April 3 - The Maid

Kenji's friends nearly imploded from jealousy when he told them his new girlfriend worked in a maid cafe. To otaku like them, that was it. A maid girlfriend?! That was as good as it got. First prize, gold medal. And if that weren't enough, he even had his own apartment. His own place and a maid girlfriend? Just, wow.
Her name was Reiko. He'd met her in a Japanese literature class they shared in college. When they were getting to know each other, she was a bit embarrassed to tell him where she worked. He teased her about it a bit and assured her he wasn't one of those weirdos who hung out at those places, but all the while he was wincing on the inside, afraid that she might recognize him as someone who'd been to her cafe. She didn't necessarily look familiar to him, but who could be sure when they all wore the same uniform and had the same hairstyle?
Either way, as soon as they started dating he stopped going to maid cafes. Of course. And just to be on the safe side, he made fun of maid cafe otaku every chance he got, even though on the inside he was dying to see her in her maid outfit.
But he never did, and it was torture for him for the same reason that it was torture for other guys to have girlfriends who were masseuses, strippers, chefs, or belly dancers. On paper it seems it would be the best thing in the world, but at the end of a long day at work, he figured that being a maid was the last thing she wanted to do. Plus he didn't want her to think he was some sort of pervert, so he never asked her to keep the uniform on. But he didn't ask her to change out of it either. He tried to keep her in her uniform without being obvious about it. Every time she went to his place after work, he tried to keep her in his living room as long as he could before she broke off to go change. For much of the hour before her arrival, he would even practice the opening line of what he promised was an incredible story. It was crucial that he hook her right away and keep her riveted as long as possible. He would do anything he could to keep her in her uniform, practically knocking her down the moment she stepped in the door.
"Oh my God, you're never going to believe what happened to me at work today. Sit down!"
"Ooh, I can't wait! Hold on, let me get changed!"
"No, wait--"
"Don't start yet!" she'd call from the bathroom and he would crumble in disappointment. On the other side of the door, she'd be in her maid uniform--undressing!--but he couldn't see it. Minutes later, she would come out of the bathroom in her fetishized-by-no-one pajama bottoms and floppy sweatshirt.
"Ah, there's my girl," he would say and struggle to sound enthusiastic as he told her a painfully uninteresting story about how he had played phone tag with a client for much of the morning. Once the possibility of Reiko listening to it in her maid uniform had been removed, any story he could tell lost all its luster.
And that's how it went. They'd been dating for four months and the accumulated time he'd seen her in her maid uniform probably added up to less than half an hour. It was torture.
Not that he didn't try to see her in her uniform. He did, but nothing worked: He suggested picking her up straight from work, but she told him that her manager didn't want any boyfriends coming around the cafe, even if they were customers.
He told her that he'd just used the bathroom before she arrived and that she didn't want to go in there to change, but she told him she would hold her breath.
He suggested she wear her uniform at his place but he said it like it was a joke, like, "Wouldn't it be dorky if you wore your uniform here?" and then laughed about it, and then she laughed too and then nothing came of it.
He even went to her cafe wearing a disguise but then chickened out before he got to the door.
And so it went. Every time she came over it was the same: A brief glimpse of some frill under her coat, then a quick trip to the bathroom, then Reiko in pajamas.
It was agonizing. So much so that eventually he couldn't take it anymore. He broke up with her. And once he did it was a relief. No more torture. No more agony. Yes, he was alone and yes, he missed her, but he was at peace. He never went to maid cafes again and stayed away from Akiba altogether.
A few months later, he heard that Reiko had a new boyfriend and that things were going well between them. Unlike Kenji, he was so cool with her working at a maid cafe. In fact, he even kind of liked it when she wore her maid uniform at his apartment.