Organize clothes by color, rearrange messily shelved books by author—or by era. It’s also fine to make meaningless doodles or write a diary.

I write a diary almost every day. As long as my body allows it. If you have nothing to write in your diary, you can write about things that haven’t happened.

That is, a completely new story.

Stories that will never happen. A prince, a knight, and a dragon.

Beings that barely maintain their existence as remnants of an old era. Or stories of a kind fisherman and a tall clown. Anything is fine. As long as you don’t take these fictional stories seriously, they will always be kind to you.

Regardless of our will, time will flow consistently, and when the dawn light brightens, your eyelids will close like wet clothes. Until then, you’re free to do whatever you want.

If the passages in paintings were connected, nights of insomnia wouldn’t be so troublesome. When neither of us can fall asleep, we could reach into the oil painting on the wall and enter inside the picture.

Stepping on soft ground where the sun never sets, listening to the sound of green leaves. So that the passing time isn’t just boring.

How about trying to close your eyes with this imagination today?

Sent by Asha

P.S. If you really can’t fall asleep, how about sending a letter? As long as you don’t disturb the sleep of the delivery person in the painting, that is.]

[To the clever and kind Asha

There’s a reason why fairy tales are read to children who fuss about sleeping. It’s to let the body sink into bed while making the mind lighter than air, floating in the sky.

For countless adventures that can’t be reached with feet planted in reality.

I didn’t have the confidence to create a completely new story. It’s not my temperament, and I’m more suited to appreciating works that someone else created with all their heart and soul for a long time.

Today again, sleep doesn’t come easily.

For the same reason as in my last letter. It will probably be like this all winter. It will be unusually long and turbulent. But thanks to your kind advice, the night isn’t as troublesome as before.

As I list these things to tell you, I imagine you more seriously than ever.

We’ve never met, and this imagination is simply a compilation of information we’ve exchanged so far. You seem just like a shape with blurry lines, full of water.

Teal hair and deep blue eyes. Even that, I can’t know the exact colors, so I go through the paintings in the corridor, sorting out colors that might resemble you.

There’s not much harvest, but I just end up doing it.

Looking back—though it’s obvious—we don’t know what each other looks like, how tall we are. It’s too embarrassing to describe my appearance, and I guess it’s the same for you.

Mere appearances aren’t important for exchanging letters, but I’ve imagined on my own. Whether you’re tall or short, what shape your glasses are, whether you prefer pants or skirts—probably skirts, since you’ve mentioned wearing dresses several times—whether you use your left or right hand to hold a cup.

Such trivial things.

When I think of you, I always picture you sitting in a plush armchair, dropping tea leaves. Not turning pages or holding a pen.

The image of you dropping dried flower petals with your thumb and index finger, then pouring hot water. Due to the steam, your clear expression isn’t visible.

Such groundless imagination.

Have you ever thought of me too? I wonder what I look like, dressed up in your mind.

Tonight seems more peaceful than yesterday.

Thinking of an unidentified friend, Carol]

[To Carol

I, too, have often imagined what the person I exchange letters with might look like.

But Carol, isn’t it a bit hasty to ask me such things? I don’t even know your hair color. Previously, you mentioned in passing that you like blue for ‘exactly’ the same reason as me.

That your eyes are also blue.

But if you know how to look at paintings, you’ll know how many blues there are in the world. Among the countless categories of ‘blue,’ which blue might your eyes resemble?

We need to start from here. Whether it’s a faint, light blue like the summer sky, a deep and profound color like the night sea, or a vibrant blue classified as ‘blue’ in paint.

You’ve never told me.

I’m not blaming you. Our topics have been filled with deeper, more serious, and honest things. It didn’t matter whether eye color was blue, red, or yellow.

But you brought it up.

Thanks to you, I’m feeling unprecedented curiosity. What do you look like? Are you tall or short? Is your hair curly like mine or does it flow like butterfly wings? Are your nails round or angular?

I couldn’t clearly determine anything. The most I could imagine was ‘probably taller than me,’ ‘probably not curly like mine.’

Even this might be far from the truth.

The only thing I can be certain of is that you’re a sixteen-year-old boy whose birthday passed a few months ago.

As much as I want to know more about you, I’ll tell you more about myself. That would be fair. With a bit of exaggeration, you, whom I’ve known for about half a year, aren’t the kind of pathetic person who would abandon loyalty and courtesy just because a girl whose face you don’t know differs from your ideal type.

Since I was young, my hair has been curlier than others. It curls like hair that’s been tightly twisted and then released.

I already mentioned I wear glasses, right? It’s rare for island people who use the endless sea as their playground to have poor eyesight—almost nonexistent—but sadly, I avoided the vast sea and the blazing sun. Looking back, it’s remarkable that I even learned to swim.

I buried my nose in books rather than the sea. I got my first pair of glasses when an optician from Delling came to Iota for vacation, and after that, Grandfather checks my eyesight every year and gets them for me. In Iota, only I and Bash’s grandmother, who’s over ninety, wear glasses.

The lenses get thicker with each passing year. Because the support constantly presses on my nose, even when I take off my glasses, that part is slightly indented.

I’ve been using the same frame for three or four years now. It’s just small enough to barely not touch my cheekbones.

As you guessed, I often wear skirts rather than pants, and light dresses with connected tops and bottoms. It’s not that I particularly prefer them, but they’re easier to put on and take off.

It’s also because all the clothes Aila handed down to me are dresses. Unlike me, Aila often moved around the island, which caused her clothes to wear out and get dirty quickly. At least on days she wore dresses, she didn’t go into the sea.

I wear loose sweaters or light shawls on top. Compared to Kasoche, Iota’s winter is hardly a winter, but I’m weak to both heat and cold.

The temperature is gradually dropping. I welcome the increasingly cool breeze. If I had to bear the midday sun on my head, I feel like I couldn’t take a single step.

When the sunlight weakens, I plan to visit the sea that you’re so curious about. Though it might be difficult for a while.

I’ve never consciously thought about which hand I use to hold cups, but it’s my left. I’m not left-handed though. If I had to classify, I can use both.

In the past, when Aila went to school and Grandfather went to work, I practiced writing with a pen held in the opposite hand from usual. Out of boredom.

Since then, what my left hand can do, my right can do too, and what my right hand can do, my left can do as well. Though I’m clumsy with embroidery and net repairs.

I’m unskilled in all kinds of physical work. Not that I have an excellent sense for intellectual work either. Until this winter, Aila, and after that, Rosette occasionally helps me try some of the studies done at school.

Though it’s discouraging when I fall ill once and the progress flies far ahead.

There is an armchair in the study, but it’s for Grandfather, not me, and I’m shorter than other kids.

Now it’s your turn to tell me. I hope you’ll answer in detail, from the crown of your head to the tips of your toes.

First, I’m curious about the exact color of your hair and eyes. I also want to know what you did last weekend, and I’d like you to introduce your large family. Of course, only to the extent that doesn’t make you uncomfortable.

November is approaching already. Around the turn of the year, outsiders will come to enjoy winter vacation. The island will become more bustling then, and I’ll have more to tell you.

From Asha

P.S. I just went for a walk. Normally, I wouldn’t go out on such a hot day, but evening was approaching and the sun had softened. I wanted to let you know what the weather was like today.]