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love how some ppls reaction to rarepairs is "that makes no senseeee did they even meet" like. oh so this ur first time in fandom or u just dont like fun or.....?
What it’s like when you and the gang are in different fandoms
The Summer Hikaru Died hit me wayyy harder than I was expecting. I'm not that good at putting things into words, but its depiction of growing up queer in a rural community felt so real.
Yoshiki is repressed, stifled by the community he grew up in. He wants so badly to leave, to go to the big city, to finally be free of all the nosiness that comes from living in a small town. In some panels, the sounds of the cicadas are written in every possible blank space, giving a suffocating feeling.
Something I haven't seen people talk about yet (though I'm sure it exists) is all the discussion about Yoshiki becoming "mixed up" by spending time with 'Hikaru.' At the end of chapter 4, Rie tells Yoshiki to put some distance between himself and 'Hikaru' before he becomes mixed up. And obviously, she's talking in the sense of the supernatural, but it reminded me somewhat of my own experiences. In middle school I was friends with someone that was heavily rumored, but not confirmed to be a lesbian (she was, but closeted.) My parents told me to keep my distance from her, because they didn't want me getting "involved in the wrong crowd" or "influenced."
Just as my only refuge from growing up this way was my small group of closeted queer friends who shared my struggles, Yoshiki was safe with Hikaru. Except now, Hikaru is gone, replaced by a mimic that uses his body and retained his memories. He's gone, but he's not gone.
In TSHD, queerness and the supernatural are intertwined. Just as 'Hikaru' must hide what he truly is, Yoshiki must as well. Just as 'Hikaru' is a monster, Yoshiki views himself as a monster because of his upbringing. Getting involved with the supernatural is dangerous, just as how being openly queer in a homophobic area is dangerous. Both are things that people fear, that must be hidden in order to stay safe.
Anyway this is long and rambly but I just needed to share. I obviously knew that TSHD had topics of both horror and queerness before reading, but I didn't expect it to affect me as much as it did.