I sighed as I looked at the results of the poll to see which characters everyone wanted to be. The leading male role, Hiko, only had one name listed: Shig's. I suspected that once he put his name on the poll everyone else was too intimidated to compete with him. It made the casting easier, but it seems like a hollow victory for the lead role to be picked by default…

What was even more worrying to me was that no one signed up to audition for the female lead, Ori.

I stood up in front of the rest of the club, the poll in one hand and the script in the other. "Can I have your attention for a moment? I'm going over the audition list, and we have a pretty big role with no one offering to perform it."

Harada crossed his arms and frowned. "Which role?"

I tucked the script under my arm so I could hold up the poll and point out the empty space. "Ori, our leading woman."

"That… is a very glaring gap." Harada conceded, backing off.

"Is there really no interest in the role?" I looked around at the girls in the club. Some of them looked sheepish now that they were under scrutiny.

Shig adjusted his glasses and looked around. "Well? Is there any interest in the role or not?"

There was an uncomfortable silence for a minute while a number of girls looked at each other uneasily. I didn't like this silence. There was clarly something wrong, or there wouldn't be so much hesitation.

I heard the shuffling of papers as someone went through their copy of the script. After a moment a chuckle broke out from Shihohara.

"Are you all too shy to kiss Morishige on stage?"

I sighed at Shinohara's tactless question and its implications. Was the lack of interest in the lead roles entirely because everyone was afraid of Shig? What did he do to deserve this?

"Shinohara, don't provoke anyone. That won't settle anything." Shig said calmly, not seeming fazed by Shinohara's outburst.

I cleared my throat and looked around the room. "We need to have someone play Ori or we won't have a play. Will anyone volunteer to audition?"

Everyone looked around at each other until Shinohara raised her hand excitedly as if she were trying to be the first to answer a question in class. "Oooo ooo, if no one else wants it, pick me! I always wanted to be a star!"

While her enthusiasm was admirable, I felt a bit of dread at Shinohara taking such an important role. She had only been acting for a few weeks now, and she still had a lot to learn before she could perform well. I decided not to mention this to anyone and instead smiled and put her name down on the audition poll.

"Alright, we have at least one person offering to play each role now. Take some time to go over your scripts again and we'll get started on the first few auditions in twenty minutes."

Shinohara was literally bouncing in place with excitement. Shig walked over to me and leaned in close before whispering into my ear.

"Are you sure she's the best fit for the role?"

I shrugged. "I don't want to force anyone to play the part. Maybe if we can get her to focus she'll be able to pull it off."

Shig sighed and nodded. "If she is capable of concentrating that long."

I let Shig get back to reading his script and sat in a desk to skim the script again before the auditions. Ishida had written a lot of useful notes in the margins, so I started going over those as well.

Part of me felt annoyed. There shouldn't have been so much of a problem with Shig being in a lead role. Sure it's a love story with a kiss scene, but it's not like a stage kiss has to be a real kiss. We've even been practicing how to perform mock fighting; it wouldn't be too hard to extend that to other things.

Of course, I didn't plan to express my disappointment in the club. It's annoying that they all shunned Shig like that, but I don't want to get into an argument with anyone. Even now that I live on my own, I can still remember the fights my parents would get into. That's not something I want to go through here, with my friends.

"Suzumoto? Are we starting the auditions?"

I looked up to see Kokowa and a few others waiting expectantly. I turned to see that Ishida seemed ready to observe the auditions and I nodded. "Yeah. We'll get started in a moment."

The auditions were mostly a formality for a number of roles, since Ishida and I had been watching everyone practice for a few days now and had an idea who would be best suited for each role. Still, there were a few surprises. Not that I could remember them after Shinohara's attempt at a performance.

I don't really like to think poorly of a friend, but while I could tell Shinohara was trying she wasn't really performing the role as Ishida intended it. I tried to think of some constructive criticism during her audition, but I drew blanks. She switched from her own personality to overacting every other line and never quite got the intonation right.

After a bit, Ishida held up a hand for Shinohara to stop. I felt a lump in my throat. What were we going to do?…

"C-could you do that line a-again? This time, emphasize the first part of the sentence i-instead. And don't r-raise your arms like that during the line…"

Shinohara cleared her throat and did as she was instructed. It wasn't much better, but it did sound a lot closer to how Ishida had described the scene to me.

"What do you think, Ishida?" I whispered after Shinohara was finished with her audition.

Ishida nodded. "S-she can do it. She j-just needs to practice it."

"Are you sure?"

"Y-yes."

I took a deep breath and nodded at Shinohara. "Sounds like a yes, Shinohara. You're going to be Ori."

Shinohara pumped her fist in the air and smiled from ear to ear. I looked at Ishida to see that she had written a note next to Shinohara's name on the audition sheet: "add more notes to shinohara's script."

That sounded like a good plan…