murakami, haruki - Norwegian wood

scissors and went out to the porch to read it. I had a feeling this was
not going to be good news, and I was right.
First Reiko apologized for making me wait so long for an answer.
Naoko had been struggling to write me a letter, she said, but she could
never seem to write one through to the end.
I offered to send you an answer in her place, but every time I pointed
out how wrong it was of her to keep you waiting, she insisted that it
was far too personal a matter, that she would write to you herself,
which is why I haven't written sooner. I'm sorry, really. I hope you can
forgive me.
I know you must have had a difficult month waiting for an answer, but
believe me, the month has been just as difficult for Naoko. Please try
to understand what she's been going through. Her condition is not
good, I have to say in all honesty. She was trying her best to stand on
her own two feet, but so far the results have not been good.
Looking back, I see now that the first symptom of her problem was
her loss of the ability to write letters. That happened around the end of
November or beginning of December. Then she started hearing things.
Whenever she would try to write a letter, she would hear people
talking to her, which made it impossible for her to write. The voices
would interfere with her attempts to choose her words. It wasn't all
that bad until about the time of your second visit, so I didn't take it too
seriously. For all of us here, these kinds of symptoms come in cycles,
more or less. In her case, they got quite serious after you left. She is
having trouble now just holding an ordinary conversation. She can't
find the right words to speak, and that puts her into a terribly confused
state - confused and frightened. Meanwhile, the "things" she's hearing
are getting worse.
We have a session every day with one of the specialists. Naoko and
the doctor and I sit around talking and trying to find the exact part of
her that's broken. I came up with the idea that it would be good to add
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