I Don't Have a Hobby of Hugging Men
"Not gonna wear it?"
His massive frame approached like a shadow. One step, then another. The floor trembled faintly under the weight of his stride, and I instinctively backed away.
"Th-that's not what I meant!!"
The pressure of his approach closed around my throat, but I managed to cry out, thrusting both hands forward in a feeble attempt to hold him back. Whether it was the intimidation or the shame, my heart hammered out of rhythm and my fingertips trembled so finely that even that small rebellion lost all meaning.
"This isn't underwear..."
In the end I couldn't stop him from coming closer, and my words trailed off. The embarrassing garment in his hand caught the store lights through its thin lace, the silhouette beneath leaving nothing to the imagination. Just looking at it sent heat flooding through my entire body. My earlobes burned.
"Why? Looks like underwear to me."
Kyle seemed to enjoy my reaction. He took another step toward me in the same tone he might have used to recommend ordinary lingerie, herding me into a corner, then slowly dragged his gaze from my eyes down the line of my throat to my collarbone, just as he had before. Under that stare I felt as though I had already changed into the clothes he was holding. For a moment I had the illusion of air brushing against my most sensitive places. My breath grew short, and my eyes dropped to the floor.
"It doesn't even cover anything..."
Even I could hear how weak and small my voice was. I should have denied it firmly, but the underwear in his hand made the embarrassment well up so thick I couldn't finish the sentence.
"That's what makes it better. No need to take it off."
Unlike me, Kyle whispered it clearly, without a trace of embarrassment. The moment his voice grazed my ear, it was like electricity shot down my spine.
It was an absurd thing to say... and yet, strangely, a scene painted itself in my mind. Flesh bared through the gaps, nipples peeking out between them — and then the image of his hand brushing them lightly, pinching hard, twisting. The clearer that scene became, the faster my heart raced, and a tingling tremor ran through my inner thighs.
A slick, wet trickle.
"Ah...?"
In an instant moisture spread fast, a hot wetness soaking into my panties. I had experienced this several times already, but I still couldn't believe my body's reaction.
...Again?... No...
I denied it to myself, but the faint trembling of my inner thighs and the wetness seeping through the fabric cruelly testified to the truth. The warmth of my juices slowly blooming through my panties.
"Sera?"
A voice calling my name, his head tilted as if puzzled. Kyle studied my face carefully as he said it. The moment our eyes met, my heart clenched. If he noticed my current state...
No. He absolutely cannot find out.
I snatched the garment from his hand as if grabbing it.
"I... I'll just buy this! Anything. It's fine."
Even I could tell how awkwardly I stammered it out. Afraid he would notice, I avoided his eyes, looking for all the world like someone with something to hide. But I had no choice. The best I could do was give him the answer he wanted and get out of this situation as fast as possible.
"That so?"
Kyle seemed pleased with my answer. His voice lifted, and the corner of his mouth curled up. A truly ominous smile. He slowly looked me over from bottom to top, then instructed the clerk to wrap up the underwear. Once the clerk left to package it, Kyle smiled again. Playfulness and suspicion mixed together in his eyes.
"Did you like it that much? Enough to shout about it?"
"D-don't come any closer..."
More than his teasing question, it was the way he started toward me that made my heart drop. If he came any closer, he would find out exactly what state my body was in. I instinctively reached out to push him away, trying to steady my breathing.
"I just... wanted to get home quickly, that's all."
I told the truth, but I didn't mention the reason. Please don't let him notice... If he found out that a single moment of imagination — and the aftertaste of it — had already made my body react like a woman's, I didn't know what would happen. No — actually, I had a pretty good idea. Which was exactly why I had to hide it.
"Want to get home fast so you can try it on?"
"What?"
I asked back in surprise, then shot him a look. How did he always manage to pick the most infuriating things to say?
"I'm not wearing it. I bought it because of you, Kyle. Not because I wanted to wear it."
"It's a gift, though?"
He was trying to poke at my weak spot like last time, but it wouldn't work. Forcing it on me and then calling it a gift?
"Absolutely, absolutely not wearing it."
I said it firmly, facing down his shameless attitude.
"Fine. If you don't want to wear it."
Kyle agreed more easily than I had expected. ......He did agree, right?
"I don't mean I won't wear anything. I'll just wear something else."
I added it out of some nameless anxiety. Hadn't he just cornered me like that a moment ago? But instead of answering, Kyle asked something completely different.
"Sera. Are you a woman right now?"
I looked up toward his voice to find Kyle watching below my waist as he asked. That wickedly curved smile I had seen several times today.
Ah...
In that instant, I knew. He had known from the beginning. Even the state between my legs. Everything. Without thinking, my hand dropped as if to cover my hips. The sensation of damp fabric clinging to my skin reached my fingertips, and my face burned hot. I had been caught. Caught having gotten this wet from nothing but a simple fantasy. My breath caught in my throat, and my gaze could only fall to the floor. I couldn't bring myself to look him in the eye.
"Hurry up. Are you a man?"
Kyle's voice was slow but sharp, digging into my chest. There was a suppressed force urging me to answer, and a malicious intent to make it so I could no longer call myself a man. A question that wanted confirmation from my own mouth that I had already become a woman.
I had thought I was a man when I left the house today... but with the wetness I felt between my legs, I could no longer call myself one. I had been deluding myself. I had decided I was originally a man, and only became a woman briefly when things got difficult. The truth was that I had been using masculinity to suppress the female instinct carved into this body. The moment I felt that, something inside me crumbled with a soft snap. The realization that my baseline wasn't male, but female. Becoming a woman had never been my choice. It was simply something I had to accept — whenever, wherever this body wanted it.
"When you're a woman, the choker. I told you to wear it."
Kyle's voice broke through my thoughts. Once I said I was a woman, he put weight on the word choker as he spoke to me. As if scolding me. Feeling inexplicably guilty, I looked at him, and Kyle was scanning my nape with a cold gaze — as if confirming that something that should have been there was missing.
"Carry it with you."
Carry it with me... It sounded like he was telling me to be ready to become a woman at any time. Ordinarily I should have felt repulsion at those words, but after the realization I had just had...
"...Okay."
I had no choice but to accept what he said.
Home, after shopping. The anxiety born from my soaked panties, and some nameless sense of loss, seemed to melt away little by little.
"Kyle, I'll shower first."
I wanted to wash away this sticky discomfort that had clung to my body all day. Then Kyle handed me the shopping bag.
"Put it on and come out."
His tone was casual, but knowing what he meant, my breath caught. Just thinking about what was inside the bag made my face burn.
"I-I can't."
Inside was a thin silk nightgown and underwear that covered none of the important parts. The nightgown... I could resign myself to wearing that. But not the underwear. I had only grabbed it to pick something quickly. I had clearly said I wouldn't wear it, so why...
"If you don't want to wear it, you don't have to."
A flicker of relief passed through me. Right. This meant he understood, didn't it? I immediately headed for the closet. The moment I reached for my usual underwear—
A large hand seized my wrist just as I reached for the closet door.
"We bought new clothes. Why are you taking out something else?"
His voice dropped low, and a strange tension ran down my spine.
"You said I didn't have to wear it if I didn't want to."
I glared at him, feeling wronged.
"Wear what I bought you... or don't wear anything at all."
"...!?"
My breath stopped for a moment. The answer I hadn't heard in the elevator earlier now revealed its true form. If I didn't want to wear it, I was to wear nothing. Just as I had feared.
"Don't force it. I clearly said I wouldn't wear it."
Under his continued pressure, irritation crept into my voice. I kept glaring at him as he held my wrist.
"..."
Kyle held my gaze, then slowly let go of my wrist.
"...Alright. I'm sorry."
His voice, spoken low, seemed mixed with something like a suppressed breath. He took a step back and pressed the shopping bag into my hand.
"Then just wear the nightgown. Wear whatever underwear you're comfortable with."
It was what I had wanted, but his unexpected concession left a strange discomfort in my chest. There had been something like disappointment in his manner. Come to think of it, this was a gift he had gone so far as to rent out an entire department store for...
I looked at the contents of the shopping bag again. ...Forget it. I felt sorry when I thought about the feelings he had put into it, but I simply didn't have the courage to wear that underwear. Right. Wearing just the nightgown would be enough.
"Alright."
I answered briefly, then gathered my usual underwear and the new nightgown from the shopping bag and quietly went into the bathroom.
Warm water streamed down over my shoulders. The tension and strange anxiety that had lasted all day felt like they were washing away little by little with the soap suds. But somewhere in my heart, Kyle's voice and his gaze still lingered.
"...Alright. I'm sorry."
I truly couldn't understand why I kept thinking of Kyle saying those words. I turned the water hotter for no reason and focused on my shower. There was no need to feel sorry. No need to feel uncomfortable.
Having shaken off those thoughts, I finished showering and put on the underwear I had brought and the newly bought nightgown. The soft fabric touched my skin, wrapping me in a strange, subtle sensation.
I opened the door and went out into the bedroom. Kyle was sitting on the bed, watching me. He must have washed in the living room bathroom — he sat there in a towel robe, his hair still wet. He looked me up and down without a word, a persistence as if he were taking in every thread of the thin silk with his eyes. That gaze wasn't looking at the clothes. It was devouring me through them. Feeling as though I were being pierced through, I unconsciously drew my arms together to cover my chest.
"Th-that's enough, right? Let's just go to sleep."
The moment I said it, Kyle finally smiled lightly, as if satisfied.
"Yeah. You look pretty."
With that, he lay down on the bed as if nothing were out of the ordinary. Out of habit, I walked over and took my place beside him.
But then... the body heat that usually came from behind me wasn't there. The man who always wrapped his arms around me from behind didn't move at all tonight.
"...Kyle?"
Puzzlement colored my voice. He turned his head as if to ask what the matter was.
"What?"
A completely casual expression, as if he genuinely didn't know why I was asking. I hesitated for a moment, then finally opened my mouth, small.
"Um... aren't you going to hold me tonight?"
At my words, Kyle glanced over my neck, then turned his body the other way.
"...!!"
It sounded like a joke, but the meaning inside it was clear. He was looking at me — with nothing around my neck — not as a woman, but as a man. I absently ran my hand over my throat. The same sensation as always — catching nothing, slicing through empty air — felt strangely desolate.
I sat up and stared at the drawer where I had put the choker. If I took it out and fastened it around my neck... No. I couldn't. I let out a long breath and forcibly dragged the blanket up to my throat.
I am a man. I never needed his embrace in the first place.
Thinking that, I lay down and turned onto my side, putting my back to him. I closed my eyes, but one side of my body kept feeling hollow. Without the solid arm and heavy warmth that should have been there, the bed felt even wider than before.
The deeper the night grew, the more I tossed and turned for no reason. His breathing kept flickering at the tips of my ears, and a strange, empty draft played across the nape of my neck. In the end, my eyelids never grew heavy enough to fall — not all the way until dawn.