Dreams
Chapter 39: Going Crazy
"Oh shit..." This time Len muttered out loud as he buried his face in his palm. "I'm busted."
"What do you mean you're busted?" the girl asked, looking a little puzzled. "Don't tell me..."
Len gulped and tried to calm himself down. Alright, she could say whatever she wanted since he had already spilled the beans. There wasn't anything to be scared of. It was not like she would tell the whole world that he was the one who made that outfit of a low standard.
"... you're learning how to make clothes? That's so cool. I've never seen guys interested in this," the girl cooed and began fanning her face with her hands animatedly. "Oh my gosh, Kagamine. I tell you, it's fun. You should try sewing with your hands first. You need skills and... patience! Yeah, patience!"
Somehow, Len had an idea that she thought he was taking in feedbacks for his own learning purposes. Well, that was good. At least she would not know who was the one who made that outfit.
Len smiled and nodded in understanding. "I see. Thanks."
"You're welcome!" The girl smiled kindly at him for a brief moment before fidgeting on her seat. "Say, are you here to see the new model or are you a fan of Tete and Tata?"
"The new model. Why?"
"Same!" she exclaimed and squealed. "I'm a fan of Luka Megurine so I'm wondering how the new model is like since they're both from the same agency. I'm so glad..."
Upon hearing that, Len's face darkened and turned away from her, looking sullen. The girl immediately stopped her chatter and looked worriedly at him. It felt as if she had said something wrong. Or did she?
"Are you all right, Kagamine?"
Shaking his head, Len raised his hand up and held it in front of her again. "I'm fine. It's just... that I'm hungry."
Liar...
"Oh... I've some sweets with me. Would you like to have one?"
Len knitted his eyebrows together and forced a weak smile as he shook his head again.
"No, it's okay. The show is going to end soon anyway. Thanks a lot."
That's right... I'm a liar.
-:-:-:-
The comedy variety show turned out to be unexpectedly boring. It was more like a talk show whereby the comedians asked questions and Rin answered them. Then, halfway through the show, they invited Rin and a few audience to play a hilarious game called animals charade. Rin received a card with a picture of a scorpion on it. She stared hard at the picture, wondering how to act this out without uttering a word.
Looking at the other participants who were waiting for her poses in order to guess the animal, she grinned sheepishly and spoke, "How am I going to..."
"No talking," Tata interjected. "Actions only."
Rin bit her lower lip and groaned. Why was her debut so... extraordinary?! This was definitely not a debut! She had known it long ago anyway.
Awkwardly, Rin bent her knees and shaped her hands into the shape of pincers. The responses were 'crab' and 'lobster' which were not surprising at all. These are common features after all. Who or which clever being would have thought of a scorpion?
Rin placed her hand on her backside and wriggled her forefinger, hoping this additional hint would help them. However, no one could guess the answer correctly. Funny answers like 'pig', 'monkey' and 'sloth' had insulted her greatly. Was her pose that bad? Rin mentally screamed.
After many guesses, a middle-school participant raised his hand and answered in an unsure manner, "Scorpion?"
"Yes, finally!" Rin shouted in relief and raised her arms in the air as if she had won a soccer match.
The audience laughed while Rin turned to look at them with a bashful smile. After the comedians marked the end of the game, Rin exited the stage wearily but was glad that the past few weeks of physical trainings had made her stronger. Besides acting like a scorpion, she had to act out other animals' moves for her subsequent turns. Getting a backache wouldn't be a surprise after all...
"Rin, do you want to die that badly?" She heard Haku's angry voice behind her.
Instinctively, Rin froze on the spot and began to think hard for excuses because she knew what Haku was going to say afterwards.
"I'm a stupid girl who is a failure in school and hates studying," Haku rattled on with a scowl. "Was that what you're trying to tell the whole world? Huh? Say something!"
Rin turned around and gave Haku a piteous look. "Miss Yowane, I was just being honest."
Haku frowned and laughed her statement off. "Honest? What about Tete and Tata? We promised them that we... Rin, it's their show as well! You can't just ruin it!"
"But it's my career! I can't just lie to them!" Rin retorted as she pointed towards the stage. "I'm not as good as what the script was written!"
Haku's eyes softened upon hearing Rin's protest. Deep inside her, she agreed with Rin but she could not say it. She could not support this view of hers...
"That's why ALICE Studio wants to create a nice image of you," Haku said in a low voice. "You need fans."
"I want true fans... like true friends!"
"Reality is harsh, Rin. People tend to go for good role models. With you sprouting nonsense about yourself, what will happen to you? Everyone in ALICE Studio is already trying to find faults in you!"
... that was right, it was because of ALICE Studio.
"What?" Rin's eyes widened in shock. "Why is ALICE Studio..."
This time Haku's eyes widened as well when she realised that she had said something unnecessary to Rin. No, it was actually not unnecessary. It was supposed to be very important but she could not let Rin know about it.
"Forget it," Haku mumbled and waved her hand in the air as if trying to brush her previous words off. "The staff of ALICE Studio will definitely be disappointed if they find out that you didn't follow the script. Half of it was written by them."
Neither was Rin stunned or frightened by what Haku had said. She just did not know what to say. Her mind went blank at the thought of the possible outcomes if she had followed the script and deceived her audience. It was hard to imagine to live a life of deception. What if she couldn't meet her fans' expectations in the future?
"Stop lecturing her. She's just a newbie," a voice broke the short silence.
Rin and Haku turned her heads around only to see Dell Honne the make-up artist standing next to the messy pile of stage props. Haku frowned again at the sight of his face and crossed her arms to show her dominant side.
"Don't just butt in," she bellowed. "This is our business."
Dell chuckled and then smirked at Haku. "As far as I could remember..."
"Rin," Haku cut his words off as she turned to look at Rin again. "Let's return to the dressing room to get change."
Just when Rin was about to reply a yes, Dell continued without hesitation, "You've no right to lecture Rin."
"What?!" Haku roared and glared at the smirking man.
"You were once like her before." Dell's smirk slowly faded and was replaced with a weak but warm smile. "I have always been watching you..."
Rin's face reddened as she looked at Haku and Dell back and forth. Well, that was sudden.
"That's right. I forgot. We need to talk. Really," Haku said in rapid staccato, looking normal and unaffected by his words. "Rin, I'm sorry. Can you head home by yourself? I need to talk to this guy here."
Rin's eyes lit up and she grinned. "Sure, Miss Yowane! Have a great time together!"
"Ri... Rin!"
Rin waved goodbye to the two of them and skipped away while Haku suddenly felt a sense of cold air brushing against her skin. She paled.
"Hey, you..." Haku quickly regained her composure and narrowed her eyes at Dell. "Don't listen to what Rin said. Actually, her head has some loose screws to begin with... so... yeah, ignore her."
-:-:-:-
'Good performance you have there. You made me laugh almost the entire game. -Len Kagamine'
Rin furrowed her eyebrows upon reading the text message. He was obviously teasing her. Feeling a little angry, she put her handphone away and combed her hair. After a few seconds, her handphone beeped again. She picked it up again and opened another text message.
'Sorry that I didn't attend your debut. But don't worry. I watched the broadcasted version. -Len Kagamine'
"That liar!" Rin yelled at her innocent handphone. "I knew you came!"
Suddenly, another incoming text message appeared on the screen.
'Just kidding. Hahahaha!
P.S. It's strange. Why do I have this feeling that you're yelling at your handphone?
-Len Kagamine'
Rin gasped as she immediately slammed her handphone down against her lap and her cheeks became beet red. It was strange for her as well. Why did she have a feeling that Len was grinning evilly at his messages sent to her?
"I have always been watching you..."
Dell's words to Haku rang in her mind. Like a lovestruck teenager, Rin giggled sheepishly to herself and wondered if Len had been watching her as well. If so, it would be too good to be true...
Rin frowned. That was right. It would be too good to be true after all he had been trying hard to push her away before he had actually accepted her request to make her an outfit. She picked up her handphone again and stuck out her tongue at it before letting out another giggle.
"Man..." Rin sighed and stared at the text message. "I want to see him..."
Wait... what?
Did she just mutter those words out loud?
Damn that mouth of hers!
"Rin, you're becoming stupid!" she shouted at her mirror image which was just before her. "No, no, Rin, you have to be honest with yourself. Wait! Maybe you're really stupid! Hold on, based on Sigmund Freud's psychoanalytic theory, whatever you've just said was your unconscious thought. Hahaha... no, Rin. You've gone crazy."
Suddenly, Rin stood up and screamed, ruffling her hair at the same time. Her period was definitely over, yet she was feeling extremely agitated like a woman having 'PMS'. She must have definitely gone crazy for thinking about Len too much. It must be time to make an appointment with a psychiatrist very soon...
"Oh my gosh, Rin! Say that you are longing to see his idiotic face!"
As Rin was engaging in a self-agonising moment, Rin's thumb accidentally pressed on the dial button and there went her call...
"Ah! Shit!" Rin shrieked upon realisation while her fingers was too stiff to move an inch.
... for Len.
Hi everyone, thank you for reading up to Chapter 39. I would like to thank those who had reviewed Chapter 38. Thanks for all those encouragements. Hope to hear more from you again! :D
Here are the reviewers:
- mirrors02
-Neonlightshow
-Snow Queen Stya
-Mimi02
-Vocaloids X Otaku Nekomimi
Next, I would also like to thank those who had story alerted and favourited this story.
Preview of the next chapter:
Chapter 40: Friend
"That orange handphone! Don't tell me... you're Kagamine's girlfriend?"
Upon hearing the word 'girlfriend', the soup burst out of Rin's mouth and she stared wide-eyed at the older man. The man ignored that stare and chuckled to himself.
"Two months ago, Mr Kagamine suddenly came to me and asked if I could accompany him to buy a handphone. He said it was for a girl and since I have a daughter, he wanted to know what type of handphone a girl would usually buy. So, I agreed and helped him to choose a cool handphone model which I think a girl would like," the man explained happily. "Do you like the handphone, Miss?"
"Yes! Thank you very much, Sir!" Rin bowed to the man gratefully.
"No, you shouldn't thank me. The person you should really thank is Mr Kagamine. You see, Mr Kagamine wanted to work night shifts all of a sudden. That was... two to three months ago, if I'm not wrong. Our supervisor once asked him why he was working so hard without taking a break, Mr Kagamine replied that he wanted to buy a gift for someone using the night shifts salary... Today, I finally see that someone whom he had been working so hard for, other than his mother. You must be special to him."
Author's random notes:
1) Sorry for the late update! Internship is taking a toll on my mental and emotional states now. For the past six weeks, I have encountered so many bad situations that I wished I could wake up from those bad dreams. I literally wished that when I woke up, everything that was eating me was merely a fragment of my nightmare and things would be just as normal as they could be. I wished, but when I woke up, I realised that I could not escape from the reality. I did not expect myself to fall into a state of depression for days, refusing to eat or sleep and crying silently whenever I was alone. I lost 7lbs within a week and that alarmed my mother. She scolded me for being so affected and told me to learn how to let go of some matters no matter how bad they are. My lecturer came to know about the situations and my bad state, thus she came down to my placement and had a talk with me. She told me to stay strong and rely on her if I encountered any more problems at the placement. Now, I feel much better knowing that I have someone to talk to and that I am not alone.
2) As I have mentioned in the previous author notes, I am a student-teacher. A reviewer asked me how old I am and my answer would be 'above 15 and below 20 years old' (I won't exactly tell you my age, sorry...). What kind of teacher I am aiming to become? Long story short, I did not plan to become a teacher and after this internship, I don't think I would want to be one either. Although my parents keep pushing me to join the Ministry of Education or National Institute of Education upon graduation, I will think twice or thrice about joining it. Don't get me wrong. Teaching is a noble job, I feel. But being a teacher isn't my cup of tea. I am thinking to branch out to other field after I have completed my course of study.
3) My next update of this story will probably be in mid-June when I am having a short break in the midst of my internship. I just can't wait for this internship to be over! Before I end my notes here, I just want to say that the next chapter will longer than the rest of the previous chapters (to make up for the late updates) and there will be progression in Len's and Rin's relationship. Since I have already written the chapter but it has not been proofread yet, I can tell you the estimated word count (possible word count to be exact because I may edit further) is between 5,500 to 6,000. I can assure you all that I will not disappoint my readers.
Thanks for reading my lengthy (and redundant) author's rant-notes. Have a great week ahead! :)