CHAPTER 15: Old Habits
Despite the season, the air felt so fresh and warm outside that Miku decided to leave the window open, at least for the time being. Cars were driving by outside, people walking around, everyone living their own life with its own meaning. Even though she was somewhat more known around the world than regular people, she was still just one drop in the sea of souls. Co-existing, and yet independent.
How many people were completely untouched by the things that she went through at the end of last year? Close to none, at least when put into perspective with the enormous mass of mankind, that was for sure. No matter what, the world had been spinning long before Miku was born, and it would continue to exist long after she would be dead, so long as a random asteroid wouldn't about to collide with Earth in the next couple of decades.
Looking back at it all, her struggles felt almost ridiculous. Not that Miku wanted to belittle her condition; that night on the bridge, it was all undeniably real and serious. But Mrs Sakamoto did all she could to open her eyes. The girl wasn't any worse or any more special in this sense than the other billions of people living on the planet. There were so many who felt the things that she felt, so many who resorted to suicide attempts as the only solution they saw to everything. And if they were able to get past that and live happy lives, then so was Miku.
She knew that before, but she didn't know how was she supposed to fight back. Mrs Sakamoto has shown her the door, and Miku was working her way through.
One of the steps she took required her to focus on the smallest of joyful moments throughout her day. Anything so stupid, in a way, as the taste of hot chocolate, hearing a nice song on the radio or her aunt smiling at her for no particular reason, Miku had to acknowledge and take time to appreciate. That way, she would be able to see how many good moments life offered, and it would eventually pull her out of the perpetually moving train of thought which was sometimes making her overlook the positives.
Maybe that made it easier for her to answer the door that morning. Miku would obviously be happy to see her friends anyway after all the long weeks, regardless of what her therapist told her about appreciating the good things. But her advice at least made the girl silence the voice of doubt in her -she was a little afraid of encountering her colleagues again, given the circumstances under which she had to leave before.
However, all that was left of this fear went away the second Rin leapt into her arms. Both girls laughed for each other, and Miku had no reason to doubt that the twin really missed her. Believing other people's feelings was another thing she had to learn in therapy, and someone as straightforward as Rin was a good place to start. Less so her brother who was a little more reluctant to hug her, but that was just the way he's always been.
Several minutes later, the trio was upstairs in her bedroom; Rin immediately began to aimlessly dig through Miku's manga collection, Miku was grinning at the back of the twin's neck from her rotating chair, and Len simply sat on her bed with an adorably awkward smile.
"Here you go," her aunt said when she walked inside the room with three hot chocolates on a tray which she placed on the desk. "Do you guys need anything else?"
"Seriously, auntie, we're good, don't worry," Miku said for about the sixteenth time that morning and smiled.
"Yeah, thanks, Mrs Hatsune!" Rin sprung up and reached for a colorful superhero mug.
"Okay, then. I will be downstairs if you need me," the woman replied and left the room again.
"Hey now!" Miku shouted when she saw her friend immediately turn back towards the messy pile of comic books on the floor with the mug still in her hand. "If you spill chocolate all over my comics, I'll kick your butt right out!"
"Ugh, fine," the twin groaned and looked around for a place to sit. Then, she saw a yellow bouncing ball in the corner and took it as her own.
"Seems you and your aunt are finally getting along," Len spoke up and carefully sipped on his chocolate, afraid that he'd burn his mouth.
"We're trying our best. This came from Sue as well."
"Sue?"
"My therapist. I call her that behind her back because, well, it's shorter." Miku snickered.
"And what did 'Sue' tell you?" Rin asked.
"Not much in particular. She just sort of forced us to communicate and talk about what was bothering us. There were some tears and we brought up so many dumb things from the past, but what's important is that we've been trying to stay honest with each other ever since. And we talk more."
"So what was the problem? I thought you couldn't stand each other."
"Well..." Miku paused and thought about how to phrase it correctly. "It's sort of funny, but neither of us could remember why we started to feel the way we did. Apparently there was some stuff way back in the past that we just ignored instead of trying to resolve it right away. And everything else built up from that."
Len seemed to be thinking. "Then it almost sounds like December was the best thing that could have happened to you."
"Bro!" his sister exclaimed. "How can you say that?"
Miku, however, giggled. "It's alright. You're not really wrong, Len. Sure, it was bad, but I probably wouldn't have actually started to try and make things better if that didn't happen."
"Still." Rin looked out the window. It was strange to see her this calm and motionless. "I wish things didn't have to go that far. We could have been better friends to you... and..."
"Don't even begin to think like that, silly!" Miku stopped her. She didn't want her to feel guilty. "You've done wonders for me. I don't blame anyone for what happened."
The twin girl was staring at her as if she expected her to get mad any moment. "Are you sure?"
"Hundred percent! That video you sent me from Budokan? Literally made my day. And that was just one of the moments when you guys managed to cheer me up when I needed it."
Rin looked away again and took a sip of her chocolate. Miku suspected her from tearing up and trying to hide it, but she let it slide.
"Miku?" said Len. "Do you feel comfortable talking about this? We can always change the subject."
"It's okay. I don't love talking about it, but I should. At least for the time being. Sue said I shouldn't pretend it never happened."
"I don't think I wanna know all the details anyway. I like to picture you happy, if you know what I mean."
Miku laughed, and even Rin joined her. The other twin just snickered.
"You're one of a kind, Lenny," she told him.
Rin giggled. "You're not the only one who thinks that."
"Oh, not this again!" her brother muttered. "Do you really need to always jump from one ship to another?"
"YES!"
Now, Miku was slightly confused. "Hey, you two! What's all this about?"
"Len has a date."
"No I don't!" Len jumped up in frustration. "She just wanted to ask about some stuff about singing and showbiz. It's not a date!"
The turqoise girl couldn't help but chuckle. Whoever this girl was, she made the twin boy show more emotion than she ever saw him show before. "So who is this person?"
Len didn't care to answer that, so his sister took over. "A girl from our class. Kinda crazy. She wants to sing like we do and she totally has a crush on Len," she added in an audible whisper.
"You've got it all wrong," he retorted and sat down again. "In fact, why don't you just mind your own business?"
"Okay, I'm sorry," she laughed. "I just gotta be enthusiastic about other people's love lives since mine's a disaster, you know what I'm saying?"
"Oh yeah, you did mention that you and Ichiro didn't work out that one time," Miku remembered. "What happened?"
"He's an idiot, that's what happened. He was all butthurt that I didn't want to..." The twin paused and looked over at Len who was suddenly carefully watching her every word. "...I didn't want to stay at his place when I wasn't exactly in the mood."
"I see. Then I guess you're better off without him?"
"Oh, absolutely! I don't know what I even saw on him in the first place."
"People change," the boy sighed. "I mean, Ichiro was always kind of a troublemaker, but I didn't think he'd turn out that douchy."
Rin smiled. "Hey, let's not talk about him again, huh? Why don't we focus on someone who's actually got it working out for them?"
"Sister?!" said her brother in a dangerous tone and frowned at her.
"Not you! I meant Luka and Kaito."
"Ugh!" slipped out of Miku. "Sweetness alert!"
Len blinked. "You're not jealous, are you?"
Miku rolled her eyes and laughed at Len's understandable, but wrong assumption. "No, but Kaito's been reaching out to me asking for advice. If that's not ironic, I don't know what is."
"You, out of all people?" said Rin in disbelief.
"I mean, I get it. We've always been great friends, and if we have to be completely honest with each other, we were never supposed to be anything more than that. But having to read his messages about how he feels towards her... It's weird." Miku shrugged. "I hope he grows enough balls to tell her soon, then he might give me a break about all this."
Despite her tone, she was really rooting for Kaito. If what Rin told her was true, he and Luka were head over heels for one another, they were just both too scaredy to sit down and talk about their feelings. Not that everyone needed to do that, sometimes these things just happened -Miku would know. But knowing both of them, neither one was probably going to be satisfied until they heard it explicitely. That was why she encouraged and supported the hell out of Kaito -she wanted them to get there as soon as possible.
"I can't help but notice," the twin girl continued, "that everything seems to be working out well for once. I mean, Meiko's always been doing great, but now you're starting to feel better, I've gotten rid of Ichiro, Len has a girlfriend-"
"Shut up!"
"-and Luka and Kaito are totally hitting it off as well. Oh, and our fans love us now more than ever, so there's that," she finished with a chuckle.
Miku didn't want to argue with that just yet. Sue warned her that the reason she's been doing so well recently was only because this was merely the beginning of the process, and it was completely normal to feel highly motivated to achieve something in such an instance. But this motivation will go away one day, and she will have to be prepared to fight her demons again when they return.
But with enough effort to make things better and with her friends by her side, she wasn't afraid anymore; she saw there was a solution, and the path in front of her was more or less lit up now. In the end, Miku had to agree with the twin: everything was going to be alright.
That very night -which, due to time difference, actually meant a late afternoon in Europe -the city of Paris dove into darkness, as it did every evening. It was February so nightfalls were still coming pretty soon, although the days were slowly but surely stretching. The city was still very much alive after dusk as people were going by their daily tasks. The only difference between this and Summer probably was that there weren't that many tourists in Winter.
Regardless, the line of people who wanted to get to the top of the Eiffel Tower was so long that the two of them dismissed the idea of joining it. Luka was happy enough to have a selfie with the tower in the background -and Kaito in the front, of course.
For the time being, they both decided to undye their hair; Luka even cut it a bit shorter, knowing that it was going to grow back before the next tour would begin. This helped them become even more anonymous among the Europeans, most of whom already thought all Asians looked the same to begin with.
Fleeing far away from their fame at home was one of the reasons they traveled all the way to Paris. There was obviously another one, even bigger, to go on yet another vacation together, but neither she or Kaito said that out loud, although she thought they both must have subconsciously known it at that point. And still, in case he only liked her as a friend, Luka wanted the illusion of a relationship to last just a little while longer. He did already reject her once, after all, even if indirectly.
However, her potential fear didn't stop her from hanging on his arm when they aimlessly wandered through the city side by side. Whatever the true nature of their relationship was, it felt good having Kaito next to her, talking to him about whatever silly idea that crossed her mind, teasing him, trying to give back all the joy that he was able to give her simply by saying the right thing at the right time.
He demonstrated that when they suddenly found themselves walking past a random empty playground.
"Well this looks familiar," Kaito simply said, causing her to chuckle. Luka let go of his arm and leaned towards the metal railing surrounding the area, checking out the playground. There was a set of swings, a small carousel, and monkey bars of course.
"Um," he stuttered next to her. "Have I ever told you that I was sorry?"
She blinked and looked at him. "For what?"
"For kissing you that one time. I had no right to do that."
Luka laughed. "Gosh, it's almost exactly a year now, isn't it?"
"Seems about right."
"Well, let me ease your mind, Kaito. You have nothing to apologise for. We were both pretty drunk, and..." she gulped. "...and it was actually really nice."
"Yeah, it was," said the boy. They both briefly looked at each other before quickly tearing their gaze away and stubbornly staring in the other direction.
"Luka, can I ask you something?" Kaito mumbled and cleared his throat.
"Hm?"
"What... What do you think this thing between us is?"
Luka's heart stopped, and she took her time to choose her words carefully. The question was simple, but to her it seemed really unfair. This was clearly an opportunity to tell Kaito exactly how she felt; however, what if he didn't like what she'd say? And if she played it safe and said something different, what if he didn't like that either?
"Uh," she opened her mouth and decided to brush it off as a joke for safety. "About fifteen inches of distance?"
"Come on," said Kaito, and Luka felt his hand on her arm. She turned and saw him looking directly at her. "I'm serious. I can't... just keep going until we settle this."
He breathed in and continued. "I really like you, Luka. You're more than just a friend to me, and that's why I have to know how you feel about us."
Her brain needed a moment to process this, but as soon as it reached the last corner of her mind, Luka jumped into Kaito's arms. He immediately clenched her back as if he expected her sudden attack.
"Is this a 'yes'?" he asked into her hair.
"No." She giggled. "You didn't ask a yes or no question."
"Okay, I'll just ask one now." Kaito pulled back and their eyes met again. "Can I kiss you?"
Unable to say a word, Luka simply nodded. They both leaned forward, holding each other's hands, and their lips softly touched. Her mind completely forgot about everything else to make room for the kiss, which was now securely imprented into her memory forever.
After an eternally long moment, they pulled back, looked at each other, laughed happily and hugged once more.
"You don't have to ask next time," she said.
THE END.
Afterword
I called this story 'Behind The Curtain' for two reasons. The first one was to highlight that when they're not performing, the performers -whether it means musicians, actors, or circus clowns -are completely normal human beings like anybody else, and they have their own lives outside of what regular people usually get to see. The second reason, a less obvious one, was more figurative. It represents the curtain of a human face, one that's capable of hiding what's happening inside the head.
Some of you might have been thinking: How could this author be so cruel to Miku? Why did he have to drag her through all that? Well, if I may be honest with you, I didn't like that all the time either. But I stuck to my initial goal, which was to write this story as realisticaly as I could. There are so many people out there who go through the same things, more or less. I wanted to dedicate Miku's part of the story to them.
I do not have bipolar disorder in particular. However, I do know people who struggle with it, as well as depression, borderline disorder, PTSD and so on. And it surprises me that some people still refuse to accept that these illnesses are 'real' in their consequences. In chapter 13, I used Mrs Sakamoto to voice my own concerns: there is not enough debate about this topic. We need to acknowledge that mental disorders exist and learn how to deal with them in ourselves and in other people around us.
I wrote this story not only to hopefully raise the awareness about this subject, but also to give out hope. There is always something you can do to fight back. Having reached rock bottom at one point in my life, I can tell you from experience -your brain tends to fuck with you. Just the fact that you think something's true doesn't mean that it actually is. Please, try to find the strength to outsmart your demons, and absolutely do find other people who can help you with it. Your true friends usually know better than you, you just have to believe them.
I know that this particular fanfiction isn't going to change the world and save lives. But I'm glad if I even made you think about all this some more. You can always share this story with people who you think might need some encouragement. And hey, if you struggle to fight your own battles, you can PM me without hesitation, and I can tell you all I know. I'm happy to help.
Thank you for being here until the end.
-GJ-
