The Only Boy at an All-Girl Sleepover

The stuffy atmosphere in the room was suffocating me as the discussion progressed. Everyone was serious about finding the best strategy for Mamie, and certainly, I wanted to help her win the election too. But not like this. I had no idea how we should have gone about it, just not in a way that would end up with my friend trying to get into the pants of a nepo baby.

Yes, my friend. I understood full well that Mamie was just that. A friend with benefits. We were by no means exclusive, and I’d rather not think about how I felt about this fact, because even a single self-reflective thought would make things worse. Despite knowing that I should have been putting in my all to assist Mamie in courting another man, my brain offered zero cooperation, and it was as if I were the only boy at an all-girl sleepover.

Because I kind of was. I scanned the pretty women who were deep in their conversation, and my gaze settled on Mamie, on her focused eyes and pursed lips. Beautiful, because she was displaying the diligence that I admired. Torturous, because I knew what winning the competition entailed. Caught in my coil of emotions, I excused myself with a spontaneous lie and took a stroll outside, away from the enthusiasm in the room that had been drowning me.

At the near-full parking lot, the entire five-story studio complex was in clear view. It was a bright-orange chunk of concrete dropped amidst a jungle of gray and white, out of place but still fitting in snugly. It knew its place and knew nothing could make it any less alone, so it stayed here, settling and quietly resigning to its fate as an eternal outsider.

But resigning to fate was at the bottom of my to-do list at the moment, because I had a sudden crisis on my hands that had to be more urgent than the competition.

Standing near was a woman. That fact on its own wasn’t remarkable, but the woman had brown hair and jade eyes. Her face was reminiscent of someone I knew intimately.

It was Chiaki-san, Mamie’s mother. Her gaze pointed at the roof of the complex, even though there seemed to be nothing there. My curiosity wasn’t strong enough for me to approach her to ask, especially when the whole point I stepped out here was to clear my head of any thoughts of Mamie.

She hadn’t noticed me yet, and judging by how engrossed she was with… the sky, I guess, she wouldn’t even see someone dressed like a gorilla passing in front of her. Still, I wouldn’t take any chances.

I turned to the exit and strode in a straight line as if I were taking a sobriety test.

“Where are you going?”

I had forgotten that people have senses other than sight. Of course, the brushing of the outsole against the coarse concrete wouldn’t go unheard. And of course, I wouldn’t just lie down and let Mamie’s mother unleash whatever emotions she had been feeling onto me.

So, I pretended not to hear her, clutching the air near one of my ears to give the illusion that I had an earbud on. Almost there. Counting the steps left was a good distraction.

“Kuronuma-kun. Where are you going?” The voice got closer, meaning she was catching up. That wasn’t much of a surprise, since I had to keep my pace at an unsuspicious rate.

I glanced at my phone with an exaggerated motion so that she could see me doing it from behind, and that was as I kept the earbud façade up with my other hand. “Wow, I’m going to be late. Better rush to the convenience store now to buy what I need.” And so, I sped up into a jog, armed with the pretext of my imaginary shopping trip.

“Who would actually say that out loud?”

“Wow, I really do remind myself of my to-do list out loud, a lot.” A few more steps, and I would be safe.

“Kuronuma-kun. Who are you trying to fool?” The voice got a bit fainter, but I had no idea if that meant I was outrunning Chiaki-san. Regardless of the truth, I successfully crossed the threshold from the parking lot to the sidewalk.

Unfortunately, unlike in video games, people don’t just forget that you exist when you enter another area. And in my brief respite from a premature celebration (a loud “woohoo”), Chiaki-san gripped my shoulder tightly as if she were preventing me from falling off some cliff.

After a stiff breath, I turned my head with a smile. “Chiaki-san, what a coincidence.”

“Sure, it is.”

“What are the odds?”

“Not that low, actually. We are both here for Mamie. Supposed to be, at least. You remember our deal?”

“You will call off my expulsion, and I will maybe help Mamie… Gessho-senpai a little with her campaign to win the election.”

“A little?”

“She is a capable woman. She doesn’t need that much of my help.”

“You’re right.”

My heart soared higher than the studio building at her agreement, and I could barely believe that my attempt at downplaying my responsibility would be this easy. That was until she continued, “Then maybe she doesn’t need your help after all.”

I waved my hands with so much fervor that they might just fall off. “She does. She does. She does. I still play the important role of her emotional support. So… so, I’m not completely useless. No. No. I meant I’m not useless at all. I’m very useful. Very useful.”

She responded with a dry chuckle, which could mean a myriad of things. “Don’t worry. I promised Mamie that I would help you stay in the college if she put in the effort.” At this point, this revelation didn’t even faze me. I was more interested in how her gaze returned to the roof of that studio building, maybe looking at a ghost that only she could see. “But maybe I shouldn’t have. Maybe I shouldn’t have pushed her like this. Ever.”

“It’s not mentally healthy to doubt your every choice. Take care of yourself!” I said with the most convincing smile I could scrounge up. Since she wasn’t making eye contact, I had no idea if this display was effective.

“Do you think Mamie… do you think she wants to win?”

“Of course, she does. Why else would she do all of this?” This wasn’t a lie. As I recalled the drive flaring up in her, I could even say that she wanted it a bit too much.

“Sometimes we do things just to go with the flow.” Her attention suddenly snapped towards me, etching the cryptic message into my soul. We stood there, in the silence that was occasionally broken by a passing car, until I couldn’t bear it anymore.

“I’ll go back to see if Mamie needs help.” I should have used this excuse from the start, instead of running away like a guilty criminal. Chiaki-san gave me a simple nod, and I slipped back into the studio. Sneaking one last glance at her, I saw that she had returned to her natural state of roof-watching, and it brought to mind an NPC whose sole purpose was to give the player a quest. The more I thought about it, maybe I had been given a quest. One of those hard-to-understand ones too.

By the time I stepped back into Mamie’s room, they had already worked out a few strategies to pursue. The remaining time was spent refining them, practicing, and preparing the props, outfit, and makeup. The only contribution I could give was to act as the unimpressive boy and read out the questions or conversation topics that might come up.

As Mamie’s smiling face stayed on throughout our mock interactions, I noticed that it had become less familiar to me, but I pushed these observations deep downward and away. We were in a hurry, and these thoughts wouldn’t help us at all. They were unneeded.

With this unease still simmering in my heart, the curtains of the competition opened.