In the following months, Coppelia did shows in Chiba and other cities in Kanto. You couldn't always go to all of them, but you tried to go to the ones you had time for. You went alone all the time and admired Coppelia dancing on stage, with a hand over your beating heart. And all the time, you would wait to meet her backstage with flowers, even though her manager usually gave them to her for you. In all the months, you had never met her once, but simply watched her from afar.
She was true to her character afterall, just like a doll that can be looked at and admired but never attainable.
It was the last night of Coppelia's performances in Saitama, before she toured Yokohama, you were about to leave the roses at her door as usual, when the dressing room door opened. You were looking at a pair of slender fair legs "What are you doing?" embarrassed at admiring a woman's legs so close you jumped back instantly and fell, the bundle of roses came undone and fell everywhere! In the midst of your embarrassment, you looked up to see who's legs you had so closely looked at.
She was different than how she looked on stage with her long brown hair undone and went to her waist, her face wore no makeup, and the always present smile was an expression of suprise, but nonetheless it was your Coppelia. You stood up hastily and bowed to her many times "I have made such a fool of myself, I'm sorry. But I am such a fan of you, Coppelia." She placed her hand on your shoulder and you stopped bowing "Only on stage am I Coppelia, when I'm off the stage I'm Ryoko Shiraishi, its nice to meet such a dedicated fan, thank you for all the flowers you always give me." She smiled and your feet wobbled from under you, she caught you and steadied you "You must be hungry too than. Do you care to get something to eat with me?" It was late by now and not many places were open except a little cozy ramen shop. You ordered something spicy with lots of meat and thick noodles, looking over you saw that Ryoko had ordered something light with clear broth, thin noodles, and lots of vegetables. "How boring, you call that ramen? You should at least have some sort of meat in it." Ryoko smiled and ate daintily "I have to watch my figure, I can't eat recklessly, there are many others waiting to take my spot." "How can there be another Coppelia? Many of your fans would be outraged." She laughed "Fans? As if I had those, the only fan I have is you, and we haven't met properly at all." "Well, my name is Fuji Syusuke. I am a third year at Seishun Gakuen Middle School in Tokyo, and a I'm a regular on the tennis team. I have two siblings, Yumiko Fuji my older sister and Yuuta Fuji my younger brother. I enjoy taking pictures as a hobby and I love eating apples." She extended her hand "Nice to meet you Syusuke." you shook her hand, suprised at how soft and pretty her hands were. "Its not fair that I told you so many things about me, yet I know none of you." She swallowed her moutful of noodles "Contrary to what you might think, I'm not so interesting. I don't attend school, and dancing is the only thing I know how to do. I have one older brother who plays tennis at Shitenhoji Middle School. Besides ballet, I don't have many other hobbies, and what I like to eat is ice cream with whipped cream, and I don't get that a lot." she paused and let her chopsticks drop for a moment "When I'm talking like this, my life does seem kind of boring and I don't have much going on besides dancing all the time. But thats okay isn't it?" You smiled "Of course it is, doing something you love and being good at it, isn't that what we should all find sometime or another?" she smiled "You sound just like my brother now." "Your brother plays tennis too?" she nodded and a smile erupted on her face "He is a third year at his school and he is really good at tennis, people say he plays perfect tennis and that hes like the tennis bible. My aniki is really good." "Maybe I'll play him sometime." She placed her hand over yours "If thats the case I wish you the best of luck. And I'll just say now that my brother was never once defeated." in return you placed your other hand over hers "Not to brag but I'm pretty good myself." she laughed
and you laughed just because she did.
At the end of the night, Ryoko escorted you to the bus stop and wished you a safe ride home. "Don't you go home at all?" you asked her. She shook her head "I have to be a good doll and go to the workshop to get a few things fixed before next performance right?" you laughed "Thats right." "Will you come to my next show?" she asked. "We're having a team practice, I can't go to your next show." she placed her hands on her hips and sighed "Then you'll just have to call me and congratulate me that way." she took your phone and hastily entered her number. "I'll be leaving now." She bowed and she left in the car that was waiting on the corner for her.
Ever since then, you had been texting, calling, emailing, and video chatting with Ryoko whenever you couldn't go to her shows. You were both always tired and she always fell asleep first. But you didn't mind because you knew she was busy. Even though you had stopped seeing the shows, you heard about Coppelia all over Japan. Ryoko was always on the newspapers and magazines and did TV interviews too, you would always cut out the newspaper and magazine articles about your Coppelia and put them in a scrapbook. On nights when you couldn't hear from her, you comforted yourself with these cutouts and admired the picture you took of her that night the first time you laid eyes on her. Tonight was the last stop of Coppelia's national tour and tonight was her last show as Coppelia at Sapporro. You wished your star luck and imaged you were watching her now even though you couldn't.