Chapter 3:
Marii’s Sensation
WHEN I HUG Marii Yukari from behind, the scent of shampoo and soap invades my senses.
It’s a sign of how much she cares about cleanliness. It’s a good thing to pay attention to, but knowing her reasoning being one of valuing cleanliness to make up for her looks wells up a deep sadness in me that I’m forced to push down. I dig my face into her hair and neck, looking for her own natural smell, longing to know the real scent of her. Once I realize what I’m doing, I get embarrassed and ask myself what the heck I’m doing to a girl. Back at home, in my bed, I flap around hating myself. But even so, almost every day, I hug her and whisper into her ear, “Yukari, you’re so cute.”
When I do that, she squirms around for a while, but then she turns around and hugs me back.
Apparently, she thinks compliments have to be returned. At first, when I told her she was cute, she’d answer that I was, too. Unfortunately, given that Yukari thinks everyone else looks like a robot, it feels strange when she says someone’s cute. She might think it’s a compliment, but how would a normal girl react to being told she looks “durable” or “powerful” or like she could “support a lot of peripherals”?
She might tell me, “Gaku-chan, your design is so Super Robot!”
I know it’s supposed to be a compliment, but I don’t understand what she means in the least. All I can do is say something vague and safe like, “Uh…huh. Right. Thanks…?”
We went through a lot of awkward moments like that. Eventually, Yukari stopped returning the compliments in favor of offering hugs. To be honest, although it’s definitely embarrassing, I like that much better.
One reason is that it’s hard to know how to react to her replies (what does it mean for a design to be so “Super Robot,” anyway?), but honestly, I’m just not a big fan of exchanging compliments: it feels forced to me. Then again, I do feel this weird duty to praise this insecure girl at least once a day (and yes of course I do really mean it), but in general, I’m not the kind of noble person who goes around praising people. It’s always embarrassing for me. I mean, it’s not like me to do such a thing.
That’s how I see it anyway.
Besides, I’m not saying I’m ugly, but I look okay at best. It feels frustrating for a girl as cute as Yukari to praise my appearance. So why engage in this sad exchange of compliments when you could just hug it out, right? Even though it’s embarrassing, it gets my feelings across better than relying on words. Or maybe that’s just me.
Feeling Yukari’s body against mine feels so soft and warm and the aroma of her scent is so nice. I think to myself I’m glad I was born a girl. If one of us were a boy, we couldn’t do this so casually, and if we were both boys—yeah…I don’t think that would work either. So I take advantage of our same-sex privileges and hug her with all I’ve got. Meanwhile, it occurs to me, is this what she’s thinking, too? To her, am I soft and warm?
Yukari says I look like a robot. (A Super Robot?) Does that mean I feel like one, too? To me, she looks like a girl, so I’m holding a girl, but that’s not what she sees through her eyes. Would that mean that to Yukari, what’s holding her isn’t a soft girl, but a cold, hard robot?
I did ask her once, “How do I look to you, specifically?” She just gave me a sad smile, though she did tell me why she wouldn’t answer. A friend in elementary school asked her that years ago, and she’d answered. Soon, her friend was far away.
Yukari also told me that she drew a friend once in an art class. Her drawing, naturally, was of a robot. After her friend saw the picture, she hated her and started bullying her.
So that’s how Yukari came to hide how she saw the world.
I wonder what that picture looked like. Did it not look like the girl at all? Or was it a picture of a robot that was still recognizable as her? Was it such a creepy drawing that it would actually make someone hate a girl as cute as this one?
I begged Yukari to answer me.
She stated, with equal urgency, “Please don’t ask me what you look like.”
She seemed so desperate about it, I agreed I’d never ask her again. That said, she’s so absent-minded, she keeps letting slip every now and then stuff about Super Robots and peripherals and whatnot.
Right now, I’m holding a girl who feels great in my very human arms. But how does Yukari see me? Durable and powerful? A Super Robot with lots of parts and peripherals?
I squeeze harder and Yukari squeezes back. I think, Yes, this is better than words.
After all, I don’t know what this is like from her perspective, but I can tell she’s okay with it. From her eyes, I know she accepts it—even wants it.
In conclusion, hugging is better than words.
I’d like to think my feelings get through to her, too.