South of the Border, West of the Sun: A Novel (Vintage International)

by Haruki Murakami

What confused and disappointed me, though, was that I could never discover within her something special that existed just for me.

same. What we needed were not words and promises but the steady accumulation of small realities.

“the sad truth is that certain types of things can’t go backward. Once they start going forward, no matter what you do, they can’t go back the way they were. If even one little thing goes awry, then that’s how it will stay forever.”

“Lovers born under an unlucky star,” she said. “Sounds like it was written for the two of us.” “You mean we’re lovers?” “You think we’re not?” I looked at her. She wasn’t smiling anymore.

To what extent facts we recognize as such really are as they seem, and to what extent these are facts merely because we label them as such, is an impossible distinction to draw.

The reason I didn’t want to hear that tune again had nothing to do with memories of Shimamoto. The song just didn’t do to me what it used to. Why, I can’t say. The special something I’d found ages ago in that melody was no longer there. It was still a beautiful tune, but nothing more. And I had no intention of lingering over the corpse of a beautiful song.