Chapter 7
Author's Note:
Skip Beat! and its characters belong to the creator Nakamura Yoshiki. Skip Beat! is serialised in 'Hana to Yume' magazine (Hakusensha) and licensed in English by 'Shojo Beat' (VIZ Media, LLC).
The work below is written in the spirit of fan appreciation.
UK English has been used throughout.
"Muse-sama!"
Kyouko had just finished changing into her LoveMe overalls and emerged from behind the curtain when Jelly Woods stepped into the LoveMe section.
"Kyouko-chan! Long time no see! Drop the 'sama', though, would you?"
Kyouko grinned at the immaculately coiffured diminutive woman. "It's good to see you."
Jelly Woods gestured at Amamiya-san and Kanae-san, who sat at the table eyeing the new arrival with interest. "Would you introduce me?"
Kyouko introduced Jelly Woods to the other LoveMe girls, and vice versa.
"The Jelly Woods?" said Kanae-san. "This is an honour. How do you know each other?"
"I can't say," said Kyouko.
At the same time, Jelly Woods said, "Through a top secret job."
"Muse-sama, please," whispered Kyouko. "I'm not supposed to talk about that at all."
"Ah. The 'Something dangerous' job the president gave you at the same time as he gave us our last LoveMe jobs?" asked Amamiya-san.
Kyouko remained silent. She wasn't sure she could say anything at all. Her friends were so smart she was sure that if she said one word, they would figure out the whole Tragic Marker secret.
Jelly Woods snorted, then laughed. "Something dangerous? That's how Darling described the job? Does he know Darling described him that way?"
"Ah, no, the topic never came up." Kyouko blushed. She understood the track that Jelly Woods' thoughts had gone along. She'd never before considered that the job might have been called 'Something dangerous' because of all the time she'd spent alone with Tsuruga-san. Rather, she had always thought the 'dangerous' had referred to the Heel siblings' personalities. Somehow she was embarrassed on Tsuruga-san's behalf. He was better behaved than that.
"Wait, did you use 'sama' again?" asked Jelly Woods. "Really! You're as bad as Ren-chan."
Kyouko bowed. "I'm sorry, Muse-s— Muse."
"That's all right." Jelly Woods took a seat at the table. "I found your message on my phone. I have to say, Kyouko-chan, it was rather garbled. Luckily I saw Ren-chan yesterday and he asked if you'd called me yet. From what he said, I kinda knew what you were going to ask."
"Did she just call Tsuruga-san 'Ren-chan'?" whispered Amamiya-san to Kanae-san.
"I'm sorry to bother you, Muse, for something so trivial," said Kyouko.
"Not at all, Kyouko-chan! Really, actresses have to be confident about their looks. I think it's important for your development to think about these things. I thought that the tricks I taught you for that job would have helped."
Kyouko took a seat at the table. "But that was her, not me."
"It was so you. I couldn't have made just anyone look that sexy and cute." She tapped one manicured nail on her lips. "You LoveMe girls are Darling's favourites, so I've thought before that I want to do something to help you all out. How about this? You can all come over to my salon one day and I will demonstrate some makeup and fashion tips for you that will help you in your careers, particularly dressing for interviews and television appearances where you won't have a costume to wear. What do you say? It can be a mini LoveMe project."
"Us too?" asked Amamiya-san.
"Yep, of course. It's not fair to show Kyouko-chan favouritism just because I've happened to work with her in the past."
"Oh my God, yes!" said Kanae-san. "Yes please!"
Kyouko had never seen her best friend that worked up before. Jelly Woods was clearly an even bigger deal than Kyouko had realised.
"Well, OK then. I'll sort out a time with your manager and have an appointment sent through the normal channels." She stood and waved at them. "I've got to go. I'm meeting Darling for lunch. See you later!"
The three girls stood stunned in her wake.
"She's like a whirlwind of energy," said Amamiya-san.
"She's so much smaller than I thought she would be," said Kanae-san.
"Did you hear that, or was it just me? She seriously called Tsuruga-san 'Ren-chan' like he's a little kid. Unless she meant another Ren. How old is she? She looks our age at the most."
"I heard it. And who is 'Darling'? She said we're her Darling's favourites."
Kyouko coughed. "She means Takarada-shachou."
"What?!" said both the other girls.
Kanae-san shuddered. "Even though she must be older than she looks, somehow that seems like too big an age gap."
Kyouko shook her head. "I don't think the President has any idea that Muse-sama has feelings for him. Despite how obvious she is."
The others stared at her.
"You mean, the no. 1 love promoter in the entire world is too much of a love idiot to figure out that the woman calling him 'Darling' has feelings for him?" said Kanae-san.
They all stared at each other for a few seconds, then burst out laughing.
"See this button over here: that's how you follow other Twitter accounts. You don't have to follow every account that follows you. But if you do follow lots and can't keep up with your Twitter feed, you can organise your favourites into lists like this ..."
They were visiting Yamamoto-san, the online media manager. Kanae-san and Kyouko had each been given crash courses in how to use Tumblr and YouTube, respectively. Kyouko hadn't been shown much about YouTube yet, because apparently someone else would be uploading the videos for her, and that person hadn't yet arrived.
Kyouko and Kanae-san sat on chairs against the wall out of the way while Amamiya-san absorbed all she could about Twitter. They had both been poking around on their brand new smartphones and investigating the features that were new to them. They'd all been asked what type of phones they wanted. Kanae-san had apparently asked for an iPhone because she had one of the new rose gold models. The only time Kyouko had ever touched a smartphone was when she had watched the meal videos on Tsuruga-san's phone. Because his was an Android phone, she'd asked for the same. She'd been given a shiny bright blue one. She smiled and ran a finger over the back. It was one of the blues that the Corn stone sometimes became in certain lights.
"I still can't believe you know Jelly Woods," said Kanae-san. "And I also can't believe she calls Tsuruga-san 'Ren-chan'. That's just hilarious."
"She sometimes calls him 'that kid' or 'that brat' as well. It really stunned me the first time I heard it. I get the sense that she's been his stylist since he entered the industry."
"How did he wing that? She was a big deal even then."
"I don't know."
"Speaking of that guy, I saw it: a code orange."
Kyouko swivelled in her seat. "Aimed at who?"
"Aimed at me."
"Oh, Mouko-san. What did you do?"
"I laughed at him."
"What's this?" asked Amamiya-san, who had stepped away from the computer.
"Have you finished?" asked Kanae-san.
"Yep."
"I'll be back in a moment," said Yamamoto-san. "Talk amongst yourselves." She left the office.
"So, what's this 'code orange' thing?"
"It's something Kyouko once told me about Tsuruga-san. I didn't believe her until I saw it for myself. When I said that he doesn't seem to get mad about anything, she said he does but he usually looks different from most people when they're mad. Code yellow is when he smiles super politely, code orange is when he smiles so much he seems to sparkle, and code red is when he finally drops the smile and looks angry."
"I think of them as the gentlemanly smile, the sparkling smile, and the Demon Lord," elaborated Kyouko.
"Haha, you're making that up," said Amamiya-san.
"Am not," said Kyouko. "Was he really at the sparkling stage?" she asked Kanae-san.
"Yes. It was exactly as you described. If you hadn't told me what that look meant I would have just thought 'Why is he smiling at me?' Instead, I got a bit scared and then bluffed my way through the rest of the conversation."
Kyouko was about to ask what the conversation had been about when the door opened and a little bundle of frills and curls torpedoed into the room.
"Onee-san!" cried Maria-chan as she threw herself into Kyouko's arms.
"Maria-chan! What are you doing here?"
The little girl sat on Kyouko's lap, plucked her new cellphone out of her hand, and started poking around on the screen. "I'm here for the meeting, of course."
"She doesn't know that part yet, Maria," said the president, who for once had entered a room unnoticed.
"Here: smile!" said Maria-chan as she pushed her face up beside Kyouko's.
Kyouko smiled automatically. Her phone made a camera shutter sound. "Did you just take a selfie of us?"
"Yep. Look!" Maria-chan handed the phone back to Kyouko and then hopped down from her lap. Not only had Maria-chan taken a selfie of the two of them, she had also set it as the home screen wallpaper.
"Cute!" cried Kyouko. Maria-chan was super photogenic. Even though it was a cell phone selfie, she looked fantastic. Kyouko thought her own face looked gormless, but she hadn't had a lot of warning.
"Mogami-kun: Your assistant for your LoveMe job will be Maria-chan."
Kyouko looked at the little girl who stood looking at her expectantly. "Maria-chan!? Really?"
"Yep!" said Maria-chan. She dropped into a curtsy. "Please look after me."
"Do you know how to upload videos?"
"Yamamoto-san is going to teach me. I'm also going to be filming your videos for you."
"Your LoveMe job will double up as a homework assignment for Maria," said the President. "She has to do a creative project for school, and she said she wanted to try a video project. That's why on paper your job looks bigger than the other two girls'. You're only responsible for half of it."
"I want to be a director one day," said Maria. "Everyone has to start somewhere; I want to start with an online video series. You'll help me, won't you, Onee-san?"
"Of course!" said Kyouko. "You'll make a fantastic director."
"Of course I will. I'll make movies with female leads who are amazing, and no one tells them 'You're good at that, for a girl,' and they won't act just like men with boobs, and they won't forget all their skills by the end of the movie and need to be rescued by a man, they'll be competent right up until the end and save the day, and my movies will be awesome!"
"You show them, Maria-chan!" said Kyouko.
"If you make movies like that, we'll be lining up to be cast in them," said Kanae-san. "I'm already sick of playing weak characters just 'coz I'm female. And Kyouko only gets to play strong characters because they're the villains."
Over at the computer, Yamamoto-san snorted. "You girls are going to revolutionise the Japanese entertainment industry," she said. "I can't wait. Now, Maria-chan, come over here and I'll show you how to upload to YouTube."
"A makeup review video series."
"Too common. No."
"A doll making video series."
"You want to do that in your own time, that's fine with me. But it's too off-topic for a LoveMe job."
"Um, sewing?"
"No."
"But it could be about sewing costumes. It's not that far off topic."
"No. The end-product of sewing may be interesting, but the process is like watching grass grow."
"A one-actress drama about a magical princess."
"NO."
Kyouko sighed. She was scraping the bottom of the barrel now. "A cooking show."
The president stroked his moustache. Worrying lights lit up in his eyes. "Yes. I can see it. A cooking show with celebrity guests. You cook something with an actor or talent, and while things are baking or simmering or whatever you interview them."
"Ah, Takarada-shachou, how would I get guests?"
"By asking them, of course. People you work with, people at LME. You'd interview them informally, and show a different side of them than the polished interviews they usually do. People will want to watch your videos to get a more intimate view of your guests than they usually get to see."
Kyouko held up a restraining hand. "Ah, this idea is snowballing somewhat. That seems like a really big deal. It'll need special equipment."
"You can use the kitchens at the mansion. That way, Maria doesn't need to take her computer and other equipment out of the house."
"It'll need ingredients."
"I have a few friends who own restaurant chains. I'm sure they will give you a small budget if we ask them to sponsor the show."
Kyouko looked at Maria-chan. "What do you think?" She hoped the little girl would think it was too much and ask for something simpler. Unfortunately for Kyouko, Maria-chan's eyes were alight in a similar way as her grandfather's.
"I love it. The kitchen would make a great stage because of the windows. We'd be able to get away with simple lighting and still get a good video. And we'd get to meet heaps of interesting people and eat lots of Onee-san's cooking. Ren-sama told me you're a fantastic cook!"
Tsuruga-san told Maria-chan about her cooking?
"Oh!" continued Maria-chan. "We could have Ren-sama as a guest!"
"No," said the president.
"Why not?" Maria pouted.
"Because that guy's so famous right now that Mogami-kun would get her 1000 followers right away. An important part of the LoveMe job for Mogami-kun will be finding and inviting guests to the show. It's no point if she doesn't have to do that."
"She'd still have to ask Ren-sama."
"Like he'd ever turn her down," muttered the president.
"Plus, Maria-chan," said Kyouko, "Tsuruga-san is potentially the world's worst cook. He's truly terrible. Do you want his fans to find that out about him?"
"I ... didn't know that. I guess not."
"I personally don't mind if that guy does show a few flaws," said the president. "Sometimes he's so perfect that his potential fans get put off. How about this: If the channel doesn't have 1000 followers by the ninth video, then for the tenth you can ask Ren."
"Yay!" cried Maria-chan.
"Right: moving on. Amamiya-kun, what are your ideas?"
Amamiya-san ran through a long line of ideas, mostly involving critiquing things: critiquing shows, critiquing acting, critiquing fashion choices.
"No, no, no, Amamiya-kun," said the president after he sad no to the sixth idea. "Your ideas are all so negative. I want you to avoid that impulse."
"How about 'Overheard at LME'? I've seen a few accounts like that on Twitter."
The president thought about it for a moment. "The idea isn't original, but it must be harder to do something original in such a short space. Plus, the things you'd be hearing will be original because there are so many strong personalities here at LME."
Says the strongest personality of them all, thought Kyouko.
"I agree," said the president. "But! You can't say who said which quote. Keep people guessing. That also means you can post more interesting quotes, because no one will know who said them." He leaned back in his chair. "That's a good idea, Amamiya-kun; well done. Your status as an outsider within LME makes you an interesting 'spy', and you'll have to talk to lots of people to have the opportunity to get quotes.
"Now: Kotonami-kun. Let's hear your ideas."
"LME fashion. Pictures of well-dressed people I spot around the building. I'll ask them for the brands of the clothing they're wearing and post it beneath the photos."
The president grinned. "Perfect first time, Kotonami-kun. Well done. That's a great idea. It'll be interesting for followers, and you'll have to talk to lots of people and make lots of connections to do it." He sat up straight. "Well, it looks like you all have the beginnings of your assignments. Over the next few days Yamamoto-san will help each of you set up the online accounts. Until then, spend some time thinking about exactly how you will want to approach your assignment."
The three LoveMe girls stood and bowed to the president.
Kyouko sighed as she left the president's office. She didn't even know where to start.
Next time: It's time for the round-table read through of the first episode of Aozora no Yume. What will Kyouko think of her cast mates, and what will they think of her?
