Lies Make Way for Ridiculous Truths

"Ugh, damn it...screw this stupid wig." The moment I slammed my bedroom door shut, I grabbed the top of my wig and ripped it off, taking my hairnet with it. "Screw that woman. Screw this world!"

I pounced onto my bed and lay motionless, breathing in the soft fabric of the sheets. "Agh...I wanna be a guy."

I lay there until I ran out of breath before finally lying on my back and pulling out my phone. I swiped through Isosta stories, one after another, watching the glittering lives of girls from my school unfold before me. Karaoke, dessert shop, clothes shopping. Karaoke again...

I stopped when Mura-san's Isosta story came up. 'Getting ready for the big cleanup tomorrow~! 🧹🧽🧻 @sssasakyo_ @sayuuuri23'

Oh, right! We had a school cleanup tomorrow. I was grouped with Mura-san for the activity, so maybe we'll even get some alone time together...she's so dedicated and helpful, going out of her way to buy cleaning supplies with her friends. Before I knew it, a goofy grin was on my face and my frustration was momentarily dispelled.

But my mood immediately turned sour after my next swipe. Oh, there's a lovey-dovey couple in an aquarium. Who goes on an aquarium date after school? And why post it on Isosta for all the depressed singles to see?? What a b*tch...

I punched my plush with all my strength. THUMP, THUMP, THUMP, THUMP. I punched, and punched until the impact somehow began to hurt.

"I wanna go on an aquarium date with Mura-san..." I muttered to the plush.

Enough. Stop being so jealous. The plush stared back at me, almost as if it was telling me off.

It was a chibi plush I made myself in a school activity before. Back then I'd made it a male version of myself for fun, but maybe my subconscious was telling me what I'm sure of now. That this stupid chibi was actually the ideal version of me.

I swiped left again. The next story was a video. "Here, babe! Say aah~"

"Aaaargh!!!" I threw my phone across the room and kicked my blankets, swimming freestyle on my bed as I knocked the chibi me off the bed. "Ughhhh! I want to be a tall, handsome ikemen too, damn it!"

"Then Mura-san and I could finally..."

I wallowed in despair for a while longer before rolling off the bed to get my phone. I stared at my reflection in the dark screen. Staring back at me, along with my dead fish eyes, was my new haircut - the shifted inward bangs. I look like a 12-year-old boy with the soul of a 56-year-old uncle...why did I even get this? It's not like I'm going to show it to anyone. It's just pathetic self-fulfillment...definitely not worth the risk of my mom finding out. I'm such an idiot.

My phone screen lit up as I sat up. With a swipe, Isosta reappeared, but it was on the Reels tab. It must have switched tabs somehow while I was having my tantrum.

"We all have deep desires, but it's almost always impossible for us to get what we want. But that ends now! Today I'm going to show you a trick that'll help you get exactly what you want. All you have to do is..."

What nonsense, I think to myself. But for some reason, my eyes remained glued to the screen.

The speaker, an attractive young woman, was hugging a stuffed dog to her chest and filming herself in her bathroom mirror. Suddenly, she started doing a cringe-worthy J-pop dance to loud, energetic kawaii bass BGM. "I swear that if I get a dog, I'll be good for the rest of my life. Fundamentum cupiditatem est veritas!"

The video cut to 3 days later, when the woman's husband came home from work. Needless to say, he got her a dog and she acted all overjoyed. This is definitely staged...how embarrassing.

But I made the mistake of looking at the likes. 400k likes?? And the comments were full of positive feedback too - "Thank you so much! I actually passed my test without studying~" "I finally made up with my wife thanks to this!" "My crush confessed to me the next day!" "I got into my first choice university!" …

What is this ridiculous nonsense? Did that woman buy all those likes and comments?? I buried my face in my hands. Surely, surely I won't get desperate enough to do this...

But it was too late. The little voice in the back of my mind was already chanting. Do it. Do it. Do it. Do it...

I groaned and grabbed my phone. "Fine! Screw it. It's not like I need to share the video. Besides, my wish is impossible anyway. There's no way this'll actually work." I nodded smugly to myself. "Yeah! I'm just doing this to prove that it's fake. A bunch of baloney."

That night, I waited for my mother to start showering in the master bathroom. Then I snuck into the smaller bathroom and held my phone up to the mirror. I'm embarrassed to admit this, but I've been practicing this dance all afternoon. I'm going to nail it.

Annoying kawaii bass music, check.

Bathroom mirror, check

Plush in arms, check.

I took a deep breath and hit record.

"I swear that if I get a male body, I’ll be good for the rest of my life. Fundamentum cupiditatem est veritas."

As the music faded, the bathroom lights suddenly flickered...and went out.

I swallowed a huge breath and froze in place.

A few seconds passed before the lights flickered back on.

"Argh! Why did I do such a stupid thing? I’ve gone crazy!" The voice echoed my exact inner thoughts. But it was deep and masculine - not my own voice. I stumbled back in surprise as the chibi plush pushed itself out of my arms. With a few twists and turns, it pulled its tiny body away from me and began to float in thin air.

"Wh-wha-" As I stepped back, I lost my balance and my body flailed backwards. THUD! I fell onto the bathroom floor on my sore, sore back. "Ow!"

But my pain was the least of my worries. I turned to the chibi. "What...what are you?"

My chibi, whose stitched eyes and mouth miraculously began to move, frowned at me. "Didn't you wish for a male body? Well, here I am. I’ve been summoned from the Land of Truths."

"The Land of...what?" I winced as I slowly stood up. "Ugh. Give me a moment. I need to process this."

"Roger that!" The chibi me evaporated into thin air. My eyes widened in the reflection of the mirror as I watched him vanish from existence.

"Why am I even surprised...great. Looks like I'm hallucinating too." I rubbed my eyes and stumbled back to my room.

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After pacing around my room for a few minutes, wondering how I was going to break the news to my mother that I was schizophrenic, and mostly muttering curses under my breath, that damned creature materialized once again.

"Sh*t...I've had enough. Why is the world so cruel to me?? My mother's going to kill me...I don't want to be mentally ill..." Once again, he began by expressing the thoughts in the back of my mind. Good grief. Why do my thoughts sound so dramatic out loud?

"So, are you finally ready to hear me out?" He asked, darting left and right in front of me.

"No..." I grumbled into my bed sheets. "I'm trying to figure out how to make you go away. I'm really stressed, you know."

"That's exactly why I showed up!" The chibi me protested. "I can't control when I appear, you know. Whenever you feel emotionally overwhelmed, I appear and express your deepest thoughts for you-"

"Well, stop that!" I swatted that chibi-shaped fly out of the way. "Why don't you say something meaningful for a change? Like, maybe explain why I'm suddenly schizophrenic?"

My chibi gave me a weird look. "Well, what happened was that you wished for something using an ancient magic ritual from the Land of Truths. It's a place that stores everyone's the true thoughts and identity. And, to fulfill your wish, I was summoned. Are we clear?"

"No!" I snapped, reaching to grab his head but missing completely. "I wished for a male body, not an annoying, sentient, stuffed pest. Please go away."

As he dodged my grasp, the chibi me shook his head sadly. "I can't go away until you've fulfilled the wish you have deep inside, Kira. Your wish was...biologically impossible, and so it was freely interpreted by the wishing system, and thus I was brought here. You should have known better than to wish for something outside the realm of possibility."

I scowled at him. How dare this brat mention the realm of possibility when he's literally defying gravity??

"Anyway," he continued, "you're going to have to live with me. I'm not quite sure what abilities I have here, either, but according to some memories I've seen back home, we clones can be seen by humans, so-"

"WHAT?" My jaw dropped wide. "Y-you mean, if I have an emotional breakdown in front of my mother, you'll pop out and cuss her out and she can see you?"

"When you put it like that...I'm quite the troublemaker, aren't I?" My clone grinned apologetically. "Looks like you're going to have to get ready to introduce me to your-"

"Like hell I will!" I finally managed to grab him by the leg. Ignoring his pained pleas, I shoved his face into the bed. "I know you can disappear at will like you just did. You will follow my orders and leave when I say, or I'll feed you to stray dogs in the neighborhood. You hear me?"

"Fine..." My clone muttered, his voice muffled against the bed. Apparently having had enough of the pain, he disappeared again.

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That night, all I could think about was tomorrow's school cleanup and how I'd probably have to keep to myself to avoid activating my stupid clone. That meant no alone time with Mura-san... didn't it? But one thing was certain.

I definitely can't let Mura-san meet this pathetic version of me.