Fortune-teller
A story I heard from the manager of a certain company.
A few years ago that manager was arranging her schedule to meet with a fortune-teller she was usually on good terms with, to consult about the future of her business. Nevertheless, they were usually too busy for each other, and there was no way their schedules would mesh.
In the meantime, while the manager was stopped at a large intersection, she accepted a call without the secretary she'd been using up to that point. She was told that he could meet her only on a certain day, and after that he would never again be able to tell her fortune. Checking the date, the manager took offense that he would absolutely not tell her fortune anymore after that, so she went to another fortune teller whom she found out about through an acquaintance.
One month after that...
She was still angry about having been flatly refused at that time, with "I can't tell your fortune anymore." Wanting to find out the real intention behind having been told that, she tried calling the fortune teller one more time. However, she heard an announcement regarding the existence of that phone number...
It was on the manager's mind too much, so she called a similar fortune-teller friend.
"I can't get in touch with that person anymore, but don't you know what the circumstances are?" she asked.
"Huh? You didn't hear? The truth is, that person died recently you know... Actually, it was really sudden," her friend told her.
Naturally she was taken aback and gasped in a breath, and at the same time said with surprise, "When did he die? On what month and day?"
When she heard the answer, the manager understood everything in an instant.
The day the fortune-teller died was the day after he had designated for her at that time.
A few years ago that manager was arranging her schedule to meet with a fortune-teller she was usually on good terms with, to consult about the future of her business. Nevertheless, they were usually too busy for each other, and there was no way their schedules would mesh.
In the meantime, while the manager was stopped at a large intersection, she accepted a call without the secretary she'd been using up to that point. She was told that he could meet her only on a certain day, and after that he would never again be able to tell her fortune. Checking the date, the manager took offense that he would absolutely not tell her fortune anymore after that, so she went to another fortune teller whom she found out about through an acquaintance.
One month after that...
She was still angry about having been flatly refused at that time, with "I can't tell your fortune anymore." Wanting to find out the real intention behind having been told that, she tried calling the fortune teller one more time. However, she heard an announcement regarding the existence of that phone number...
It was on the manager's mind too much, so she called a similar fortune-teller friend.
"I can't get in touch with that person anymore, but don't you know what the circumstances are?" she asked.
"Huh? You didn't hear? The truth is, that person died recently you know... Actually, it was really sudden," her friend told her.
Naturally she was taken aback and gasped in a breath, and at the same time said with surprise, "When did he die? On what month and day?"
When she heard the answer, the manager understood everything in an instant.
The day the fortune-teller died was the day after he had designated for her at that time.
<Coach's Regret>
I can't say anything about a story involving a person dying. In the text you rewrote "It's regretful" as the words "It was really sudden." You considered words that reach into the depths of the manager's heart, rather than words that speak for someone else. To begin with, the mood of saying "regret" comes after that of saying "sudden." Consequently, though the friend would feel regret as time passed, if the manager who heard about it suddenly heard the word "regret," then the mood wouldn't be very much so she wouldn't have grasped it immediately. Therefore it's all "sudden" right? When I hear "sudden" in this kind of story, I can grasp the person's mood. Isshi, you know... I wonder if you can understand my mood of when I wrote "Regret" here?