The structure for this volume is most intriguing. I have not read the Long Walk by Stephen King (actually haven’t read any on his books) but the oscillation between the distance that Oreki had to complete for his 20km run as well as jumping between the present and the past is quite interesting especially since the theme for this book is that distance between two people.

Oreki and Chitanda obviously are closer but that’s because we were privy to that closeness with the final chapter of the previous volume when he went and held the umbrella for her and actually the author uses this as the hooking point of Oreki’s initial anxiety as none of the other members knew that Chitanda visited him when he was sick due to that final line of “it’s kind of cold at the end of Volume 4. Because Chitanda knows the layout of his living room and how to get to his house while the others don’t know it as well is a raise for concern especially when there’s a new member into the dynamic.

Satoshi and Ibara dating almost felt like a passing statement much like the fact that it was Oreki’s birthday. I didn’t really see either of these built up but it’s understandable since Oreki doesn’t really find it that important even if his thoughts contradict that statement of receiving praise while even though we have come to know Satoshi and Ibara well enough, since we are in Oreki’s point of view once again unlike Volume 3, their relationship or matters are obscured from the reader.

This point of view is what is most important. Oreki doesn’t go out of his way to hide things from us the reader but that he didn’t even find that noteworthy to remember. Similar to how Satoshi only takes interest in people that are spectacular to him, Oreki selectively tunes out most things compared to others. But so does most people. I tune out way too much when I couldn’t care less about it and that is totally normal. Maybe because people tune things out or maybe it isn’t exactly correlated, assumptions are formed in this gap of knowledge and expectation. This is where the root of misunderstanding takes place.

We’ve had volumes upon volumes to figure out how our characters interact in a group setting. We got an insight on how they think with the culture festival. We saw how they changed across the seasons with the previous volume. Now we see when a newcomer gets placed into it all. Time progresses relentlessly between these volumes and that’s natural. It would be sad and or disheartening if these characters didn’t continue to progress beyond what we read of them in the white pages.

Running is something that I have taken on as a personal goal of mine to run a 5k by the end of the year. I’ve been doing pretty terrible in running a mile a day like I set out to at the beginning of 2024 but I got plenty fo time to think and let my mind wander just like Oreki who had to do 4 times this. While the journey might be something required from school that isn’t even close to required anymore in today’s schooling system (although I definitely had to at least run a timed mile when I was in high school some decade ago), the things we do within that goal is more important.

Similar to how car mirrors state that objects are closer than they appear, these relationships could be closer than that without some fear of others finding out. Ohitanda and her guilty feeling is never something that someone should feel when it a friendship or relationship with another. Even if Oreki complains about the curiosity of Chitanda, he never faults her for his troubles or that he strays away from the energy-conservation ways. Instead he just justified it as a more cost effective way similar to how he takes that shortcut with Ohitand. The blame shouldn’t be onto another. Even if it was toxic or ended up badly, Ohitanda still holds that relationship to heart and shares the good parts with others even if she only ended up showing Oreki the bad parts of it.