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Something I noticed rereading this again is pg 35-36. It was never really clear to me before whether Kan faced sexual abuse at work in addition to the obvious physical, verbal and emotional abuse. I mean there's him being ordered to strip, but that could be construed as more humiliation and not something overtly sexual. But if you look at pg 35 this is where he's ordered to strip naked and the disgusting boss says he's "nice and slim" and the next page he's in the bathroom, panting, washing his mouth/face, and rubbing his lips (saying ow, though there doesn't appear to be any wounds on the outside of his mouth, so maybe it's on the inside). So uhh was he forced to suck that guys dick or am I reading too much into it?
I’ve always thought so too. And then he goes and tops his bf. Which to me, always made it seem he was raped at work and forced to bottom.
I feel like he was sexually harassed rather than assaulted, though you might be right. I think when he was rubbing his lips looking in the mirror, that it more about it being painful for him to smile after being humiliated.
ik this is an old comment but if ur not currently reading the ongoing manga following this storyline (i dont pay attention to titles but its the one abt kan chan and his current bf) the manga shows evidence of kan chan being sexually assaulted/raped.
Rereading this series I have a greater appreciation for Tanaka-sensei's storytelling abilities. I'm used to yaoi spoonfeeding information to us such that I don't expect to have to pay attention to the subtleties in the art and panels to the extent I might with other media. But I realize sensei actually does keep a lot of things more subtle and expects the reader to pay attention and deduce things on their own without being directly told. Like in Azami it's not shown directly that Kan is orally (and possibly further than that) sexually assaulted by his boss but it's very much implied. And here with 5.5 the extra with Yumi and Mayama it's not directly stated or shown, but based on context it's pretty obvious Yumi's mother hung herself right in their home and Yumi found her body (how fucking awful of her tbh, like at least have the decency to kill herself where her young son wouldn't be the one to find her and especially to do that after telling her son they weren't pitiful and that he would have to protect her, way to scar him for life). And it's not entirely clear what happened to his father, but it seems maybe he killed himself too, with the way they talk about him at the funeral. Those little scenes explain so much about Yumi's character and why he stayed with Kan-chan so long. And it makes me want another Yumi story, I think he still has a lot of issues that he needs to work out which are not really related to Kan at all.