Past vs now. D never changed

First, I just want to give a huge thanks to @itwearsadress for providing such a quick and amazing translation for all of us!

So, this chapter was extremely, extremely interesting.

My main impression here is that, while there's definitely been a breakthrough of sorts between Yashiro and Doumeki, there's still a great deal of fear and uncertainty in both of them. The entire first half of this chapter was Yashiro trying, in vain, to avoid Doumeki's probing questions. To me, Yashiro came across as really terrified, and I think that terror was coming from the genuine belief that Doumeki was just messing with him, basically using his new found knowledge of Yashiro's impotency as a way to be unkind. Normally, this sort of thing wouldn't bother Yashiro, at least, not consciously, but he's in love with Doumeki. Really, really deeply in love. And we see what his perception that Doumeki is being intentionally cruel is doing to him. It's Yashiro's attempt to shield himself from that kind of hurt, the hurt of loving and not being loved in return, that's making him so resistant at first. I really, truly think Yashiro doesn't know that Doumeki loves him, at this point, and I think maybe he's never, truly known it. We have to remember, Yashiro's self-image is completely warped. He's believed all his life that he's not a person worthy of love, or even capable of being loved. His experience with Kage only served to reinforce that notion in his head.

I'll get more into this in a minute. But first, I want to talk about Doumeki's internal thoughts at the beginning, and what I think it means for the end of the chapter. Doumeki says to himself that he's been concealing his emotions to keep Yashiro from running away. Basically, we finally get a definitive answer explaining why Doumeki's been so cold to Yashiro. It's not so much that Doumeki is afraid of Yashiro's rejection, or that he's angry at Yashiro for that rejection, but more so that he just doesn't want to create a situation again in which Yashiro runs from him. He's trying to keep Yashiro at his side. At the end of the chapter, when Yashiro asks him what kind of sex this is that they're having, Doumeki very deliberately says that he's "a man without principles" and that he's just doing this to have sex. He's saying there's no emotion involved. That he's not "in love" with Yashiro and wanting to have sex with him because of it, but simply that he gets physical gratification from having sex with Yashiro, and that's it. I think Doumeki is saying here what he thinks Yashiro wants him to say, or what he wants to hear, because he thinks it's what will keep Yashiro around.

Basically, it seems to me that while there's some unspoken understanding between them, I think they're both still very much pretending here. Even if Doumeki suspects or knows that Yashiro cares for him, he still thinks Yashiro wants to pretend there's no emotion involved. That that's what's required to keep Yashiro with him.

The awful thing is, this is exactly the opposite of what Yashiro actually wants.

Yashiro's almost startled look after Doumeki says this, followed by a sort of sad resignation, makes me think that he believes it. Because when they first met, Yashiro plainly stated that anyone who developed feelings for him would be turned out. I think Yashiro looks sadly resigned here because he wants Doumeki to tell him he loves him again, he wants Doumeki to tell him he cares about him, but he doesn't, and Yashiro no doubt blames himself for that. I think Yashiro is, once again, resigning himself to the idea that whatever chance he had with Doumeki, he blew. He wants the Doumeki from before, who so openly expressed his love for him, but he seems to really believe that chance has passed him by. That he's ruined it. . He WANTS Doumeki to tell him he loves him, but if he can't and won't, he'll take the next best thing, which is just having Doumeki with him. So he just accepts it. He just accepts this idea that Doumeki has no feeling for him beyond the mutual, physical pleasure they share.

Now back to the first half of the chapter and what it tells us about Yashiro's state of mind.

Yashiro looks truly mortified for a moment when Doumeki shows him the memory card and asks him if he knows what's on it, before falling back into an apathetic attitude. That one panel where we get a close up of Yashiro's eyes shows us almost a moment of panic from him, and I think that comes from the sudden realization that Doumeki must now know he's impotent with everyone but him. I think this causes panic in Yashiro, again, because he desperately doesn't want to have to face Doumeki's rejection, and so he doesn't want Doumeki to know he has feelings for him. Doumeki discovering that Yashiro can't get it up with Inami, or anyone else, is tantamount to Doumeki discovering that Yashiro has feelings for him, which leaves Yashiro vulnerable to Doumeki's rejection. So we see Yashiro go into an extremely defensive mode at this point, pretending to brush it off, acting like he doesn't care if Doumeki watches it, acting like he's not ashamed or embarrassed. Yashiro's acting unbothered, but he's clearly freaking out inside. When Doumeki presses, saying "It seems that it's quite different with me", we again get a close up of Yashiro's eyes, showing a panicked, desperate expression, before he again tries to brush it off as just that "sort of play", trying to paint it as meaningless. Again, he's trying desperately to hide his feelings for Doumeki, to keep Doumeki from discovering those feelings. I think Yashiro's attempts at evasion here need to be understood through the lens of Yashiro's fear, and his belief that Doumeki doesn't care about him anymore. He thinks if Doumeki realizes Yashiro loves him, he'll either purposefully use it to hurt him, or just hurt him through rejection. So he keeps playing it off as no big deal.

But Doumeki keeps pressing, because he knows Yashiro is putting on an act here. He asks Yashiro why it is he's so satisfied with him, and again, Yashiro looks panicked. I think the following exchange is really important to understanding what's going on here with Yashiro specifically.

He knows he's trapped now. I think he knows Doumeki realizes that he can only get it up with him because he has feelings for him. We see again a resigned defeat in Yashiro's expression again when Doumeki asks him if he remembers how many times he came. The important thing here is that, after answering that he doesn't, Doumeki says he doesn't either, and again, we see Yashiro's eyes up close, looking startled and hurt, and he slips again into pretending like none of it matters. Again, he becomes defensive, saying sarcastically that Doumeki is just being "mean" now. But Yashiro's expression here is very telling. He's smiling when he says the above line, but I think he means it. I think Yashiro's feelings are genuinely hurt. He thinks Doumeki is messing with him on purpose at this point. That he's rubbing it in, maybe to get back at Yashiro for how he treated him before the time skip. I think this exchange is, once again, reinforcing for Yashrio the belief that he's ruined any chance he might have had to be with Doumeki, and turned Doumeki against him, to the point that he thinks Doumeki wants to hurt him.

Doumeki meanwhile seems to be getting frustrated with Yashiro's continued evasion. We see his hands curling into fists when he asks Yashiro from what point it was he started to feel his body had chemistry with Doumeki's. He wants Yashiro to just confess that he has feelings for him, but Yashiro won't do it. I think, from Yashiro's perspective, he thinks Doumeki is just continuing to rub it in and is enjoying this, needling Yashiro, messing with him. Doumeki isn't, but again, this is from Yashiro's perspective. So we see Yashiro, again, get defensive, lashing out by asking Doumeki about his woman. Yashiro's hurt is obvious here. He's upset that Doumeki seems to be screwing with him, using his feelings against him, and so he lets his hurt over Doumeki's involvement with his woman come out. Again, it reeks of desperation on Yashiro's part. He's trying anything and everything to protect himself from the pain Doumeki's causing him, but he's only exposing himself further by doing so.

And Doumeki again calls him out on it, observing that it's unusual for Yashiro to show an interest in his personal life. Doumeki has Yashiro trapped again, basically telling him that he knows Yashiro is lying by acting like he doesn't care. Yashiro is on the back foot during this entire exchange. And again Yashiro gets incredibly defensive, this time standing up and trying to end the conversation. He knows he's got no way out of this now, no way to pretend any longer that he doesn't care, so he tries to escape it by fleeing. But Doumeki doesn't let him.

We once more see Yashiro lash out defensively, tearing away from Doumeki and telling him what he does in his life has nothing to do with him. His hurt again shows itself when he tells Doumeki that he's got no reason to "fuck" him anymore and that he should just go do it with his woman. Again, I think this exchange is super important. Yashiro is showing once more that he genuinely still thinks Doumeki doesn't care for him. His jealousy over Doumeki's woman is his despair over losing Doumeki coming out. We see once more Yashiro's resigned expression when Doumeki tells him that just like it's not his business who Yashiro has sex with, it's not Yashiro's business either who Doumeki has sex with either. Yashiro's resigned expression here tells me again that he thinks he's lost Doumeki. I think Yashiro is operating during this entire exchange with the belief that Doumeki is just there to torment him. That's backed up by Yashiro's next words, when he asks Doumeki what it is he came there to do, and then accuses him of being there just to confirm that Yashiro can't get it up with anyone else and "take pity" on him. Yashiro's expression becomes one of apathy again as he says this. It's clear he's trying to shield himself. He thinks Doumeki is trying to hurt him.

But Doumeki of course isn't trying to hurt Yashiro, he's trying to get him to admit his feelings, and he just keeps pressing, because he knows he has Yashiro trapped.

One more really important exchange happens here, I think, when Doumeki presses Yashiro about how sex doesn't feel good to him with anyone else but him. Yashiro says "So what if that's true? You... You were only doing this to satisfy my sexual urges. What benefit is there to you?"

Doumeki's expression is startled here when Yashiro says this, and then in the next panel, it becomes soft, even sad. I think Doumeki realizes in that moment that Yashiro really believes that Doumeki never had any, real feelings for him, and that he only ever wanted to have sex with him for Yashiro's benefit, not because he was genuinely attracted to or in love with him. I think Yashiro's words here break Doumeki's heart, because of how truly sad that is.

And I think that sadness in Doumeki is compounded by his own belief that he can't just tell Yashiro he loves him. He says, in response, "The body chemistry is mutual". It's the best he can do without actually saying he loves Yashiro, because he still thinks, if he says that, Yashiro will run away. He doesn't realize how much Yashiro WANTS to hear Doumeki say it. Like I said, they're both still pretending here, because they both are still operating under false beliefs about the other. Yashiro under the belief that Doumeki doesn't love him and never has, and Doumeki under the belief that Yashiro will again run away if he confesses his feelings.

And then comes the big moment that everyone keeps talking about, which is an indirect confession from Yashiro of his feelings for Doumeki, when Doumeki says in reply to Yashiro's accusation that Doumeki has said some cruel things to him, "You liked cruel things, didn't you?"

I think Yashiro's expressions here are vital to understanding this exchange too.

Again, Yashiro, for a moment before his answer, looks stricken. The thing is, Yashiro DOESN'T like cruel things. He wants Doumeki, and he wants the Doumeki of before, the one who was so kind toward him. But he can't ask for that, because he still thinks Doumeki doesn't care about him, and he can't leave himself open to the kind of pain he'll experience with the rejection of his feelings. The next panel shows Yashiro with what I would call a resigned smile on his face as he says "I do". I think this is Yashiro saying he likes cruel things still, because he thinks it's the only way he'll get Doumeki now. This new version of Doumeki that doesn't love him, but is willing to have sex with him. It is an indirect confession on Yashiro's part, but it's once again predicated on Yashiro laboring under the belief that Doumeki doesn't love him.

It's really kind of a catch-22 between them, because Doumeki doesn't think he can say he loves Yashiro without driving him away, even as it seems he knows Yashiro cares for him, and Yashiro wants Doumeki to say he loves him, but can't bring himself to ask for it because he thinks Doumeki doesn't love him.

Basically, it's still a mess between them, even as we see a kind of acceptance happen at last in this chapter.

I think people tend to forget that Saezuru is, by and large, a tragedy, and there's a definite air of tragedy to this chapter. A lot of the expressions between Yashiro and Doumeki strike me as heartbreaking, resigned, sad, fearful, etc... I think that kind of encapsulates the general feeling of this chapter. It's definite progress, but it's progress that's still greatly hampered by misunderstanding.

Doumeki returning to confiscate Yashiro's cigarette while admitting he doesn't 'like it' marks a significant progression. From the previous panels it seems evident that Doumeki has realized Yashiro's emotional vulnerability, realizing that Yashiro is only emotionally intimate with him. Despite previously attributing his presence to orders, the latest chapter shows a shift. With Tsunakawa's directive to stop observing Yashiro, Doumeki lacks that excuse.

After the time skip, Doumeki's connection with Yashiro seemed tethered to a sense of duty (or so he purposely made everyone around him including Yashiro believe), as he often cited orders as the reason for maintaining proximity. However, when Tsunakawa intervenes in this chapter and instructs Doumeki to discontinue his surveillance of Yashiro, it erases the impersonal justification he once clung to. In the absence of external directives, the logical course for post time skip Doumeki would have been to withdraw, and silently figure out another excuse to stay either by his side or 'observe' him from a distance without Yashiro knowing (like he has all these years gathering current information about him from informers).

Surprisingly, Doumeki doesn't follow the expected path after Tsunakawa's directive. He does leave after informing Yashiro, but then he comes back without the usual excuse of orders or duty, opening the door for a more personal understanding. His comment about disliking Yashiro's cigarette habit adds to this, especially when it comes to Yashiro who is prone to taking things at face value (especially now that he is sure that Doumeki holds no love for him), would perceive Doumeki's return and candid comment as genuine. The shift from a duty-bound presence to a more personal and emotionally invested one challenges Yashiro's understanding of their dynamic, introducing a layer of complexity and depth to their evolving relationship.

But then again, just like Yashiro took Doumeki's comment about him not liking Yashiro having sex with anyone else as a way of Doumeki disliking him and his sexual promiscuity, so he might take this as something Doumeki dislikes about him as well.

This is still a huge step for both time skip Doumeki and their relationship and I cannot wait to see how this unfolds in ch 56!

this is one of my saezuru top five scenes. it says so much, and there’s no dialogue. sensei conveys everything with visuals. right before this, yashiro kicked doumeki out of the car, thinking that accepting doumeki means destroying himself. he thinks he sent doumeki away.

in these panels, there’s a hint of what could have been. things could have been different for yashiro if he were protected from his stepfather’s abuse - if his mother had done what mothers do. if these things were different, maybe accepting doumeki wouldn’t cost him so much. maybe he would know how to accept safety.

somehow we see everything without any verbal explanation. yashiro’s quiet contemplation turns into an aching envy as he watches the kid being protected from the rain by his mother. yashiro looks away from the scene, but he can’t escape his feelings. there’s nothing to shelter him, no one to protect him. that’s why the background fades and we’re left with yashiro sitting in a darkened car, alone, unable to escape the rain even though he’s gone through so much…

… only to have doumeki bring him an umbrella in the next scene.

What do you think?

Hi, and thanks for the ask!

That's an interesting theory, that Doumeki was attempting to reassure Yashiro that he hadn't joined the Yakuza as a result of anything Yashiro did. It definitely makes sense. Given his apparent tone, it came across as a statement of defiance though, so I suppose that's where the assumption comes in, that he meant it as 'you don't get to tell me what to do anymore', etc... I don't think Yashiro feels so much like Doumeki's continued involvement with the yakuza is a betrayal of him and his efforts to keep him out, but more that he probably just feels like his suffering these past four years has been pointless, like he gave Doumeki up for no reason, has had to live with the misery of his own loneliness and wrecked self-identity and all it amounted to was Doumeki still being involved in such a dangerous and violent world. I don't think Yashiro is angry at Doumeki at all for throwing his chance to get out away, but probably just more upset at himself and his own failure.

I think it's hard for Yashiro to understand WHY Doumeki would want to remain in the yakuza, because of his own experience with that world, and the way he, and most people, were forced into it, rather than choosing to be a part of it. Yashiro's life was essentially stolen from him by Misumi, and he was forced, through lies and manipulation, to become essentially a criminal. Yashiro sees Doumeki has a family that cares about him, a mother and sister who want him in their lives, and given that's something Yashiro himself never had, he just can't relate to why Doumeki would willingly toss that aside to stay in such a corrupt, power hungry world, or to stay with Yashiro himself, when Yashiro sees himself as a worthless person. Rather than discarding Doumeki's feelings or not considering them, I would say Yashiro is just so convinced of his own worthlessness, that he assumed Doumeki's love for him had to be an infatuation, and that eventually he would be able to move on from it. He compares Doumeki to a baby bird that's imprinted onto the first thing it saw, which was him, and so he thinks Doumeki will be alright without him. So, more than dismissing Doumeki's feelings, I think it's rather just Yashiro's own, warped self-perception that made it so difficult for him to believe Doumeki genuinely loved the real him, or needed him. Doumeki's remained in the yakuza it seems solely in an attempt to stay close to Yashiro, not because he had any burning desire to actually BE a yakuza. So, really, I think it was just Yashiro not understanding how much Doumeki really loved him, again, because he doesn't see himself as a person worthy of love.

As for Doumeki's demeanor, it's almost certainly affected, meaning he's only pretending to be cold and distant. You're right that his discovery that Inami is still in Yashiro's life didn't help matters. I would say Doumeki was acting pretty distant even before than though, just in terms of his aloofness and curt responses to Yashiro. But, again, since it's almost certainly an act, when he feels like Yashiro is in trouble, he has a kind of knee jerk response, like catching him in the shower, because of course that's how he REALLY feels. He cares about Yashiro. The same as during their sexual encounter in Yashiro's apartment, when he nearly reached out to comfort him, but then stopped himself. Those are the sorts of clues that let us know Doumeki doesn't really feel as cold toward Yashiro as he's pretending to be.

@cosmicjoke

Yes, Yashiro is in a dark place; depressed, defenseless. But the realization he narrated to us probably isn't new to him. It's new to us, because we see him for the first time completely naked and disillusioned. Honestly, he looked low-key depressed to me since the time skip. He probably lost the comfort of his lies years ago. And he kept the painful pattern of behavior - despite his realization, despite pain being everything that was left - because that is the only way he has ever known. He's struggling to make sense of it, but it has become so deeply ingrained in himself, originating from his formative years, that abandoning the pattern abruptly would have been even worse at that point. There is still hope, I think. Yashiro recognizes it for what it is now. His true desire is slowly seeding and raising from an unconscious level. He's learning to be honest with himself. But he's still not ready. Many fans seem to think that, somehow, most of the problems rooted in deeper psychological levels, would be resolved if those two would suddenly become aware of each other's feelings. Unfortunately, it is not that simple. Yashiro has a long struggle ahead of him, and Yoneda Kou won't cheat the progress.

Intimate meetings with Doumeki will continue, and they will probably become more intense each time. Faced with a struggle to maintain his composure, Yashiro will occasionally want to flee. But it is unlikely he would abandon Doumeki now when he knows he's still in Yakuza, currently in the middle of a dangerous operation. His rationalization (protecting Doumeki by leaving him) doesn't work anymore. Even if he thinks Doumeki hates him now, he'll want to make sure he stays alive.

I don't think Doumeki will give up on him, but the tension is probably going to culminate at some point. The chance of Doumeki being in love with that woman is probably close to 0. He toughened up, sure, but he had to. Yashiro is not the only one who faced his worst fears. Doumeki faced his fear of becoming like his father and losing Yashiro. He reached his own hell. But he's not the type who runs from his feelings, so (unlike Yashiro) he lived it through and conquered it. That's why now he's the one in control. He's also hurt, and his own painful realization (to which he came on the roof with Nanahara four years ago) influences his behavior. He blames the loss of control over his feelings on himself, so now he seems determined not to lose control. His jealousy is getting through, but I have to admit I underestimated him. His cold demeanor probably helped Yashiro unleash his fantasies, but I can see Yashiro becoming increasingly frustrated over his own loss of control. Current power dynamics will become unbearable for him at one point. One thing is certain though - they will both want to protect each other's life at any cost (and I predict at least one of them will be in immediate danger). That urge should reveal their feelings.

It seems like Yashiro’s had a breakthrough, in coming to understand that what happened to him as a child was completely out of his control, and that his response to that, his way of dealing with it, was to embrace it and convince himself it was something he’s always wanted, and even caused.  But now he realizes he doesn’t want it, he doesn’t enjoy it any more, and realizes he never, truly has.  When he says “I had understood that, somewhere.  If I hadn’t come to know it, I didn’t have to lose it.”, though, is the part that’s concerning.  He acknowledges and understands now that being abused during sex isn’t something he enjoys, that it’s a product of his having been raped as a child, that that experience from his childhood has continued to negatively impact and largely dictate his entire adult life.  And it’s good that he understands that.  But, at the same time, with that understanding, with that consciousness, he’s lost, and he’s aware that he’s lost, his one coping mechanism, the one thing he had that helped him deal with and manage the pain and trauma and destruction of the abuse he suffered.  Without it, without that one thing to cling to, it seems like Yashiro is truly adrift now, lost and deeply depressed and hopeless.  He says “Truly, nothing... nothing has really mattered to me any longer... And I couldn’t cope with anything, any more...”  The one consolation in an otherwise empty and lonely existence for Yashiro was his desire for sex.  As unhealthy as it was, it was the one thing he took pleasure in, the one thing he held on to which gave him any, real desire to live, or anything to look forward to.  But whatever pleasure and comfort he once derived from that is now gone too, and so... he has nothing.  Only the realization of his own victimhood and, as he thinks, the “ludicrous and laughable story” of his life.  There’s no buffer any more between him and what happened to him, there’s no narrative where he can pretend that he had a choice in the matter, that he had some agency or control.  Just the ugly, awful truth, that he was a victim, and continued to be victimized throughout his life because what he experienced as a child robbed him of the tools necessary to live a normal, dignified life.  

I think Yashiro is maybe at the most fragile and vulnerable we’ve ever seen him here.  He’s teetering on a very dangerous precipice.  

What’s happening here is, I think, incredibly realistic, and shows such an immense amount of sensitivity and compassion toward people who are living with deep trauma, and the difficulty they face every moment of every day, in coping with that trauma.  There are no easy solutions, there’s no quick fix, there’s no miracle cure.  Yashiro is deeply damaged, and the pain of what happened to him is something he can never, fully escape.  The one buffer he had to help him deal with that pain, to manage and live with it, is gone, and so now, he’s being consumed by it.  Drowning in it.

It’s going to be interesting to see what Doumeki does, because the ball is in his court, I think.  He has the potential to help Yashiro, but he also has the potential to make things even worse for him.  If he continues to act apathetic and uninterested in Yashiro, continues to affect a cold and distanced demeanor, I think it’s going to have devastating consequences.  Yashiro feels utterly alone now, I think, trapped with the reality of the tragedy of his life, and nothing else.  He’s feeling hopeless, truly hopeless.  Like he has nothing to live for, any more.  Doumeki has seemingly become the one thing Yashiro feared most of all, the one thing he tried so desperately to prevent him from becoming, a full blown Yakuza, a once sweet and caring man who’s lost all compassion and kindness.  Yashiro is surely going to blame himself and his own perceived wrongness for that.  He’s going to see it as only further evidence of his own worthlessness, and Doumeki’s coldness as proof of his own unlovability.  

Yashiro isn’t okay.  He’s really, really not.  This chapter has shown that, without doubt, he continues to struggle immensely, every day, with his trauma and any sense of self-worth.  Doumeki is trying to force Yashiro into admitting his feelings for him, but clearly, from what we’ve seen, even if Yashiro is able to admit those feelings, that isn’t in itself going to save him from the deep shame, self-hatred and hopelessness Yashiro now feels.  That isn’t going to suddenly make Yashiro see himself as worthy of love, or worthy of kindness.  He hates himself, and him becoming fully conscious, at last, of his own victimhood and the falsity of the narrative he’s clung to his whole life isn’t going to help that.  If anything, at the moment, it’s made his self-loathing worse.  It seems like he sees himself as pathetic now, on top of every other negative belief he holds about himself.  Doumeki is going to have to be very careful going forward, I think, and above all, he’s going to have to drop this act he’s putting on, or the consequences could be devastating.  

I’m new to this fandom, although not quite new to the manga itself. In the past few months, I’d read it a couple of times. But this is the first time I got to wait for the new chapter release, the first time I had to seek spoilers, and the first time I faced fandom response in real time, as new information keeps coming.

SPOILER WARNING

I’m honestly surprised by the reaction of the fans. It made me feel like we’re not reading the same piece of work. Because I’m not disappointed, not even hurt (yet) - this kind of development is exactly something I expect at this point of the story. To be completely honest, I expect worse. Much worse. One of my own predictions is, not only Yashiro having sex with someone other than Doumeki, but him setting the scene especially for Doumeki to see. Yes, I think Yashiro would totally do something like that down the road, in a desperate attempt to gain back control. His way of embracing love is going to be long and messy, because there really is no other way for him. People fantasize about these two having a mature conversation about how they really feel and then enter a healthy loving relationship - but I don’t torture myself like that. :D Was Saezuru ever a fan service? I don’t think so. It’s a dark story, with dark characters, in a dark environment. There will be more angst, pain, heartbreak, loss and death before it ends. And Yashiro will certainly not lose the battle against his heart easily.

The first time Yashiro opened up about his feelings, it was during a dissociative episode (in a bathroom scene in Doumeki’s apartment). I expect something like that to happen again. Circumstances may be different. Something has to trigger Yashiro to drop his defenses, like the last time. My prediction is that it will happen when he gets drunk (alcohol seems like a perfect underused tool to mess up his inhibitions). That is also the only way I see him making the first move. Doumeki, on the other hand, is playing smart for now. The pain he is causing Yashiro by being cold and distant, is a safe kind of pain (for Yashiro at least), the type that won’t make him run away. Although, it is highly unlikely Yashiro will run now when he knows Doumeki is in danger. He would want to find a way to address that problem, and I’m dying to see his manipulative self taking control and shining again.

Thank you so much. Yes, you answered all my questions, in great detail and depth. Emphasizing the nuance of the Japanese language and offering multiple possible meanings was especially helpful. It makes sense that the author used vague language on purpose. Also, Yashiro has always been an extremely unreliable narrator, so he might not be aware of the cause himself. Narratively, thematically, psychologically - it would make more sense that his incapability to feel pleasure during sex with other men (especially violent sex, which he was probably seeking) is directly linked to his experience with Doumeki. He’s had misconceptions about himself before, but it would honestly surprise me if he doesn’t make this connection eventually.

Yes, he knew making love to Doumeki was dangerous ( “don’t break me”). I don’t know if he could predict his impotence or the depth of his heartbreak, but he definitely felt overwhelming dread and inevitable loss. He revealed in chapter 23 that he was afraid how deepening relationship with Doumeki would eventually make it impossible for him to lose Doumeki. And I think he was right. He cornered himself by falling in love. Even if he tried to embrace love back then, it would have still destroyed him; I think it would have likely turned into dysfunctional codependent relationship. Yashiro wasn’t prepared for love, he wasn’t capable of processing anything that was happening to him back then - not his feelings, not Doumeki’s affection, not his own newfound pleasure experienced through non-violent sex. His requited love was in contradiction with every lie his child-self created in order to survive. He rationalized his actions with the desire to protect Doumeki from Yakuza, but I have always thought he felt resistance on a fundamental level - it was deep, existential fear that made him wish to abandon Doumeki. Personally, I don’t believe he planned to live that long to see the consequences of their intimacy and heartbreak anyway, I think he meant to die facing Hirata. So pushing Doumeki away (after they both survived) was necessary. He needed these four years to process everything, they both did. Even though they’ve caused a lot of pain to each other, I think their love has better odds now. Of course Doumeki loves him, but they still have a long way before their love can be shared in a healthy way. Ideally, they will find a way to get out of yakuza and go to therapy, but I don’t dare to hope that much. :)

My question is why does he not care about his eyes ? I don't think he could survive blindness

i don’t think he cared about living at all when he went to confront hirata. he’d solved so many problems: he protected misumi’s position, he (thought) he prevented his subordinates from getting themselves further involved with hirata. he says when hirata is choking him, “to go on living a used up life is just absurd.”

remember when he wakes up after being shot, he tells kage that there weren’t many good things worth remembering in his life, except a couple. one of those is doumeki.

so doumeki was something he thought worthwhile that he gave up when he went to confront hirata. he expected to die. and because he’d be dead, he wouldn’t have to deal with the fact that the things he gave up on still exist. but because he’s alive, he has to live with the pain of doumeki still existing and still being a cause of desire and pain for him. i honestly think when he’s saying he wishes hirata had taken both his eyes, he’s lamenting he’s still alive.

I’m sorry, I don’t use instagram for Saezuru purposes at this moment, so I’ll ask here. If it’s inconvenient for you to answer here, I’ll completely understand. :)

Does Yashiro specify when he stopped feeling pleasure during sex with men, or is explanation inside brackets your own interpretation? Or his (maybe inaccurate) interpretation? Does Yashiro really think the reason he became incapable of feeling pleasure was because he was raped by Inami?

I was so sure the transformative event was his pre-timeskip sex with Doumeki. Not Inami, or anyone else. Yashiro knew how to handle monsters like Inami, he was handling them for decades. He created an elaborate defense mechanism for the sole purpose of surviving them. He accepted violence as part of his reality and learned how to function accordingly. His sexuality, his core personality developed in a way so he could survive an abusive environment. But Doumeki and his gentle love - that was something he wasn’t prepared for, something he didn’t know how to handle. If Inami being the cause of his impotence/anorgasmia was true, it would change everything for my head canon.

Sorry I am not familiar with Tumbler.

I don’t really know how I can reply to you well in public. So I answer back like this.

Firstly, you’re hitting the very good point.

Actually, in the original Japanese, Yoneda Sensei used a phrase 「男にレイプされて」, which contains quite a vague word at the end.

It can be interpreted as:

“As (Because) I was raped by a man”,

but also can simply mean:

“I was raped by a men, and I became…”.

As in the second one, the Japanese word “〜されて」「〜して」can only mean a situation happened after an event in the course of the time.

So, even in the original Japanese, you can’t tell which of the two are the true meaning the author had in her mind. Or rather, she seems to have left this part to be vague.

That is why I used the word “as”, which is closer than “because”, for a translation of this word in this context.

Secondly, although most of Japanese fans seem to have taken this as the first meaning above, “since” or “because” of the rape by Inami, Yashiro actually started feeling no pleasure in sex.

However, personally, I do agree with you.

It may have been right during Inami’s rape that Yashiro realised he stopped feeling any pleasure in sex, but I think it was fundamentally after Yashiro had his first ever experience of making love with the person he’s in love with, ie, Doumeki, Yashiro must have come to feel no pleasure in sex with others than Doumeki.

In the omitted part from my translations, Yashiro actually tried with several customers at his casino to see if he reacts and got sexually excited or not, after he was raped by Inami on the street. And the results were, according to Yashiro, he didn’t react. He didn’t feel any sexual excitement with them either.

So, he has been impotent for a long time until Doumeki kissed his arms and touched him in Chapter 46.

And lastly and most importantly, the final monologue of Yashiro means that he of course realised he was in love with Doumeki right at the moment he recalled that he himself was also kissing Doumeki while he was asleep on the cheek in his recollection after hearing Doumeki’s confession in volume 5, just right after they started making love there.

Also, it means Yashiro had somehow known what would happen to him already from before, probably from before abandoning Doumeki four years ago.

As he expected, Yashiro stopped functioning “in order”. In a sense, his broken side was mended after making love with Doumeki. He stopped feeling pleasures in sex without true mutual love.

So, the very final part of my quote translations implies, Yashiro knew he would go strange if he lost Doumeki four years ago.

It also implies that Yashiro has been thinking if he hadn’t fallen for Doumeki, if he wasn’t in love with him, if he didn’t know how much pleasure and love he could feel when he actually experienced making love with the person he too is seriously in love with, for the first time in his entire life, then, he didn’t have to suffer from pains of having abandoned and lost Doumeki.

Because he hasn’t still forgotten his love toward Doumeki, that’s why Yashiro has been in such huge agony and pain for four years now.

I am very very certain that Doumeki has been similar. Doumeki must be still crazily in love with Yashiro.

So, I strongly believe that they would face each other now and would become true lovers together this time in near future.

Hope I could answer all your questions.

And thanks for allowing me to post this reply in open public.

One more correction!!

Maybe my English for the final part of the quotes was grammatically wrong. That’s why it caused misunderstandings!

It should be:

“I had understood that, somewhere.

If I hadn’t come to know it, I didn’t have to lose it.”

We see from Yashiro’s reaction to Misumi too, after the time skip, when Misumi hits him, Yashiro again has an expression of pain and fear.  He no longer looks turned on by that kind of treatment.  He just looks hurt and scared by it.  So Yashiro already knows, by the time we catch up with him after the time skip, that things for him aren’t like they were before.

I need to make it leave my Word doc so here you go. spoilers, of course. 

So, I have been thinking about Nanahara. He's such an underrated interesting character. In the post-timeskip, I suspect he fell in love with Yashiro (Chapter 45). It's not just a family bond anymore:

Chapters: 1/6 Fandom: 囀る鳥は羽ばたかない | Saezuru Tori wa Habatakanai Rating: Explicit Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Relationships: Doumeki Chikara/Yashiro Characters: Doumeki Chikara, Yashiro (Saezuru Tori wa Habatakanai), Ryuuzaki (Saezuru Tori wa Habatakanai), Misumi (Saezuru Tori wa Habatakanai), Doumeki Aoi, Nanahara (Saezuru Tori wa Habatakanai), Original Characters Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Actor Yashiro, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Past Rape/Non-con, Glove Kink, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Sickfic, Hurt/Comfort, Angst, Fluff, Rimming, is impotence kink a thing, if so yashiro has it Summary:

In high school, Yashiro had developed a ranking of desperation for his future self. In the top spot, which was to say, not desperate at all, he had “film or television actor.” Below that, “voice actor, not porn.” Then “extra, voiceover, or commercial actor” and “voice actor, porn.” That was where he was hovering now, nearly twenty years later. Then there was “pornstar,” followed by “yakuza, legitimate,” and finally, “yakuza, gay for pay.”

He feared he was falling into a rapid descent down the list.

Or: Evicted from his apartment and unable to find work, Yashiro crashes at Ryuuzaki’s apartment, but Ryuuzaki is in prison again, and in his place Yashiro finds an extremely hot, if emotionless, wannabe yakuza.

SAME, ANON. SAME. This one is my fave:

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Sorry, I want to reply to both your reblogs at once, so I chose to write a fresh post instead of reblogging. I don’t know if I’ll be able to answer all the questions you’ve asked because, well, I am still figuring out a lot of what I think about Saezuru.

One thing is clear to me the longer I read and think: Nothing in Saezuru is simple. There’s never a clear yes/no answer. Our characters’ motivations are multi-dimensional, and they’re not always easy to identify or understand. In other words, the reason Saezuru succeeds where a lot of BL falls flat is because it’s human. Humans are messy and hard to label.

So, forgive my rambling here. I’ll pick up on some your thoughts, but please know YMMV and I’m still working things out. We may also disagree on things, but that’s because so much of the story is up for audience interpretation. I don’t think there are wrong answers. I’m also riffing off the top of my head, so keep in mind I haven’t cited precise chapters or provided manga caps.

More under the cut.

CW as typical for Saezuru - rape, child sexual assault, violence, sexual violence.

I feel like I wasn’t able to make myself clear, actually, partially because I do ramble and don’t really try to lay my ideas out point by point.

I definitely didn’t intend to cast any sexual kinks in a negative or belittling light, so I’m sorry if what I was saying came off that way.  I’m just trying to work through all of the obviously deep complexities of Yashiro’s character, because he really is so multi-faceted.  You make great points and show perfect examples to back up everything you said, pointing to evidence that Yashiro does in fact feel some kind of pleasure from experiencing pain, and I absolutely don’t think there’s anything wrong with that, or think it’s even weird.  I only thought, it’s interesting, because there’s similarly so many instances where I think it’s clear Yashiro isn’t actually enjoying himself, instances when he’s hit particularly hard, where he looks like it just hurts, and he doesn’t like it.  But also what he says about the pain making the sex more tolerable, about how it makes him feel less sick while he’s having sex.  Just straight sex seems to make Yashiro feel physically ill.   So that interested me, because again I felt like it maybe indicates that the pain is a kind of anchor for him to hold on to, almost like a distraction from the more negative feelings and emotions he feels during sex, linking back to his trauma.  I don’t know, I don’t feel like I’m doing a very good job explaining myself, haha.  

About what I said regarding Yashiro being gentle, well, yeah, I definitely agree that Yashiro IS violent and engages in violence, and is even somewhat sadistic.  I feel like all of that, all the examples you mentioned which evidence that sadism, are linked for sure to the abuse he suffered, and also the world he’s involved in.  I guess what I meant is, if one were to take away the tragedy of Yashiro’s life, the pain he’s endured, etc…  I think his natural inclination would actually be gentility.  I don’t mean to say he IS gentle, because the circumstances of his life and the experiences he’s gone through have made retaining that kind of nature almost impossible.  But I think in a pure, unsullied state, that’s who Yashiro is, deep down in his heart.  I think he cares about people deeply, in a way he doesn’t even understand himself, or doesn’t see about himself.  I think it’s telling that Yashiro never seriously injures or hurts anyone, and never kills anyone.  He could.  Given the world he lives in, it would be expected and even applauded.  But he never engages in anything permanently damaging to anyone, which I find really interesting.  And the way he goes about trying to protect people often manifests in violent actions, but as you said, I think that’s because that’s all he’s ever known.  He doesn’t really know how else to go about these things, because he never had anyone to show him.  I brought up the instance with Hirata and him hitting him with that rock, because I think that’s telling too.  Yashiro didn’t fly into a blind rage and smash Hirata’s skull into mush, even though he could have, and even though he was clearly horrified and upset about Doumeki being shot.  So it struck me that he didn’t even hit Hirata hard enough to knock him out.  Like you say, what makes this series so incredible, well, one of the things, is it’s nuance and subtlety, and I just get the impression of Yashiro, contradictory though it may seem, that he’s actually, in his heart of hearts, not a violent person at all.  And I think, if so, that’s another added layer of tragedy to his character, that he’s been forced onto this track in life of violence, both against him, and against others, when it isn’t at all who he would have been had his life not taken the tragic turns that it did.  Of course the whole story revolves around the impact of child abuse, and the ways in which in manifests, and I think part of it is the violence in Yashiro’s life, on top of all the other, innumerable issues plaguing him.  I think what makes us, the readers, feel so deeply for Yashiro is that we can sense that there’s an inherent goodness in him, despite his many issues, and his sometimes immoral behavior.  It makes us feel all the more heartbroken, knowing there’s that goodness inside him, but seeing it pressed down and hidden beneath so many layers, and for so many reasons.  The fact that even with that, it still at moments shines strongly through, is in itself incredible.  It’s what I think Doumeki is referring to when he calls Yashiro beautiful and kind.  I think Doumeki is right about Yashiro, that it isn’t blind idol worship, or as Yashiro tries to convince himself, Doumeki simply latching on to the first person he saw out of jail and following blindly.  He sees the truth of who Yashiro actually is, underneath it all, in a way Yashiro certainly doesn’t see about himself, in a way most people don’t see, in fact.  I think it’s also part of the reason why Yashiro tries so hard to push Doumeki away, because Doumeki’s odd perceptiveness scares him, and he doesn’t want to have to examine himself that closely, or confront the falseness of the image he presents, both to others and to himself, the way he doesn’t want to acknowledge the actual impact the sexual abuse he suffered has had on his life.  Anyway, I’m rambling again, haha.

But yes, again, all your points about Kage are right on, and he’s a terrible friend, and I was really happy to see you make all the points you did about him, because I honestly thought he was a serious douche from the start, and his lack of perception about Yashiro is in so many ways heartbreaking.  Yashiro deserved a better friend then that.  If he’d had one, he likely wouldn’t be so messed up now, which you also did such a fantastic job of explaining.

And yes, Inami needs to die.  God I hate that bastard, haha.  I’m really going to be interested to see just what the deal is between Yashiro and him, if it gets addressed again, if Yashiro is allowing Inami to treat him the way he did in that first encounter still or not.  I don’t know.  Like you said, things are falling apart in terms of Yashiro’s ability to keep the narrative of rough sex equating to rape in place as a defense mechanism.