"So this is - catharsis?"

"A little bit of that, a lot of feeling sorry for myself or realising that there are things I want that I'll never get or... stuff like that."

"Yeah, I guess it would be - different, coming at it as an adult, I was doing a primitive form of this when I was six so stuff hasn't really had time to accumulate for me."

"...six. That sounds adorable."

"Well I wasn't very good at it then, my handwriting needed work, but yes."

"I also realised that—a big part of why I have a hard time with the horrors is that I feel like the only people who could possibly—set me free, allow me to be okay, are Lee Tae-gun and Kim Hye-jin. If they forgave me then..." Shrug. "But that's one of the things I can never have."

"It's... at least something you can't seek out," Haru allows.

"So I have to either figure out a way to be okay with that or a way to be okay with not being okay."

"You have a lean between the two yet?"

"I'm extremely self-centered and cowardly so I'm certain I'll manage to just be okay eventually, at least now that I've fully determined that what I want is unachievable."

"...that's certainly a way to describe things. I guess I sometimes describe myself as self-centered but I think the tenor of the adjective is different somehow when I do it."

"...I suppose it must be. I can't say I'd have described you as such."

"No? Is it because the part of my self that I most loudly center is the one where I am a charitable and heroic and research-oriented sorta guy? I assure you I'm extremely smug about it."

"Smug I can see. You don't center yourself to the detriment of others, how about."

"I'd have so much less to be smug about if I did that, it'd be like buying myself a World's Coolest Esper mug and pretending that was meaningful."

"Should I buy you a World's Coolest—no, that doesn't sound so funny outside my head."

"I don't want the mug, I barely even want the outside acknowledgment though it doesn't hurt, I want the reality. I would still want to be the world's coolest esper even if for some reason I had to do it in perfect secret."

Sure, let's pretend "esper" was the word he had been going to say next.

"The thing I mean when I say I'm self-centered is, you know, the thing that led me to the horrors. Focusing on my own feelings even if they hurt others."

"Yeah. But 'self-centered' alone doesn't get you there. Depends what part of the self, depends on what you do with what you've identified as the center."

"This may be my ESL speaking but that feels like pretty close to how I've seen other people use the term?"

"Yeah, it's not wrong, just not a complete description. And I don't think 'cowardly' covers it either. So you've identified some traits that you do not necessarily have to give up if you embark on a journey of self-improvement."

"'Cowardly' was because when I thought that the correct thing for me to do was to atone for my sins I instead decided I should kill myself. ...you can stop me if I'm getting too heavy again, I seem to always do that."

"I'm okay so far, if this is in fact the conversation you wanna have, but if you are having it by accident we can look at more snowflakes. Or have sex."

"I'm not having it by accident but I never know when I'm sliding into 'dumping all of my emotional issues on nonconsenting victims' territory. Although if the alternative you're proposing is sex I can't imagine this could possibly be more pleasant than that."

"Well, is the thing you're after a pleasant time or is it processing your notebook-catalyzed revelations with another person, the buffet has both options."