Senpai's Harem Pt. 01

There was nothing about José that made him seem particularly special to the casual observer. He in fact seemed average by nearly every obvious measure, from his height to his eye color. While perfectly ordinary, it would still be fair to say that he was described by some to be reasonably handsome. In fact, he bore a decent resemblance to Michael Aranda, if Michael Aranda had adopted Ash Ketchum as his style icon.

To fully appreciate José, one needed only to look the tiniest bit deeper. First, he was bright. Thanks to his laid back demeanor and unpretentious manner of speaking, it was easy at first to underestimate exactly how intelligent Jose was. As frustrating as he often found his job, he also consistently performed it better than most of his peers. He possessed great creativity and the artistic talent to share his rawly beautiful visions with the world. While he was nihilistic and thus struggled to see meaning in his own life, he never made others feel like they lacked value. His sense of humor tended to be a bit dorky, a smidge sassy, and a lot self deprecating.

That was actually the most endearing yet heartbreaking thing about him. Perhaps because the people who ought to appreciate him most didn't always do that as well as they should, José was often oblivious to his ample charms. José was actually flat out clueless, but that was about to change. He was about to learn just how exciting, overwhelming, and sometimes scary it could be to have many women all discover his appeal nearly simultaneously. José was about to find out he had a harem.

There were three women at the core of José's harem, and besides their shared yet varied degrees of interest in José, they really didn't have much in common. Mariah was the classic beauty, with the build of a dancer and the grace to match. She was the sort that insecure women tended to irrationally hate, which was all the more absurd when you recognized she also possessed genuine kindness and humility. Her life was largely happy, thanks to plenty of love from a close knit family, and a deep satisfaction in raising her young child.

She admired José mostly for his stability. Her previous lovers had taught her that men could be unreliable, but José was dependable. Even when he grappled with insecurity and depression, he was still someone you could count on to be there. That might not have been something she found especially attractive in her youth, but now that she was a mother, it was the most appealing quality a man could possess.

Kayla was more edgy and loud, in both attitude and sense of style. She had a deep bond with her family, too, but had no immediate desire to start one of her own. She tended to enjoy her men on a very basic, animalistic level, and often had titillating dating stories to share. Her co-workers found her entertaining due to her candidness, outrageous antics, and fondness for gossip.

As much as she mercilessly teased José, she was drawn to him courtesy of his ability to give just as much sass back. Kayla had a strong personality, and needed a man she couldn't steamroll. She wasn't naturally inclined to give all her attention to one man, but the fire in José had her tempted to do so.

Emma was pretty, but in a more understated way than Mariah, and she lacked the brazenness of Kayla. She had all the presence of a mouse, maybe because she was the youngest of the bunch and hadn't had enough time to shed her naivete and to cultivate much confidence. Maybe it was due to the piety instilled by her religious upbringing. For whatever reason, she was mega levels of nice and ridiculously helpless- so much so that it was perceived as fake.

Some thought she was hiding sociopathic tendencies and would one day snap. Others believed she adopted the persona as a way to wheedle out of things she didn't care to do. Her reasons for idolizing José managed to be both complicated and pure. He exhibited patience and provided her with guidance. He was also the worldly older man who gave her attention, and that struck her as extremely seductive.

Jackie was a different beast all together. Sure, there were hints of Mariah, Kayla, and Emma in her makeup, but the end effect resembled none of the three. While she was kind and at moments possessed the grace of Mariah, her default mode was mega klutz. There was the tripping, of course, and the fact that she relied so much on her hands when talking that she sometimes whacked her hand on objects- or worse, people. When especially excited, she talked so high pitched and fast that her audience's eyes glazed over, finding it easier to tune her out than decipher her ramblings.

She was sweet like Emma, but not. Mostly she strived to be helpful, efficient, empathetic, and fair, which gave the overall impression of sweetness. She was only Emma levels of sweet when she was feeling anything but- usually when others were testing her patience and she couldn't show it. Perhaps if she also shared Emma's religious background, impatience would be less of a problem, but she definitely did not. After many disappointing church experiences, she had become disillusioned with religion.

That didn't mean she was an atheist. First, she was practical and recognized that while there was no harm in believing in God regardless of his actual existence, not believing in God if he did exist was a mistake. Second, she found comfort in the idea that a fatherly figure cared about and looked after her, especially after her own father passed away.

Unlike Kayla, Jackie didn't have a supersize personality that she freely expressed to the world at large. She certainly had more personality than she often got credit for, but that was because she reserved it for people she was comfortable with, and that was a very exclusive club. There was her youngest brother, Jacob, who was her favorite person and the primary recipient of her love. She loved her mom, of course, but their turbulent history meant that she was far more guarded and choosy with how that love was expressed, showing it mostly through acts like surprising her mom with small treats such as a favorite candy, offering random shoulder pats, and issuing somewhat subdued declarations of "Love you". And there was her grandpa, who warranted full hugs and love yous that had a bit more spirit.

Lena, her best friend and college roommate, used to receive Jackie's small treats and a whole lot of her (occasionally unwanted) mothering. Because they no longer lived near each other, that had morphed into random messages from each that they were thinking of the other, generally courtesy of hearing a song the other adored, and recommendations for books they thought the other would appreciate. But Jacob was the one to benefit most fully from her affection, be it frequent gifts of root beer and chocolate, head rubs when he had a headache, hugs, and regular wholehearted assurances that he was loved.

The biggest way she differed from Kayla involved her dating life, or rather lack thereof. Whereas Kayla was content to play, jumping easily from man to man, that just wasn't something Jackie could do, nor would she want to. This was something that people tended to misunderstand about her. Some believed her continued virginity to be rooted in an obligation to her faith, when in fact she didn't think God cared much about the sex lives of his subjects as long as it was consensual.

The more common theory was that she lacked the confidence to pursue someone of interest. That was also inaccurate. True, a self imposed rule that she wouldn't date until she was 25 had naturally limited her flirting experience, but that wasn't something that held her back. And sure, she wasn't physically the embodiment of the average man's dream woman, being both short and fluffy. But she had been complimented on the color of her eyes, and the fullness of her lips, and had heard rumors in high school of boys liking her for her...ample assets. While she wanted to be liked for better reasons than that, she could at least recognize that while she wasn't every man's type, she was some men's type, and she didn't even need some- just one. So insecurity didn't hinder her on that front.

Her biggest obstacle stemmed from something she prized deeply. The compliment that meant most to her wasn't that she was in some way beautiful, sweet, intelligent, or a good employee. The finest praise she had ever heard was, "You're efficient". She absolutely detested wasting energy, and dating seemed horribly inefficient. Maybe if she were interested in something that was casual, with no care about whether it would evolve into something more, it would be a different story. But she felt things too deeply to make casual possible for her.

Thus, Jackie wanted at least some assurance that a man was worth her feelings, and she didn't see how dating was the proper way to gauge that. One, it could be an expensive way to learn very little. Movies meant long stretches with no talking, so that wasn't very helpful. Depending on where you ate, it could be loud, plus there were interruptions. Then there was the very purpose of dates- to impress someone. Therefore, how much could be trusted? If the company was pleasant, only so many dates could go by before there was at the very least a discussion about exploring some level of intimacy.

In that regard, Jackie was insecure. She had kissed exactly one person- literally the boy next door. But kisses exchanged at age 10 for purely scientific purposes don't exactly make one an expert. So if she kissed without saying anything about her inexperience first, the theoretical man might think she's just an awful kisser and lose interest. On the other hand, if she did warn her date, that could be disastrous in other ways. If he were a real ass, he could be all, woo hoo, I'm gonna bag a virgin, then promptly skedaddle when that was no longer the case.

The better but still not ideal possibility was that he'd instead decide he wasn't suited for the emotional complications that might stem from entangling himself with someone so innocent, and end things. That wouldn't be utterly devastating, but depending on how many dates had transpired, it would likely be at least somewhat hurtful. The whole institution was simply illogical, and entirely unnecessary. She didn't need children, she could kill her own damn spiders, she was quite capable of scratching her own itches, and actually enjoyed alone time. She never understood people who needed to be in a relationship.

Jackie didn't get the need, but she could understand want. She didn't want to stay forever single, but she was fine being so if it meant she didn't settle. She could never be satisfied with a man who was anything less than a kindred spirit- someone who was worthy of respect, had a strong sense of integrity and justice, accepted and loved her for the neurotic klutzy fluffy foul mouthed dork she was, and who could both engage in amiable conversations about shared interests and join her in companionable silence.

Since dating was clearly out of the question, she could see only one path- friendship. That made perfect sense. Friends didn't care as much about the impression they made, so there was less incentive to lie about what they wanted and to hide their flaws. If it led to a relationship, he'd know going in that she was sometimes anxious, randomly blue, and almost always neurotic. The subject of her romantic non history could be revealed in a more organic way, and a friend wouldn't want to risk hurting her simply for an ego trip.

Plus one tended to make friends easier if they had common interests to talk about, so there was the added bonus that they might also be a dork, and talking about things she already liked was way more natural to her than flirting. And really, the perfect relationship was at its core a friendship with the bonus of sex. So that was her approach. It hadn't been successful if one judged on the basis of it resulting in a relationship, but she wasn't discouraged. If over the course of 31 years, she'd had over 40 crushes, had friendships with 8 said crushes, and confidently told 3 that she liked them, it was within statistical probability that they would not reciprocate her interest. And two of those three turned out to be gay, so she couldn't take it personally. Even if it never progressed beyond friendship, she still had a friend, so win win.

Where did José fit in? Jackie was still trying to decide. She respected him on many levels. There was the excellent work ethic, of course. She could acknowledge he was intelligent, though they had different strengths. He was kind, but didn't take it so far it became a weakness. And she was fond of him, maybe because he exhibited all the qualities she appreciated most about herself, and she could empathize with his occasional darkness because she had some of her own.

She'd never really had a type when it came to appearance, finding that anyone could be sexy with the right character traits, but she recognized he objectively had good looks. Even though they didn't have the opportunity to interact as much as she'd like, she was surprisingly comfortable being herself around him. If she wasn't, she would never have admitted her fascination with tentacles. She didn't explain why, but only because it hadn't been possible to continue the conversation.

Jackie was always happy to see José, and made no attempt to hide that he was her favorite coworker. But was she a member of his harem? She just didn't know. She was so close, but...If only she knew him better, she'd be more certain.