A Kiss Would Make Things Clear
Lake Biwa
This time, while watching The Boyfriend, so many feelings came up. I cried at the end when Shun said that cold water had been thrown on his feelings. I understood what he meant, even though the reason was so subtle I almost missed it myself.
More feelings surfaced during the conversations about Gensei’s father and grandfather's passing away, and how that kind of loss shapes the way you love. You don’t know this, but I hated my father for a long time. I never understood why I was treated as if I weren’t really one of his children. So often I felt alone, like I didn’t belong in my own family, as if I were just a vessel, present but unheld. I don’t want to linger there too much. I mention it because of how you once spoke about your father and how you have to take care of him.
I want that kind of care from you. But sometimes it feels missing. No response to messages. No check-ins. Often, hardly anything at all. It has taken me, and is still taking me, a long time to understand what your silence means, even though I know now that silence is a response. How can we like each other so much and yet barely communicate?
Our world should be full of love.
Having a boyfriend is a big deal to me. I’ve told some people about you. But what I really want is to tell my mom. That’s how proud I am of what I feel we have. When I was home for the holidays, all I could imagine was you meeting my family, them falling in love with you the way I did. Even though I don’t fully understand what family is, I know that loving you would complete my idea of what family is.
I know same-gender loving relationships are often kept private in Japanese culture, but I still hope you’ve thought about letting me meet your parents. You say it would be difficult to show me where you grew up. But why? Aren’t you proud of what we have, too? Or are you ashamed—of me, of us—that I might not be worthy of meeting them?
Our world should be full of love.
Yes, I am jealous of your boyfriends. Even though I was grateful you always made time to see me while you were with them, I still felt conflicted. Last year, something shifted. Maybe things became serious, and you needed to focus all your attention on him. I could have understood that if you had told me. Instead, I felt left in the dust. Unwanted. Still unsure what family is, and moments like this don’t help.
You couldn’t even give me one day to spend time together for your birthday. That hurt deeply, especially because you spent the day with me on mine, and it was so beautiful. And then it ended sadly because you didn’t respond to my DM when I thanked you and told you how meaningful the day was to me.
The more I watch The Boyfriend, the more I feel myself becoming like Shun—or wanting to return to my Shun-like qualities: distance, restraint, no longer reaching. My arms and my heart can only reach so far.
Our world should be full of love.
The more I cry, the more water fills the empty spaces in my heart. I’m afraid it will drown me, that there will be no room left for you. I’m not asking for a lifeboat. Be my moon. Be the tide that steadies the water where I’m trying to keep us afloat, as we drift, together, toward something luminous. “A kiss would make things clear.”