4 Miki #1

My name is Hyoudou Miki, a run-of-the-mill Japanese housewife, the likes of whom you could find anywhere in the country.

I've lived a mostly mundane life. 

I grew up in an ordinary, middle-class Japanese household of four family members – my parents, my younger brother, and I. 

Growing up, I didn't really have any dreams or aspirations. Like everyone else I knew, I went to an ordinary public school. I made friends at school, gossiped with said friends, did my schoolwork… made fun of the teacher who tried to hide his bald spot with a comb-over. 

Basically, things one would expect a normal teenage kid to do.

I also thought of dating someone, like my friends bragged they did, but chickened out in the end due to a lack of confidence in my appearance.

After all, I wasn't particularly blessed in the looks department. About average, one could say… and puberty hadn't been very kind to me as well. I had a face full of acne, and my hair was rough and almost untameable on a good day…

The thought of asking my parents for money to go to a salon, or to buy makeup, was out of the question, since 'focus on studying' would be their obvious retort before they eventually said no… so I never asked.

…

I wasn't a part of the 'popular' crowd either – the athletes, the rich, or even the delinquents. It wasn't to say that I was one of those kids who got picked on… like the poor otakus, or those awkward kids who had trouble making friends. 

I was just… there. One of the many. A nameless face in the crowd.

The only ones that expressed any form of interest towards me, and gave me time of the day, seemed to be the kind who perhaps hoped that I would be an easy lay.

…

So I backed off early. After all, childish dreams of romance aside… I didn't want a boyfriend that badly.

Not that it mattered though, in the end.

…

Shortly before I was about to graduate high school, and was agonizing over my future choices… my parents made it 'easy' for me to choose, by removing all choices but one.

I was 'asked' to get married.

It was an arranged marriage, obviously. Something that was the norm at that time. My prospective partner was the only son of one of my father's old friends.

His name was Hyoudou Gorou, a person with a stable salaryman job in a decently large company. He got to meet my father through a business opportunity with the company where my father, also a salaryman, worked… which was how my father got in touch with his old friend again. 

The pair of old men met for drinks, and hit it off with each other… the result of which was me suddenly finding myself married right out of high school.

Hence, I was set to become a boring housewife for life… and I… didn't mind. 

After all, as I said, it wasn't as if I had any particular ambitions for myself. Normal was fine. Normal was good.

After all, normal was all I knew.

…

Speaking of Gorou, he seemed like a silent and serious type of person at our first meeting.

Then, during a family dinner after our engagement, and just before our wedding… after our parents had consumed a decent amount of alcohol, Gorou's parents exposed his "dark past."

Of his dreams of having a harem.

…

Of course, all of us laughed it off as a rather silly joke, a bit of harmless banter at his expense… and things proceeded smoothly from there on.

We got married soon, albeit, a tad too quickly… as if they – Gorou's family were rushing the affair for some reason.

…

Then, the truth of why they did so eventually came out on the night of our wedding as we, the newlywed pair, sat in our wedding chamber… when I finally found out that Gorou had ED. 

…

Erectile dysfunction.

Or, to say it crassly, Gorou couldn't get 'it' up.

…

I felt lost and confused for a while. 

Was my marriage just a sham then? Just a convenience for Gorou and his family to keep up appearances socially? Were my parents in it too?

'Was I sold for a business deal or something?' A dark part of my mind asked myself.

…

What about children?

I had sometimes daydreamed of having a pair of kids of my own – a son and a daughter, just like my parents did. 

And it was not like the pair of us married for love, that we could confidently say that we would survive into old age with just each other's company. We barely knew each other as a matter of fact. 

…

But what now, I asked him.

Gorou seemed to have been waiting for this question, obviously… and suggested that we might try something called IVF.

I agreed on the spot… and hence began our slightly odd, non-intimate marriage.

After all, what was I supposed to do? Divorce him? 

Unfortunately, this was my life as a Japanese woman… and not as a female lead in a Western movie.

…

But then, as days passed by, I compared my new life to the one my parents led; at least how I remembered them while growing up… and I realized that maybe, things weren't really all that different from normal.

…

Eight months into our marriage, we finally went to a fertility clinic… where the doctors informed us of the complications and the low chances of successful pregnancy… as well as the even lower percentage of live births. 

I got afraid, of the many what-ifs, but I still went ahead with the procedure. It… was an incredibly trying time of my life, because of the uncertainties that plagued me every day. 

But, I guess I was incredibly lucky in the end. Everything went incredibly smoothly for me… so smooth that even the doctors were amazed, and said that maybe I was being looked favorably upon by the Kami.

…

And then… my first child was born. 

He was a fragile little thing, who worried everyone for a long while that he might just not make it. So much so that our parents, seeing the success the first time, urged us to try for a child again. 

I was shocked by their callousness. Was the difference in generations this much?

…

I spent a year in a limbo-like state. My entire time was spent by my son's side… whom I named Sosuke, in the sole hope I held for him… that he would grow up healthily.

Then, Gorou got a promotion at work, enough that his salary could support a family of four… and I finally capitulated under the pleas of everyone. We went to the clinic a second time… and scarily enough, it went extremely smoothly this time as well. 

…

My second son, Issei was born a picture of health, if not slightly overweight, and both of our families were overjoyed.

…

I… would never admit it out loud, but I had hoped for a baby girl.

…

But then sometimes I think I might have prayed too hard, considering how both my sons turned out. There was Issei, with his obsession for breasts… so much so that I feared that one day he might just grow his own pair.

Sosuke, on the other hand… well let's just say that if I put him in women's clothing and let others see him go about his day, I'd be having a lot of offers to let 'my daughter' marry into their homes.

Seriously, I can't remember the last time Gorou and Issei ate the food I made… Or the last time our house had a visible speck of dirt and disorder.

…

My two sons were the opposites growing up. Sosuke was a quiet, affectionate child, who preferred to spend time by his mother's side, either just watching me go about doing the housework, as well as helping me with it, or contently drawing in his notebook. 

He took a first look at a manga that Gorou bought for them one day, as a child, and got infatuated with the art.

Enough that he wanted to become a mangaka when he grew up… which he did, terrifyingly young enough.

…

Issei, on the other hand, was a loud, physically active, and cheerful kid, who had various dreams over the years.

Like being a pilot. Or a hero.

Or his current dream… of being a harem king. 

A mini Gorou – our families jokingly called him. 

Unlike Sosuke, Issei also grew up to be independent very quickly, and would rather sleep alone, as well as not be hugged or kissed by his mom in public. 

Probably because of the PC that Sosuke bought for him as a present from the money made from his manga sales.

Where he now saw pictures of boobies in his free time. 

It was funny, seeing the boy believe that he had hidden it from us successfully… or the 'games' that he bought with his pocket money lately.

Ah, puberty. The start of awkwardness in every family.

…

Of course, in my mental amusement at Issei's situation, I had forgotten one tiny little thing… 

Sosuke was older than Issei…

…

'My name is Hyoudou Miki, and I've lived a mostly normal life.'

And yet…

I looked downwards, at the lewd action my hands were performing, as well as the flushed face of my son, and only had one thought in my head.

'This is definitely not normal, right?'

…