This takes place at some point before episode one.
Be warned that this may shatter the image of the characters.
As usual, there are no romantic elements.
This is about Maito’s obsession with muscles and Hagasaki’s complexes. Please be cautious.
“……What are you doing?”
“If you look, you’ll see, arm wrestling.”
One day, when I went to club activities, for some reason, an arm wrestling tournament was being held.
“……!”
“You’re quite strong, Kadomi-kun……!”
Kadomi-kun and President were competing. President, despite being thin, wasn’t without muscles……and unnecessarily had technique.
Kadomi-kun’s strength was simple to see from his arms alone. It was just pure muscle strength.
Watching them, Kadomi-kun won.
“Pure strength is indeed unbeatable.”
“No……I think it’s enough……”
Kadomi-kun slumped exhaustedly onto the desk. Good job.
“Wow!?”
“Ehehe, it’s my win, right?”
Next to them, Hariu lost to Kariya in an instant. Kariya was surprisingly strong. Hariu wasn’t that strong, so it couldn’t be helped.
“What’s wrong?”
“Deaaaaaaah!”
And for some reason, next to them, Maito was competing against Suzumoto.
“……This is too much, isn’t it?”
“You think so too, Hagasaki-kun? I think the same.”
Suzumoto, who seemed to have been holding back to keep it even, spoke leisurely with me and then suddenly exerted force, slamming Maito’s hand onto the desk.
“Ah……7 consecutive losses……”
“Of course, what were you thinking trying to win against boys?”
From what I could see, Maito apparently arm-wrestled with everyone except me. Is she stupid?
“Damn it, I at least want to defeat one person! I hate being the weakest in the club! Alright! Hagasaki-kun! It’s a match!”
“No thanks.”
It’s simply bothersome, and if I lose, it really won’t be a laughing matter.
Swim class has become nothing but agony ever since.
Because I hate being seen with my body, where the bones are too prominent, and there’s hardly any flesh.
My body, which was naturally thin since I was small, grew rapidly during the summer of my third year in middle school, becoming even thinner relative to its height.
Only my bones grew, but hardly any flesh followed. No matter how much I ate, I couldn’t gain weight, and so, I couldn’t gain muscle either.
My shoulders and hands felt like they were made entirely of bone, which I truly hated.
Looking at my abdomen from the side, the sheer thinness made me despair. It wasn’t just thinness; it was the slimness.
Additionally, I was born with unnecessarily white skin and a needlessly fine complexion.
But it’s not like I have a particularly feminine face, and, to begin with, I unnecessarily have height, and my skeleton is quite solid.
I really wish it were one or the other. If I couldn’t be distinguished from a woman at this level, I might have given up altogether.
Because of such a body, I can’t exert much strength.
…Actually, I think Maito doesn’t know, but a long time ago… around the summer when I was still a first-year, we had an arm-wrestling competition among the boys in the club.
As expected, I lost every match. President, who seemed to be as thin as me at first glance, had much better arms than I did. I got so frustrated comparing myself to someone like Kadomi-kun. I might have joked about how combining mine and Toriumi’s strengths and dividing by two might just about make it decent.
I hate my body. Sometimes, when thoughtless girls tell me, “It’s nice to be thin,” it really makes me angry.
Being thin might be a status symbol for girls, but for me, it’s something I’d gladly throw away.
I dislike girls because there’s an insurmountable gap that will never be understood.
They might intend it as a compliment, but I really hate it when they rub salt in the wound of someone’s complex.
I hate these weak, thin arms. I really do. I absolutely detest them.
In the end, “Are you running away?” Maito taunted me, and I was completely taken in. Just to be clear, it’s not that I have no resistance to taunting; it’s just that Maito’s taunting skills are too high.
As I sat opposite Maito and placed my elbow on the desk, Maito smiled happily and, with the same posture, grasped my right hand with hers.
Maito’s hands were rough and chapped, not at all feminine.
“Ready? Set…… Go!”
The moment it started, my right hand felt the strain.
I managed to exert force into my right hand, but it seemed that Maito’s thin arm had about the same amount of strength as my thin arm. The hands were locked in a stalemate, moving neither way.
…Honestly, I think I put as much effort into it as I would rank in the top five most serious moments of my life.
As a result, I managed to slowly push back Maito’s arm and finally slammed her hand onto the desk, breathing heavily through my shoulders. It was embarrassing, even for me. But at least I didn’t lose.
“See, it’s impossible. Just give up and be the weakest in the club.”
Maito seemed genuinely frustrated by that.
“I want to become more muscular… and then break Hagasaki-kun…”
In the end, she said something like that, and Hariu, who was quite far away, couldn’t stop laughing and was taken away by Katori.
“Why would you even?”
When Toriumi asked, Maito, while opening and closing her hand, said,
“I hate that there’s something you guys can do that I can’t.”
I know.
“Give it up, you’re not a boy.”
So, knowing it was taboo, I said it anyway.
Slowly, Maito’s gloomy gaze turned towards me.
Really, she’s hopeless.
Knowing full well it won’t be filled. Even though she’s already given up.
She doesn’t need to care about the difference between us, or about gender differences. At least, not as much as she thinks.
I mean, even if you were a boy, there are plenty of guys without muscles.
Like me.
…I hate it, but it can’t be helped. I unbuttoned the cuff of my right sleeve and rolled up the long-sleeved T-shirt I was wearing underneath to my elbow.
Thin arms. Pale, thin, and utterly detested arms.
Maito’s arms seemed softer to the touch than mine, but when it came to thickness, there wasn’t much difference.
Maito’s hand reached out and grabbed my wrist, fitting neatly into her hand. …I really hate this.
“Our arms aren’t much different in thickness, are they? Are you satisfied now?”
“Not at all.”
“…What?”
Even though I embarrassed myself for her sake?
Maito was making a serious face, opening and closing her hand.
“The quality is just too different. Hagasaki-kun’s arms are thin, but… they’re made of hard muscle, aren’t they? Even though they’re thin, after all… they’re really the arms of a genuine boy. Your hands are also big.”
…Maito looked very frustrated, but I couldn’t care less about that anymore.
“My arms, you see, are mixed with fat, and even if you say muscles, they’re just soft muscles! My hands are so small, I can barely crack an egg with one hand! And compared to yours? They’re rock hard! Your arms are rock hard! …Ah, wait, are you laughing, you bastard!”
It seems I was laughing before I realized it.
“You! Aaaaaaah! Unforgivable! Hagasaki-kun is unforgivable! Watch me! I’ll train even more and then I’ll be able to break an arm like yours.”
“It’s okay, you’re not a boy, but you’re definitely not a girl either.”
As I said this half-laughing, Maito’s face suddenly looked deflated.
“…Really?”
“Really.”
Someone who talks about muscles all the time, with hands rough and calloused, isn’t a girl. Generally, someone who looks at my arms and says they’re like a boy’s, isn’t a girl.
“…I see.”
But I won’t say that when she smiles faintly, she looks a bit like a girl. Because if I did, she might stop smiling.
I think she’s disliked girls since that incident, and likes us, in a sense. Of course, in a platonic way. As the opposite of dislike. Compared to the girls around here. She doesn’t have many friends other than us, you can count them on one hand, so relatively, that’s how it ends up.
…So, I think… she wants to be like us. That is, she wants to be a boy.
She’s really sensitive in weird ways, this one.
By the way, I think if she can think properly, talk about politics, E. coli, windmills, Japan’s agriculture, and such with us, if she stays true to herself, then it really doesn’t matter to me.
I don’t like her being girly, but I’m not particularly against it either, so whatever she becomes doesn’t really matter to me.
“But I’m aiming to become muscular.”
“Do whatever you want.”
But please, don’t become more robust than my arms. Otherwise, I might end up hating myself even more.
