I Have the Ability to See the Future
Author: Kaneki Sai
Suddenly, I can see the future……
I, Kuroki Atsuki, am just an ordinary student who has just started my second year of junior high school.
Even though I can see into the future, unfortunately I can’t specify the date and time.
Moreover, the future branches out, so it changes constantly depending on circumstances.
That’s why there are so many different scenarios to enjoy.
When I was a child, I thought it was just a dream, but at some point, I became convinced that it was the real future.
But unfortunately, this ability to see the future only allows me to see the future around me, not other places.
But the good thing is that once I’ve seen the future, I can close my eyes and visualize it to see what happens next.
If I want to, I can even see it in my dreams, and I can keep seeing the future along that timeline until it changes.
Of course, I can interfere with the flow of the present, but the future that changes as a result often doesn’t return to the way it was.
If I can change my current actions successfully, it might return, but this is very difficult.
For example, if it’s something that will happen tomorrow, the probability is higher.
I tried this when I saw what was for dinner that day, which turned out to be curry.
When my mother asked me to go shopping, I usually agreed without hesitation, but this time I tried to refuse.
When I closed my eyes, the dinner menu changed to Chikuzenni, a dish I don’t particularly like.
While preparing dinner, my mother told my future self, “Lotus root and shiitake mushrooms were on sale at the supermarket.”.
When I opened my eyes in disappointment, my mother was still at the entrance.
Naturally, I quickly snatched the eco-bag and said I would do the shopping.
This time, I was able to return to the original future, and the menu for that day reverted to curry.
By the way, the supermarket really did have lotus root and shiitake mushrooms on sale.
But I was really disappointed that I couldn’t win the Lotto 6.
I think that’s probably because if the winner changes, the future itself will change dramatically.
Oh, sorry, I got carried away with the introduction.
But please hear me out a little more.
My parents are close, or rather, they flirt all the time.
Apparently they got married while they were in college, so even though I was still in the second year of junior high school, they were still 34 years old.
My younger sister and I, who are one year apart, are amazed at the sight of them hugging and kissing each other goodbye and welcome home every time without fail.
But, you know, I secretly envy them.
My aunt occasionally visits, but my uncle just drops her off and picks her up without saying a word, and my aunt only speaks ill of my uncle…
If it weren’t for their child, they probably wouldn’t want to stay married.
☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆
After that, I became curious about whether my own marriage would be happy, and I went to bed hoping to see that future.
Ideally, I’d like to see myself flirting with someone cute.
It didn’t go as I hoped at first, but after a few months, I finally started seeing it.
At first, it was my classmate, Takane-san.
She’s a very cute girl, so I thought I’d be happy, but…
What I saw was a day five years into their marriage, and it was far from my ideal.
Unfortunately, by that time, she hardly spoke to me at all.
As I continued watching, three days later, she stood me up on our wedding anniversary.
My future self deeply regretted marrying her.
Out of curiosity, I endured the pain and continued to watch this future for a while.
According to my inner monologue, she confessed her feelings to me just before summer vacation after we started attending the same high school together.
She was the cutest girl in my class, so I happily started dating her.
She asked me to go to college with her, so I ended up going to a university that was significantly lower in rank than my choices.
After graduating, I got a job, and we got married right away.
However, about two years after we got married, she changed completely. She quit her job, stayed home, and stopped doing housework.
Despite spending every day lounging around, she constantly complained about me and compared me to her friends who worked at top companies.
Still, I tried my best for three years to have a happy marriage, but on our anniversary, she stood me up at the fancy restaurant I had finally managed to book.
In this future, I’m alone, venting my frustrations, and my mental health is suffering…
From the next day onwards, I decided to avoid Takane-san completely.
Thanks to that, this future no longer appears to me.
☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆
The next vision was on a certain day in the second year of marriage.
The other party seems to be a woman I met during my second year of college.
Her name is Misaki, and since there’s no girl with that name around me now, she must be a woman I’ll meet in the future.
This time, much to my delight, everything seemed to be going smoothly, as if the honeymoon phase were still going strong.
Whenever I saw this future at night, we were always in bed.
It was too stimulating for me now!
It’s not like I was just looking at this future because I wanted to peek into their nightlife, you know?
I need to make sure that I meet this person, right?
While making mysterious excuses to myself every day, I found out that I met this woman at a safety school after failing to get into my first-choice high school.
It seems that this future me lost interest in studying when I was in the third year of junior high school.
After becoming friends with this woman in the second year of high school, I comforted her after she had been dumped by her boyfriend at the time.
Apparently, we started going out after I approached her.
In the future beyond that, I saw myself rejoicing when Misaki tells me, “I’m pregnant”.
I was so happy, thinking, “This is a great future!”, but a sad event was waiting for me a week later.
On that day, the future me felt unwell and had to leave work early, and saw that Misaki was having an affair with her ex-boyfriend.
Even worse, the affair had started shortly after we began dating, and there was a high chance the child in her womb was her ex-boyfriend’s.
After that whole ordeal, my future self was completely broken.
I began studying hard so that I would not fail to get into my first-choice high school.
After a week, it seemed like I had escaped this future as well.
☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆
And then?
After that, I saw various futures over and over again.
There were other classmates, a cousin, and a woman I didn’t know at all, but they were all far from my idea of a lovey-dovey married life.
I divorced my classmate, was separated from my cousin for three years, and was in an awkward marriage with a woman I didn’t know who always yelled at me.
Am I the problem?
Thinking like that, I feel like I’m about to break down.
Naturally, I quickly distanced myself from my classmates and cousin, and as a precaution against the woman I didn’t know, I drew an illustration of her features, and somehow I managed to escape from that future as well.
Maybe my parents are like an endangered species…
There’s no point in thinking that way, but I keep failing at living a romantic life every time.
While I was fixated on such a future, in reality, I had already advanced to the third year of middle school.
And as a high school entrance exam candidate, I had already given up on a lovey-dovey married life.
☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆
As summer vacation was coming to an end, I saw my future again.
I was an old man lying in a hospital bed.
I was too weak to move my body, and even speaking seemed like a hassle.
It seemed like death wasn’t far off.
And when I looked around, there was no one there.
“So this is what it means to die alone…”
Looking at the bleak hospital room, I knew that my future was lonely.
Even though I didn’t want to, I couldn’t stop seeing my lonely future, not just the next day, but the day after that too.
“What am I doing wrong?”
Perhaps the reason for so many bleak futures was my own fault.
Still, I thought it was better than being parasitized by other women, so I continued studying.
But even without a spouse, it was painful to have no visitors in the hospital.
From that day on, I tried to be as kind as possible to people.
If there was an old lady, I helped her carry her bags, if there was a pregnant woman, I gave up my seat, and if there was a lost child, I helped them find their parents……
Just ordinary kindness like that.
☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆
One day.
My hospital room had changed.
The once bleak hospital room was decorated with flowers, and a gray-haired old woman sat next to my bed.
She gazed at the future me with kindness, occasionally wiping the sweat from my face.
Could it be? Just as I thought that, an elderly woman entered the room.
“Mom, are you still with Dad? He can’t even hear us anymore, can he?”
Oh man, I must be in pretty bad shape.
Dad? Is she, my daughter?
So did I marry this old woman?
As I was thinking that, the old woman replied.
“Even if he can’t hear us, I want to be by your Dad’s side as much as possible while he’s alive. He’s the most important person to me, no matter how old I get.”
“Mom, you’re really… I never thought you’d stay the same even at this age.”
!!!
I was surprised.
Because that was the future I had hoped for.
Even though we’re grandparents now, we must have been a loving couple when we were younger!
However, even though I’ve come back to see this future many times since then, the problem was that I had no idea who the old lady was.
Because her name never comes up.
Even though my son and his wife, my daughter’s husband, and about five grandchildren also come to visit me, everyone just calls her “Grandma” or “Mom”!
After that, I stubbornly stuck it out for about a month, and then a ray of hope finally appeared.
The old lady took my nearly motionless hand and murmured softly.
“Back then, you were ‘Onii-chan’ to me, then Atsuki-san after we started dating. When we had children, you were Papa, and then Dad. Now you’re Grandpa, but you’ve always been my precious person…”
She said this while crying softly.
I was surprised.
‘Onii-chan’?
The only one who calls me ‘Onii-chan’ is my little sister, Asana, right?
The next day, I headed to the city hall.
This is because they had a copy of our family register.
“But there are photos and videos showing my mother with a big belly.”
I was too young to remember anything about when my little sister, Asana, was born, but there’s no way that the lovey-dovey couple wouldn’t have left behind some videos from that time.
I had seen them many times.
As it turned out, we were indeed biological siblings.
Well, Asana and I get along well, but there’s no more than sibling affection between us.
In that case, who would call me ‘Onii-chan’?
I wonder if I can get more hints.
Unfortunately, by the middle of that day, I could no longer see that future.
It’s not that the future disappeared, but that the future me had passed away.
I can’t see a future without me in it……
So the path to this future remains forever a mystery.
☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆
From that day on, I no longer saw any future where I was married.
Well, maybe I couldn’t see it anymore.
Maybe, but I think it’s because as long as that future continued unchanged, I couldn’t glimpse any diverging paths.
Just like before, I could still see futures unrelated to marriage.
Since then, I have continued to study hard and be kinder to others.
That old lady seemed very kind, so I’m sure that future me would be kind to her, too.
That may be the only thing that will lead to me in that future.
“Is that Miyu-chan from the Takada family?”
A girl recently moved into the house two doors down from me.
About a month ago, when she had just moved in, I helped her when she got lost, and since then, she seems to have taken a liking to me.
“What’s wrong, Miyu-chan? Where’s your mother?”
“You see, Mommy got lost again, so Miyu is looking for her. Atsuki, help me look, too.”
Miyu-chan is supposed to be in fifth grade, so she must be embarrassed to get lost again at her age.
She seems to have forgotten her smartphone today, and the shopping mall is so big.
Especially for girls, it’s dangerous.
Being the kind-hearted person I am, I don’t question Miyu-chan and help her look for her mom.
After searching for a while and finding her safely, Miyu-chan’s mom and I exchanged phone numbers and LINE IDs in case it happens again.
Miyu-chan is quite a pretty girl, and Miyu-mama is stunningly beautiful, so I think Miyu-chan will be very beautiful in a few years.
But, unfortunately, I don’t think she’s the one I’d marry.
－Atsuki! I’m bored, let’s play－
－Atsuki! Come quickly－
“Atsuki, you’re late! You kept Miyu waiting!”
Whether it’s on LINE or in person, Miyu-chan always calls me “Atsuki”.
She has never once called me ‘Onii-chan’.
☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆
Five years have passed since then, and I will soon be in my second year of college.
Because there was a future I wanted to avoid, I didn’t give up on my studies and was able to get into my first-choice high school and a university that was even better than my top choice.
The strange thing is that I still don’t see that future marriage.
But everyone I can think of is gone.
Besides my sister, two other girls called me ‘Onii-chan’.
Yes, it’s in the past tense.
One of them was the granddaughter of the old lady whose bag I had helped carry a long time ago.
At the time, she was in the first year of middle school, two years younger than me.
We played together for a while, but after a few months, we grew apart, probably because she didn’t like it when Miyu-chan suddenly approached me.
The other is the younger sister of a high school friend.
She called me ‘Onii-chan’ in a cute way for a while, but after I invited Miyu-chan and Miyu-mama to the school festival, she stopped coming around.
So today Miyu-chan is inviting me over to show off her high school uniform.
The LINE messages are still as terrible as ever.
－I’ll show Atsuki, the lolicon, Miyu’s uniform－
－Atsuki is probably free anyway, so come right away－
Yes, she doesn’t even treat me like a senior, let alone an ‘Onii-chan’.
But she’s so cute, I can’t refuse.
With that thought in mind, I hurried over to Miyu-chan’s house, and Miyu-mama told me to go to her room.
“Miyu, can I come in?”
“Yes, come in.”
I thought it was unusual for her to respond so calmly, but when I entered the room, I was surprised.
There was a beautiful girl with long, smooth hair, half-up and lightly made up. She looked more demure than usual, somewhere between a beauty and a cutie.
“You see, I wanted Atsuki to be the first to see this. What do you think?”
What did I think? She was so cute that I wondered if there was any need to ask, but when I saw her unusually serious expression, I felt like I had to respond seriously.
“To be honest, I was mesmerized. It suits you well.”
Miyu smiled happily, and then turned to me again with a serious face.
“Atsuki-san, I’ve loved you since I was little. Will you go out with me? Please?”
What should I do…
To be honest, I really like this girl.
At first, it felt like I had gained a cute younger sister, but even though she casually called my name, she never treated me casually, and that kind of personality is probably one of her charms.
But if I accept this, the future of that lovey-dovey couple will probably be ruined.
As if sensing that I was thinking of refusing, Miyu cried out with a tearful expression.
“Is Miyu not good enough? I can’t have anyone but you!”
Oh, I’m such an idiot.
I guess I was too fixated on that future being the only good one.
The girl I like told me she likes me too. If I don’t respond, I’ll definitely regret it!
“Umm, Miyu. If marriage is a given, I’d be happy to date you. I love you too…”
Before I could finish speaking, Miyu hugged me and covered my mouth.
She didn’t let go for several minutes.
I thought to myself that I wanted to spend the rest of my life with this cute girl who was showing me such passionate love.
We became inseparable and could hardly let go of each other.
Realizing that quite some time had passed, I hurriedly decided to go home.
“Um, thank you for having me…”
“Th, thank you for coming today…”
With Miyu-mama watching, we both became flustered.
“Oh, is that it? You should say goodbye with a kiss at the door before leaving.”
Yes, my face was on fire.
I didn’t think I could beat Miyu-mama.
Of course, Miyu gave me a kiss as I left the front door.
☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆
Since then, I’ve been hoping to glimpse my future with Miyu, but I simply can’t.
It seems my ability to glimpse future marriages only works until I meet the woman destined to become my wife.
So, I made a choice. If I can’t see it, I won’t obsess over it.
Instead, Miyu and I will cherish each day and build something wonderful, one step at a time.
“Miyu, have you two finally started dating?”
“Un, from now on, I’ll call him Atsuki-san.”
“Well, it’s not good to keep calling ‘Onii-chan, Onii-chan’ forever.'”
“Mom! Don’t tell ‘Onii-chan’ about that!”
Sads Translates 