Home Visit (2)
If you had to keep just one of the five senses and give the rest up, smell would not usually make the shortlist.
Sight and hearing are simply too hard to rank below it. In truth it is only a matter of relative importance — lose any one of them and life would be wretched — and yet there are still people who dismiss smell altogether.
I had never given it much thought.
Until today.
"Waaah…"
Yuhan had been in high spirits from the moment we reached my neighborhood. In the car he had even worn that uniquely sly-looking smile of his.
A stranger might have taken it for some unsavory private joke, but I know he smiles like that sometimes, so I know it is a genuine laugh.
…It is, right?
The look on his face as he takes in the inside of the elevator still has not lost that delight. Obviously it is not because elevators are a novelty. From the way he talks, he seems amazed that someone as young as I still am lives in an apartment like this.
I know I am an unusual case, so the reaction does not make me uncomfortable. If anything, it feels like being recognized, and that only makes me glad.
Anyway, that is not what matters right now.
Mm. I know how this looks… but that fragrant scent that has been lingering around Yuhan since earlier — one I never noticed the last time we met —
Damn it.
Yes. It is working on my sense of smell.
I have seen posts like that on the internet. Perverted little confessions about quietly inhaling every time the man in the next bus seat sighed, just to catch his scent.
Does that mean I am on the same level as people like that now? Or maybe not quite that far?
Back when he said he would buckle my seatbelt for me, and those arms — harder than an ordinary guy's, that solid body — wrapped around me, I had caught a sudden wave of shampoo then, too…
…If I think about how I got a little excited smelling it then, maybe I am on that pervert's level. Or worse.
My eyes scrunch up under a self-loathing I cannot swallow. This is ridiculous.
"Hm? Pfft! What's with that face? Unclench your brow. You'll get wrinkles."
Saying that, Yuhan gently presses the space between my eyebrows with his thumb. He looks oddly practiced, as if he has done something similar plenty of times.
Yuhan is a man, and he is bigger than I am overall, height included. How to put it — like a successful model. Anyway, he has a physique you do not see every day, and when someone like that steps in front of me in the corner of the elevator, the space somehow feels sealed shut.
And in that cramped pocket, wall at my back and Yuhan's body in front, the bombardment of scent went on.
Body lotion? Shampoo? It did not seem like cosmetics. Some unidentifiable fruit fragrance bored straight into my nose.
I am going to lose my mind.
It is so unfair. I was not originally this kind of creepy person. Lately… I do not want to admit it, but I do seem to be letting a little of that creepiness show.
This is really…
Obviously I never do this kind of thing when I am with Junhyuk. Doing something this disgusting to the person I love? Me? That is insane. No — I have never even imagined behaving like this in my entire life. I pride myself on having lived a reasonably wholesome one.
…Put that way, though, it also sounds like I am saying it is fine to do this to Yuhan…
The thoughts chase each other in a chain. It is true that lately these dirty desires seem to be trying to surface. I have never been like this before — are these things that were hiding inside me all along? That, at least, I cannot accept.
"What… are you okay?"
A breath so close it felt dangerous brought mint with it this time. We are so near that even the faintest stimulus registers with painful clarity.
Is this okay? Am I allowed to be like this?
If I think about it, these cravings that have gotten worse lately have always been pointed at Yuhan. Why does it get so hard to keep them in check the moment he is involved?
"Ari? Why aren't you saying anything?"
"Uh, uhh? Ah, well."
"Is it because of yesterday?"
"Uh… yeah."
"Pfft. Coming home brought it back, huh? Don't worry — I'll collect today's payment properly."
…
Maybe because I have been getting tossed around by this creepiness all day, I had forgotten that the original reason we were meeting was because of yesterday. After causing him that much trouble just yesterday, now I am…
Yuhan wears a smile that looks almost mean in front of me. I know those exaggerated gestures are meant to ease my guilt. I have at least a minimum of social awareness.
But the more he does that, the deeper the self-loathing goes.
Having a boyfriend and still feeling this kind of desire toward another man. That the target is someone this kind. And that even so, looking at him keeps making strange thoughts rise up.
It was just so pathetic.
Meeting someone I click with this well in a gender-reversed world is honestly a shame.
Mm. Does that sound weird?
I mean it is a shame that I met someone I get along with so well, because this is a gender-reversed world.
I did not really have friends in my original world. In middle school I was too busy worrying about the future to do school properly, and high school was…
Anyway. I do not think I am particularly unsociable, but not making a single friend was still a little sad. That is why becoming friends with Ari felt pretty great.
But…
Because this is a gender-reversed world, the people I click with enough to be friends are all women, and Ari in particular — who matches me so well — is, objectively, a considerable beauty. We have not known each other long, but even those few conversations were so enjoyable I wanted to stay friends with her.
Of course it is not that I thought she had no appeal as a woman. Getting closer than friends with someone who already has a boyfriend would be insane. How would a sweetheart like me do something that unconscionable?
Anyway, I tried to treat Ari as much like a same-sex friend as possible, but I am also a man in his twenties at his peak. Looking at a woman like that, of course you get dirty thoughts sometimes. Every now and then I could feel myself treating her more as a woman than as a friend.
…
Still, I did try, in my own way. This should be enough.
Lying on Ari's bed right now, playing games with her sitting in a chair — that is the fruit of my effort to treat her naturally, like a same-sex friend. It might just be rude, but Ari is not saying anything about it, so whatever. I wanted to hang out comfortably at a friend's house too. Besides, this kind of rudeness ends today, right?
The racing game Mariu Kart, played on Ari's Tintendo Switch.
It is a little different from my preference for calmer things, but I am not that picky about games. We had set the console on Ari's bed; I was lying on my stomach, and Ari had dragged a chair over and sat beside it, and we were playing together.
When I asked if I could borrow it for streaming, she agreed right away. Gender-reversed-world women really are straightforward. She asked if I wanted to play together while I was borrowing it, I accepted immediately, and this is the result.
I have been coming in first for several races already. This body with its fraudulent performance is perfect at everything except luck, and that is optimal for winning games. As expected, that perfect ability extracted only the best results even from a racing game.
This race, too, of course…
"Huh?"
"Ari, what's wrong? Something happen?"
"No, it's just… look at this."
Ari's character gestured, and a red shell came flying toward me — the most annoying item in the game when an opponent uses it, auto-tracking the enemy until it hits.
So this is what they call luck.
It only ever gives me the weird items…!!
Hit by the shell near the finish line, I watched my character fall behind as Ari took first.
"It only ever gave me those shitty banana items!!"
"Pfft!!"
"What, am I funny to you?"
"Mm… a little?"
This kid. When she is even a little sorry she shrinks into herself, but this time she is grinning and teasing me a bit — looks like she has gotten somewhat comfortable with me.
I had been in that position so long my body was really stiff, so I set down the game pad, rolled onto my back, and stretched.
"Haaah… I don't like this."
"Uh, Yuhan…! Your clothes!"
"Huh?"
Oops. Stretching must have pulled my shirt up with it. I am not the type to worry about that kind of thing much, so I had not noticed.
Run it through the Reverse Filter and it is about like a girl lying around with her stomach out at a guy's house? Comparing myself to a girl is a little annoying, but that is this world for you. When in Rome, do as the Romans do; when in a gender-reversed world, follow gender-reversed-world rules.
"Ah. What."
That was all I said as I pulled my shirt back down. And when I looked beside me, Ari was staring at me with a flushed face.
"What? First time seeing a guy's body? Ah. You saw my Grand Bow clip, so I guess it's not the first."
"Ah, no! That's not it!"
"Or. Are you staring because you like my body? That's seriously disgusting…"
I put on a playfully contemptuous expression, and Ari did not know what to do with herself. This girl has a boyfriend and yet she seems surprisingly un-immune to guys. The reaction is funny, but I should cut this kind of teasing at a reasonable point.
"Heh heh. Forget it. Get ready for the next race. This is really the last one."
"That's the third time you've said that…"
Well. If I win blandly or I lose, it does not count as the last race, right?
The result of the last race? I took first two more times and we wrapped up. It is a skill game, that is what I am saying.
After that we played some other games, I went into Ari's streaming booth to look around, and we sat together and even put together a PC build. I know a lot about computers, so I used a bunch of specialist-sounding terms, and Ari gave me another surprised look.
At this point shouldn't she be used to how unusual I am?
Anyway, there was plenty to do, and we actually did a lot. As a junior streamer I got a lot of help from her, too. Playing like that, before we knew it it was 5:50. As expected, Ari and I get along so well that time just flies.
We have been chatting at the dining table now for well over an hour. I have received so much today — maybe I should at least make dinner? Even if the house is nice, she is still living on her own, and would it not be nice if someone cooked for her?
Heh. Seems like a good idea…
Huh.
Is that Ari's phone? No — it sounds like an alarm. Looking ahead, I see Ari's panicked face.
"What…? What's wrong?"
…
Ah.
"Ah."