The Flower in Flight
This is a story of a girl who struggles with her imperfection — her acne, her weight, her life — and tries to find ways to get back on her feet. I'm aiming to make it as realistic, with slow-building romance instead of hasty romance, because I want to see stories of girls embracing the imperfections in their life, instead of privileged girls who are beautiful, or cheerful, or lucky from the start. Who knows if there are you, readers, who are going through the same thing. Hopefully this can reach out and will give you courage as heroines who can fight, despite not adhering to the new beauty standards nowadays. :)
This fanfiction will also contain lots of reference to other anime/manga/games since it revolves around Mayuzumi, the reader, and Akashi, as well as her cosplay life. If you feel lost, don't hesitate to leave a question in reviews or google up the pictures of the mentioned characters. :)
30 December 2014 marked a very important date in your life.
Winter Comiket held annually at Tokyo Big Sight was a feast for fellow anime and manga enthusiasts, flowering doujinkas trying to strike it big, aspiring photographers honing their skills, and most importantly, ecstatic cosplayers sharing their passion and portraying their characters to the best of their abilities. To someone like you, Comiket was holy, Comiket was life.
You remembered fumbling out of bed fresh at 5:30 a.m., washing up, eating a light breakfast, and lugging your trunk of props and fabrics to the train station. Arriving at the location early, you did your meticulous makeup and donned your costume of the day: Claire Farron, also known as Lightning to her fans, the heroine of the Final Fantasy XIII-2 series. Brandishing your sword (read: mounting board, EVA foam, and a ton of glue), you were the Knight of the Goddess ready to slay anyone in your path.
Makeup? Flawless. You practiced it every single day of the week lest a case of shaky hands ruined your winged eyeliner. Dolly Wink false eyelashes glued to your eyelids, you stabbed your eyeballs with icy blue contact lenses and adjusted the contouring of your bronzing. Props to you for remembering to spritz your face with some makeup setting spray to smoothen the creases.
Costume? Details rivalling Queen Elizabeth's dress. Burned fingertips were the least of your worries, after years and years of wielding hot air guns to shape your armour, building up the bases from layers after layers of foam. You might as well become a mahaguru at this. Shoulder guards checked, breastplate checked, knee guards checked. Even Lightning's aesthetically pleasing feathered skirt was lovingly crafted from dip-dyed feathers from yours truly.
Sword and shield? Ready for action. Sleepless nights juggling between homework, cutting out the symbol of Etro, engraving the rest of the details, and crying over destroyed pieces all paid off in the end. Your efforts were rewarded in the form of a shapely sword, though not exactly foldable, and a shiny shield.
Everything was perfect. You were ready for your day of stardom, transforming into Lightning. Pink wig styled in wefts, blue eyes cold, silver armour shining. Not your average black hair and plain Jane brown eyes. No fidgets, no more slouching. Spine straight, serious smirk, snarky like her. Hiding behind Lightning's persona, you were not yourself.
Nothing prepared you for him though.
Almost dazedly, you asked, "Akashi-kun? What are you doing here?" When he didn't respond, your heart seized up. "I—you're not supposed to be here. Here, of all places."
Bright mop of scarlet hair teased into his customary hairstyle, save for the surprisingly short bangs—where had they gone to?—it was difficult to pass Akashi Seijuro off as some cosplayer. Given he was 173 cm tall and you were only 149, it wasn't hard feat for him to stare you down.
"Mayuzumi-san invited me to come along after our basketball match."
Basketball. Winter Cup. Rakuzan had been practicing hard to win the match, with Akashi often disappearing after classes as soon as lessons ended. He worked overtime as the Student Council president, the captain of the Basketball Club, master of shogi competitions, he excelled in nothing short of everything. Crippling his enemies with just a single stare alone, to you, he was downright terrifying. Even being in the same place as him shook you, though the year was already coming to an end.
"So," Akashi said, quietly. He didn't continue it.
You took a deep breath. He stared. The painful silence continued.
In all sixteen years of your life, you had never thought there'd be a day where Akashi Seijuro would see you in your cosplay regalia.
MAYA
54,000 Facebook Likes and still counting. Ranked 21st on World Cosplay and 17th on Cure Cosplay respectively. Received all-expenses-paid invitations from various cosplay gatherings and circles within Japan and extending even to Taiwan, South Korea, and Vietnam (regretfully, she declined them due to studies being a priority). Highly celebrated on the internet for her creativity in crafting costumes, varying photoshoots, and kindness in replying to the comments left by her fans.
You never really had a place as yourself, Yoko Ise. Not as Maya either.
Maya painted you into an extraordinary beauty, talented like a prodigy in an anime setting. Ise made you into a crippling idiot with Bs for Maths and C+ for Physics. By right, these two conflicting essences should not bleed into one another's life: Maya was Maya on weekends of photoshoots, Ise was Ise on weekdays of Rakuzan High. Ise had a handful of friends, Maya had hundreds and thousands of mysterious lovers.
Now that Akashi knew of your double lives, you prayed he wouldn't leak it to anyone else.
"You know her?" Mayuzumi asked.
Akashi alternated looks from you to his teammate, and seemed mildly perturbed. "She's a student of our school, my classmate. Is that a problem?"
You would've answered if it wasn't for Mayuzumi cutting you off. "Yeah, kinda." He scratched his cheek and gestured to your ensemble. "She's a cosplay idol in the circle. Saw the news that Maya's coming to promote Diomedea's new anime, but I guessed I missed that."
"Um. Yeah. It was on the first day inside the hall, I promoted Kancolle that's going to air in January…" You shifted under their intense staring.
The makeup felt useless if they knew who's under the layers of foundation and powder, hiding pockmarked skin bitten by acne. Lighting was supposed to stand strong and silent, but Maya could only portray her to a certain degree when faced with… external threats. With Akashi around, your defence had been reduced to a shabby 0%. His eyes saw everything in his line of vision. Maybe that was how he easily picked you out in the crowd of thousands.
Mayuzumi didn't look pleased with himself, despite your unease. "Was hoping to grab their goodie bag… guess I have to wait until next year. Better hit the Ringo-tan booth then."
The pale-haired teen continued to mumble under his breath and seemed crestfallen, though you didn't understand why. You had seen him in hallways before, particularly when members of the basketball team would come downstairs to the first floor to reach Akashi's classroom. They'd crowd at the doorway and beg for an extra day off practice, but Akashi never gave in to their demands. Mayuzumi was among one of the familiar faces you knew, though purely on a naming basis. He must not be familiar with you either.
Carefully tucking away your SQUARE ENIX lanyard with the words OFF-DUTY scrawled on it, you avoided Akashi's gaze as much as you could. His fierceness instilled fear even in the teachers' hearts, and expectedly, in yours too. A natural over-achiever, he didn't hesitate to make his demands known whenever the situation required him to step in. Someone like him burned too brightly like the sun, and you avoided getting into his path for whatever reasons, short of your death.
"They call you Maya here?" the red-haired captain queried. "Is that what you go by?"
He didn't sound particularly against the idea of pseudonyms for some reasons. In fact, you stole a glance at his strangely calm eyes and noticed he was a lot less icier than before, well, at least to a certain extent. Passionate to the point of persistence when it came to everything he was involved with, he used to sound a lot like an interrogator for criminal justice. Unnerving. Now, Akashi was mild, and it was an improvement you weren't sure why it happened.
"Yeah—Maya, just Maya here, just Maya," you replied, trying not to mind the hiccups in your sentence.
Not when your hands trembled. A quarter of it could be from fear of standing in front of Akashi, but you knew where the rest attributed: The fear of being exposed. In a split second, everything could crumble. The empire Maya built for herself out of hours of costume details, spotless photoshoots and booth-promoting, Akashi could topple it without needing to do much.
He had that much of power in his hands.
You would've continued in a fit of begging, even almost resorting to falling on your knees and praying for him not to mention a word in school, but a tap on your shoulder stole your attention. Turning around, you met the eyes of a short, stubby man holding out a Canon DSLR with its mounted lenses, and he gleefully pointed to your costume.
"Maya, can I take a picture of you?"
Out of all timings, now? Ise would've been cringing and flinching away from the thought of getting a picture taken with her acne on full HD, but Maya couldn't do that. Maya and her ten layers of carefully primed foundation wouldn't back down from the camera. Maya as Lightning had a duty to the people: to be Lightning for them.
Nodding at his proposition, you readied your stance and wielded your sword like it's another limb of your body. The elegant sashay of Lightning's feathered skirt brushed up your thigh and you raised your sword a few degrees above your head, poised in a stance to strike the offenders.
It was magic.
Within a couple of seconds, uninterested passers-by suddenly stopped and snapped out their cellphones, digital cameras, heavy DSLRs. A circle automatically formed around you like an impregnable wall of blinding flashes, all set to immortalise your perfection.
Quite suddenly, you forgot their existence. As Maya, they no longer mattered. Nothing ever mattered anymore.
YOKO ISE
First year student currently schooling in Rakuzan, Kyoto. Born to a family of five, the youngest of her three siblings. The eldest sister worked as a successful accountant; currently living the high life in the arms of her equally successful boyfriend. Never heard from them again. The second oldest sister ran part-times in modelling companies as a makeup artist. Unlike her capable sisters, Ise sported nothing but acne on her cheeks and knotted, shabby hair.
School had an odd way of sucking the enthusiasm out of you.
The meaningless cycle of forced interaction between certain parties, a circle of six days inclusive of schooling Saturdays.
Uncharacteristically generous this time around, Rakuzan gave its students a long break extending from Christmas Eve to New Year. Some said it was the Christmas spirit visiting the administrators' dreams last night. Spirits or not, you were thankful, regardless, because the holidays gave you adequate time to lacquer over the finer details of your costume and booth work for Comiket. More holidays meant lesser interactions with your classmates. Lesser interactions meant having to spend even lesser time slicking a smile on your face, pretending the world's fine.
You mentally shook yourself at the thought. Nothing was wrong with your classmates, or even Rakuzan's students. The girls had been helpful and kind, and the boys equally funny and charming to boot. No stereotypical evil female villains cluttered your high school journey whatsoever. It was just that Rakuzan didn't feel quite right to you. There wasn't a sense of belonging. A loose jigsaw puzzle that had fallen out of its frame.
Don't get too close to them. You made the same mistake in middle high school, and they unhesitatingly tore your heart open with a dagger. Spitting insults about your face behind your back, sugared tongues wagging when you talked to them. The same shouldn't be happening in Rakuzan if you kept your distance. You didn't want a replay of the tragedy.
"Icchan, you're not going for lunch?"
Two seats away to your right, a girl with bright blue eyes propped her head up against the desk. Widely smiling, Kondo Mariya was an eccentric beauty, a halfling born to a Japanese mother and an Eurasian father. Always so friendly, ever amiable, everyone adored Mariya. To a certain extent, she was like the 1-A's class mascot with her sleek black hair, blue eyes, and toothpaste-commercial smile. It was practically impossible to hate her, and of course, you didn't dislike her.
"Thanks for reminding me, Mariya-chan," you said, getting up from your seat. "I'm a bit hungry myself."
"Going to get yourself four breads again?" she laughed, eyes twinkling with mischief. "What's it going to be? Cheese, custard, red bean paste, and chocolate?"
You shrugged lightly. The drag of your chair almost muffled your words, so you raised your voice higher. "You know me too good. Should I get you something?"
Mariya shook her head. Her hair bounced with each move, airy. If boys watched her every move, hawklike, it was impossible not to fall in love with her. "It's fine, thanks for offering. I'm on a new diet, you see! It was on NHK this morning. The banana fad, it's even trending on Twitter!"
Uhhhh, diet. Okaaaay. You found yourself cringing inwardly at the word. As much as you wanted to lessen your thick thighs and flatten your belly for more flattering cosplay, udon huts and sweet teahouses were your saviours. Shuffling away from Mariya, you called out, "That's great, keep up with it!", heard her response of, "Aww, thanks Icchan!", and promptly exited the class.
The hallways were cold as always, even with streaks of students passing through.
Winter hit Kyoto a bit too hard this year. Doubled with reopening the school on 2nd January, the aftermath of a long holiday showed its impact on everyone. Zombies infested the school this time around, with boys slouching lower than ever and girls scurrying about with hot cans of coffee from the vending machines. Decked in your oversized sweater that hung at the same length of your uniform's skirt, you stuffed your hands inside the pockets and drew a huge breath.
You began walking.
The trip to the school's convenience store, situated right beside the cafeteria, wasn't far. As a first-year, you only climbed down two sets of stairs, crossed the lobby near the shoe lockers, and stopped short at the entrance near the South block with its sports amnesties. The long queue had diminished significantly, probably because everyone made a leeway to the cafeteria to get soupy hot noodles instead of warm breads.
Fingering the lining of your sweater, you stole a glance at the crumpled notes in your hand. About 2,000 yen… more than enough to get eight breads… but you didn't really need that much. Just four would do. As soon as it came to your turn, you picked out two custard and icing-dusted breads since cheese was already out of stock, a chocolate cream bun, and a vanilla coronet. Costed you a little more than 1,200 yen, but the purchases were worth it.
Getting out of the line, you unpacked the first custard bread and bit into it.
The heavenly flow of creamy thickness flooded your mouth, rich and milky. You suppressed an appreciative groan from its fine texture and savoured the flavour, licking up the corners of your mouth. Some female seniors, third-years with golden III tacked to their lapels, giggled at your display. They'd probably been observing you from the start, maybe pitying the sight of a starving student devouring bread.
Or maybe they noticed the bulging acne pus on your cheeks and gossiped to themselves about it. Maybe they were laughing at you.
No. You flinched internally. Fighting that train of thought, you forced your legs to walk away and lowered your head. Bite into the bread. Chew and swallow. There's no lump in your throat—just swallow, chew and swallow, walk and chew and swallow, Ise, you can do this. You didn't intend to dash up the stairs two steps at a time, and you certainly didn't skid around the corners trying to run away from them, but then 1-A's signboard came into view faster than you expected, with your chest heaving up and down, breathing erratically.
The world came into a stop.
You're pathetic. Pathetic. Holding your bread close, slumping. Just running away from what they might, or might not have said about you. It's like Schrodinger's Cat all over again: if you opened the box, you'd know if the cat's dead, but if you didn't, then you could assume the cat is both alive or dead at the same time. If you opened the box, you'd know if they were dissing your acne, but if you didn't, then you could assume they were not actually dissing your acne. But you knew it was otherwise, there's no denying it.
"Yoko-san, you're standing in front of the door. Do you mind moving?"
The sudden voice coming to your right startled you right out of your skin. Trying not to drop the breads, you discreetly looked over your shoulder—red—and faced forward again. It's him.
Akashi had a certain way of appearing out of thin air during the least expected moments, hence resulting in more students getting caught with smoking even in the most private of spots. How did he maintain the air of absence around him?
"Sorry about that," you apologised, fighting a losing battle to keep your voice calm. A battle he didn't need to know. "Just wanted to try being a roadblock for a day. Is it working?"
He might had made a reply, or might not had, but you pushed him out of your mind and threw the door open.
You and him weren't close, so there was no need for faked friendliness. The first person to perk up at your return was Mariya with her glittering blue eyes, then followed by boys grouping around at the far end of the classroom. They always had sessions of Yu-Gi-Oh! dueling, or sharing Pokemon battles through their handheld consoles during lunch. They visibly crowed over your return, just the average show of teenage imbecility.
"Ise-chan, that custard bread again?" Aoyama, the class joker, laughed heartily at the sight of your arms full with food. "You're really the school's bread monster!" He was met with more laughter, but you knew it was just them poking fun again at your gluttony.
You walked in a measured pace to your place, stopped by Mariya's table to deposit a vanilla coronet, and turned to scowl lightly at them. "Just let me eat in peace, Aoyama-kun," you said, "and if you're going to ask, I'm not planning to share it with you. I'm sharing it with Mariya-chan."
"Eeeeh? But I'm on a diet!" she cried out. Her hands crept up to your stash anyway. "That's terrible of you, Icchan… don't do this to me again!"
"Yeah, that's terrible of you, Icchan, you keep feeding Mariya-chan and she's gonna be a whale," Kugutsu, the bespectacled class representative, mimicked from the front of the class. He laughed along with the rest of the boys when you lightly rolled your eyes and shrugged at their teasing, then perked up when Akashi came in tow. "Oh, Akashi-kun, the Newspaper Club's looking for you. They wanted to interview you about Winter Cup."
Winter Cup. Comiket. Tokyo Big Sight. You masked the slight flip in your attitude at the mention of Winter Cup, trying not to be reminded of meeting him there. Maya doesn't exist in school; Ise existed instead. Mariya served as good distraction as she mucked around with the plastic packaging of the coronet, cooing at the trickling vanilla cream. You'd look at anywhere but Akashi, even if it meant watching Mariya sloppily eating.
"Yes, I came across Ono-san earlier," came Akashi's reply, smooth. He walked from the door to his seat right in front of your desk, placed some manila folders, and sat down. "Thank you for notifying me, Kugutsu-kun."
Kugutsu's glasses would have fallen off if he hadn't been holding on to it, trying to clean the smudges with a cloth. "U-Uh, no problem."
Akashi thanking someone? That was unheard of.
Akashi had never thanked anyone for such trivial matters. Eight months in Rakuzan since your intake in spring, April, you never heard words of gratitude falling from his lips to someone. If someone had pleased him, he would sound haughty and full of himself with words along the lines of "Good work" or "You have done well", just something that reeked of smug superiority. Words of sincerity weren't like him at all.
Being the one who sat behind him, you never came across such a phenomenon.
Apparently you weren't the only one standing still in silence, trying to absorb what just happened. The rowdy boys had fallen mysteriously quiet at the back, eyes hovering from table to table like some eye contact would magically explain everything. A group of girls eating their bento peacefully at the front had inelegantly dropped their chopsticks to gawk at Akashi as well. You could just read their train of thoughts like a telepath.
Their cold idol, Akashi, was starting to melt the icy wall around him?
The red-haired captain acts like everything's normal. He filed in some reports into the manila slits, penned in some title for each folder, and stacked them at the side. Always professional, even when the world was falling apart around him. Akashi went over the contents in his pencil case, drew out a gel pen, and signed some important-looking documents. He repeated the action several times, just signing without a care.
It's not like it's my problem anyway, you thought to yourself, watching oddly undisturbed Mariya pick her way through the coronet. Raising the half-forgotten bread to your lips again, you took a savage bite and chewed. At least… I don't think he told anyone about Comiket. He's not that kind of guy. Some cosplay event won't be the most of his concern.
Of course it won't be his concern, ever. He was Akashi Seijuro for a reason, the captain of the basketball team, the leader of the Student Council. Not a pathetic fanboy of Maya. Slightly appeased at your pathetic attempt of self-comfort, you wolfed down the rest of your lunch and was about to start on the second packet when your phone beeped.
Upon checking, you saw a mail had come through with the title heading:
CURECOS PROUDLY INVITES MAYA.
Good morning. Maya-san, this is Sumire Houji from CureCos. We are pleased to inform you that Aza Miyuko of South Korea will be coming down to Japan to conduct a photoshoot with Misa of Taiwan. The honorary photographer will be GARAM & DALL. Here, we would like to invite you to participate in our organised photoshoot to celebrate the release of VOCALOID 4.0 in conjunction with YAMAHA's private party.
The details are as follows -
LOCATION: Hacostadium, Tokyo
TIME: 0800 - 1200
DATE: January 16, 2015
We hope you can RSVP as Megurine Luka V4X. Please mail me if there are further enquiries.
We at CureCos look forward to work together with you.
"Icchan, are you okay?" Mariya's voice shot through, sounding painfully concerned. "You're really pale…"
By the time Mariya said it, it was too late. Your hand shook slightly holding your phone. You knew who Aza Miyuko was. Who wouldn't? She was part of the Spiral Cats team back in South Korea, working together with GARAM & DALL and the rest of their studio workers to make some of the most insanely complicated costumes. Their legendary armours were something that never failed to enthral you as you admired their craftsmanship to bits.
Misa from Taiwan wasn't to be underestimated either. Although she focused on cuter cosplayers that emphasised more on the moe factor, such as Asuna from Sword Art online, she had a wide fanbase. Just being put together with Aza and Misa to hold photoshoots for VOCALOID 4.0, one of the biggest platforms for voice synthesisers, had you feeling queasy in the stomach. You knew who Luka was and had seen her costume for V4X's release, but to do it together with the legendaries?
"Icchan, you probably should sit… you look really sick." Mariya got up from her chair, delicately shoving you to your seat.
You followed her directions without protest. The black-haired beauty began fussing over you but everything went over your head. Her words made no sense. The only thing running through your head were your insecurities. Shameful insecurities. How were you going to do this?
In your grief (more like state of shock), you failed to realize Akashi had looked over his shoulder slightly, quiet red eyes observing your every move.
If you enjoyed any part of this, or if you have any thoughts about this fanfic, please leave a review to let me know what you think. :)