Heaven's Door

Synopsis

Harumi has been in the hospital practically her whole life. She has a life-threatening disease, and is kept inside at all times. Her life is incredibly mundane until she meets Masato, a new patient. He isn’t the best influence, being a heavy smoker and drinker, but since they’ve both got nothing better to do, they become friends. This humorous oneshot follows their meeting and the night they spend together, talking about what it means to die early. (Source: Nagareboshi Manga)

I must give this manga some merit because of the characters, which aren´t the typical shoujo characters, especially the girl who has a strong personality. The story isn’t the typical shoujo school love story either (which is good), but there are serious problems with the plot. To be true, there is one big problem, which ruined the whole story, it threw me out of the story completely. Harumi is expected to die of cancer in a few months. Having lived in a hospital since she was a little girl, she has experience little in life, until she meets Masato, a boy (a man, really, ashe is at least ten years older than her) who is hospitalized with a similar diagnosis. He has a brain tumor and is going to die in 4 days. And this is where the problem lies. I do believe Harumi´s and Masato´s reactions, the way they decide to deal with their situation, I believe their emotions... I just can´t believe Masato would be physically able to do the things he does. If he really had 4 days to live, his brain should already be in a state that wouldn´t allow him to do anything. He probably wouldn´t be able to walk or speak, even eat. He might even have lost his sight. Let´s assume that this is a rare exception, and that he can still do all that... how is it that the doctors could predict that he was going to die in exactly 4 days? It doesn’t work like that. The end, as touching and poetic as it is, is absolutely unrealistic two. Perhaps my judgment of this work is too influenced by my personal experience. Anyone who has witnessed the death of a relative from brain cancer knows things are way different from how they are portrayed in this manga. I´m not saying every case is the same, but I really couldn´t bring myself to believe what happens in this story.