N3 Japanese Reading Practice: Text Message from a Friend
This free JLPT N3 reading practice is a short train-ride scene about an unanswered text. Read with furigana if needed, study the hesitation language, answer the comprehension checks, then keep training with short adaptive passages in Yomigi.
Passage
友人から「今日、時間ある？」とだけメッセージが来た。何の話か分からなかったが、すぐ返す気になれなかった。いい返事を考えているうちに、電車はもう家の近くまで来ていた。
友人から「今日、時間ある？」とだけメッセージが来た。何の話か分からなかったが、すぐ返す気になれなかった。いい返事を考えているうちに、電車はもう家の近くまで来ていた。Gist. A friend texts only “Do you have time today?” The narrator does not know what it is about and cannot bring themselves to reply right away. While thinking of a good answer, the train is already near home.
Vocabulary
友人 (ゆうじん)
friend (slightly more formal than 友達)
メッセージ (メッセージ)
message (often a text / chat message)
返事 (へんじ)
reply / response
気になれなかった (きになれなかった)
could not bring oneself to; did not feel like doing it
考えているうちに (かんがえているうちに)
while (still) thinking; before one realizes
近く (ちかく)
nearby / vicinity
Grammar notes
とだけ for “only …” quotation
「今日、時間ある？」とだけメッセージが来た means the message contained only that short line—nothing else explained.
気になれない
すぐ返す気になれなかった softens refusal: not “I decided not to reply,” but “I could not get myself to reply.”
〜うちに for elapsed time
考えているうちに shows that time passed during the thinking, and the train situation changed.
Comprehension
What did the friend’s message say?
Only “Do you have time today?”
Why didn’t the narrator reply immediately?
They did not know what the message was about and could not bring themselves to answer right away.
What happened while they were thinking?
The train had already come close to home.
Why this level
- Interpersonal hesitation and omitted context—more N3 than a plain event list.
- Quoted chat style plus connective soft refusals (気になれなかった, うちに).
- Still a single short paragraph; no essay-length argumentation.