After we got back to the restaurant, our parents had already finished having lunch together and were getting ready to pay the bill. I’d expected them to be annoyed that we had both skipped out on the lunch they had taken the time to organize and haul us along to, but I couldn’t have been more wrong.

When I entered the door, my mother had the largest grin – from ear to ear – painted on her face – it was kind of creepy. I figured she was just happy to see me out and socializing again, but there was something nefarious about her smile.

We all went our separate ways and well, here I am – back at my apartment with a strange and unfamiliar feeling in the pit of my stomach.

Today has been more eventful than any day I’ve had in a while. Not that sitting and watching Mayu all day isn’t eventful, but well that is just one event, today I feel had multiple events making it eventful instead of just event–

I’m rambling again.

Although tired from the outing and having done so much with my day, I feel there's almost an emptiness inside – something beckoning and asking well what do I do now?

What do I do now?

This restless feeling is interrupted by a buzzing on my phone.

1 Notification from Mayu Hoshinoka | Doki Doki Demons

God bless you, Queen Mayu! Coming through for me in my time of need – I will not forget this kindness.

I shed a tear as I swipe to open the notification.

“I’m back, vermin! But seriously, sorry again for cancelling on you all this morning. Going to be doing a guerilla stream now so I hope to see you there.”

I feel the pain of my wretched vermin brothers as they get slammed in the opening of her second apology tweet. Hell. What am I even thinking? Those exhibitionists love it.

I, on the other hand, am from a different breed and the slight insult at the start of the message when I’m already feeling down just hurts my soul a little. I’ve already been trashed enough by one tsundere today; I’m not used to being trashed by two in such a short period of time.

Oh my god, this is my anime protagonist arc.

One tsundere is bad enough, if the anime in which I’m the protagonist has a tsundere harem then I would rather not be a protagonist at all. Please let me be that side character that finds happiness hassle-free.

Glancing around at my apartment and seeing the multitude of posters with anime girls on them with no actual girls in sight makes me realize one sad truth.

I feel like I’m catastrophizing a situation that will never come to be, Mayu will never even know who I am at this point. Heck, aside from her lore and backstory, I feel as if I hardly even know who she is.

As I go to my computer which I never turn off and quickly shift over to Mayu’s stream, I’m hit with another twang of pain in my heart.

Mayu and I will never really get to know each other. Not in the way that Koi and I do.

I sit back on my computer chair, hands behind my head just staring at the ceiling.

Wait, did Koi and I even talk about ourselves even a little bit? The strain of the insults and the desperate state I was put in to develop quippy comebacks completely overshadowed the fact we didn’t talk about anything of substance at all!

I don’t know why, maybe because of how I had pictured Koi before, but I had assumed at the very least we would’ve had some awkward conversation bringing up the past and reminiscing while talking about what we’ve been doing lately. It wouldn’t have been fun but I’m pretty sure that’s what people do when they haven’t seen each other in ages right?

She literally just jumped straight to hurling insults at me and then claiming she’s a romance option in my anime.

This is my anime; I decide these things! Do the protagonists get to decide who is in the running though?

On another note, if she’s running uncontested does that mean she gets the spot right away?

Will this be the first story ever where the childhood best friend goes unchallenged?

In the end it doesn’t matter because I have Mayu, I’ll always have Mayu. As tumultuous as our relationship can be when it’s mostly catering to the masochistic desires of the majority of her viewers, it’s still the one I’m in.

Sitting back up, I look at Mayu’s smile radiating from the screen, the Demon Queen of Moe, the picturesque vision of sadomasochism, with a key to my hea–

Take away all the supernatural elements on Mayu’s avatar and it doesn’t look too dissimilar from Koi in a way. Thinking about it, their voice is eerily similar, and I know she’s sounded like that since we were kids.

My eyes get closer and closer to the computer screen as I focus on every little detail of her avatar.

It’s strange I’ve never noticed this before.

My eyes dart around the room, trying to avoid analyzing the Mayu on my screen, only to find themselves transfixed on the small figure of her I have on my shelf. Its alluring aspects prompt me to remove myself from my chair and wander across my apartment to look at it.

The journey is hindered by empty cup ramen packaging strewn across my floor, creating a physical hurdle to get to the immaculate figurine.

Finally, as I reach for the figure, I pull up the sleeves of the hooded jacket I’m wearing to cover my hands in order to pick up the fine piece of merchandise. I can’t let my grubby fingers mark the beautiful Mayu.

There has always been something familiar and comforting about Mayu, but I would’ve never thought it would be her similarity to Koi.

I wonder if that’s why Koi seemingly feels to attached to Mayu as well, I never got to ask her about it today, but she has the mannerisms and outward appearance of a massive Mayu fan on a level I haven’t seen before.

That level of attachment would make sense if she saw so much of herself in Mayu, which would be an ironic similarity to my forming an attachment with Mayu based on how much similar she is to her.

If that is the case, of course, no psychologist or trained professional has linked these relations so I’m not going to treat it as fact just yet.

It could all be a mere coincidence. Right?

I put down the figure and slump back over to my computer chair, spinning around on it once before getting back to Mayu’s stream.

I feel like I should hang out with Koi again.

I will hang out with Koi again, even if it’s just to hang out with another Mayu fan in real life. I feel like we can do something more productive than hurl smart insults at each other next time.

I hope at least.