Chapter 2. The troubling girl problems I face.

There’s no fucking way.

No.

Why the hell are these here?

I wasn’t fat. I’d always been pretty thin, so those definitely weren’t some nasty man titties.

A dream.

Yeah, that’s it. This must be a dream after all.

If I was really sent back to the past, why would I suddenly be a girl?

This definitely isn’t real.

I gulped nervously as I discreetly lowered my hand between my legs.

I had a black and red plaid skirt on. It was part of the girl’s uniform.

It’d been a bit chilly since I initially opened my eyes, but I hadn’t thought much about it. It all made sense now. It was this damn skirt’s fault.

However… what was beneath the skirt? Was I… truly a girl right now? Or was I a weirdo who came cross-dressing to school on the first day? I didn’t remember such an event at all. If I had done so, I’m sure I’d have never forgotten it.

The true question right now was a pretty natural one to have… was ‘that’ still there?

I gulped for the second time as my hand touched my groin over my skirt.

It was… gone.

Why!

What the hell is this!

I don’t want to be a girl damn it!

If you’re going to force me to relive high school let me do it the same as before!

I can’t survive as a girl.

Girls are scary.

Terrifying creatures.

Just the thought of a certain violet-haired woman sent shivers down my back.

If I was a girl… just what sort of hardships would I be subjected to at work after school?

Would I… have to actually be expected to be more social and talk to customers more?

I don’t wanna!

I hate awkward small talk with customers!

As a girl, it’s going to be the worst experience ever!

I looked up out the window with listless vacant eyes at the clouds in the sky to try and escape from this dreadful reality.

“Haaaaaah.” After a while blankly staring at the scattered clouds drifting along their way high above, I let out a sigh in sync with the sound of the door sliding open behind me.

Kill me.

I wonder if I jump out the window if I’ll really die.

Haha, oh right, this is the first floor. I forgot.

I could go to the roof and jump from there maybe.

Maybe then I’ll wake up from this awful nightmare.

I want to go back.

Sure, there were benefits that came with being a girl, but there were naturally many cons as well. I wasn’t naive enough to think it was all fun and games being a girl.

The biggest con for me though… was how girls had various expenses that guys didn’t have to deal with. Tampons being one of them.

I don’t want to have a period. Haaaah. Do I seriously have to go and buy those things now? Wasting money on all that extra stuff wasn’t something I wanted to do.

Forget it for now. Maybe if I’m lucky I’ll wake up and it really will all just be a bad dream. I could only take things in stride. There was no point panicking over it. Freaking out would change anything.

If this is my new reality… I’ve got to just adapt to it for the time being.

Right now, as I was in a rather comfortable position, I couldn’t be bothered to turn my head to check on the identity of the person who’d just entered the room. It was most likely another student. But why would I care? They had nothing to do with me or my current dreadful situation.

Well, I guess there was that story I thought of that I could use this situation to collect reference material for, but I was so comfortable I just didn’t feel like budging an inch.

While I thought everything over, I heard footsteps approaching closer to me but I paid it no mind.

I thought they would take a seat at a desk closer to the front of the class, but against my expectations, I’d been incorrect in my judgment. They’d instead come to a stop directly to my side.

I could have turned to look at this point, but I instead closed my eyes and pretended to be asleep. I didn’t particularly want to interact with them. I’d rather just keep my distance and take the chance to observe the happenings in this potential dream as though I were an uninvolved third party for the time being.

Of course, things never played out as you wished they would.

“Move.” A crystal clear feminine voice demanded.

I ignored them and continued to feign sleep, hoping they’d buzz off if I didn’t acknowledge their existence.

“Do you think you can pretend you’re asleep?”

Yes. Precisely. I am a man… no, woman now... who has long mastered the art of pretending to be asleep in school so others don’t bother me. Now shoo, shoo.

From the sound of things, it seemed she hadn’t taken the hint as I instinctively sensed her presence draw even closer, as though she were bending over my desk.

I felt her hot breath run down my neck before she softly whispered into my ear, “If you move, I’ll owe you one.”

A shiver ran down my back as my shoulder twitched and the hair on my arms stood on ends. This reaction wasn’t evoked as a result of stray thoughts born from her suggestive tone, but rather, her voice when she whispered had an uncanny resemblance to the whisper in my dream earlier.

My eyes shot open half expecting the scenery would change to my room at home, however, against my expectations, it was still the same as before.

Haaaaah. What an unpleasant experience.

My eyes looked up a bit into the reflection on the window. There, I could make out the figure of a girl in a school uniform. I couldn’t discern her features very well, but I could tell she was by no means unattractive. 

Knowing that definitely didn’t make me excited or anything. But that didn’t mean I didn’t feel somewhat nervous. I opted to not budge an inch and held my ground. I would not concede my seat to anyone, regardless of who was asking. This seat was mine. Whether you were attractive or not made no difference to me.

Without her saying a thing, I suddenly felt her index finger gently come into contact with my left cheek. Her smooth finger slid along my cheek brushing past my ear lobe, coming to a stop dead center behind my neck. With her index finger on the back of my neck, she whispered again, “I really don’t like being given the cold shoulder you know.”

I raised my arm behind my head and grabbed her hand while I sat up. I pulled her finger away from my neck then turned to her with a calm expression on my face. While I held onto her unreasonably soft hand, I told her disinterestedly, “Can you please refrain from touching me without my consent?”

“Huh? Uh, sorry?” Seemingly caught off guard by my unfavorable response, she apologized, slightly confused by my overly negative response. I could immediately understand why too. Judging by her looks, I was certain there wouldn’t be a man in his right mind who’d be opposed to close contact with her. Well, I was a woman right now though, so that didn’t exactly apply in this situation.

Her two tranquil ruby red eyes stared back at me as I sized her up.

When I scrutinized her appearance more closely, there was no doubt in my mind she was a girl who’d be very popular with guys.

She had her waist-length long red hair tied up in a ponytail high up at the back, slightly off-center to her left. Her bangs were parted from right to left at a forty-five-degree downward diagonal to reveal her fair white unblemished skin beneath. A small portion of her bangs hung down to the left side of her face, though a bit shorter than her bangs angled to the right as it was tucked under a horizontal braid in her hair that stretched to directly under her off-center ponytail at the back of her head.

She had a black ear piercing in the helix of her left ear. Her light pink lips were petite and cute. Her eyelashes, long, fluttered whenever she blinked. She had everything going for her, the term ‘pretty face’ was undoubtedly made for people exactly like her.

It was a shame I was already a grown adult at heart and knew fully well for every pretty face there was an ugly underside hidden beneath it.

“Uh… how long do you plan to hold onto my hand?” She asked, slightly troubled when I didn’t immediately release it.

“It’s unpleasant being touched without consent, isn’t it?” I said to prove a point.

“Oh? So it’s unpleasant being touched by me?” She squinted and looked at me like she wasn’t convinced.

“Precisely, so don’t do it again.” I released her hand and returned to my previous position with arms crossed, head lowered on my desk.

“Heheh, sure, acting like you hate it so much.”

“I’m not acting. I’m 100% serious. Also, I’m not giving you my seat, so please take another. Just take the one on the opposite side at the back if you want a back corner seat so badly.”

“You’re seriously not giving up your seat when I’m asking so nicely?”

“Regardless of whether you asked nicely or not, the answer would be the same.”

“Are you sure about that?” She placed one hand, palm flat down, with her galish long fingernails on my desk then raised her leg a bit revealing her snow-white skin beneath her short plaid black and red skirt. I suddenly felt the warmth from the side of her right upper thigh transit to me through the back of my right upper arm in contact with her as she leaned her rear on the edge of the desk while looking down at me with a razor-sharp look in her eyes. Her hair that hung down low behind her back brushed up against the side of my cheek. The air around her turned heavy, threatening, and even imposing. She was pretty domineering about it as if she wouldn’t take no for an answer.

Was this how an alpha woman behaves around other girls to get what they want? Was she planning to bully me for the rest of the school year if I didn’t back down?

Despite her best efforts to intimidate me, unphased, I responded, “I’m sure.”

She said in a low voice, “You know, it would be a real shame if you make the wrong people angry. It’s the first day of your high school life, it would sure suck if… something bad happened to you.”

“Is that supposed to be a threat?”

“Not at all. Just a warning.” Her lips moved to say one thing, but her eyes told an entirely different story.

“Since it’s not a threat, then please scram. I appreciate your thoughtful warning, but I can’t be bothered with such childish nonsense.”

“Hmmm~ I see. I just hope you don’t come to regret your decision later.” As she said that, she hopped off the edge of my desk, curled her index finger, and tapped on the underside of my chin with her long well-kept fingernail and a sly smile.

What a troublesome problem child. Was there such a girl in my class back then? I don’t remember any of my classmates at all. After all, the majority of my time was spent with my head down in class not paying attention to anyone else. I completely ignored the world around me in high school. Let alone any interactions I had with my classmates, which were already sparse in number to begin with, I sadly couldn’t so much as remember any of their names, faces, or voices from all those years ago.

Seriously, what’s the worst she’s going to do though? Get other girls to bully me? Like hell I care about something small like a bit of bullying in high school. If someone tried something like that, I’d viciously bite their hand off like a mad ma- no, woman, if I had to.

If she gets guys in the class to beat me down, I’m sure as hell going to fight back. Trouble or no trouble, I’m no pushover. Wait, now that I’m a girl, would guys do that? No, right? They wouldn’t raise their hand against a girl. Meaning… I just had to be wary of the other girls in the class.

Thinking that our interaction was over, I folded my arms on top of my desk and put my head down again.

Only seconds later, I heard something that forced me to rotate my head slightly to take a peek to my right. I felt nothing but dismay when I confirmed my suspicions after I heard the sound of a chair pulled out directly beside me.

As if she’d noticed my gaze directed toward her, she leaned forward over her desk and propped her right cheek up with her right elbow on the desk in the palm of her hand as she locked eyes with me.

“Is there something wrong, Ms. Neighbor? Do you have something you’d like to say?”

This was a rather unpleasant development. I thought if I displayed just how terrible my personality was and how unsociable I was, she’d at least sit somewhere far away from me across the room.

“I’d like to tell you to move, but you’re free to sit wherever you want and there isn’t much I can really do to stop you.”

“Good.” She had a cheeky smile on her face as if she’d suddenly found a fun toy to play with.

If I really stayed here, I was certain she’d continuously bother me whenever I tried to make myself comfortable.

Her move had really turned this into a lose-lose situation for me. If I stayed, she’d bother me endlessly throughout the year during lessons in class. If I changed seats for one far away from her, she’d win and take my seat. If her plan had been to bother me outside of class hours through bullying or something, I wouldn’t have particularly cared. But because she sat down beside me and made it obvious that I’d have no peace in class if I remained there, I was left with no other choice.

“Haaaah.” A small sigh inadvertently leaked out from in between my lips and rather than fold to the little threat she made, I decided to fold willingly of my own accord in the name of peace and quiet during lessons. I’d mostly want to sleep through them and she’d probably harass me so I couldn’t. She’d likely call me out to the teacher in the middle of lessons.

With the back of my knees, I pushed my chair back and stood up straight. I bent down and picked up my bag from the ground beside me and put it over my shoulder.

When she saw me abruptly stand up, she asked, “Oh? Where are you going now?”

“The toilet. Is that any of your business?”

“Is that really okay though? Aren’t you afraid I’ll take your seat?”

“If it’s taken, so be it.”

“If you’re concerned about it being taken, why not leave your bag in your chair instead of taking it with you?”

“I’m worried there might be a petty woman who doesn’t know how to keep her hands to herself that will hide it somewhere or rummage through my belongings without my permission.” I never left my bag unattended or out of my sight when I was at school. It was a habit to always take it with me everywhere I went.

“A petty woman who doesn’t know how to keep her hands to herself? Whoever could that be referring to?” She smiled and played dumb.

The effort I put in to keep my seat had all been for naught. When I thought back on it now, I finally vaguely recalled how an event similar to this really had transpired on my first day of high school. 

I couldn’t remember the girl’s face because I hadn’t so much as spared her a glance at the time and we never really interacted back then. In contrast to back then, I’d lethargically stood up and surrendered the seat immediately because I didn’t have the energy to open my mouth to talk to her. 

Talking to others had been something far too exhausting for me back then and I considered it unnecessary. I only ever talked when it absolutely required me to. For something I considered optional like this, I kept my mouth shut and wordlessly moved to the opposite side of the classroom. As far as I recalled, the two of us never interacted again after this since she got what she wanted.

I exited the room and stood outside the door for a while. I didn’t look back on the way out the door, but I heard her chair scrape along the ground which confirmed she’d taken my seat.

Counting down from sixty in my head, a minute passed while I leaned up against the wall out of sight around the corner. When I figured it’d been long enough, I reentered the classroom and took a seat at the back corner opposite of hers.

“Ms. Neighbor, what are you doing? I saved your seat for you.” She called out to me from the side. 

I tilted my head in her direction and peaked at her. She directed a deceptively pretty smile toward me. If a man didn’t know any better, they would in all likelihood instantly fall for her on the spot. 

It turned out, against my expectations, she was still seated where she had been previously. I wasn’t able to understand the situation immediately as I’d heard her get up from her chair when I exited the classroom. But when she leaned back a little, I figured it out. Thinking I’d be a while, she’d stood up and rested her purse on top of my desk to prevent it from being taken by an uninvolved third party.

I didn’t bother to respond, I simply looked away, folded my arms over the desk then buried my head face down in my arms, and outright ignored her.

I peaked forward and only now realized our homeroom teacher had watched our entire interaction with a somewhat amused expression on his face. ‘Ah, youth.’ That was the type of thought the look on his face described. Don’t you, ‘Ah, youth.’ me and pretend you’re watching some shitty drama on TV! I glared at him angrily to convey my intent before I lowered my gaze to my desk and closed my eyes.

With that, I figured it would be over. Class would soon begin and students would soon start piling in.

However, it seemed there were some sick gods somewhere out there laughing at my naivety. To my left came the sound of someone standing up from their chair. A few footsteps later, the chair closest to me on my left was pulled out.

I rotated my head to the left and peaked from the corner of my eye. There sat the touchy red-haired beauty staring at me with a jeering smile while waving her hand close to her face as a greeting.

She spoke softly, “Rise and shine, it’s almost time for class sleepyhead.” 

That was it, checkmate. I had no more moves. I had been thoroughly defeated in a landslide victory on her part. My only option left would be to leave the room and skip class, but who was to say she wouldn’t follow me out of spite?

Frustrated beyond belief as a result of this persistent petty woman, I wordlessly stood up and returned to my original seat. She immediately followed right behind me with a victorious smile having sealed off all my escape routes.