muse ✨'s manga / #falling in love(35)

A delinquent sophomore, Nagato, falls in love with Ai, a beautiful boy who, rumor has it, has been used as a sex object by the seniors. Ai has a low opinion of himself and is confused when Nagato continues to approach him, and is bowled over when Nagato confesses his love. This story focuses on consent, healing, mutual pleasure, honesty, and open communication. What a delight. I'd give it ten stars if I could.

A surprisingly endearing story about a one-night-stand that turned into love.

A 17yo looking for his missing older brother comes to the city where he meets Joe, a hustler. Thus begins this strange, strange love story. This started out fade-to-black and ended up tastefully explicit, and while the love story between Joe and Otoji was a nicely developed slow-burn, the author threw so much unnecessary drama at them it got ridiculous. I'm not sorry I read this, but it's not something I would re-read.

When Noboru suspects he might be gay, he approaches a gay classmate and begins a physical relationship. But as tends to happen in these stories, as things progress, he falls in love and has to navigate Yagi’s feelings for someone else. A beautiful story about first love featuring supportive and awesome friends!

This was fluff by Harada standards. Momo sells himself to pay his bills and is taken advantage of by the three people currently caring for him when he meets Yata, who offers to let him stay for one night. They end up in a convenient relationship that eventually grows close and serious, and eventually lifelong. This is a love story, a story about getting past your past, and not being caught up in blaming people for your present state. Now that it's over I want to cry. I really loved it.

When a runner is diagnosed with a disease that is going to shrink his penis, he begs his best friend to help him with the only non-drug treatment... a prostate massage. After refusing but agreeing to accompany him to a professional (Miss Aya, the best character in the manga), the best friend changes his mind when he learns the drugs would show up on a doping test. With no other options, they begin regular treatments. And then fall in love and have proper sex like good BL boys. Good potential for team switch if we ever got a sequel.

Thirteen years after he's killed as the result of a raid led by his once closest friend, Wei WuXian - the YiLing Patriarch - finds himself reincarnated in the body of a tormented young man who gave his life and soul to summon him in exchange for revenge. Wei WuXian pieces together bits of the young man's life, and in fulfilling his wishes, comes back into contact with his former best friend, Jiang Cheng, and someone he'd desperately tried to befriend ever since they met twenty years earlier as students - Lan WangJi of the Gusu Lan Sect. To Wei WuXian's dismay, Lan WangJi takes Wei WuXian back with him to the Cloud Recesses in order to protect him -- a place he visited as a student twenty years ago and wants to avoid due to its strict rules. In an attempt to get himself kicked out, Wei WuXian climbs into bed with the once modest WangJi, who shocks him by telling him to stay for the night. As they continue to spend time together solving the mystery of a demon arm that attacked Mo Village, he sees a new side to Lan WangJi and discovers that his feelings may not be -- and never were -- what Wei WuXian believed. This is a survey of the novel, which is much richer in detail, but it's a great complement to the story! The art is pretty and I like how they're drawn in it versus the animated series (which I also love).

A guy with strict sex rules to protect himself falls for an architect who has been pursuing him for a decade.

When his childhood friend cockblocks him at a group date, a man asks him to take the place of the girl he chased off - and he agrees. This leads to a wishy-washy relationship because of insecurities, but things work out in the end! I wish the author had spent more time on the "substitute for a girlfriend" portion so we could see the emotions build a little bit more before the "omg, i'm in love!" realization, but this was nice. ETA December 2021: I didn’t have any trouble with the timing of relationship revelations this time. This was really sweet. I probably read it too quickly the first time.