very heavy on the ayu being a victim part. ayu began her relationship with max at a very young age, and there is a large age gap between the two of them. not to mention that he is literally ayu's boss. it's a similar dynamic to that of mariah's and tommy mottola's relationship back in the 90s, and we all know now how that went... i'm not necessarily implying that max was abusive to ayu during their relationship, however i think with all those factors considered its pretty safe to assume that there was definitely a pretty big power imbalance in the relationship. maybe ayu just feels too intimidated by that still to speak out or call out max on any of his wrongdoings.
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