Dear Sempai
Disclaimer: I do not own SkipBeat! or any of the characters from the Manga.
Summary: Lory has conceived yet another devious scheme, wrapped in the guise of a LoveMe assignment. All the girls have to do is to write at least one letter a week to the person they respect the most. Simple… right?
Letter 22
Dear Corn,
Paris is as incredible as you described in your letter. On my off-hours I have been wandering the streets and markets. I am supposed to speak French later in the movie, so I have been engaging in as many conversations with the Parisians as possible. I took French and English in middle school, so I did learn some of the language, but not nearly enough. The Director has me in a crash-course with a consulting language teacher. Hopefully I should be better soon. Honestly, I don't know why I was chosen rather than an actress who already knows the language.
The first week of filming for Desperate Hours has been relatively light. The first part of the movie tells the story of how my character, Shiratori Mieko, first came to Paris with her father as a rebellious teen, I don't have to worry too much about speaking French at first. But later, when we begin filming the scenes of my character's older self, I need to be ready.
I was confused about your cryptic words concerning the possibility of meeting here in Paris. What did you mean, exactly, when you wrote that I "already know [you] well, although necessity kept [you] from letting [me] know you at all"? I have read and re-read this, but I still can't decipher your meaning. At first I thought that you were referring to the fact that you allowed a young girl to believe that you were a faerie prince, but you already know that I bear no grudges for this. Is there another secret, something larger still? Please believe me when I write that there is nothing that I will not forgive.
I apologize for pressing this issue, but I fear that you are keeping yourself hidden from me because of this deep secret, and it saddens me. Please allow me to meet my childhood friend again?
Your friend, sincerely,
Mogami Kyoko
oOoOOoOo
Dear Moko-san,
Thank you for reassuring me about the tabloid report and the false stories concerning you and Okaa-san. It pleases me to know that you and she are getting along. At the moment I am grinning from ear-to-ear while I look at the two-page spread in Vogue about the Swan fashion show in Milan. It is only fitting and natural that they chose to snap the photo while you were foremost on the runway. The flowing tea-dress that you are wearing only emphasizes how perfect Julie-sama's fashions fit on you. Do you think that I could get a copy of this photo? I will keep the magazine copy, but a print would look so much better framed.
This seems to be my week for receiving cryptic messages in letters. What did you mean when you wrote "perhaps I have misjudged certain things"? And what did you intend when you wrote that you were going to "adopt a wait-and-see approach"? Does this have something to do with what you said before you left to join the Swan Fashion Tour?
Filming for Desperate Hours is going well so far. My fellow cast-members, both Japanese and French, are fun to work with, though they do make me feel like a fraud. Several of the younger Japanese members seem overawed by my lead-status and they are behaving with alarming deference to me. One in particular, a young actress who plays a friend in the movie, claims that she has the box-set of both Dark Moon and Box 'R, as well as the DVD of Fuwa Sho's Prisoner video. She behaves as if I am some sort of star instead of the new and inexperienced actress that I truly am. This must be how Tsuruga Ren feels all of the time, though he actually deserves the adulation that he receives.
My French lessons are moving along rapidly, though I could wish that I possessed even a portion of your gift for memorization. Just about the time that I think that I am able to converse in this language, a Parisian will expound volubly and passionately on some subject and I won't understand three words. Still, progress is being made. I have taken to visiting local coffee shops and cafes in order to polish my skills. There is a pastry shop near the studio where I wish that you and I could sit and visit together.
Tsuruga Ren will arrive in one week and the filming will begin in earnest. Up until now the focus has been on my early scenes. Once he arrives, we will film the kidnapping, his rescue, and our desperate flight through the streets of Paris while the terrorist hunt for us.
I am concerned about some of the later scenes. As the movie progresses, my character is supposed to fall in love with his. This would have been difficult before, but now it is worse. Moko-san, recently I have come to realize [a full sentence is completely blacked out at this point] … certain things… and I am deeply afraid that those… things… will reveal themselves at an inopportune moment. I desperately wish that you were here right now so that we could speak together privately. I am in need of advice from my dear best friend.
Please take care of yourself in New York,
Sincerely,
Mogami Kyoko
oOoOOoOo
Dear Chiori-chan,
Do you like the scene in this postcard? As I write this, I am sitting near the center of the foremost bridge in this picture. I can't sit in the direct center because it is occupied by a dear old couple who are celebrating their fiftieth wedding anniversary. They told me that they sat and drank coffee in that very spot fifty years ago. They must love each other very much.
Will I ever know a love like that? It probably seems to be an odd question coming from me, but perhaps I have been too stubborn on that particular subject.
Please take care of yourself and enjoy your break from letter-writing,
Your friend,
Mogami Kyoko
oOoOOoOo
Dear Friend,
I don't know if this letter will reach you before it is time for you to board your flight for Paris. Your own letter to me did not arrive until yesterday, so perhaps this letter will miss you and may have to follow you back here.
Perhaps I should have been more circumspect in communicating my sense of impending events. I did not wish to alarm you, nor did I wish to make you think that I was saying goodbye in any way. I only meant to say that I feel that certain things are going to change; in ways that both frighten and thrill me. Perhaps I should have written instead that I have become more aware of things that I have either overlooked entirely or studiously ignored in the past.
It would be foolish to write more at this time. It is frightening to think that I am right in my newly found perception, but I now realize that it would be even worse to find that I was wrong. Now my letter has become as cryptic as other letters that I have been receiving. I will write no more on this except to say that I want very much to be right this time.
I look forward to seeing you in Paris soon, Tsuruga Ren,
Your Friend,
Mogami Kyoko