Waifu
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None.
"You look different than in your pictures."
Melvin's one to talk.
Online, he presents himself as this suave, fit, suit-and-tie professional. In person... Not so much. He greets me wearing Monokuma slippers, periwinkle sweatpants, and an off-white, hole-ridden wifebeater that clings to his stomach like an overly ambitious web.
Online, Melvin oozes confidence. In person, he can't even meet my eye. His hair is a nest of greasy blonde cowlicks, his teeth look like they haven't been brushed in weeks, and his moustache? Crumb City.
In fact, the only similarity I can glean between this Melvin filling the doorway and the version of him leering up at me from my phone is in their shared facial expression.
They do not look pleased to see me.
"Is Yuumi here yet?" I squeak. I don't mean to, but my voice gets the better of me.
Melvin licks his lips. "She's downstairs," he says. After a second of hesitation, he sidesteps to reveal the foyer, fanning his hands, bidding me entrance.
Now it's my turn to hesitate. Yuumi texted when she arrived, but she never explicitly said she went in. There's a chance she isn't really here...
This is exactly why I told her to wait for me, but she's got blinders on, that girl. Melvin could have opened the door juggling machetes and wearing a bloodied Kiss the Chef apron- Yuumi would have waltzed on in like nobody's business.
"Lematagurbag," Melvin grumbles.
"What?"
"Let. Me. Take. Your. Bag-" he enunciates an-noy-ed-ly. I can tell it costs him some effort not to tag a "Bitch" onto the end of that sentence. Definitely not happy to see me.
Before I can frame a response, he stoops down and sweeps my suitcase up into his surprisingly skimpy arms. It's replete with all matter of mine and Yuumi's, but mainly Yuumi's, costumes. Everything he requested for our little photo shoot this afternoon, plus whatever Yuumi couldn't bear not to bring.
With that, Melvin turns around and ventures inside, leaving the front door gaping in his wake.
Taking one last look at the overcast sky, at the dimly lit suburbs behind me, I resist the urge to flee.
The first thing I notice is the smell. It's a tinge on the rancid side, less spoiled milk, more... old cheese. That, and his walls. They're utterly barren.
"This way," Melvin grunts. Rounding a corner where the hall opens up on the kitchen, he immediately starts descending some unfinished wooden stairs. I'm about to do the same when something catches my eye.
"Who's that?"
Through an alcove over the sink, I can see into the adjacent room. A woman sits at the dining table with her back to me. She's skinny, frail, and wearing what looks like a Japanese schoolgirl outfit. Her hair is sleek, straight, long, and dizzyingly black, refracting the light overhead. She sits eerily erect, motionless. Well... almost motionless. If I peer closely, I can see she's playing with a strand of her hair like it's the world's tiniest violin.
Halfway down the stairs, Melvin stops dead in his tracks. "Kumiko?" Ever so slowly, he turns his head, glowering at my feet. "That's my girlfriend."
Girlfriend? He says it so definitively I almost want to protest, but then... protest what?
I turn back to the girl who's now swaying ever so slightly, like an anemone, in her seat, and wonder whether I ought to ask if she's okay.
Melly-boy doesn't give me the chance. "My studio's down here," he says. Do I detect a hint of malice? A sprinkle of resentment?
Hovering on the topmost step, I debate whether to just leave. Something's off. I've got bad vibes. DEFCON 5. What if Yuumi isn't really here? I only agreed to come for her sake. That, and because Rachel, another no-name streamer in our 'circle,' vouched for this guy, but hell if I know why. He practically radiates... sketch.
"Coming?" Melvin grumbles.
Stealing one last glance at the mystery woman, I steel my resolve and begin to descend.
Entering the basement, I exhale a pent-up sigh of relief. Some relative normalcy. Here lies Melvin's photo studio – quite the setup – but even better: Yuumi. She sits, one leg draped over the other on a fold-out chair, idly swiping at her phone. Thank God! I almost want to strangle her.
Yuumi peeks up at me and smiles, wide. "Heyyyyy!" People are always surprised by how much prettier she is in person. Her's is a special kind of pretty, heightened by how oblivious she is of it. The kind of pretty no one gets envious or annoyed about; the wholesome, homely, little sister, 'look at me, I'm a nervous bundle of energy!' pretty that weebs flock to, gamers gawk over, and incels begrudgingly fap at.
There's no denying I'm plain by comparison, but I'm not complaining. I'm just thankful she makes an effort to include me in her side hustles at all.
Melvin putters his lips and swallows, hard. "I was thinking we'd start with some headshots before moving on to-" he gesticulates wildly at the green screen, "-cosplay." Already he's fiddling with his camera. "Yuumi, care to step up to plate?"
Apt name. He looks at her like she's a piece of meat.
"Okay!" Yuumi yelps, chipper as ever. She places a comforting palm on my arm as she brushes past and I resume her recently-vacated, still-warm seat. Unsure of what to do with my hands, I burrow them in my lap and take to looking around.
Melvin's studio is outfitted with all sorts of expensive anime merchandise, ranging from posters to boxsets to an impressive array of figurines squirrelled away inside a massive display case. There's even a few framed autographs – Yuasa and Hosada among them – not to mention a human-sized Eva Unit 01 statue brooding by the entryway.
Judging by the sheer breadth of it all, it's safe to say Melvin's tastes aren't inclined to any one particular genre, to say nothing of a certain indefatigable Medium. There are sprinklings of everything from the most popular shonens to the most obscure visual novels, but nothing prototypically American. No Marvel. No DC. No Star Wars. No Airbender, even. It's like he consumes nothing that isn't Japanese. An otaku, through and through.
Of course, I have a pretty extensive knowledge of all things anime, too – maybe not to Melvin's degree – but enough that I can recognize and name the vast majority of his toys and their respective IPs... with one exception: A body pillow, slouched in the corner to my left, bearing a likeness I simultaneously do and do not recognize.
The girl it depicts is pretty generic – raven haired pigtails, red bow, schoolgirl outfit – but also... somehow not? I try to recall what show or film or harem I've seen her in- or am I confusing her with someone else? Someone similarly dressed? Is that it? The high-schoolers can blend together, but then there's that insignia on the breast pocket, and her eyes... they're weirdly distinct. I could almost swear I've seen-
SCREEEEEEEE.
Upstairs, an awful noise beggars my attention. Nails on a chalkboard? Close: chairlegs on hardwood, followed by a high-pitched giggle. I stare at the ceiling, trying to pinpoint the laugh's origin, remembering Melvin's alleged girlfriend... who was wearing a similar outfit to the pillow's, now that I think of it.
I shudder despite myself.
"You okay, Dora?" Yuumi asks. I flash her an exapserated look. We explicitly agreed not to use our real names.
She merely raises her eyebrows, oblivious to her mistake.
"I'm fine," I say.
Melvin gives me a disgruntled sneer, loathe to be interrupted.
Neither of them seem to have registered the giggle.
I don't push it. Instead, I wait until they pick up where they left off and then start examining the body pillow again, racking my brain, 'Where do I recognize you...' when, apropos of nothing, it moves.
Seriously.
The pillow sways in place like a bowling pin before tipping – timmmmmmber – right into my lap.
It takes everything I have not to shriek.
Mustering my courage, tamping my revulsion, I slowly push the body pillow back into a standing position... and that's when I notice a tiny hole in the middle of its head, like its been trepanned. And jutting out of this hole, it's what I think is – I can't be sure – hair.
I spare a glance to make sure Melvin's not looking.
"Do you speak Japanese?" he's asking Yuumi.
"No," she says, very matter-of-fact. "Dora and I are Korean."
I swear to God, the man winces. "Shame."
Suddenly, my curiosity outweighs my disgust. I take the tuft of hair between my finger and thumb and... tug.
Have you ever unclogged a bathtub? The gash in the body pillow's head dilates and births a wet, tangled clump.
Oh, it's hair alright. Human, by the looks of it. Jet black. Silky smooth. As big around as a rat. And it stinks. I try my utmost not to gag.
Peering into the hole in the body pillow – wider now – I can make out what looks like more hair. Coils and coils of it.
Time to recalculate: what DEFCON are we at? 4? 3? From above, that demented giggle starts up again, reaching a crescendo before tapering out. Okay, who am I kidding? DECON 1. Definitely 1.
I'm debating what to do- what do you even do in this situation?- when I hear the telltale pitter patter of scurrying feet. Someone's coming. Instinctively, I shove the moist wad of human hair into my pocket and sit up straight just as two women, right around my age, come bounding down the stairs.
"Konnichiwa!" they squeal in unison, bowing performatively deep. Both are extremely pretty. The one is dolled-up like a pop star. Purple contacts make her abnormally large eyes pop. Her hair is fashioned into pigtails and elaborately dyed: hot pink curlicues complementing cotton-candy blue highlights.
The other is more traditionally dressed, rocking a cherry-blossom-patterned kimono, two painstakingly plaited braids, and some military-grade straight box bangs. This must be the one I saw upstairs. Melvin's girlfriend. She seems... familiar somehow.
After greeting me, the two girls assail Melvin's cheeks with a fusillade of kisses, then bombard his ears with dueling flurries of Japanese. Long-winded, out of breath, talking over and under each other excitably- it borders on parodic. Melvin basks in the attention.
There's a pronounced change in him now that they're around. He stands taller. No more fishing for eye contact, he doles it out freely and self-assuredly – even, in passing, to little old me.
It's like the man's undergone a complete and total tonal shift. Like he's living life in a different font. Like he's become his internet counterpart.
All of a sudden, my stomach does a flip. Something is very, very wrong.
When Melvin can finally get a word in, he does so in what is – as far as I can tell – pitch-perfect Japanese. His voice is deeper, more guttural all of a sudden. Whatever he says, it makes the two girls blush. They cup their mouths and giggle quietly. Some warped approximation of, "Ladies, ladies..." if I had to guess. "There's more than enough of me to go around."
I meet Yuumi's gaze and raise my eyebrows. She doesn't seem as ill at ease as me, but she's definitely weirded out. It's just... bizarre. Who are these two anyways? Exchange students?
Melvin says something else I can't translate and the girls nod wayyyy too enthusiastically. If they had tails, they'd be wagging. He turns to Yuumi. "The girls are wondering if you'd perchance like to go for a dip."
Perchance. Goddamn.
"You have a pool?" I can see Yuumi debating with herself. This was meant to be strictly aboveboard, PG-13, no 'funny business'.
Correctly deducing her misgivings, Melvin raises his hand- scout's honour. "Only whatever you're comfortable with. Only if you want."
Nobody's paying attention to me. It's a golden opportunity. Slinking over, I position myself so to better analyze Melvin's girlfriend's face: now where do I know you?
Seeing me staring, she gives me the side-eye, a sneer, and BAM- it hits me like a freight train.
"Rachel?" I blurt it out before my brain even has a chance to process. Big mistake.
I swear it's like a real-life record scratch. Time grinds to a halt. In less than a second, the atmosphere of the room has unmistakably changed.
The two girls turn to face me, narrowing their eyes like snakes.
I study Kumiko's face more intently than I've ever studied anyone's in my entire life, even my own, but I can't decide. If it is Rachel under all that makeup, then she's had to have had some work done. If it is Rachel, why wouldn't she just say?
The more I toss it over, the more it seems like an impossibility. And yet... "Rachel, is that you?"
Melvin clears his throat. "I'm afraid you're mistaken, Dora. This is Kumiko."
Studying her cheekbones, her contours, her chin, I meet Kumiko's eye and nearly flinch.
She looks just about ready to play jumprope with my intestines.
Melvin steps in between us to dispel the tension, cooing softly, framing Kumiko's face in his hands. She melts at his touch and, for a moment, I pitch all thoughts of Rachel to the wayside. There's just no way.
But then I remember the glob of hair in my pocket. Just as I'm about to succumb to the warm embrace of logic, I turn to look at the body pillow, the one I now realize looks weirdly like Rachel. The second I do, it flumps to the floor, pointing accusitorily in Kumiko's direction.
Melvin speaks in garbled English. "To the pool it is."
I sit in a crappy, plastic lawnchair in Melvin's backyard. The sun briefly dips in and out of a cloud – peekaboo – playing hard to get, as it's been doing all day now.
Rain is on the horizon.
Next to me, Yuumi lounges in her bathing suit, sipping at a glass of lemonade Kumiko prepared her. A glass from which I refused to partake, for obvious reasons.
"You really don't think that's Rachel?" I murmur.
Kumiko is prancing around the sprinkler in a skimpy, two-piece polka dot bikini. Her friend, wearing yellow galoshes, a sunhat, and a stolen bathrobe bearing the Hilton crest, hollers 'Baby Shark' at the top of her lungs.
"For the last time, no..." Yuumi whispers. "They do look similar though."
This is all she'll grant me. Barely a concession. I don't understand how she can be so chill. I don't understand how she can be so painfully oblivious- like the well-meaning mom in a horror movie. Kumiko looks like Rachel because she IS Rachel. Right?!
There is no pool, I should mention. Or not what any rational human being would consider one. In its stead, Melvin – sporting the Ray-Ban aviator sunglasses from his profile pic – is busy filling an inflatable kiddie pool with a garden hose, holding it like a limp dick as he's taking a piss.
"Girls!" He points to a couple deflated water wings lounging by the patio. Kumiko and whatever the other one's name is immediately spring into action. Scampering over, they pepper Melvin's cheeks with kisses before turning their attention to the flattened, orange, plastic discs.
Suddenly, I can't take it anymore.
Thankfully, Yuumi can't either. "Melvin, how did you and Kumiko meet?"
Kumiko, water wing raised to her lips, blows determinedly, smearing lipstick all over the transparent valve, eyes glazed over. Mindless.
Melvin doesn't bite – he gulps. His unshaven Adam's apple bobs up and down like a guilty fishing lure. "Foreign exchange," he murmurs.
"What school?" Yuumi insists.
An errant shaft of sunlight catches his shades. They glint dangerously as he turns to face not Yuumi, but me. I catch a fleeting glimpse of my own reflection.
"Sorry, I meant to say modeling contract, actually."
The kiddie pool has begun to overflow. Tendrils of water reach out across the grass like little hands. I scoot my seat back and raise my feet instinctively.
"Modelling... wow! How'd she get that?"
Does Kumiko know she's the subject at hand? I can't tell if she's paying attention. If she's even capable of paying attention. Her face is burrowed in the water wing, filling it with powerful exhalations, as dumb to the world as a baby suckling a breast.
Melvin adjusts his shades. "By virtue of her... assets" He simpers to himself. "Her, shall we say, premium 'assets'."
Internally, I cringe. Externally, I also cringe.
Yuumi plays along, her words punctuated by the screech and clop of unwilling plastic. "And how, pray tell, did you become acquainted with these... assets."
Blow. Blow. Blow. Kumiko is practically blue in the face. Expressionless.
Melvin shrugs. "The internet."
A cloud drifts in front of the sun. I reach my hand into my pocket, pulling out the wad of hair I stored away for safe keeping, holding it by my thigh, out of Melvin's sight.
Kumiko's eyes flit to me momentarily and I explore them for any hint of recognition, but find none. The veins in her forehead bulge.
"You make it sound so ominous, Melvin." Yuumi says coyly. She's being a little too flirtatious for my liking, but whatever... whatever gets us out of here alive.
Noticing the hair in my hand, Kumiko begins to breathe fast-
Melvin grins. "Well, I am her agent-"
Faster, faster-
"Among other things."
The water wing has reached megalithic proportions. It's near as big Kumiko's head.
"And please. Call me senpa-"
BAM! The water wing explodes in Kumiko's face- I jump in my seat, plugging my ears only after the fact. It's louder than you might expect. The Other Girl squeals.
Next thing I know, streamers of shredded plastic are hanging from Kumiko's fingers and chin. Her lips are still affixed to the detached plastic teat, and she continues to blow into it- emitting a strangled whistling sound. Oh, and her hair is gone.
A wig. How did I not realize? It lounges in the wet grass like roadkill.
She isn't entirely bald- random wisps of hair sprout here and there from her splotchy head, but these shocks only compound her harrowing aspect. They make her look like a crazy person. What's worse are all the furrows, lightning-shaped and half-scabbed over, scarring her scalp wherever her hair has fallen – or been brutally ripped – out.
All the same, Kumiko seems almost indifferent to her baldness. That is, until the Other Girl points and screams.
Kumiko's eyes go wide. Wider. She probes her head. Hyperventilating, whimpering, mewling, she retrieves the sopping wig from between her feet and tries and fails to put it back on. Patting it into place, it deflates like a spent souffle.
At which point the Other One stops screaming and starts cackling.
That does it. Forgetting her desperation for a second, Kumiko launches at the Other One and rips her wig off, holding it triumphantly above her head before dashing it to the ground and stomping it out as if it were on fire.
"Kumiko!" Melvin yells.
The Other One starts wailing. Kumiko starts wailing. Melvin debates who to console before the two of them respectively flee and storm inside, at which point he turns to us to say, "I'll be right back-" leaving Yuumi and I, finally, to our lonesomes.
I wait a minute, choosing my next words carefully. "Can we get the fuck out of here, please?"
Of course, Yuumi isn't quite ready to leave. Not until we get our money. Plus, she relishes chaos, whether she'll admit it or not. So I leave her be and go inside, ostensibly to use the bathroom, certainly not to examine any body pillows again...
In the kitchen, through the alcove, I can see Melvin hugging not-Kumiko by the table, whispering sweet nothings, presumably in Japanese. He doesn't notice me. She does. Over his shoulder, I see her eyes pincer. It's a wonder she doesn't hiss.
Making haste, I quietly dip downstairs, only to find Kumiko, sitting right where I once sat. She stares into space, wig spread out in her lap like some kind of animal pelt, absently stroking it. The combined effect of her dead-inside eyes and the straggly wisps of hair poking out of her head gives me the creeps. I snap my fingers in her face to get her attention.
"Rachel? What's going on? Is that you?"
Kumiko looks at me, eyes wide, lifeless. A battered animal.
I sigh. Alrighty then.
Next to her is the body pillow, depicting what I'm now sure is her, cartoonified. I don't have much time. I flip it over, feeling up and down the lumpen surface, wondering what its 'stuffing' might hide. Beyond the one hole in the head, there are no discernible zippers or seams. Taking a deep breath, I do what anyone would do- I do it before I can think better of it.
I widen the hole. I plunge my hand in. I pull.
It's about what you'd expect. Clumps upon clumps of hair. Sheeny, immaculate black globs and knots, stinky and sticky and slick with some oil-like substance. I tear it out by the fist. Within seconds, the whole basement smells of rotten egg.
Kumiko stares on, making no move to interfere.
I tear the fabric open as much as I can, but it's surprisingly resilient. In up to my elbow now, my fingers brush something and scrabble for purchase. My blood runs cold. I can't tell what it is from touch alone – it's too big to seize all at once – but it's fleshy. And warm.
Suddenly, Kumiko begins to scream. The lacquer in her eyes fades, replaced by a look of immaculate horror I don't think I'll ever unsee. Her mouth is frozen in a perfect O. It's like nothing I've ever witnessed before. Terror, in its purest form.
I make to comfort her, only to realize I'm trapped. My arm up to my shoulder is now stuck in the pillow and this fleshy thing, whatever it is... it's moving. Something wet and viscous laces through my fingers like a sentient plaque. It holds my hand.
I shriek and try to yank my arm back, but for the first time, meet resistance. It's like trying to remove your foot from a bog, but your shoe comes off- except the shoe is my goddamn socket. I have to stop before I dislocate my arm, but as soon as I do, the goopy feeling begins to trail up my wrist.
Seized by a new wave of determination, I get a better grip on the pillow, prepared to rip it to pieces. In the back of my mind, I'm dimly aware of a pair of feet storming down the stairs.
Melvin is upon us. I fling around to fight him off and there's a wet plop – a sunction-y sound – and suddenly I'm retracting my arm as if nothing happened. The pillow slithers off of its own accord, pooling like snakeskin around my feet. I marvel at my seemingly intact limb, covered in black sap and more hair than I have on my head, looking as if it's been tarred and feathered. I gag.
To my left, Melvin beelines right past me. He cradles Kumiko, rocking on his heels, horrified. She continues to scream.
"Out!" Melvin points at the stairs. He points at me. "Out!"
I just stand in place, dazed. Tearing himself free of Kumiko, Melvin begins frantically collecting all the clumps of hair I pulled out and stuffing them back into the body pillow. Kumiko balls in on herself, chanting underbreath while clawing, literally clawing, bloody trenches into her head.
"Get out!"
A hand clasps my shoulder and I startle. "What did you do?!" Yuumi whispers angrily.
"GET OUTTTT!!!!"
Before I can make any more sense of the situation, Yuumi hurriedly collects our stuff and takes my arm, dragging me upstairs, past the Other One, and out the front door.
"That was really weird, right?"
"Totally." Hours later, safe in our own apartment complex, Yuumi still doesn't seem too fazed. Not even after I told her everything that happened. In the immediate aftermath, she'd had the gall to go off on me for 'fucking around,' but then the eTransfer came through and all was forgiven.
Now we're sprawled out on the couch, me staring at the ceiling, Yuumi occupied by her phone. I'm still debating what to do next. Call the police? And tell them what, exactly? Even Yuumi seems to think it was all in my head. And Rachel... I texted her after the whole kerfuffle. She got back to me quick. Suspiciously quick.
"I mean it," I say. "That guy was really weird."
"Yep." Yuumi nods, clearly not paying attention. "Really weird." And then, in a mumble, as if trying to pass it off as an afterthought: "Kinda cute though."
I grimace. "No, Yuumi. No, he wasn't."
Yuumi shrugs. "To each their own."
It's a struggle not to shudder. "Look, just promise you'll never go back there."
Bobbing her feet, pouting childishly, "Oh, c'mon, Dora! Think of the money."
"Delete him. Block his number or I'll do it for you. I'm serious."
Yuumi sits up straighter, strident, annoyed all of a sudden. "Uhhh, I'm my own person, and are you forgetting we just made half a grand?"
I'm about to object when it hits me. "I thought it was 250."
But the moment has passed. Yuumi's back to staring at her phone. She isn't usually like this. Receiving a text, she snorts and laughs.
"Where'd the extra 250 come from?"
Suddenly, Yuumi remembers I exist. She rolls her eyes. "He gave me some extra for a lock of my hair, okay?" She looks me up and down, very mean girl, as if disgusted by my outfit; by my horrified expression. "What."
"Did you not listen to anything I just said?!"
Before Yuumi can respond, she's distracted by another text. I watch helplessly as her eyes light up. As she bites her lower lip. As she brings a hand to her mouth and giggles.
