CHAPTER 11: The Party

Ichiro's parents were wealthy, no doubts about that. To Len, their house was like a palace. It was a two-story building full of empty space -most of the furniture, save for details such as a dining table and a giant sofa in front of the television, was looming above the room around the walls. This arrangement doubled the sense of greatness, but as their host told them, the upper floor looked way less majestic, probably because his parents were never taking any guests upstairs.

Usually, it was just Ichiro's small 3-piece family living in the house, but Rin's boyfriend made sure to invite as many guests as he could when he had the opportunity. Most of the people there were the twins' old friends from school; a few of them brought siblings or more friends. As a result, there were around thirty people occupying the house.

Ichiro didn't have a real reason to host this party, he simply loved having people around. Len suspected a little bit that he wanted to use this chance to brag about the house. The twin didn't like him all that much; before the Vocaloid tour began, he used to think that the boy was a bad influence on his sister. She would have been a bit rebellious by herself, but while he, being a good brother, would sometimes try and talk her out of her recklessness, Ichiro seemed to encourage it. Len didn't trust him.

He did, however, trust Rin's judgement. When she said that Ichiro was a completely different person now, he chose to believe her and give the boy another chance.

Len wasn't nearly as careless as others sometimes thought. He simply chose not to participate in most of what was going on around him. He was the exact opposite of his sister: while she was vocal and dived head first into everything, he thought twice and then two times more before he took any action. He prefered to sort things out in his head before expressing his statement.

Because of his observant nature, it immediately caught his attention that Miku and Kaito broke up about a month ago. All of a sudden, they almost completely stopped talking and rarely could be seen in the same room together. Both of them were trying to pretend that nothing was wrong, but Len saw clearly how devastated they both were.

Because he felt like it wasn't his place to ask any questions, he didn't know any details except for what his sister told him. Apparently they initially wanted to stay friends, but the breakup took such a toll on both of them that they just couldn't bear talking to each other.

Their gloominess partially affected all the rest of them as well. Rin was running out of patience with Miku who was, figuratively speaking, constantly crying on her shoulder. Luka was left to take care of Kaito; she was understanding, but at the same time, she was too sensitive towards other people's emotions -so much so that she soon began feeling down herself and quietly blamed Miku for it.

Fortunately, Christmas holidays were right around the corner, and everyone was sort of relieved to leave all the drama behind. Len was optimistic: he believed that everything will be better when they come back together. And even if not, there were only two more shows left in that tour. Nothing that wrong could happen during that time.

"It's been so long," a voice right next to him suddenly spoke up; "and you still wear the same expression."

Len turned his head to see Meg, a former classmate, looking directly at him with a frisky smile. He had been sitting on the sofa for a while, just watching the people around the kitchen-living room area move around. The girl must have just arrived, he didn't see her before.

Meg had always been an interesting person -kind of wacky and all over the place, but in a different way than Rin. People seemed to like her, but they were also a little bit afraid of her because no-one could estimate what she was going to do in the next moment. She looked completely ordinary, a girl of average height and short-ish black hair; her personality was then all the more shocking because of that.

When they were kids, she was known for being very fond of chewing gum. They used to call her Gumi because of that, and this nickname would last even after she grew tired of her gum affection.

"Oh, hey, Gumi!" Len greeted her. She laughed and briefly hugged him, literally taking his breath away. "I wouldn't expect you here."

"Why not?" she asked and gave him some space to breathe again.

"I dunno, I just didn't think these kind of parties were your thing," he explained and smiled. "But I'm glad you're here."

"Me too!" Gumi looked around the room. "Is Rin here too?"

"Oh yeah, she's probably upstairs. Ichiro wanted to show her the house." Len frowned. "Quite some time ago, actually."

"Ah, I wish you could've been here when he told us the big news!" The girl proceeded to imitate Ichiro's low-pitched, confident voice. "'Dudes, I'm dating Rin Kagamine! The famous pop star! I'm better than you!"

"Did he really say that?"

"Nah, I'm paraphrasing." Gumi smirked.

Len let out a deep sigh. "Well, I'm glad I'm not the only one who thinks Ichiro is a douche."

"Right? I don't know why is everyone buying it. But," she giggled; "you know what they say. Guys with such ego probably compensate for something else."

"You've been here for two minutes and already you're talking about wieners." The twin forced the thought of Ichiro's parts and how they might interact with his sister out of his head. "What if you just told me how have you been the entire time?"

"Alright." Gumi hopped up on the sofa and laid down with her head on Len's lap before he had the chance to protest. Her innocent smile when she looked up at him was a bulletproof argument.

"Let's see," she said; "I stopped taking piano lessons. It was boring and I was only going there because of my parents, but I started feeling old enough to make my own decisions."

"Well, good for you, I guess." The twin wasn't sure how to respond to that, in part because he wasn't used to people violating his comfort zone like that. "I can't tell you if that's a good thing or a bad thing, I never heard you play."

"Good! I would've permanently damaged your sense of hearing." Gumi frowned and looked at him again. "But you know what, I've been... kinda thinking about trying to sing."

"Oh? Did me and Rin inspire you by any chance?"

"No! I mean, sort of. Fine," she continued when she saw Len was grinning. "When you guys were gone, and then when I listened to your songs, I was kinda jealous. Not because of you're famous now, just because... I would love to do what you do. Travel the world and sing for people." Gumi sighed. "But I can't sing."

"You think so?"

"Yeah. I dunno why," she finally sat back up; "but I'm too... scared, I guess, even when I'm alone. I've been trying to sing some random stuff, but I always forget how to use my voice."

"Hey," said Len, suddenly enthusiastic that they were talking about his passion. "That's completely normal."

"Really? Did you have this too?"

"I bet I did in the beginning, but I've been singing longer than I can remember. Our Kaito, though, he was super shy at first. When we first got together in the studio, there was a vocal coach telling us a whole bunch of stuff, including how to overcome our shyness."

"And what did you learn?"

"Welp," Len stretched his arms; "most of the time when people are too shy to sing, it means they're not confident enough. So there's a lot of work going into developing your voice, especially your muscle memory. Eventually your body's gonna know exactly what to do, and you can focus on other things, like doing the dance routine right."

Gumi was hanging on his every word. "So you never get nervous on stage?"

"Sometimes I do," he confessed. "And that's normal as well. But the best thing you can do at that point is to just dive in and believe in yourself. Your brain gets scared of nothing sometimes, you have to develop a sense of reason. At least that's what the coach told us."

"Wow." His friend blinked. "I never realised how much work do you guys put into all that. You know, for us mere mortals, you just come, sing a couple of songs and leave again. It seems so... effortless."

"Like I said, there's a lot going on behind the curtain that makes us what we are. So what I'm saying is," Len softly pressed his fist against Gumi's shoulder; "don't worry. If you really wanna do this, all you have to do is practise, practise, practise. I could hook you up with some people who could help you out. If you wanted."

"Really?"

"Totally! But you'll have to be absolutely sure you wanna do this for real. These people don't like to waste their time." He gave her an encouraging smile. "Just think about that. If it's still gonna be a good idea tomorrow, let me know."

Before he knew it, Len had Gumi wrapped all around him again.

"You're the best!" she told him before pulling away. "I swear I'll make you proud."

"Geez, you ever heard about personal space? You almost broke my ribs."

Gumi giggled and put on a daydreaming face. "Well, if I'm gonna be like you guys, I guess I should dye my hair, too. Green is still available, right?"

Len laughed. "Please don't. I can't imagine you with green hair."

"By the way," she was already moving on to another subject; "what is it like to be famous? When I heard you'll be here, I thought everybody's gonna freak out and ask for autographs."

"Yeah, well, these guys-" he gestured towards the room around them where someone was just passing homemade cookies while others were passing shots; "-they are cool. They knew me before we took off, and I'm just the same boy I used to be while I'm here. Which is great. I kinda missed this. Me and Rin had some... interesting fangirl encounters some time ago. I don't want the whole world to be like that."

"I saw some random selfies on the internet the other day," Gumi smirked. "You, Rin and two girls, one of tham had a red ribbon, does that ring a bell?"

"I think so..." Len concentrated on his memories. "Yes! They met us and our parents while we were on a break two... no, three months ago. It was adorable."

"I would think so! But it was also hilarious to me, they basically wrote a letter under that picture explaining how much you two mean to them and how this was the opportunity of a lifetime, and I was just sitting there and laughing because I get to get in touch with you whenever I want. It was awesome."

Len's phone beeped in his pocket.

"Excuse me," he said to his friend and looked at the phone. He had a message from Miku.

The twin opened the message and froze. He felt the smile on his face melting away like snow in Spring.

"What's the matter?" Gumi asked.

And Len who had never in his life said a bad word muttered: "Holy fuck."


"I don't know," said Rin.

"Come on," Ichiro insisted, and his fingers were softly playing with her knee. "It's gonna be awesome."

The two of them were lying in his bed upstairs, behind the locked door of Ichiro's bedroom. The room was suspiciously tidy, as though the boy had cautiously cleaned it just for the occasion of bringing Rin inside. There was a desk with his computer by the wall, an expensive black bass guitar in the corner, and that was pretty much it. It was certainly cleaner than her bedroom back home.

Ichiro and Rin were still fully dressed at that point, but he was persistently trying to change that.

"I don't know," she repeated after a few seconds of silence.

"Are you nervous?"

"I don't know. I think I'm just..." Rin gulped. "Does it have to be today?"

"When else?" Ichiro's hand moved from her knee onto her thigh. "You're going away soon, and god knows when we'll get another chance."

"You know I'm coming back at the end of January." She closed her eyes and focused on his gentle touch, but forced herself to snap back into reality quickly. She didn't want to show him how pleasant it was.

"I don't wanna wait another month." Ichiro leaned forward and gave her a kiss. "Come on, don't you like me or what?"

Rin smiled faintly. "Of course I do, Ichi. But... This is my first time we're talking about. I wanna do it right."

"Hey, it's my first time too. But how bad could it be?" He was looking at her like she was the only thing in the universe that mattered. "Come on. Don't be scared."

"I'm not scared."

"So why don't you just wanna do it?"

Unbeknownst to him, Rin actually wanted it. She went to his house on that evening filled with anticipation, and she was almost sure it was going to happen. She just wanted to tease Ichiro a little longer; she thought it was funny to pretend like she wasn't interested. In reality, she was just waiting for him to turn his words into action; she needed him to force her into at least a little.

Also, she was nervous, quite understandably. The mere idea of sleeping with someone was so surreal to her, and now she was about to enter the surreality. She had no idea what to expect from it -everyone was always saying it was the best thing ever, and Rin didn't know if maybe her expectations weren't too high. What if she didn't like it -what if he didn't like it with her?

"Why now?" she kept playing for time. "We have the whole night ahead of us. You should attend to your guests."

"I have the whole night to attend to my guests," Ichiro counterattacked. "But I just like you so much, I can't wait any longer."

Rin chuckled. "That's so nice to listen to. Can you tell me more?"

"I like the way you giggle," he whispered and covered her face in smooches. "I like the way you look, I like the way you smell, I like the way you breathe..." His face, still snuggling with hers, was getting lower and lower until it stopped on her neck. Rin's heartbeat accelerated.

"Ichi..." she sighed quietly; she reached out and placed her hand on the back of his neck, partly to stop him from moving even further and partly to prevent him from pulling away. "Please..."

"I like your neck," he simply stated and kept on smooching it. A weird feeling of energy ran through her entire body, and Rin felt her guard finally lowering.

Oh my gosh, it's really happening, she thought. But instead of panicking as she thought she would, something took control over her body, and she simply let her hands travel around Ichiro's torso. She closed her eyes and let the feeling of his body against hers overwhelm her. His lips on her own, his left hand slowly finding its way underneath her shirt-

Somebody decided to knock heavily on the door at that exact moment.

"Go away!" was Ichiro's immediate reaction.

"It's me, Len!" the other twin called behind the door. "Please, I have to talk to Rin!"

"I'm busy!" Rin shouted in response.

"Please come out," her brother pleaded and tried to open the door -but, of course, it was locked. "It's about Miku!"

"I don't care about Miku right now!"

Len groaned. "Just... look at your damn phone, will you? It's bad!"

"Fiiiine," she replied and gave Ichiro a sad look. "I'm sorry, he won't shut up unless I look at my damn phone."

Her boyfriend got off of her with a murderous expression. Rin quickly reached into her pocket and saw that she had a message from Miku. She opened it and read through.


To all my friends.

I want to thank you for everything that you did for me. You all tried to help me with my problems in one way or another, and I'm grateful for that.

But my problems are beyond solving. None of you know what it's like living in my head. I'm scared all the time. I can't enjoy anything anymore, and I don't want to make your lives miserable just because I can't get over my shit. I don't want you to try and save me just because you think it's expected of you. I never expected this of anybody but myself, and I can't do anything.

I never achieved anything in my life. Every decision I ever made was bad, and I can't keep on living like this. Every second I spend alive, I fear that it's going to be even worse, and I have to stop this.

It ends tonight. I hope you can understand.

Goodbye, M.