CW: body horror, eye trauma, gore, vomit, hallucinating
I love Mistress Angel Junko-san. I love it far more than words can say.
Mistress Angel Junko-san is an anime series that's been running strong for nearly a decade now and has played a major part in my life. The premise is simple, as each season follows a strict formula. They always start out with some teenage boy down on their luck, whether it be bullies, a rough family life, or a non-existent love life. The boy is always miserable and wallowing in a deep depression until they're visited by a beautiful angel girl named Junko Suzuki. Junko serves as a guardian angel to lost, lonely boys in need and by the end of the season, manages to turn their lives around. It's always sad when she has to depart and leave her love behind, but she never does so without a passionate kiss or a romantic night in bed first. The series is on its eighth season now and to me, it just keeps getting better and better.
I don't know where I'd be without this show. I first discovered it when I was fourteen, just as I was about to enter high school. The series was on its fifth season at the time, but I saw it gaining a lot of attention online and thought it might be fun to binge. To say I was blown away would be an understatement. Never before have I seen a show as fun, wholesome, and sweet as this one. The animation is both incredibly charming and fluid, the humor is lighthearted and quirky, and it always manages to bring a smile to my face. Every time Junko-san has to depart with her newfound beloved, it never fails to make my eyes water. It's all so bittersweet, yet inspiring and hopeful when the boys get to move on to a better life. Everything about this show is absolutely perfect, but none of it compares to how great Junko-san herself is.
I adore Junko-san with all my heart. I'm obsessed with her. I love her more than my own mother and father if I'm being honest. No matter how you look at it, Junko-san is the ideal image of what any woman should be. She's delightful, sweet, and ever so patient. She's a bit ditzy and adorably clumsy, but also has some motherly wisdom when the time comes for it. I was captivated by her right from the first episode. When she first fell from the heavens and landed face-first into the dirt, I immediately wanted to dust her off and give her a hug. She's also incredibly beautiful. Far more beautiful than any woman I've ever seen in the real world, I'd say. She has long, glistening light blue hair that flows beautifully in the breeze. Her body is thin, petite, and without the slightest flaw. Her eyes are big, bright sparkling turquoises, which resemble a shimmering galaxy whenever she lights up. She's always seen with this dainty schoolgirl outfit that she never takes off (except for special occasions, like the beach episode) and her back is adorned with two painfully adorable tiny wings that can only get her a few inches off the ground. Junko-san is perfection incarnate. Even her name means "pure" in Japanese.
I've always wished Junko-san could visit me someday, and help me find the joy in my painfully mundane existence, but I knew she couldn't...
I wish I could go to school with her, just to see her beautiful face every day. To talk to her, or to even walk past her. But instead, I have to go to that shithole alone. I have to go there, day in and day out, and put up with the most obnoxious dickwads ever assembled. I hate my teachers and I hate the other shitheads I have to take my classes with. They're all so loud. So goddamn loud. The boys there are terrible, but the girls are even worse. Always looking at me and whispering. Always fucking giggling about how ugly I am. They probably think I can't hear, but I can. I always can.
Luckily, that all changes tonight.
About a week ago, I discovered an online forum. An online forum dedicated to tulpas. At the time, I had no idea what a tulpa was. I'm pretty sure most people don't, but soon I became invested in this strange rabbit hole and began digging deep. Before long, I learned that tulpas were essentially hallucinations. Hallucinations with cultural roots in Buddhism and other spiritual beliefs. They take the form of fully realized beings, complete with personalities and behaviors. To summon them, you'd have to fully commit to envisioning them. You'd have to center your mind toward how they'd look, how they'd talk, and how they'd move until they finally manifest. As I looked further into this practice, I found out about all the various forms tulpas could take. Some people used their tulpas as spirit guides, while others used them as imaginary friends. But there was one particular niche that snatched my interest
Some people had tulpas of fictional characters.
Characters from books, characters from cartoons, you name it. If a character existed, you could make them real. Real to you, at least. You could bring them to life, talk to them, touch them, and treat them like a dear friend.
From the moment I learned this, I knew what I had to do.
As I enter my home after another long, tiring, and pointless day, I rush up the stairs towards my room. I dash straight inside as soon as I reach the top and carelessly slam my door shut. I can tell the sound of it was echoing through the entire house, but I can't bring myself to care. All that matters now is me and Junko-san.
My heart is beating rapidly from all the excitement, but I do my best to calm myself. I sit down on my bed and place my hand on my chest, feeling it jump and flutter until it gradually steadies itself. I take a deep breath and exhale several times, allowing the adrenaline to flow out of my system. To summon Junko, I will be using meditation, so a calm and steady body is what I need first and foremost.
I lift my legs onto the bed and cross them neatly. My eyes close tightly, and I draw all my focus toward the darkness. My intent is to mold it with my imagination, so my mind conjures a clear image of Junko-san. I remember every single little detail there is to her. I think about her gorgeously round face, the soft, flowing texture of her hair, those two adoring eyes full of innocence, and her gentle smile...I thought of it all. I can see it all inside my head as if she were truly there, standing right in front of me. In my ears, I can hear her soft, bubbly voice, with a giggle as sweet as a chiming bell. I try to imagine her saying my name. Over and over again, I repeat it, hoping that I can perfect it. Slowly, I can hear my voice melting into hers. It fades and transforms so subtly, until...
"Michael?"
My eyes flicker open…and standing right in front of me is Junko-san.
The sight of her makes my heart skip a beat. Although unmistakably there, she seems flat. Like a painting or a cardboard cutout. For a moment, I'm hesitant, unsure if she can move or speak. I resist the urge to touch her, and spend a few moments observing the figure looming over me. But before long, I notice her subtle breathing. This two-dimensional drawing is noticeably pulsating, as if she were a real organism made of flesh and blood.
Nervously, I reach out my hand and gently stroke her long, dainty fingers. I don't know what I expected the hands of a living drawing to feel like, but the texture takes my breath away. Her skin is completely smooth, and oddly reminiscent of a glassy surface. I rub them gently, feeling their curves and shape, and become uneasy. Despite her lack of visible depth, there does seem to be some dimension to her. I move upwards to her arm, just to feel its unapparent figure. Her existence truly defies all logic
I look up at Junko-san, who's staring down at me cluelessly. Her eyes are radiant as ever, but so far and distant. She's indistinguishable from an image on my computer screen or a character on a poster. From this, I begin to have second thoughts. She can't possibly be real. She's just a figment of my imagination. A psych experiment I shouldn't have indulged in. A lost cause.
But then I look at her again.
I see her perfect face and her perfect body. Her perfect eyes, her perfect hair, her perfect frame, all of it. I look at how she's just standing there, looking at me curiously. So sweet, so unassuming. Her knees are buckling bashfully, likely from feeling insecure. Her face wears an expression of thoughtful concern, and a soft pink flush is glowing over her cheeks. She's everything I wanted. She's beautiful and heavenly.
She is Junko-san. She is perfection.
Without thinking, I wrap my arms around her and pull her into a tight embrace. I squeeze her with all my might, perhaps terrified that she might disappear as quickly as she came. Her body feels light and weightless, but I can't bring myself to care. All that matters is she's here. Here in my arms and here for me. For many minutes, I stay in that embrace, savoring it like the warmth of the womb. I could spend hours like this, if not days or even months. I could die like this if I wanted to. What would life even matter, compared to an eternity close to her?
"Michael..."
She lets out a sharp breath into my ear. Through her gritted teeth, I can hear an unmistakable wince of pain.
"I'm not supposed to exist."
Something's wrong.
I stroke her arm again and come to a horrible realization. Her skin, which was once glossy and slick, now has the rubbery, recognizable texture of human flesh. In an instant, I push myself away from her, and am met face-to-face with the unimaginable.
Junko-san's eyes are now bulging straight out of her skull, and much too big for her own head to handle. Although large before, they now resemble the eyes of any other human being...ones that had been ballooned and disfigured to a grotesque degree. Inside them are dozens of veins, none of which were there before. Each of them appears to be swelling as they begin burning a bright, painful shade of red, coating over her entire corneas. Her once sparkling pupils have now become two overgrown black pits, devoid of her highlights. I can feel the empty irises piercing straight into my soul, causing my stomach to churn.
What used to be her fair, ribbon-like hair has become a messy blue lump of straw, full of split ends and tangled clumps. The exaggerated, impossible length of it, a normally endearing quality, has led to it dangling drably from her scalp and lumping together on the ground, like a disgustingy worn rag. As I scan her appearance, trying in vain to take in this ghastly display, I look upon her skin again. All over her twisted form, I can see pores, hairs, and other imperfections growing in by the hundreds. Her smiling mouth has teeth. Real, jagged, individual teeth, instead of a clean strip of white. Her fingertips now have long, pointed nails, misshapen and stained.
This is what it means to be real.
I clutch my stomach, overwhelmed with sheer terror and revoltion.
I think I'm going to be sick.
Suddenly, there's a loud crunch. A wet, visceral crunch.
I look down at the source of the noise; her impossibly thin waist. Her waist that now had real muscles, a real underlying bone structure...and real organs. From inside it, I hear a nauseating cacophony of squishing, twisted, and popping, with a distinctive meatish quality. It all comes to a head with an appalling SNAP, resembling the sound of a rope breaking in two. I gasp and cover my mouth with my hands, and the reality of what was happening finally hits me.
Her organs, which were too big to fit within the confines of her cartoonish anatomy, were being crushed.
Soon after, blood begins spurting out from her mouth, spewing and splattering everywhere from her coughing. Her heaves and whimpers of agony climax with one last upheaval of fluids and with that, all life is snuffed out. Junko-san's body goes limp, collapsing and rolling onto the ground. All that remains is a corpse. A deformed, contorted, blasphemous corpse.
On her back, I can see her two tiny wings. Both are bent beyond repair and have bones visibly snapped in half.
I can't hold it back anymore. Out of impulse, I spring to my feet and run towards the bathroom. The vomit charging through my throat refuses to wait and it bursts out of me before I can make it to the toilet. For the next hour or so, I spend my time lying on the floor, staring off into space and processing what had just happened. Once I'm finally able to get up, I begin cleaning the puke off the floor, all while using my sobs to hold back my desperate need to scream.
A few weeks have passed already. And yet, she still remains on my bedroom floor.
Not from a lack of trying though. I've tried several times to dispose of her body, but she always comes back somehow. I've tried dumping her outside, burying her, lighting her on fire, and even stuffing her in my closet. But no matter what, she always comes back when I wake up in the morning. Always.
I suppose it's because sleeping is how the brain refreshes itself. Restarting my consciousness restarts her in return, and I'm not sure what can be done about it. I've spent every day with her lying on my carpet, her body in a dormant state without decomposing. When I go to sleep at night, she's there. When I try to focus on my homework, she's there. No matter what, she's there, reminding me of the goddamn nightmare of a night.
My only blessing, however, is that no one can see her except me. Whenever my mom and dad come in here, it's clear that she's still a mere figment of my mind. It's rather disturbing to watch them walk through her lifeless body, blissfully unaware of it, but it's another horror I've learned to get used to. And honestly, I can't think of a better punishment.
She exists for me, and me alone. She'll never go away. We're together, forever and always.