Umezono Komaki.
To the casual observer, she is the perfect person.
She has a good personality, athleticism, and good grades. Someone once said that she was an impeccably beautiful woman, and in fact, there was no end to the number of boys who confessed their feelings to Komaki.
But people don’t know Komaki’s true nature. In reality, she has a horribly bad personality in inverse proportion to her good looks, she is vicious, and her round eyes are always looking down on people.
Even now, you see.
「Hey, are you done yet?」
Sitting at her desk, she looked down at me. She crossed her legs in a pompous manner and poked me in the shoulder with her toe. I pulled my lips tightly together to show my dissatisfaction.
「What’s with that face? Who was it who lost the game?」
In a mean voice, she said so. It reminded me of a power-harassing boss I saw in a TV drama who had this kind of tone.
I did indeed lose.
I was the one who suggested that we compete on the score of the upcoming mid-term test, and Komaki was the one who put the condition that「the loser would offer its dignity to the winner」.
「Hurry up, come on.」
Komaki put her index finger to her lips. Her lips, moistened by colored lipstick, looked soft, and I once heard a boy in my class say that he wanted to kiss her.
Even to me, as a person of the same s*x, Komaki’s lips are attractive, but I have never thought that I want to kiss her.
No matter how beautiful she is, the same s*x is the same s*x, and above all, Komaki has a bad personality.
「Wakaba, of your own volition, kiss me… Don’t tell me you can’t.」
「I know. Don’t call me names so frivolously.」
When Komaki brought up the word “dignity,” I knew that something terrible would happen. Even though I knew that, I played the game because I thought I could win this time.
But I lost. Completely. By a total of ten points. It was probably deeper than the Mariana Trench, a difference that would be hard to fill.
If I were to go back on my word and run away, there would be no place for me at school starting tomorrow. If it were Komaki, I would definitely do something like that.
But the kiss. My first kiss. A first kiss that I’ve been saving for the past 15 years. I can say that I simply never had the chance to do it, but it’s not something I can give to Komaki.
「Close your eyes.」
「Is the loser ordering the winner around?」
Those bottomless words suffocate me.
How could this person be so relaxed? Komaki must have been changing men and having her first experience with a man long ago.
Still, it makes no sense at all that she would offer her own lips just to trample on my dignity.
Only lovers are allowed to punish each other for kissing. Reluctantly, we are childhood friends, but never lovers. But I also know that common sense does not apply to Komaki.
Even if I were a man, I wouldn’t want to be a lover only with her.
I want to tell the boys in the Umezono Komaki fan club. That she is a woman of the worst character, and that she enjoys watching me suffer. No one would believe me if I told them that.
「Fine. I’ll close it on my own.」
I stood up and stretched. Komaki wouldn’t get off the desk when I tried to kiss her, so I had no choice but to put my hands a little below her shoulders and support myself as I moved closer to her neat face.
Farewell my first kiss. The rest is just a field and a mountain.
I closed and aligned the coordinates of my face with her lips that I had memorized.
There is no sound—— just a quiet contact of lips. They are jelly-like, yet I can feel the warmth of a living creature.
It was a strange sensation. I had once fantasized about kissing a senior I used to like, but in my fantasy, her lips were never this soft.
Perfectly, completely, one hundred percent female lips. But they are different from mine. I don’t think my lips are this soft or warm.
It was a mistake to close my eyes. When my vision is blocked, I feel Komaki, even if I don’t want to, as if my other senses are more acute. The feel of soft lips. The sweet scent of shampoo or perfume, I don’t know.
Worst, worst, worst.
Even though my heart screams it, everything Komaki gives me feels so good that someone inside me whispers to me to surrender myself to her.
「…Hey.」
I hear a somewhat irritated voice. I wonder what it is, and the next moment, I am held by both hands on my head.
「…Muugh!?」
As it is, my lips are forcefully parted and her tongue enters. The tongue, soft and moderately elastic, moves freely inside my mouth like a different creature. It rubbed my upper jaw, traced my gums, and gently stroked the backs of my teeth.
Impossible, I think.
I knew Komaki was crazy to go this far. I patted Komaki on the back, but there was no sign of release.
Realizing that resistance was pointless, I relaxed.
I heard that if you can tie the lame end of a cherry with your tongue, you are a good kisser.
I once told such a story to a friend, and if it were true, Komaki would surely tie all the knots she wants. As I was thinking this with a sense of escaping reality, Komaki blocked my nose, as if she didn’t like that.
She’s going to kill me.
I flail my body and resist, but it makes me gasp for air, making it even more painful. As I desperately try to breathe, the smell of Komaki fills my nostrils.
My mind was filled with resentment toward Komaki, and my body was filled with her scent. At this rate, I myself was being invaded more and more by Komaki, and I almost didn’t even know who I was.
After a while, her lips finally parted from mine. I quickly turned my face away and took a deep breath.
「Yuck! Do you have to get to this point usually!?」
My first kiss is over.
I think that no matter how many or how many dozens of people I kiss in the future, I will never forget this day.
I don’t know if I will kiss that many people.
「I have to. You have offered me your dignity, Wakaba. That dignity is as good as gone, so you cannot and have no right to refuse me no matter what I do to you. Do you understand?」
Komaki pinches my neck with both feet. It would not be surprising if she squeezed my neck like this. Komaki would do it. I felt my back sweat.
「I guess Wakaba don’t remember well enough.」
I looked at Komaki and our eyes met. Light brown eyes. In them, I see a tantalizing color.
「Then, let’s do this. If you win even one game with me from now on, I will give you back your dignity. But if you lose, then I will take one of your precious things from you. How about it?」
“How about it?”, as if.
She’s no longer asking, she’s ordering me. I have no right to refuse from the start. If I don’t accept the match, I will be forced to do what I did today at Komaki’s whim. Then, there is no choice but to win.
For a moment, I felt as if I had both feet in a bottomless swamp. I would probably find out in the not-too-distant future whether it was really an illusion or not.
I stared at Komaki.
「Alright. Deal.」
Komaki smiled. It was an angel’s smile from the side, but to my eyes it looked like the smile of the Grim Reaper or something.
「Good. I like an honest Wakaba.」
She would call my name repeatedly as if she was harassing me. I glared at her each time, but it didn’t seem to have any effect.
She is satisfied with my words and poof, she leaves her feet. I step away from her and pick up my bag from the floor. If I stayed here any longer, something worse could happen.
I took a short run and put my hand on the classroom door.
「Wakaba.」
A voice calls out from behind me. I turn around to see Komaki looking at me with a beaming expression on her face.
A madder red light shining through the classroom’s large window shone down on her as if to congratulate her. I gasped. I felt a heavy intimidation that made my heart ache, as if I were facing something unworldly.
「How do you feel about your first kiss with someone you don’t like?」
A voice like rolling bells. I wanted to cover my ears.
「Worst of the worst. If I were a person of the past, I would commit seppuku.」
「For what it’s worth, you looked like you were feeling good. Do you want me to imitate you?」
Without waiting for my approval, she put on a look of debauchery. Her cheeks were flushed, her eyes were glazed over, and she looked like a fool in pleasure.
I think for a minute that she is so dexterous to be able to change her facial expression in an act. But more than that, I felt my face burning with shame and anger.
「I, I didn’t make that kind of face!」
「But you did… Maybe I’ll take a picture of it so you won’t be able to get away with it this time.」
「There’s not gonna be a next time.」
I opened the door roughly. The badly built door made a rattling sound. It was as if it was expressing the creaking of my heart.
「There is. Because, Wakaba, you have never beaten me once.」
I couldn’t say anything back, so I silently walked out of the classroom. I was going to turn my back on her and leave, but before I knew it, she was standing in line next to me and took my hand.
「If you’re frustrated, try to win. But, I know you can’t.」
She steps like a fairy and pulls me along. My house and hers are so close that even though I always try to go home alone, before I know it, I end up going home with her.
After graduating from high school, I would definitely go to college in Tokyo and run away from Komaki.
With renewed determination, I moistened my lips with my tongue.
The feel and smell of Komaki still lingered a little, well, a lot, and I bit my lip involuntarily.
