muse ✨'s manga / #hot af(2)

A completely wonderful, fucked-up love story between a man who grew up in a family of thieves and another man who became a cop in order to protect him. When he catches Naoto in a marriage scheme, rather than arrest him, Kaoru confines him to his apartment on threat of exposure. But Naoto, who had been trying to leave his criminal past behind, loves the freeloader life and comes to care about Kaoru: an unhinged, lonely man who is obsessed with him. Healthy? Probably not, but they legitimately fall in love and somehow manage to convey tenderness even when telling each other to die. I usually scroll past explicit stuff, but these two have the hottest sex I've seen in anything. Sometimes schmoopy manga misses the mark with regards to love stories; this made my heart pound. I would love to see what they're up to in a year (probably mouthing off at each other before having sex on the kitchen counter).

Another commenter mentioned that this has a lot of cliches but was a great read, and I agree - it's absolutely charming and the feelings between the characters seem to jump off of the page. There's wonderful emotional buildup, as well as some heartache, even in the final chapter, which is a one-shot and unrelated to the rest. A young man, Hanamura, is conned into designing for the company where he works by the boss he adores, who takes credit for his work under the veil of kindness - in order to leave Hanamura out of the spotlight. When it's announced his boss is engaged to a woman, Hanamura cries in the break room and is discovered by Takase, a well-known designer from another company, who recognizes Hanamura's talent and sleeps with him. Hanamura, realizing he's been taken advantage of by his current boss, quits his job and comes to work at Takase's company. But he's left wondering if what they had was a one-night stand and if he'll suffer another one-sided love. TEN POINTS for Hanamura's ABSOLUTE LOVE of having sex. It says a lot for this genre that that detail stood out to me, but so often it's "no, don't, stop" - as though an unwilling or hesitant partner is romantic. Hanamura begs for sex, says what he wants, and is not ashamed that he's gay. In fact, none of the characters in this story were dealing with internalized homophobia. What a fun read! The final story is about childhood friends who begin to live together.