poop

What the mc meant by "candy bullets don't rlly pierce thru anything" is that sugar coating the harsh reality you face won't change the outcome of it.

At the beggining of the story the MC only seeks out bullets. That means she want to face reality (unlike her shut in brother). That is why she wants to apply for the task force.

The seafoam girl comes along and creates stories about being a mermaid in order to cope from the abuse she faces at home. Everything she says about being a mermaid is just candied bullets.

Towards the end of the story the MC started realizing that and she also chose to seek out a candied bullet, a childish idea, which was to run away even tho the seafoam girl was never going to leave her father or be able to escape from him. She was always going to die and I think she may have known that.

Some things that foreshadowed her outcome:
The story she tells about the storm on the beach every 10 years and then repeating that story like twice later on.
When she tells the MC about her father, she says she loves him and later on in the story the MC's brother talks about stockholm syndrome.
Her killing the rabbits as an act of love, bc that's what her father did to poochie the dog. She has a skewed view of love bc of her father.


On a side note... I think the brother was assaulted by his classmate and as a result he became a shut in? It's only mentioned once but the mc doesn't know exactly why. "He was popular among the girls in his class and one day one came to his room and he changed."
I found that he and Mokuzu paralleled each other in the aspect of escapism.

At the beggining of the story it's apparent that both guys like each other, but one of them doesn't want to date bc of personal issues and lack of trust.
This concept is kinda common but I like the way the author executed it. At the start it's ez to see the story as the mc one-sided chasing after ohara.

That's the same lense that the mc sees the situation as. Once the perspective for ohara is given, then it's ez to see why he didn't wanna date at first and how emotionally, he is chasing after the mc.
(Personally, when that clicked was when kawai said u didn't have to cry for me, it was enough that u were already there) Ohara didn't see himself as worthy bc the very reason why the mc liked him in the first place was bc he thought Ohara was crying for him, even tho he was crying for something unrelated to Kawai.

A few points in the story that were bruh moments were
1. the MC's coworker outing him (at least this scene was necessary in order for the story to progress ig)
2. Difficult to differentiate when a flashback is done and what's the present.
3. We all know this bs cliche the MC being asked if he is gay and says I don't think so despite having sex with ohara a couple panels before ?? Ig the author only included that to back up the reasoning for Ohara's lack of trust in the potential for his and Kawais relationship. But there was others factors the author wrote in that contributed to his lack of trust so this scene wasn't necessary bruh

I like the detail that when they first have sex Ohara's leg is a barrier between them while Kawai is facing him. (representing how the MC is the one chasing after ohara in the beggining)
Then when they are fwb their sex positions are shown as symbolism for a power imbalance between the two. (Them not looking at each other and also Ohara riding it without a condom ignoring the MC. This represents how Kawai is now losing hope just like Ohara)
The final sex panel has them chest to chest face to face with no barrier meaning they are on the same page.

Something original from this story has to be the kiss in the backseat of the car, the cool part being it was while the car was getting washed at the carwash maybe the author came up with it while washing their car.