They enjoy the fact it's all girls and "there are no boys to interfere".
No one was wearing makeup, we were all in grey tracksuits, there were no boys to kiss.
My school was all-girls, which meant no cheerleading team and no boys to determine our social hierarchy.
Sometimes they went so far as to forbid gambling and onboard romance ("No Boy or Woman to be allowed amongst them," one such contract read) and to restrict late-night drinking to the deck.
Agnès, whose first word is a defiant "No!," pushes the Boy to depict the world as it really is and, in her final utterance, suggests that the tale of their love will help to liberate those who hear it.
Okada's novel begins just as Ichiro, a quiet, tempestuous young man who still doesn't understand what compelled him to become a "no-no boy," returns home to Seattle from prison.
Girls say no, boys press on, unable to stop themselves.
But when asked if he shot her, he shook his head "no" and blamed another boy to whom he said he had given the gun.
No boy wanted to be called a "sissy" or a "wimp" or, worst of all, a "girl," which is still a term of opprobrium used by some coaches to push their troops.
No boy's going to want to talk to someone who randomly runs up to them and asks what their favorite color, type of soda, computer game, and noise are and then runs away screaming or giggling.
