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For as long as she can remember, her father has been hitting her, calling her an idiot, insulting everything from her fashion to her desires. “My stupid son,” he says to customers, both familiar and complete strangers, as if she's not right there hearing every word. “He better shape up if he wants to take over the business,” he says to anyone who will listen, as if their arguments never happen. As if she's ever done anything but loathe the idea of being trapped at home for the rest of her life. As if she has no desires of her own, beyond what he's given her permission to have.
She would never dream of coming out to him; as it is, she can hardly be seen with her blue hair and make up without receiving snide remarks about them at best. It's not even the potential fights that scare her most, but the certain rejection, the thought of him continuing to say “my stupid son” to customers, despite knowing the truth. It churns her stomach more than the fishy smell that's come to make her nauseous – the smell that always reminds her of home.
The Eikichi who belongs there, in her home and in her father's restaurant, isn't her. It's a fabrication of her; an idealized version who lives only in her father's mind. The Eikichi her father loves, but will never meet.
School is a mess of aggressive noise and bodies, of intimidating boys who look just like her father when they start yelling threats and obscenities. They like to throw their weight around and stomp on whomever their feet can reach for even a chance of infamy. But here, it isn't like home. Here, she can fight back. Here, she can win.
So she fights, and she wins. She wins admiration, which she loves. The strong are admired, are praised. She was fortunate enough to grow into a bigger body and a louder voice than her opponents, and unfortunate enough to have the experience to withstand hits for the sake of victory. With her own hands, she crafts her school into her own realm, where she can look however she wants and follow whatever dreams come to her. Her devotees will always tell her how cool she looks, how strong she is, how incredible her abilities are. In this school, she can loudly be a girl who likes to fight and swear, and anyone who vocally disagrees becomes a target.
With the admiration, she also wins fear, which she's not entirely sold on. Fear is something she knows intimately; it's there when she wakes up in the morning, and it's there when she gets home in the evening. It visits her every time her father speaks, every time he sighs, every time he lifts his hand. All it ever does is eat away at her. It hurts her. To think of herself leaving others with this same feeling...
She doesn't want to hurt others. She just wants to keep herself safe. Express the true self, but not too much. Stay close to friends, but be on guard. Fight, survive. It's lonely, but it's all she knows.
And with luck, she finds herself some lackeys who will call her by a new name she's chosen: Michel. It pleases her to no end to know that some people will respect her choices, no matter how many won't. She has them spread it, use it everywhere, make sure everyone knows the proper name of the queen of Kasugayama High.
Despite it all, even here, she doesn't really belong. They don't admire her singing, her fashion, her personality, her dreams. They admire her fists. She's “Boss” here, she's a troublemaker, a delinquent, like everyone else. She's a rowdy boy, as far as anyone who knows the school's reputation is concerned. Even within its walls, she's considered a guy playing at feminine glamor by dissenters, a tough and eccentric boss by followers. With every pair of eyes comes another version of Michel, and none of them are her.
There must be a place out there where she belongs, though. A place where posturing is unnecessary, where she can simply exist as her true self. Unsmothered. Unchallenged. It's a feeling that nags at her, like she's forgotten something – somewhere – important. Sometimes she searches for it, and sometimes she cries. Sometimes, she just stares up at space and wills the stars to point her in the right direction. But they never do.