Forgotten (story)

Mai Sakurajima, an actress and third grade student who wished not to be recognized by anyone in order to escape from her busy life as an actress (as she had to suffer the expectant looks of everyone around her when she walked down the street as she was a well-known actress since she was a child), paid dearly for the consequences of that wish when she began to suffer the effects of, according to what Mai heard, is the so-called "adolescent syndrome" which causes curses that have different effects depending on each person, their traumas and their experiences, physically manifesting the deepest desires and feelings of the victims when they are involved in a psychosocial imbalance generated by a traumatic or emotionally stressful event (such as an emotional crisis), to the point of altering the space-time and the perception of the victim's environment and everyone else.

Mai, who wanders around the city reflecting on her existence while dressed in a bunnygirl leotard, feeling curious about her situation, and after several days like this, wonders how it was that her existence was disappearing to the point of not being noticed or seen anymore by almost no one, perhaps it was derived from her fear of being seen as someone she is not or something she is not? She asks herself.

At least, for the moment, Mai's tactic of wearing a flashy, sexy bunnygirl leotard hasn't worked to attract attention, so maybe Mai thinks, should rise the bet and try something more daring? That's when she comes up with the perfect solution for her next attempt to be seen, something simple but should be effective, at least theoretically.

[Drawing 1]

That's how Mai decides to enter a lingerie store to inspect and find a good place or a good showcase for herself. The hypothesis is simple: other people may not see Mai as a person who exists, but what if Mai mimics the environment to be part of the environment and she symbioses herself with the store to be noticed and seen in some way, at least as a mannequin? Be that as it may, in Mai's very complicated situation, it loses nothing to try to test such a hypothesis. So Mai looks for the best possible window to impersonate a mannequin inside the store and, by the way, she sees the lingerie in the place, anyway nobody is going to charge her for the lingerie if she takes it since in principle nobody can see her, right?

However, no matter how much Mai looks for any lingerie set she likes, she doesn't find anything special that catches her attention, something not very encouraging, even though she hopes that in the following days the store will renew its merchandise and maybe she can see some lingerie set that she likes more, but meanwhile she will have to wear for the moment the bunny outfit since it is the one that fits her best at the moment and there doesn't seem to be many options. So Mai is carefully looking around the store looking for the perfect spot as she grabs a donut and a coffee that were next to the cash register, not giving much relevance to who they originally belonged to, since Mai being invisible to everyone, she can't buy food, so she usually gets food from any possible place or context.

Finally, after several minutes of watching, she found the perfect window display for her, in a transparent glass display case that projects outwards from the store, towards the busiest part of the store. Also, that spot in the window display is so suspiciously empty, with no mannequin there before, which makes it look curiously to Mai, as if that window display was there just for her, waiting for her. That's how Mai enters inside the showcase, being so absorbed by the magic of the moment of entering a mannequin's showcase, that she didn't even notice that the door of the showcase where she entered was permanently closed and can only be opened from the outside, although that may not end up mattering so much to Mai certainly.

[Drawing 2]

However, what began as a simple experiment for Mai, ended up becoming a metaphysical experience full of pleasure, then Mai asks herself, what if she had a simpler life, like that of a mannequin? At least then Mai would not have to steal food since she could not be seen or served in any business, Mai reflects that in a way her new circumstances, in which she does not exist for any other person, are much more compatible with being a mannequin.

Besides, a mannequin not only lives a simpler existence than the complicated life of the human being, among which as priorities is only to pose clothes in a cute and flashy way, but also would also enjoy other advantages, Mai thinks, while fantasizing about being a real mannequin, how being a good mannequin would give her immortality somehow or, at least, a longer existence without aging or wrinkles in between, being able to project her young beauty eternally or at least while existing as a plastic mannequin. It is then when all those invasive ideas that cause Mai pleasure about being a mannequin take massive force and invade her mind again and again without stopping in which Mai only thinks of the infinite possibilities of what she could do if she were a mannequin, something that greatly facilitates her strange syndrome of adolescence by not being seen by anyone and having been ignored already many days.

Time passes so fast for Mai and her pleasure-filled reflection floods so deep into her mind that Mai totally loses perception of time, staying locked in the lingerie store all night posing, smiling, staring blankly into infinity in the darkness, until finally the sun rises which illuminates Mai's face, but without her reacting, nor being able to move anymore, something has changed in her, her skin now glows reflecting the sunlight while she smiles softly but invariably, and while posing wearing her bunnysuit. At the same time, it seems that the adolescent syndrome has been overcome (and perhaps replaced by another one of a different kind..) being that people can already see Mai, approaching with curiosity to see that beautiful mannequin so realistic and sexy.

[Drawing 3]

Finally the years go by in a way already indistinguishable for Mai, who was finally forgotten by everyone and assumed her new existence as a mannequin, and one day several years later, the lingerie store has become so successful thanks to its mannequin of Mai, as she attracts a lot of attention from people, that she is destined to a new branch of that lingerie store in another country, being removed from her place and stored in a wooden box filled with foam rubber to preserve her beauty well, to then be introduced in a van and be taken to an unknown destination, being her fate as a mannequin sealed forever.

[Drawing 4]