CHAPTER 46
I do not own skip beat! Yoshiki Nakamura does.
Tune of the heart
Maria pushed off the comforter and slipped out of bed. She yawned. It was the end of the morning. Onee-sama had brought her at her apartment last night and she had barely kept the eyes open enough to take a step after the other. Then giving up she remembered her Onee-san carrying to some room and tucking her in. She didn't even remember what the place looked like; she had been too out of it.
She stared down and pulled at the pink and black punky pyjamas. She didn't even remember putting this on.
She creaked the door open of what she supposed was a guest room and peak in the hall.
White walls with little blue patterns just at the bottom of them. Like little waves carrying from one end of the corridor of the other.
She followed them until the hall breached into a very bright area and after some further inspections was in fact the living room and kitchen. To the right, he kitchen had a very long counter made in a L-shape. To the left, just a step down from the floor level of the kitchen and covered in wood was the living area with a soft couch and shelves of books, discs of music and movies. And on top of the couch was a very dishevelled Onee-sama, in a fluffy white pyjamas full of cats pattern and a guitar in the hands.
It's at that moment Maria realized the drumming sound she had been hearing in a sleep induced state was coming from the guitar in Kyoko's lap.
A sweet melody was playing to the rhythm of the swift fingers strumming the instrument and Onee-san was humming with it, occasionally scratching little notes on a sheet of paper in between.
Maria promptly snapped a picture and sent it to Ren-san immediately, not caring and forgetting about the time lag and wrote a legend stating:
"Onee-sama can play guitar!"
And then she was swapped away by the biggest thing she should have noticed first.
"Ocean! You live by the ocean!" She exclaimed running to the frameless glass façade and door eating three-quarters of the living and kitchen background wall and making Kyoko jump with the sudden shout.
Kyoko chuckled eventually and walked up to where she was standing to look at the beautiful landscape with her.
"Did you sleep well, Maria-chan?" she asked her.
"I slept amazing though I didn't know the jet lag could be that bad, I still feel tired" Maria said going from excitation to grumbling in a phrase.
"Then, what about keeping it light today?" Kyoko proposed. "I will have something to do where you can't go later in the afternoon but we can share some breakfast and then we'll go for a walk on the sand if you're up to it. And in the evening I can show you around the area surrounding directly the beach and I'll give you a tour of the city of San-Francisco in the next days"
Maria's eyes gleamed with delight.
"I would love that Onee-sama!" She cried out with enthusiasm.
Kyoko smiled at her.
"Let's eat for now then"
They were barely finished when Kyoko's phone rang and to Maria delighted it was Ren-sama enquiring about Onee-san and her. She heard Kyoko asking how come he was calling this soon knowing it should have been barely four in the morning right now and she could the hear the subdued grumbles through the phone of Ren-sama's voice saying he had been woken up by a sneaky friend sending a giggled.
It was going to be so much fun over here.
Looking at her phone in the morning hue of light, Maria felt happy right now.
She had spent the last few days alternating walking on the sand, discovering the surrounding nature and areas of the city with the help of her Onee-sama when she wasn't working. And later today, Onee-sama had promised, at Maria's request, that she would show her some of the coolest places of San-Francisco.
She would also get to meet some of Onee-sama's friends living here and really excited.
But the cherry of the cake was uncontestably the pictures she had managed to send to Ren-sama. There were only five of them so far but she could feel he was only asking for more because he couldn't bring himself to beg for mercy. She had called him yesterday while Kyoko was at one of her jobs and she definitively heard the delightful slightly tortured voice after her last picture attack.
Maria giggled sweetly.
Ren-sama is such a masochist…
How silly of him…
She was waiting patiently for Onee-sama to come back from some recording she apparently had so that the promising fun afternoon could begin. Maria didn't know you could have recordings for acting but again she supposed if some dialogues felt off when a director had shot a scene, it needed to be corrected and that could be a solution. She wanted to discover more of the beautiful city that she had yet to really see. Not that you could explore and know a big city in ten days but to discover where her Onee-san had lived and the places she had loved and still does were important to her.
Some hours ago,
She crossed past the heavy doors of the building in a rush, feeling possessed by what inhabited her. She walked through other doors, not caring, not seeing though some people did greet her in recognition. She was kind of regular here.
"New song?" A voice asked, reaching her over-focused mind and she nodded, not really consciously.
"Don't forget to give us the recording afterwards" Came as she left the voice behind.
She found a vacant studio and pushed inside. She needed to express what was inside. Needed to hear it. She didn't want to forget this moment. She wanted to engrave permanently those feelings. Here. In the open. On something. Anything.
In the sight of all but safely hidden for the one that really mattered.
She warmed up her voice and took a deep shuddering breath as she closed her lids allowing repressed things to unload, to pulse outside. As much as it had been ravaging her insides since that afternoon.
Lips unlocked to share the forbidden.
'It's tickling inside,
Paint is everywhere
You're laughing
It tickles inside
For each rumbling
& I can't help seeing the colours
& I can't help to feel this rainbow of life
As you carry me
Deep down I know it cannot be
Deep down is the grey and white reality
But it's tickling inside,
For each of his rumblings
Echoes of life
For each wave bubbling out
Paint is everywhere
Blue 'nd grey on our clothes, our bodies
& I can't help, can't help
To imagine the colours without the clothes
It's tickling inside and I feel alive
Drawing out the black and white,
The colours shine in my heart
It's tickling inside,
Wishing Ohhh…
For a second, wishing…Ohhh
It's tickling inside
But the colours disappear
As the door closes
Taking away the tickle of your laugh
The dance in my heart,
Taken away
It's tickling inside,
No more…'
(Song written by the author)
Chills run down her back as she evacuated the remains of her tension with the last wave of her deep clear voice breaking through and her lips closed again.
"No more" She whispered at last. She breathed in her feelings once more before rudely closing the door and opening back her eyes.
Kyoko pulled out a folded paper from her back pocket and scribed a title on music sheet.
Colours' painted
She went to the record side of the studio and put yet another song on a virgin disc.
The door opened at that moment and Laze appeared with a charming smile.
"I heard you were there again", he began, "You have no idea how glad I'm to see you are back with a new song. It's been a long time since the last one and as your contract stipulate, I can't even bring you back at my convenience as it's only when you are inspired because it isn't your job but an hobby originally. It's really frustrating you know He grumbled falsely.
Kyoko grimaced at having been caught. She was hoping to sneak by and sneak out as discreetly as possible. He was right. It hadn't ever been planned to be something that would of lucrative benefits. One day, she just rented a studio because she wanted a keepsake of what her feelings really were. For herself. She didn't find her voice especially entertaining. She was not a professional singer. Her voice was slightly more low-pitched and deeper than most women singers and a lot more than Japanese women singers. Only the Africans and Afro-Americans' voices were deeper still. Fortunately.
It was enough like that.
She had started getting used to record the songs she would have written as tokens of her inner turmoil for each time she had missed him or had went through an intense feeling concerning him or something that reminded her of him but unfortunately someone had heard her three years ago as she was singing another one.
And that person had loved it. That person had been Laze.
She had fought against him and refused any kind of compromise for a good year explaining she wasn't doing it to become a singer nor to be famous like that and that on the contrary no one could know she could sing.
But he had come with such a prefect contract, allowing to dissimulate who she was permanently if she wish, no picture of her on potential future cover of albums, accepting there wouldn't be any live and that she would be kind of a singer with a stage name just for it; that she hadn't been to refuse anymore.
He had been damn too sneaky and crafty about it and Kyoko still fustigated herself in remembrance of the time she had foolishly accepted.
Still, as long as he didn't know, all was good she supposed.
She greeted him and Laze reached out with a hand to her.
"Can I listen?" he demanded.
She sighed.
"Not finished?"
She shook her head and gave it to him with a weak mumble.
"It is"
He pulled back the disc in and the song started for them, an embarrassed hue creeping up on her face as her voice was heard. She was still half into the feelings; they were still shaking a little in her being, not clearly tamed yet.
Laze copied the song on a USB key once it ended and turned to her.
"It's marvellous. Really raw and yet bright" he told her.
She nodded, not looking at him and swearing to herself she would go to the reception to have his schedule so she could avoid bumping into him completely raw with feelings each time she wanted to let go of some steam. She would rather prefer sending it to him later whenever she would have created one than like that.
"I don't think I will want to change much about it" he said bringing her back in the present," Just send me which instrument you would rather see with it or do a record of with only the melody if you wish" Laze asked her and she agreed before explaining she needed to leave and that someone was going to wait for her.
Which was true, Maria was surely already waiting. But it was also a very valid excuse to escape this nosy producer. Damn man.
Thankfully she had now a little studio in her flat she could usually use to do it. Maria was there this time so she couldn't without risking unveil but in that case, it would be a relief once she could use her own studio again. Not that she didn't love to have Maria. She was very happy to spend some time with the young girl but despite her efforts, she hadn't managed to push aside the remaining brushes that time had let on the weak organ that was her damn heart so necessary measures had been unavoidable.
PS: Soooo…First of all, as said, the song is from me…I've taken the time to write it…I'm really happy with it personally. I had the concept for this part of the story from the very beginning. I always envisioned Kyoko as a potential singer but without it being absolutely a passion so…
I'm falling deeper and deeper into the pit of fanfiction…No return possible, I'm afraid.
I hope you will like the song and this chapter.
Kisses.
AUTHOR OUT.