The Dirt City |
I am not sure when it has begun. How has it been so out of order? Anyway, I am in front of the door. How long did it take for me to reach here after my getting aware of it? Maybe a few hours at most. However, I feel as if a few days have passed; not having seen any sunset after it, I am totally sure not a single day has passed since then. My being in front of the door is not a problem. The problem is that I am in a sailor blouse and a skirt. And the bigger one is the fact that I am now a girl of 16-17 years right at puberty. When coming to, I found myself in bed. The unfamiliar ceiling astonished and made me jump out of bed, then noticing something wrong with my body. I have no memory of my past till that moment. I don’t know even who I am. However, probably I used to be a man, for I feel my female body does not belong to me. I can’t help but think so… A woman, whom I don’t know at all, came to me while I was in a panic with disheveled hair. She seemed my mother. I was forced to change to the sailor blouse and the skirt, and taken to the hall I am in now. Though I have just said "probably I used to be a man", now I can’t help doubting my above statement, considering I didn’t have a hard time changing. I’ve lost my confidence in myself, who could easily put on the clothes unfamiliar ... not unfamiliar but I don’t think I ever did. Even this moment I can’t even feel, without trying, something loose about my legs, which men cannot avoid feeling if they wear skirts. I can’t unconsciously feel the pressure of the brassiere, either. This skirt has the shiny part around the butt, proving itself to be often used. Have I … have I been a schoolgirl from the beginning? Strictly speaking, nobody is a schoolgirl from the beginning, though. I am now talking to you in a manly manner because my mind forces me to do. Anyway, I open the door and then see a beautiful bride wearing a pure-white wedding dress. "...!" I am stunned with her beauty for a moment. Then she notices me and smiles at me, saying: "Come this way." "Er … Y-yes…" I blushed a lot. This female body makes me feel the beautiful bride just “beautiful”, doesn’t it? It is impossible! Abandoning that thought, I make my way step by step after her into the room. It is the day of her wedding today. According to my supposed mother, from my childhood I have been in good terms and playing with the bride very often like real sisters. I have no memory of that. I am now here just because my mother has forced me to do and I could not reject it. "W-well…" I wonder what to talk about. Should I ask her who I am? No. Even if I would ask, why the hell should the bride know whose soul has been in this schoolgirl’s body. "I’m so glad you’re here at my wedding." The bride smiles at me, delightedly. Then I can not stand it. I don’t think an inch my life this way will be able to last long. I am sure to betray myself if I always live a life like this. "W-well..." "Mm?" "I-I am..." I say in a girlish manner without trying. "What’s the matter with you?" Possibly due to shame or something similar, sympathy for myself who had been put in such a devastating position came to surge on me like waves. Tears flow from my eyes. Impulsively I express what I have been thinking about my position, not caring what she may think about me. I pour out my confusion completely. "..." She seems to be contemplating "Would you mind if I ask you a few questions?" "O-of course, not." "When you woke up, you didn’t notice a little scar on your forehead?" What is she talking about? I am confused with the strange way things are going. "You must try to recall so hard." I see the bride look more serious than ever. I desperately try to look back on how I was this morning. I was so in a panic that I have had some memories scattered and lost, and I try hard to get them back and link one by one in my head. A fresh picture was flashed back in my brain that, looking in the mirror reflecting a pretty girl, I saw a line of blood being made between lines of my forelock. "Y-yes. I had it!" Hearing that, she leans forward to me. The rustle of her pure-white wedding dress is fascinating to me. She moves her hand in a pure-white glove toward to lift up my forelock. "Oh!" She lifts the veil up by reflex action to confirm the scar with her eyes set in a squint. "Huh! I told you." "W-what is this?" "One more question before answering you. Did you see a syringe in your room?" It seems to me that the bride had changed her tune suddenly; I must say she does not seem any longer a neat lady but a rude punk. I try hard to turn the jar of my memories upside down. One memory comes back to me that I kicked one metallic thing lying on the floor toward under the bed. Was that a syringe? "It may be..." "I see." Did she say "I see." now? Who the hell is she? Clutching the skirt of her dress, she handles it skillfully and flops down into a chair placed in the room as if to throw herself down. While I am speechless, in spite of my presence, she wearily lifts the veil, and reaches for the pack of cigarette on the table in front of her eyes， taking out one piece and then lighting it between her red lips. "W-well..." "Mm?" Now she does not behave herself in a womanly manner. "I’m f-----g confident. You’ve got a little memory of your former self." Still looking a beautiful bride and having a clear female voice, she speaks in a very manly tone and behaved herself like a punk, which makes you feel something perverted. "What …do you mean?" "You wanna know?" "Why not!" "You may regret …Oops!" She rushes to knock the ash, almost dropping to the floor, off the cigarette to the ashtray. "Phew! Almost ruined. I hear this is a rental dress." The dress swells out and moves. She must have crossed her legs inside the dress. "I doubt if you …are my cousin." "Your cousin, of course. Can’t you see me, eh?" She points her forefinger at herself in a wedding dress, wearing a sly expression as if to make fun of me. I stare at her intently again, but she still has too thin a waist and ample breasts. Only if you see them, you can never consider her a man wearing a female dress. The bride before me was a real woman at least physically, which I can never deny. "But..." "F--k!" She presses her cigarette onto the ashtray to put it out. "I wanna remove at least these f-----g gloves, but shouldn’t do it. You know, I can’t put on such a long dress like this by myself without making wrinkles in it. I’m afraid my husband will have to stand the smell of cigarette getting into my dress." "Who the hell are you?" "You don’t mean it, right?" "..." I can not answer. "I’m afraid you can’t believe me, but I’m gonna tell you the conclusion, first." I swallow. "Due to this city." "Due to ... this city?" "I mean, in this city everybody must lose his memory and become a different person overnight day after day." "What?" "Yesterday your supposed mother may have been a clerk of the convenience store where you go everyday. The guard man, or whoever, was really a different person yesterday." "What? But..." "Listen! Usually under the right control you don’t have your former memory. Instead, you have your new appropriate memory planted in order to adjust to your new life. Didn’t you tell you could change without difficulty?" "Y-yes." "I don’t really like to keep on speaking like a drug queen (smile wryly). Anyway, you could do it due to a newly-planted memory. Not due to your own one at all." "Huh? What’re you saying?" "The substance governing the memory is injected from your forehead by a syringe. You happened to be left with your former memory half alive as they had made a mistake in the operation, though I’m not sure what mistake it was." "…?????" "If the operation had succeeded, by now you would be a perfect pretty school girl, coming over to me, an elder friend from your childhood. Even that memory must be gone tomorrow, though." "It’s … impossible!" "I take for granted that you can’t believe me. At first I was almost crazy, too. But, however hard you try to resist, you will have to be another person next day. This is the reality you cannot change." Now one question hits me. "But how about you?" "Oh, that’s the point!" Smiling slyly with a look of triumph, she stands up with arms folded and begins walking, when her skirt almost tumbles her. "Oops! I ain’t got accustomed to the f-----g dress." She has a wry smile. In spite of her statement, she skillfully puts her skirt in order with the rustle and sits down quite in a womanly manner. "I’m probably idiosyncratic and don’t lose my original memory like other people," she said, picking up the skirt with her fingers. “That's why I have experienced this kind of things many times." "You have. Really?" "You may have been a bride once or twice, I think." "No, I haven’t." "You don’t say that now you know you’re just a schoolgirl in a sailor blouse (hah-hah-hah). I’ve got an interesting experience this time. Yesterday I was the bridegroom, but today I’m his bride as you see." "Is that so?" "I can’t deny you’re gonna keep your current memory by that mistake from now on." I am terrified. While it is a dread to live a life as a different person next day, losing the current memory overnight, it is another one to do the same, however, with the former memory kept. "Don’t think it so bad. You see, I can manage to live in that way. You can get used to it sooner or later." "Do you become …a woman so often?" "Probability of 0.5. It seems to me they, who I don’t know at all, do it quite at random." "That means..." "I ain’t sure who you were formerly, but you must have been a man yesterday." "We can’t avoid that?" "I know some persons who got aware of the fact in the past. Some tried to get out of the city, but eventually nobody but me is alive." "I wonder if …they were killed ..." "I don’t know. I just know not few persons got mad in the end. Besides, the authorities keep an eye out for us. Once you go to the mental hospital, you will never return. You may be a mental specialist there, though." She smiles a little as if to mock herself. "…" "W-well, I remember one interesting case. One of the persons who had got aware of the fact, mentally a man, was my lover." "You mean a woman physically?" "Yeah, but I was. He was a man, physically too." "He insisted very hard on our getting away together. I told him not to do that but..." "And then?" "He was disposed of." "!!…You mean..." "I think it too early for you schoolgirl to hear that." She keeps on talking coolly about what might be so serious as if it were just a usual thing. "Next day," she went on with a sly smile, playing with one earring next to her nape. "I was his superior in a company." "What?" "He became an office girl." "..." "Just imagine what happened after that." "Y-you..." "Mm?" "Then … you experienced a married life? I mean..." "Is that all you’re interested in (hah-hah)? Why not! I’m sure to have the bridal night tonight (hah-hah). I was once a woman in the adult entertainment line, once a bunny girl, a ballerina, once a male dancer, and a schoolgirl like the way you are. You can also live so many different lives from today on, though it depends on how long you can keep your mind sane." I am standing vacantly. The next moment the bride leaves the chair and stretches herself. "Mmh, mmhmmh!" Every time she moves, the white luster quivers and the soft rustle of her dress sounds comfortable to my ears. "It’s about time to go. I must play the part of a bride. You’re just an attendee. How easy, just helping yourself to the feast with a serious look. I will have to change two more times, the colored dress and the kimono with bunkin-takashimada (a kind of Japanese female hair style only when women wear special kimono for the wedding only). The dress tightens my stomach so hard that I can’t even eat anything good. "I-I see." "This is the third wedding as a bride for me …I mean the wedding reception …and it’s good to be a bride. You know, the bride is everything at the wedding reception and the groom is nothing, really. Everybody comes here just to say ‘how beautiful!’ looking at me in the wedding dress. I almost forgot. I’m gonna toss a bouquet. Should I toss it to you? Next time you may be a bride." "No thank you!" "Hah-hah-hah," she laughs with her mouth wearing lipstick wide open. There is a knock at the door. "It’s time!" "Oh yeeeees!" Her voice is now very cute but sounds terrible to me now that I know what she is like. "W-what a good pretender!" "Oh yeah. This is the least skill to live this kind of life. I think the female life has some good things, and you had better live a life trying to enjoy it. It’s time my ‘girlfriends’ came." "W-well..." Right when I try to look back, at the corner of my eyes I see her wear an agonized look. "...?" "???" "What’s wrong with you?" "No, it doesn’t matter." I feel she has got something different a little about her, about which I am so sure. "Are you alright?" "Y-yes, I’m fine." She, very naturally, reaches for her upswept hair. I get the impression that it is too natural. "There’s something wrong with me!" She is now talking in a very womanly manner. "W-what’s happening?" Thinking that she doesn’t have to pretend like that in my company, I stare at her suspiciously. "Are you OK?" "Not right. That’s not right!" She desperately appeals for something. "About what?" "No! While I never try to speak in a womanly way, my mouth seems to have its own will to do that. D-don’t!" Once being brazen-facedly calm, she is now beside herself with panic. "Oh my god! Finally my mind is also going to turn female … completely… ahhhh!" After rendering her eyes fully wide open, she comes to lose the fever like after she has got in orgasm. The bride gets silent. "Y-you’re alright?" She opens her eyes to my words. "What’s up?" "A-are you still a man?" "Come ooonnn! How can you say that? Do you think I’m a man?" Feeling as if that moment would last forever, I think …I am alone now. "Just kidding." I smile at her. |