To the rhythm and the drum beat, she hummed and tapped her feet, but there was no soul in the soles of her white high-tops.
Nori! Rock!
It all started when we first met,
and strapped on our guitars.
We made music so great and good,
that soon we were rock stars.
The biggest in japan,
with tons of screaming fans.
We're out on tour around the world
so come and join the band!
A song recording was playing on loudspeakers to start out a Hi Hi Puffy AmiYumi concert at Tokyo that night, and the concert hall was absolutely packed.
Teen girls erupted into crazed screams when pink princess Ami and bitter punk Yumi ascended unto the stage on rumbling motorized lifts, amidst clouds of pink and blue special effects smoke.
Hi hi puffy amiyumi show!
On the hi hi puffy amiyumi show,
anything is possible!
Hi hi puffy amiyumi show,
On the hi hi puffy amiyumi show,
anything is possible NOW!
In the words of one music critic, the two seperate personalities merged on-stage were a Yin and Yang gloriously united by cheesy lyrics, screamed over a guitar amped to full volume and out of place drumming, to wide audience appeal.
Years of performing in the volatile and oftentimes nightmarish world of Japanese girl pop did little to change the 'puffy' spirit of their act, which attracted fans from across the globe.
But that night, something was clearly off. The eyes of Ami at the drums were closed, and her head was bowed in an unspoken 'sumimasen'.
"I don't know how many of you read the blogpost, but I have a big announcement to make," she said into her microphone.
Quiet. Blinking eyes. Confused glances. Flashing camera phones.
Yumi looking on with her arms crossed and a sinking expression.
Ami could feel the atmosphere thicken, and she hesitated. Expectant eyes were pointed at her, pressuring her to come clean.
"The truth is..."
She couldn't hide from her true feelings any longer.
...
"I'm leaving the band to focus on my acting career," Ami repeated at a press meeting the following day. The band's manager Kaz was there with with her: a short, pudgy man squinting through his glasses in the bright light.
Harmony was a furious nine year old girl watching a news segment of the event online, at home. Under the Twitter handle 'numberonepuffyfan_111', she was making her voice heard regarding the breakup:
I CAN'T BELIEVE SHE WOULD DO THIS TO HER FANS1111!
NOBDY BETTER WATCH ANY OF HER MOVIES!1111!
She pounded her fists against the keyboard, as tears rolled down her face.
THAT BITCH! I H8TE HER1
Ami on the TV flinched from a barrage of camera flashes.
AMI U BITCH!1
"I know this must be hard on the fans, but I've given it a lot of thought."
"I don't care, Ami-chan!" Harmony spat at the screen, hugging and petting the plush toy of her she bought at one of their American tours. "You should stay a singer...Ami-chan...my Ami-chan would never turn her back on her fans...no...why is this happening..."
"Detective, the killer isn't who you think it is."
...
Ami was walking back and forth reciting lines from a script.
"If you make too many false conclusions...more people may be killed."
A knock at the door of her apartment yanked her out of the scene.
"I'll be right there," she said, accidentally knocking down a stack of ramen cups and soda bottles when she hastily set the booklet down on her computer desk. "Yabe!"
Carefully stepping over her Playstation 3, she opened the door and greeted Yumi.
"This place is really turning into a mess," Yumi said, as she plopped unto one of two small red bean bag chairs. They were situated across from the shiny brand new flatscreen television, so that the way to the door cut a narrow aisle in between. "So, since you definitely haven't been cleaning, what have you been up to?"
"I was just practicing my script for a shoot on Monday. It's a small role in that crime drama everyone's been talking about."
Yumi turned on the PS3, and shot Ami an amused grin. "You mean Detective Koshiro?"
"That's the one! I'll admit I was a little nervous at first, but playing a role on television isn't any different from performing on stage, is it?"
"Yeah," Yumi said, and scowled when the opening animation of Silent Hill: Homecoming appeared on the screen. "Sou na! You still play this game? It ruined the series."
"That's just your opinion!" Ami said, crossing her arms and pouting. "Besides, we didn't exactly get the best ratings when we first started out." She sighed, sitting in the computer chair with her back to the rays of evening sun peeking through the blinds. "Sorry, I shouldn't even bring it up."
She wished she'd never mentioned her singing career. To her, the last four years of their life were an elephant in the room now. But, as Alex Shepherd was taking his first tentative steps off a truck and entering Shepherd's Glen gone to hell, Yumi paused the game.
"You did what you had to do, Ami," she said. "If these are your true feelings you kept hidden all this time, I can't hold it against you."
Ami smiled. "Thanks, Yumi."
In the span of one day, the last remnants of Ami's career as a pop singer was her friendship with Yumi. Thankfully music is what brought the two together in the first place, but not the glue that held them together. On stage they were different as pink and blue or white and black, but beyond the glamour they really weren't so different. In a way they needed each other.
"Kaz wants me to get into punk rock," Yumi said offhandedly. "He says that visual kei is the way of the future." She suppressed a laugh, so it came out as snicker. "If you ask me, he's stuck living in the past. Losing you hurt his bankroll more than anything."
She looked to Ami for a response, but her friend's eyes were stuck to the computer monitor.
"What is it, Ami?"
"On Twitter...people are really mad about me leaving the band."
She scrolled through pages of desperate hashtags, heated arguments, and links to Facebook campaigns and emergency fan club meetings devoted to reuniting the duo.
"Don't let the haters get to you, Ami," Yumi said, grasping Ami's shoulders. "It'll all boil over in a few days, when they find something else to bitch about."