Middle Of In-Between
Part 1
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I can't do this. It's not the right one..
She glanced over at her sheet of music, let out a vehelmant exclaimation, and shut the folder with a loud thud. She let out a long sigh, and began massaging her temples slowly. "How the hell am I going to sing that? It has no meaning whatsoever!" She uttered out between her gritted teeth.
Her manager, Auriko, looked across the table at her from where she had been studying over the contracts, eyebrows raised and her arms crossed. "But just a few days ago you said you'd sing it."
"I can't." She stood up, shoving her wooden chair into its slot, and brushed away a few stray pink strands of her hair away from her smooth face. She shivered in the freezing heavily air-conditioned modern studio, which was vast and patterned a pale lavender shade.
"But the album's due to be released this month. That's not a lot of time." Her manager protested, her glasses sliding down the tip of nose. "Mimi, you can't keep rejecting every song that comes from our script writers. You need to choose some songs, quickly." She slid a heavy stack of papers along the tabletop so they were in Mimi's eyesight. Mimi glanced down at the top sheet, read a few lines, then stopped impaitiently, glancing up at her manager again, her eyes narrowed.
"And? So? What is this junk?" Mimi asked, jabbing her index finger at the pile.
Her manager let out a sigh quite like the one she herself had just made a few minutes ago. "Okay. This is new. We've got a deal with one of companies that holds some bands; they want you to have some concerts with some of them, and perhaps record a soundtrack with them."
"You're joking." Mimi flipped back the stack of papers, carelessly letting a few of them drop down to the tiled floor, while noticing the papers kept on coming; there seemed to be no end of them. "There's way too many bands! I'm not doing concerts with all of them." She cried out, just as she let go of the pile, and a great deal of the slips went cascading to the floor like a white waterfall.
"Right. I expected that. So I'm letting it up to you to choose which one. It's your choice." The manager chanced a look at her wristwatch, then stared at the heap of papers lying on the ground. "And we also have a charity event to attend to after you've finished making your decision."
Mimi let out an impaitient groan, her headache comparitively worse, and stomped her white booted foot in anger. "Don't I have any time to myself?" She asked in a small voice.
The only other person in the room looked at Mimi like she was an animal that had escaped from its cage in a zoo. Mimi bit her lip, knowing that was a stupid question. She gave up free time, along with everything else, when she had chosen to expand her singing career. And I might not have chosen even that, if not for him... Her bitter thoughts trailed off, as the sharp voice of her manager brought her back to the present situation.
"So, Mimi, please, just choose one. Any! I don't care which, just as long as you promise to go through with it once you've chosen." Auriko said, turning back to her other folders.
"Fine!" Mimi snapped back, her tetchy mood flooding through her. "Here!" She snatched up one of the remaining papers that hadn't floated down off the table without bothering to glance at it, and shoved it at Auriko angrily, before grabbing her coat and stomping out of the room, leaving Auriko bewildered.
Auriko shook her head slightly, and looked at the paper Mimi had given, no, more like threw, at her. "So." She retrived her blue fountain pen, scrawled something onto a tiny piece of notepaper, and turned on her Nokia cell phone. Quickly she pressed some numbers, and was not the least bit surprised when the person picked it up at the first ring. "Hai, Bishoko? Kobanwa. She's chosen one, thank god. Whom did she chose? Interestingly, she did pick the one you thought she'd pick. Hai, the name of the band is No Regret. Alright. I'll come in to sign the contract tomorrow. Sayonara."
***
She stomped on the gas pedal of her volkswagen beetle furiously, waiting for her anger to subside eventually. "Come on, come on..." She fixed her eyes on the slow traffic light, waiting for it to finally turn red. She turned her head slowly to glance at the small figurine on her dashboard, glued there a long time ago. It was a yellow smiley, with a small pink heart in the middle, where it was etched, "M & M. Forever and a day." She swung her head around, refusing to look at it. Well, there it was. She could never throw it out...even though her mind screamed at her daily to stop wasting her time with it. Something held her back; just like that crest in her bedroom drawer... Then again...nothing lasts forever. Lies. A bunch of miserable, horrible lies.
She slammed her hands onto the steering wheel, trying vainly to curb her internal instincts and just jump out of the unmoving car. Lies! What kind of life is it when she can never make her own choice! Sucide? Maybe not that extreme...at least, not right now. But she knew that every beginning has an end; someday, if she didn't change, she'll lead straight for that inevitable dead end. That's just fine wth her. The light blinked green. She drove away.
What was so different with this anger..? It didn't go away as quickly as the others. She spotted her favorite Starbucks coffeeshop, and drove into the parking lot. Parking the beetle clumsily, she got out and opened the entrance to the shop.
The walls. That was what she liked so much about this particular shop. Beautiful smears of vibrant color adorned every border, even the ceiling. Relaxing music, comfortable chairs, and black tinted windows for privacy. Musicians loved coming here; so did she. Of course, the good coffee always helped. She could even start to form a smile now; definately, the cool atmosphere was calming her down better than any Zen exersizes her trainer always recommended.
"Ah, your regular table for one, Miss Tachikawa?" High class Starbucks was one of the few coffeeshops that had a waiter/butler waiting on you. Which was often very convienent.
"Maybe not...I'll just take one of the normal ones this time." She answered wearily, her eyes devoid of emotion.
"Ah." The waiter nodded knowingly, and led her over to one of the tables that was in the lounge. She sat down, her chin cradled in her hands while looking out of the distant windows. "What would you like, Miss Tachikawa?"
"The regular." She said without shifting her glance. The waiter nodded, and gathered up the unused menu. Mimi let out a low sigh, thinking back to what had happened. It seemed to be an eternity to her; maybe it was only a nightmare, and that she'd find herself in bed the next morning, peevishly annoyed at her alarm clock for ringing half an hour early. Too late now. She'd even pinched herself a dozen times to make sure, but sure enough the bruises stayed. She thought she had seen a blonde-haired guy walk past the window just then, who looked so familiar, like him.... How would she know? She hadn't seen him for two years...maybe there was still a hope.. "Stop being such an idiot, Mimi." She murmured to herself softly, sliding her blue tinted sunglasses up to the top of her head. "He's gone."
Now she sincerely wished she had taken one of the private tables instead. She felt so exposed...so infinately weak and harmless against the dozens of people surrounding her.
