Episode 18
Having become single, I was finally free to love whomever I pleased.
And yet—after divorcing Mana, every one of the casual female friends I had been seeing before ended up dumping me.
Machiko, who had once cried out again and again how much she “missed me, missed me,” suddenly vanished without a trace one day.
—
When I contacted her and suggested we take a trip together, her reply was:
“I’m getting married soon, so please don’t invite me anymore.”
So all that “I miss you, I miss you” must have just been lip service. Figures.
Well, I knew no woman would take a married man like me seriously, not when marriage itself was off the table.
But still, now that I was single, this rejection hit me like a heavy blow.
The second one, Hana, also dropped me. The reason? Apparently because I had gotten divorced.
“It was fine when you were a married man,” she said. “That way, I didn’t have to take you seriously. But now? No way. I’ve got a darling husband and a child I adore. If you started getting serious about me, it would only cause trouble.”
Honestly, that stung.
Sure, for me too it was always just playing around. But to have her dismiss it so bluntly…
And yet, the fact that I was hurt at all only showed that somewhere inside, I’d arrogantly believed maybe she did have some real feelings for me.
That thought alone made me hate myself.
Still, if she could cut me off that easily, then maybe she had found an even better man.
—
While I was still reeling from those two rejections, the third woman, Aya, also ended things.
She told me:
“I’m over twenty-five now, and I want to get serious about marriage. If my fiancé’s family does a background check, your existence could ruin everything.”
So I was nothing but a liability to her.
And to think—after divorcing Mana, I was suddenly dumped by all my so-called “play partners” as well.
Maybe Mana had been a kind of good luck charm for me all along.
The way I’m using the word “good luck charm” might not be quite right, but who cares?
The truth was undeniable: once Mana was gone, the other women disappeared too.
If I’d ever seemed attractive, if I’d ever been surrounded by women, it was only because of my ex-wife’s presence.
I never made a move on the women at my company, but after the divorce, I found the stares of the female employees surprisingly cold.
For years, I had been warmed and comforted by the gaze of a wife who was attractive, gentle, and intelligent.
Now, the women at work looked at me as though I were beneath contempt—and that coldness was unbearable.
As for the men, they all said the same thing:
“You must have cheated, right?”
Their sneers surrounded me. Everywhere I turned, there was no one willing to offer even a shred of kindness or sympathy.
—
They say divorcés are supposed to be popular.
But in my case, that was absolutely not true.
Instead of becoming more attractive, I was branded with a giant scarlet label:
‘The pathetic man who managed to lose such a wonderful wife.’
Checkmate.
