Letters to Nobody
A letter is a written message from one person to another. The writer conveys his or her thoughts, feelings, ideas, opinions, and everything into a piece of paper for the recipient to read. A letter is written with care, because words are all a writer has when he or she cannot see the person for whom the letter is intended. The writer can only express him or her self through whatever is written on an unassuming piece of paper; so the words must be carefully chosen, the sentences must be laid out in perfect order, each idea must be delineated so that the recipient will understand the writer.
It is important, so very important, for the recipient to understand exactly what the writer is trying to say. What is the point of writing a letter if nobody can understand it?
Words are fickle, flat. Words are just words, two-dimensional things with meanings attached to them. But there is a magic that transforms words into something alive, an ancient magic that most people have forgotten and taken for granted.
It is a magic that, when poured into the writing of words, makes a letter so beautiful.
—
Hello, how are you today?
You may not know me, and that's all right. While I'm writing this, all I can think of is, 'will somebody even pick this up? Will somebody even read this? Is there anybody out there?'
But here you are. Among the millions of people in this city, and among the thousands that pass this street every day, you are reading my letter. You must be out there. You must be real. That makes me so happy.
My heartbeat thudded loudly in my ears as I stared at the paper in my hand.
Around me, humanity flowed like a river, forming eddies as one person moved opposite another. People talked with each other, or to their cellphones. Weary businessmen walked towards the direction of the nearest bar to relax after a heavy work day. Men and women met up and set up dates. Cars on the road behaved much the same, communicating with each other by the blares of horns and sending the sounds of revving engines and the scent of exhaust up to the sky crowded by tall buildings.
I stood in front of a light pole, a single snag in the stream of people coming and going. My hair whipped back and forth in their tails as the wind picked up and made everyone around me hurry their pace. My fingers tightened on the single sheet of white paper and its equally white envelope.
Will you keep reading my letters, I wonder?
I took my eyes off the neatly creased paper and looked around. Nobody met my eyes as they passed me by. It was like they didn't see me at all. Like I wasn't there. My gaze drew back to the simple missive, frowning. What kind of weirdo would write something like this? More to the point, I realized as it dawned on me, why did I open it? That would make me the bigger weirdo, wouldn't it?
But it had just been there, taped to the light pole just before the intersection, a piece of white among a fluttering of colorful fliers and posters. It had caught my eye, and against better judgment and common sense, I had walked right up to it, ripped it from its anchor, and opened it.
Now I had to live with the consequence of my action. Or should I? I could put the letter back...let someone else pick it up. Whoever wrote it wouldn't even know...right?
Before I could come to a decision, the sky tore open and rained down on the city and, like a startled herd, everyone ran for cover. I looked at the paper once more, seeing it slowly soak up the raindrops that were coming down faster and faster. If I dropped it, it would be trampled underfoot. The white of the paper would be dirtied, maybe even ripped to shreds once it was soggy enough.
Somehow the thought disturbed me, that something as simple as rain could wipe away someone's message, that it could stop someone from trying to reach out to another human being. Because this was what this person was trying to do, right?
This person, whoever this person was, seemed so lonely.
I liked to think that was the reason why I kept the letter in my bag and ran for the station like everyone else.
Like many of the single working class, I lived in an apartment building, third from the intersection, on the third floor, the third door down the hall. The rooms inside were small, but they suited my needs. For a fourth of my monthly earnings, I got a kitchen, a living room, a bathroom, a bedroom, and a balcony. All tiny enough for a single person, like me.
Yes. I was lucky to get it cheaply enough, and close to the subway station too.
I stomped my drenched ankle boots on the doormat before removing them. I hoped they wouldn't be ruined when they dried. I stood, dripping rainwater on the foyer. Even from the pounding rain outside, the silence of my apartment seemed more deafening.
"I'm home," I sighed. My voice fell heavily to the floor. Nobody was there to receive me. "Home, sweet home."
I walked past the kitchen, and stopped by the living room to drop my bag onto the secondhand couch before opening the door to my bedroom. It took all of ten steps from the door to reach it with the detour to the couch.
After a quick shower to wash away the rain and accumulated dust from traveling by foot, I walked back to the kitchen to prepare dinner. Just a simple fare of onion soup, which I took with me to the living room so I could eat while watching the news, which I eventually tuned out in favor of looking out the window, at the rain illuminated by a single distant lamp post.
I was distracted. The letter in my bag was like a beacon that kept calling to me. I tried my best to ignore it, which meant that I only took it out of my bag after I cleaned up in the kitchen and got dressed for bed.
The paper was still the same pristine white, if only a little rumpled from being hastily stashed in my bag. I was disappointed to notice that some parts of the paper where the water got to it was warped, the ink on it a little blurred. I felt a pang inside of me, and I felt bad for not having been more careful.
Whoever wrote this letter had very beautiful handwriting. The characters were perfectly written, and in a straight line which was hard to do on an unlined paper. It was almost an unconscious movement that brought the letter closer to my scrutinizing gaze, trying to see if it was printed or not. But of course it wasn't. I could feel the slight bumps against my fingertips where the pen pressed down on the paper too strongly.
Could this person be a man? The paper was plain, there weren't any flourishes on the words that made the writing seem feminine. Or was I being too wishful?
Will you keep reading my letters, I wonder?
I wrinkled my nose and set the letter down on my bedside table, turning off the light. This was probably just a prank pulled by some bored kid. It was nothing to get excited about.
Right?
—
I arrived at work early the next day, making my boss proud. ("Miku-tan, you're so eager to get to work today, huh? Go on and put on your cute costume~!")
I...worked at a maid cafe called Tête-à-Tête. The money was good, too; and while I didn't really care for the platform heels, the lacy dresses were cute. Dressing up had always been a weakness of mine. It was something I didn't get to do often, which was probably why I took this job in the first place.
The cafe was Parisian chic, with polished cobblestone tiles and inlaid bleached igneous rock walls. Fifteen cream marble-top wrought iron tables were scattered around the floorspace, each surrounded by two or three cushioned wrought iron chairs. Ferns and other greenery hung from hooks by the walls, and along the middle of the ceiling were two lazily spinning fans.
We prided ourselves with top service, and an unmatched daily menu customized by the boss herself.
A bar lined one wall, behind which was the staff and kitchen area. I slipped under the counter, greeting the patisserie chef, and made my way to the changing rooms. I emerged moments later in a black dress with an off shoulder peasant top. The skirt, which hung down to my knees without the petticoat, fluffed up to mid-thigh. I smiled as I tied the trademark frilly apron around my waist. Lastly, a lace bonnet sat atop my head, tied down by a ribbon under my chin. My aquamarine hair was in high tails, the ends loosely curled and resting against the back of my hips.
Boss, who demanded to be called 'Oneesama,' took one look at me and announced her day perfect. She passed me a written list for today's menu, saying, "Here you are, cutie. The outdoor board is behind the bar, and I'm afraid you're going to have to ask Leon where he last put the stepladder. Otherwise you can just ask him to write up the bar top menu himself. Ta!" She flounced off to attend to other things.
I found the chalkboard sign at the back of the bar. Laying it flat on the bar's surface, I started writing the day's menu with the colored chalk I found in one of the drawers. Halfway through, I found myself comparing my handwriting to that person's. Our handwriting were vastly different. My strokes tended to curve more often, making my characters rounded and...
"Waaah, what cute handwriting you have, Hatsune-san."
I looked over my shoulder to find one of the waiters, Leon, looming over me. He was a very tall blond, whose hair always hung over his eyes when he wasn't slicking it back for work. "It's like a child's handwriting," he said, smiling widely. "So cute!"
I could only stare as I felt the heat creeping up my face. "No, it's not," I said. "It's how it's supposed to look like." What was I saying? What did that mean anyway?
"Of course, of course," he nodded gamely and gave me an affectionate pat on my head, moving towards the changing rooms. "Keep up the good work, okay?"
"Ah, Leon-san, the stepladder..."
"It's in the janitor's closet," he said, turning back briefly to look at me. He smiled reassuringly, a dimple growing on one cheek. "But don't worry, I'll do the other boards once I finish changing. Leave it to oniisan!"
Leon was the big brother type in our staff.
As the day wore on, the rest of the staff trickled in until the cafe opened at promptly ten o'clock. I worked, going back and forth from the bar to the tables, taking orders and serving them with the practiced grace that Boss had drilled into all of us during the early stages of employment.
"Ah, Miku-chan, you ease this old man's heart with just the neatness of your actions," a regular said. He worked in the building across the street, and always took lunch in our cafe without fail. "You have such graceful hands."
"Thank you, but I'm still learning," I smiled, tilting my head just so to employ what the Boss termed the 'cuteness factor.' "You're hardly old, though, Enzo-san. Don't be so hard on yourself."
"No, no. You're old once you get married, like me," he smiled ruefully, holding up his left hand to show the simple gold band around the base of his ring finger. "Stay young for me, Miku-chan."
Customers said a lot of silly and inconsequential things like that. I learned to brush them off without batting an eyelash after a while. But somehow, I felt that with every brush off, I also brushed off a piece of myself. That piece that wanted to react and say things like, "Hey! How could you say that to me?" or "Don't touch me like that again!"
I shouldn't be thinking such things during work hours anyway, so instead I found myself anticipating the end of my shift.
Tête-à-Tête was a unique cafe; it had a day shift and a night shift. The day shift's hours of operation were from ten o'clock in the morning to five o'clock in the evening. The night shift immediately took over from then until midnight. While the day shift generally operated like a normal cafe, the night shift transformed into a live club with the staff as the performers. The area adjacent to the bar would be made over into a stage, complete with spotlights and live performance equipment.
I looked forward to the shift change. I liked to stay behind just a little later than usual to hear people rehearse. The night shift staff was a whole other talent that I couldn't help but admire. Everyone was more glamorous, more elegant. They dressed with less frills and more velvet, less lace and more class. They were everything I wasn't, basically.
But for the first time I was conflicted with wanting to stay behind and wanting to go; and it all had to do with that silly letter from yesterday. I wanted to see if there would be another letter today, once that person realized that someone had read his letter.
It was funny how I had easily assumed the owner of the letter was male just by looking at the handwriting.
When five o'clock came around, I opted to dally for just a few minutes, staying behind on the pretense of helping the night shift set up their stage.
"Hatsune-san is staying behind again today?" Leon asked as he stood on the stepladder, erasing and writing up the evening menu. (The menu also changed from morning to evening.)
"Day shift," Big Al, one of the night shift staff, said. He was an imposing man who looked like a cross between yakuza and Frankenstein. He sidled up beside me and pretended to swoon. "What a breath of fresh air. Are you here to listen to me warm up, Miku-chan? Do you have any requests?"
"Hey, Al, stop flirting and do your work," Leon said. "The menu won't write itself."
"Why? You're doing such a good job of it by yourself. Let me spend my precious moments with Miku-chan—ow! You threw chalk at me? What would you have done if it landed on my vest, huh?"
"I have better aim than that. Fifty points to me for getting your forehead."
"Get down here, old man, I'll show you fifty points!" Big Al stomped behind the bar, leaving me to set up the microphone stand in relative peace.
Everyone seemed to be running late this evening, though. Just as I finished up, the women staff of the night shift arrived, rushing to the changing rooms at Boss's scolding. I wouldn't have time to stay behind and listen to them if I wanted to make it in time for the train, and the one after it wasn't for another three hours. With a little regret, I shouldered my bag and made for the door, calling out my goodbyes to everyone.
Before my hand could reach the door handle, it swung open, startling me as another night shift employee walked in. There were droplets of rain caught in the strands of his midnight blue hair, and the shoulders of his jacket were dark spotted with raindrops. There were spots of color high on his cheeks, and his eyes were alight with something I couldn't quite name.
Shion Kaito. This was the first time I had ever seen him look like that. He was normally more subdued than everyone else in the night shift, the most gentle of the male staff. Seeing him now, he seemed...excited.
He looked at me, and he smiled. "Take care, Hatsune-san," he said as he walked around me, slipping the strap of his guitar case off his shoulder. "It's starting to rain out there."
Still stunned, all I could say was, "Yes."
He nodded, his smile softening. "Good," he said, and walked further into the cafe while I left.
Outside, the rain was a light yet steady drizzle, kicking up a mist that masked visibility down to fourteen feet at best. Everything was muted, even the sounds coming from the cars. People didn't talk anymore, instead they rushed for the nearest shelter. Instead I heard water; water trickling, water dripping, water splashing. I dug into my bag for my umbrella and unraveled it, lifting it over my head.
Immediately my range of hearing narrowed down to within the tiny dome of my green umbrella, and I stood still for a moment, listening to the frantic beats the rain was making on its nylon surface. If I listened closely enough, I could almost hear the words the rain was trying to say.
Smiling, I set off down the street towards the station. I might not have been able to listen to the night shift rehearse, but I was going to get another letter. Then, remembering how the first letter reacted to water, I started walking a little faster. A soggy letter would be unreadable.
By the time I reached the light pole closest to the intersection, my breathing had turned erratic. Brisk walking in the rain was hard to do. While catching my breath, I ran my gaze over the paper-covered surface of the pole, searching for the simple blank white envelope taped onto it.
I slowly walked around it.
I searched.
And searched.
There was no envelope. I looked at the ground, trying to see if it had fallen. Still no sign of the plain white envelope. Maybe I was looking at the wrong pole? That must be it.
Several poles later, shivering and damp, I carefully admitted it to myself: there was no letter.
I looked at my soaked in boots as I waited for the crosswalk sign to change. What had I been expecting? A genuine letter like that didn't exist anymore. Nobody ever wrote letters anymore, not like that. It had been a prank, and I had fallen for it. I fell for my own expectations.
I, Hatsune Miku, was lonely.
—
End Chapter 1: You are real.
Hello! This is my first time writing for this fandom. Please be gentle with me~!
I'm in no way an expert of everything Vocaloid, so if I mess up somehow with the characters, please let me know and correct me. But I will be using other Vocaloid characters sparingly; this is strictly a Kaito and Miku fic! ...although it will be very Miku-centric from the get-go. Yes, Miku and Kaito are older! :D Yay! This story will hopefully only span 5 chapters. I'm crossing my fingers here.
Ah, a last nonsense note. The store's name Tête-à-Tête was actually inspired by Gumi's song Aitai. Hee!
Thank you so much for reading! I hope you'll stay with me 'til the end~
Disclaimer: Leon [c] Zero-G, Big Al [c] PowerFX, Kaito and Miku [c] Crypton Future Media. Any names, places, or incidences similar to this story are purely coincidental.
(071311)