you were the person I could understand more than anyone else in the world, and yet I was only able to contact you through the person who now does.

Nonetheless, I write to you because I no longer believe in leaving things unsaid. Not if we have the chance to do something about it! Once upon a time, you were the most beautiful girl I'd ever seen, and we would've made the most beautiful pair.

I won't deny that I'm envious of how the petals fall at 5 centimeters per second even now, and will continue to do so long after we're gone from this world, but I'm prepared to close this chapter, as you no doubt already have.

I wish you all the best.

Tohno Takaki