Chapter Text
There’s a story I really like. It’s about a boy and a girl who could go to each other’s homes from their windows. They had a window-box garden to play at. They were best friends.
Despite what anyone might think, I don’t enjoy looking at myself in a mirror. They’re just everywhere, in disguises. Laughing at you, because how could you stop yourself from staring at all those store windows, reflecting you as you walk by? And yet, you need them. They remind you to smooth your hair, draw your shoulders back, suck your stomach in. They tell you when it’s enough. Mirrors, they’re like money. You need it, but you hate it.
I know I look okay to most people. Good, even. I would go as far as beautiful. Desirable, to some. Hot, they might say. It’s not like I haven’t heard it often enough. And I don’t dislike it. Because it’s power. And power, it’s been split anything but evenly in this world. If you have something going for you, you have to hold on to it.
See, that’s the tricky part.
I realized I had power when seventh grade came and puberty really hit the class and “bam!”, suddenly my breasts were twice as big as anyone’s. I never thought of myself as power hungry. But then, by the end of middle school I realized I was gaining weight. And I had always been slim, it was something I’d taken for granted. It made me realize three things: First, my breasts only gave me power in the first place because I was also pretty AND skinny AND not unpopular to begin with. Second, that even if you were given power by accident, you couldn’t keep it without effort. And third, I didn’t want to lose the power I had.
So, now I count calories, because I need to be skinny. Even though I would never admit it to anyone. It takes me an hour to wash my hair because I put conditioner on it twice. But I refuse to cut it shorter. My grandmother always told my mom: “A woman’s power is measured by her hair.” I also use this ancient trick they both have done since their childhood: Brush your hair with a hundred strokes every night. To keep my hair as shiny as possible. I also wear it down, instead of the preppy ponytail I used to wear. I decided that it was more alluring, and that being alluring was more powerful that being preppy.
But, I still want everyone to think I don’t look like this because I put effort into it. I want everyone to think it’s natural. Because, for a split second, it was. So, I guess I want myself to believe it’s still that way, too. I want them to think I wear a hoodie on top of our school uniform, because I’m really cool and chill, and don’t have to make effort. Not because my breast size forces me to wear a top so big that I appear as if I don’t have a waist, but the hoodie hugs closer to my body and reveals my real shape. Not in a million years can I allow anyone to figure that out.
Not in a million years can I allow anyone to figure out, that during the day, a mirror, is both, my best friend, and my worst enemy.
People can be mirrors too. And I don’t necessarily like figurative ones any more than I like the literal ones, because they come at you, from everywhere, each of them asking you to be honest with them and yourself in so many different ways.
Tetsu-kun once said I stare back when being stared at. I think I do it, so people would think I have nothing to hide.
This year, I think I’ve been forced to learn a lot about that. Honesty. I think, even though I stared back at people, I never really looked. I didn’t want to see myself reflected back in other people’s eyes.
Now I’ve been doing it. Really looking at people. Apparently, literal mirrors are the kind I should be looking at less. Other people are the kind of mirrors I should be looking at more. But I don’t like what I’m seeing. At all.
I’m seeing things I already knew. Things I chose not to look at. Things that have been making their way to the surface of my mind. So, when I finally find myself really looking at someone, and seeing why it is that I have a hard time really looking at them, I already know. There’s nothing new. There’s nothing new under the sun.
Like last time I saw Seirin’s coach. This year’s Inter High. I guess enough time and honesty had already gone by that I would look at her and think: Why on earth had I decided that she was my competition? Like, particularly her, individually, not just as part of Seirin. Just because she’s a girl too?
Well. Kind of. The whole reason just shows how pathetic I am. I think I just wanted to show her how much more of a woman I was than her. Because I thought it would be easy. I thought I could make her feel bad about her own femininity just by looking at me. That’s how nice of a person I am.
But, the joke's on me. Of course it is. Because for some reason, I needed to rub it in her face, over and over again. Things like how much bigger my breasts are. Why did I need to do that? Surely, to mess with her, to help my team win?
I wish. The truth is, that I just got a kick out of thinking that I had somehow won her, in my personal competition of being a girl. But… I only did that in the end because deep down I knew that she wasn’t my personal competition. We’re nothing alike. We are not “playing the same position”. I’m a manager. She’s a coach. Even if our job descriptions sometimes overlap, in the end, I’m a supporter. She’s a leader.
Her team is my team’s competition, but she isn’t mine. Just being a girl doesn’t change that. That’s why, that last time, I didn’t even go to her. I didn’t start running my mouth once. I couldn’t figure out what the point was, anymore. I just started to detest myself when I looked at her. I guess I finally realized, that I had never won anything, because I wasn’t playing the right game. I was simply taking my own insecurities out on her. Who wants to see something like that about themselves?
Sometimes thinking of people as mirrors can get so ironic. Like, what else are you supposed to think, when someone phonetically identical to a mirror starts yelling at you? It feels like a slap in the face. A slap he didn’t give me, but still looked like he wanted to. I’m talking about Kagamin, of course. What a pain, going through the trouble to do something like that. It’s like the world is screaming at you: Heey! Remember that Honesty Thing?! So, how was I supposed to just ignore what he said?
It happened after I had finally been rejected by Tetsu-kun. Kagamin came to yell at me, at our school, no less. Saying that I was unfair, that I pushed Tetsu-kun too far. That I treated him like crap, because he didn’t act like I wanted him to.
How can I deny it? He’s right. He’s so right I’m not sure he deserves a nickname any more. But, that just makes me even worse as a person, doesn’t it? And it’s not the point anyway. It’s not the point, whether he was right about me or not. The point is, how can a guy let himself be pushed around like that? Why didn’t Tetsu-kun reject me sooner? How could he let me push him so far into a corner? When I forcefully kissed him, it looked like it pained him to push me away, like he needed all his mental strength to do that. How could he be so weak? I don’t understand it.
But… I guess I have to try. Otherwise, I can’t be his friend anymore. And I still want to be his friend. Looking at Kagamin though, seeing how he looked at me, made me think maybe I lost the right to be Tetsu-kun's friend, after all. I did treat him badly, no matter how I choose to defend myself. I have to admit that much.
These mirrors really suck.
And when I look at Tetsu-kun, who still wants to be my friend, I know that… I was never really in love with him. No matter what I’ve said. No matter how much I’ve told myself these lies. It’s just that he would have been an easy person to be in love with. He was perfect, because, I always knew he didn’t love me back. That makes me the worst friend, out of all this. Because, from the beginning, I was just using him. I was just using him, to keep lying to myself.
But… that’s it. This is all that being honest and really looking at these people, these mirror pieces, does to me. It hasn’t done me any good, whatsoever. How much more do I have to look, how much more honest do I have to be? How much more do I have to hate myself, before this stops?
It’s all useless.
And then, there’s Dai-chan.
Oh God. Where do I even begin with Dai-chan?