Chapter 22 of 35
I should have technically been excited to have a day off on a week day. There was nothing to film, nothing to practice, no meeting with any authorities. I was completely free, but I was still miserable because that just meant I'd have more time to brood on my own.
I woke up at ten in the morning, and after a quick shower and breakfast, I decided I had to get out. I needed to go and do something that would distract me.
I would go shopping. It would be therapeutic. I ignored all thoughts in my head, and I surprised myself by becoming so involved in my shopping that I forgot about Aya for a few hours.
This was bad, though, because I immersed myself in my shopping with such aggression and concentration that I ended up buying too many things. I spent a lot of money. Far too much.
I got home at half past five and dropped my bags in my room. I didn't have the energy to go through them. I went and fell onto my couch lazily, grabbing the remote control and turning the TV on. Nothing interesting was on, so I left a variety show on for background noise.
I thought back to what Yossi had said to me. I'd been dragging everyone down? I hadn't realised. How could I be such a key factor in the mood of the entire group? I tended to keep to myself and I was serious about my work. I gulped at what a bad situation I was in. I was apparently so far gone that I didn't even notice my behaviour. I had to be told by an outside person that I was basically being a pest.
If you have issues that you need to work through, you'd better work through them. Either that, or call it quits, Yossi had said to me.
How could I work through them? I had to make Aya hate me, and as that happened, I grew more and more depressed. But it was the only way. There was no other way to do it than to be depressed. If I forgave her, then... then...
I couldn't remember. What would happen if I forgave her? We'd make up and maybe be able to be friends again. I wouldn't be so depressed. We could both be happy.
For about twenty seconds, I wondered what the hell I was doing trying to make Aya hate me. What was that going to accomplish? Was I momentarily insane when I thought up that plan?!
I covered up the feelings by reminding myself that I was doing this to protect myself from getting hurt again in the future. She didn't deserve my trust anymore. She'd trample all over me again if I let her in too close.
I shook my head and sighed angrily out loud. It felt like there was a traffic jam in my head. I needed someone to come and help me sort it all out. The only person who could have helped me before was Aya. I couldn't ask for her help.
I turned my attention to the TV. I'd spent so much time thinking that it was just past six o'clock and new TV programs were starting. I flipped through the channels.
"Koalas!!"
I jumped up in delight, dropped the remote on the floor, and then bent down to pick it up. Unfortunately I had forgotten to steady myself and I slipped, doing a face-plant on the floor. I didn't stop there because the rest of my body needed somewhere to do. As luck, angles, and celestial forces would have it, my body went up and over. My final resting position after my somersault was on my back, staring up at my ceiling.
"OWWW!" I yelled to nobody but myself.
I got up and pouted, rubbing my head and my shoulders. I grabbed my remote and looked at it angrily. It looked like it was laughing at me.
"You think you're so funny, huh?" I said out loud to it. "Well you're not!"
I stuck my tongue out at the inanimate object and sat back on the couch.
I had a secret from everyone: I loved animals with a passion. I watched documentaries and read books about them. Whenever we did any work with animals, I was always at my happiest. Sometimes I thought that I liked animals more than most humans. They made me happy, and whatever mistakes they made were forgivable due to the whole "animal nature" thing. They were lucky. We weren't able to use that excuse to such an extent.
The documentary playing was going to show highlights from an observation of a family of koalas over the course of two years. I recognised the names of the observers. They were very famous in the biological anthropology circle in Japan. It was my dark, embarrassing secret that I followed their work. I mostly just liked to watch their documentaries or look at the photos in their books, but I'd inevitably picked up on some familiar names and terms over the years.
The only person who knew my secret was Aya. She'd known for a long time that I loved animals, but a few weeks ago in Kobe, I'd told her how much of a geek I was about them. How I went to the library and looked through the National Geographic magazines and used the computer to look up information on good places in the world I could travel to in order to see as many animals as possible. In fact, it was one of the reasons why I wanted to learn English so much. If I could become comfortable in English, I could go almost anywhere in the world and observe different animals.
I felt happy for the first time in quite a few days. I forgot entirely about the name "Aya" and any bad thing that had happened to me lately. I ran quickly to my room to get some paper and a pen, and I settled down in front of the TV to watch and take notes.
One page of notes and thirty-five minutes later, the doorbell rang. As that happened, a commercial break started up. I bit back an annoyed growl and I quickly shoved my notes under a pillow. I couldn't let anybody catch me taking notes on an educational program on TV.
I walked over to the door quickly, hoping that the visit would be thirty seconds long. 'No, I don't want to join the Society of Jesus, but thanks anyway', or 'I take part in NHK's Kouhaku every year. Why do I have to pay for the service?' would be short and polite answers, wouldn't they?
I opened the door.
The word "Aya" suddenly had meaning once again. I hadn't expected her to come all the way to my place to see me. What did she want? I retreated into my shell and stared her down.
"Are you busy?" she asked.
I need to watch my koalas! my mind screamed desperately.
"Yes," I said.
At least I was being honest, if not polite. She then looked over my shoulder.
"Watching something good?"
I broke out into a cold sweat. I didn't want her to see what I was watching. I didn't want to show any weak side of myself to her. Loving cute, fuzzy animals was weak.
"What do you want?" I asked her quickly. I wanted her to say something so that I could have an excuse to kick her out. She squared her shoulders off and I had a sinking feeling that this would take a while.
"I need to talk to you because it's very unfair how I haven't had a chance to explain anything. I know that I was supposed to say brilliant things to convince you to let me have a chance, but I really have nothing. I'm not a brilliant person when it comes to matters of you, so you're going to have to put up with that," she said in her determined tone of voice. "Right now I want five minutes. If you have no interest after that, you can kick me out - literally if you want - and I'll never ever bother you again for your entire life."
She sounded serious. She sounded like if I didn't give her those five minutes, she'd kick my butt.
Strangely enough, I wasn't worried about that. I was mostly worried about getting her out of my apartment as quickly as possible so that I could watch my program in peace. I debated what to do and then decided that a few minutes wouldn't hurt. It's what I really wanted. I couldn't resist. I let her in and moved off to stand a few metres into my apartment. She took her shoes off and we stood facing off at the entrance of my home. I had my usual blank expression on. I wanted to make her a little uncomfortable.
She, however, was the one making me uncomfortable. She looked behind me and I thought she might burst into laughter. I heard the narrator of the documentary start up again, and I bristled up slightly in embarrassment.
"So talk," I said loudly to remind her I was standing in front of her.
She looked scared and then focused on her words.
"Miki, I lied to you, but only once. Only about one thing. Nothing else. Ever," she said firmly.
I didn't change my expression, but inside, a storm ripped through my innards and tore everything apart as I questioned her statement.
"And I did it because I didn't want to cause you any concern or pain. I didn't know how to tell you what I was thinking," she continued. "I wasn't exaggerating when I told you I feel insecure around you. You put me up on this pedestal that I can't possibly get down from, so I try to be perfect in order not to disappoint you. I'm afraid to be less than that because then you'd see through me and stop liking what you see."
"That's absurd, Aya. You don't have to act perfect. To me you're just as good when you mess up as when you're faultless," I said.
I didn't mean to really compliment her, but it was hard not to. I wanted to, but it was also the simple truth. She was perfect even when she wasn't. My mind screamed out for an opportunity to push her away.
"Then why are you so angry at me if you know I'm not perfect? Why is it that I make one mistake - I withhold some information from you - and suddenly I'm a monster?"
I wanted to scream at her to stop trying to confuse me and recognise the wrong things she'd done. Instead, I answered her question.
"I told you already before. You stopped trusting me. It wasn't just that you didn't tell me you wanted to leave H!P," I said.
It wasn't the result. It was the means. Or some sort of thing like that. It didn't matter what information it was she was withholding. It was the act of withholding it that mattered. The trust had disappeared.
And she finally looked guilty. She looked down at the floor. I didn't smile. I felt that I should smile in order to make myself an even more vile character, but I couldn't bring myself to do it. I just wanted to touch her shoulder and tell her to sit down so that we could talk more comfortably.
"That's not really how I meant to come off sounding..." she trailed off.
"Yeah? Well you did."
"It's not what I meant."
I laughed in my head. This was going nowhere. Maybe it would be better to just kick her out. I couldn't keep up this charade any longer. In all honesty, I didn't know what I wanted. I wanted her to be sorry. I wanted her to realise what she'd done to me. I wanted her to hate me. I wanted to hate her. I wanted to scream at her and then touch her hand and tell her to never hurt me like that again. Make her promise.
"Is this going to go around in circles? 'Cause we could stay here all night and argue back and forth like this, but it's not going to fix anything," I sighed bitterly.
I'd forgotten all about the koalas. When Aya was in the scene, everything else became a secondary concern.
"So what will? What will fix everything? If I tell you that you can trust me without a single doubt, will it make things better?"
Yes.
"If I tell you that I'll never keep something like that from you again, will you stop hating me?"
I don't hate you.
"If I tell you what I've told you before - that you mean so much to me - will it all be okay?"
Yes.
"Will you believe me?"
Yes!
I wanted to answer her questions, but nothing came out of my mouth. I was still struggling to figure out what was best. Make her hate me and depress myself for life... Make her like me again and get hurt again... Or maybe I could make her like me again and somehow not get hurt. Yossi told me to solve the problem. What was the best way??
"Don't ask me something like that," I said shakily and quietly.
I couldn't come to a decision this quickly. I wasn't smart enough to do it on my own.
"Why not?" Aya demanded of me.
"Just don't," I repeated, getting angry.
"Miki, why not? I want to know."
She just had to say my name. She had to let my simple name pass out of those perfect vocal chords of hers, through her perfect neck, and out of her perfect lips. I hadn't looked at her closely in a while and my heart was starting to ache because I was remembering all the things I was missing. If I wasn't careful, I was going to forgive her and quite possibly try to drag her into my room to make up for all that lost time.
"I think you should go," I said quickly, getting ready to usher her out before I did anything I would regret.
She was about to fight it, but she gave in quietly.
"Well, thanks for listening to that much."
She sounded so disappointed. She backed away and went to the door. I let myself frown as I followed her closely to the door. I didn't have any reason to follow her so closely. She bent down to slip on her shoes and I stared at the door. It was unlocked. She could easily make her own way out. But no. I had to be there to let her out. She straightened up and was about to open the door when she whipped around to face me again.
"Just tell me why. Please," she pleaded.
I looked into her eyes and all that I could see was pain and sadness. All this hurt that I had caused her by being mean.
Perhaps it was my nature, a special Fujimoto Miki nature, but I couldn't let her go. Not that easily. I needed her by my side to make me normal.
"Because I don't hate you," I rasped out before that stupid side of me tried to say something rude. "And because if you say those things to me, I have no choice but to believe you."
Instead of looking happy, she looked confused. I was offended. Hadn't I just said something she wanted to hear?
"I don't understand. Then why did you say those things to me the other day? Why did you insult my entire character if you don't hate me? Why are you so quick to change your mind?"
Oh. That's what she didn't get. How could I explain what I had been thinking? How could I ever ask her to forgive me for my outburst? I couldn't. I couldn't dare ask. But I could try to explain, if that's what she wanted. I didn't know where to start.
"I didn't- I didn't mean them," I admitted. "You made me say them."
It was cryptic, but I didn't realise that she couldn't quite read my mind. She looked shocked. I had to explain it all.
"I don't see-" she started, but I cut her off.
"Aya," I started, knowing that once I finished my first sentence, there was no turning back. "I love you more than air or water or whatever. More than myself. I don't want to tell you that too much because it's weird and creepy and you can't possibly feel the same way even if you say you do."
I watched her eyes carefully. They were wide, almost in wonder. And when I told her that I loved her that much, something flashed in them. I didn't know if it was good or bad. I just hoped that if it was bad, it wasn't too bad.
"So when you hurt me, it's like I die. I don't like dying..." I continued sadly.
I couldn't look at her anymore because I felt too bad. I looked down at the floor between us.
"I said those things because I wanted to hate you. I thought by saying them, I could believe them. And maybe you'd hate me for talking to you like that. Then it would be easier to learn to hate you. Then if I hated you, I wouldn't care so much if you hurt me. And then I thought that I'd no longer have to cut off or at least suppress any part of me that you didn't like or that wasn't useful."
I kept my eyes on the ground. I didn't want to see her reaction. She was probably very angry at me for doing that to her.
"I don't hate any part of you. All your personalities, all your sides, are what make you you. And... I like you," Aya said.
I heard her perfectly clearly. She didn't hate me. She didn't hate any part of me. How was that possible? Not even I could stand everything about myself.
"I don't see how you can," I mumbled.
She must have been being nice. She must have felt sorry for me. There was no other reason to speak like that.
I felt my shirt being grabbed, and I panicked. Maybe she was changing her mind and was about to beat me up (or try). It was a silly thought, but I had lost all sense of judgement.
"Even that stupid part of you that makes you say dumb things like that. Even that part I like," Aya said firmly to me.
"That's the part I can't stand," I whispered with a wince.
I tried to pull away.
"I say things at bad times and ruin things. I can't control it. I'm unreliable."
"Then you should learn to trust and like yourself before trying to trust me," Aya suggested in a soft tone.
I looked at her to see if she was mocking me. She wasn't. She looked absolutely serious.
Learn to trust myself? I thought. Of course I already trust myself.
"I trust myself," I echoed my thoughts.
Aya shook her head slowly.
"I don't think you do..."
My eyes widened open in despair. Was she right?
Maybe she was...
I looked right at her, not trying to hide any of my feelings anymore. They poured out through my eyes and I finally understood something - I didn't trust myself enough.
She let go of my shirt and I breathed in deeply. I'd stopped breathing for a while.
Aya started to talk about my past. How I'd been a soloist and how I'd been let down and put into a group. How I'd lost my confidence, how I'd been held back by a bunch of fifty-year-old men in suits.
I thought back to the time when everything was new for me. TV performances, concerts on a real stage, talk shows, private rehearsals... I'd felt like I was on top of the world back then. Then I thought of when they'd suddenly announced my joining Morning Musume. I'd cried in secret. I'd even called up Aya and ranted for hours about it. Eventually I'd swallowed it down like a painfully enormous pill and gone with the flow, and I somehow ended up enjoying it (or convincing myself I enjoyed it) more than being a soloist. I'd forgotten the happiness I'd originally had and replaced it with another, maybe lesser happiness.
I stared right back into Aya's eyes as she psychoanalysed me on the spot. I couldn't protest because she sounded like she was right.
"Do you really believe that? Do you believe that you're not good enough? Do you let it get to you whenever you say or do or decide things? Do you question every move you make because some people didn't need another soloist in their company a few years ago?"
I didn't answer for a long time. I didn't want to answer because then I'd be admitting something scary to myself - that my life the past few years hadn't been as great as I'd thought.
"Yes," I said hollowly.
Admitting it to myself hurt more than admitting it to her.
"Don't. Don't let them convince you that you're anything less than outstanding," Aya said angrily to me.
My natural instinct was to protest, so I tried. She cut me off.
"Miki, what happened to that overconfident, funny, stubborn soloist that I met? Was she defeated by a change of situation?"
I told her no, but that I didn't think about it. Then she told me to start thinking about it.
"If you don't believe in yourself, as stupid and cheesy as that sounds, then you can't believe in other people. Not properly, at least. It's fake. And if you don't like yourself, then you can't like others properly."
I thought about it. How could I have not noticed? How could I have tried to give myself to her when I didn't even understand myself? As a result, I acted so foolishly when there was a misunderstanding, which led to me saying all those hateful things to her...
"I'm sorry," I apologised, looking at the floor again.
"Don't apologise to me for it. Just be-"
"No, not about that," I said, shaking my head.
Again, she wasn't a mind reader. I'd jumped from Point A to Point C without explaining Thought Process B.
"I mean for yelling at you last week and... saying those things and just being... really rude to you."
Part of me didn't want her to forgive me. I felt so bad that I thought she should be angry at me for a long time to come because I didn't deserve any better.
"Just promise me that you'll try and let the past be the past and learn to trust yourself," Aya said quietly, her voice full of something that sounded like forgiveness.
It made me feel warm again, hearing that voice from her. I relaxed a bit. One of her charm points was that she relaxed me - disarmed me - completely with that exact tone of voice. I never knew if she knew that particular tone worked like a charm on me and therefore used it, or if it was just the kind of tone that came out naturally when she spoke with me. Nevertheless, it worked. I looked up at her
"It might take some time," I said honestly, unsurely.
She reached out a hand and touched my hair. I wanted to cry because she hadn't done that to me in far too long.
"You have plenty of that."
No, I told her. "Life's too short."
I didn't have nearly enough time on Earth to live. Even if I lived until I was over one hundred, I would never have enough time to do everything I wanted to. More importantly, it wasn't enough time to figure out how to tell Aya everything I wanted to or to do all the fun or simple things with her that I wanted to do.
"Mmm. Maybe," Aya conceded. "But there's no sense rushing through it and messing up everything when you can take it slow and get everything right."
I felt my lips curve up in a small smile. I guess that made sense. If I lived till I was three thousand and did and said all those things poorly, it wouldn't be worth it. I wanted to get it all right, even if I couldn't finish it.
I felt Aya's hand run through my hair and then touch my cheek. I became a little dizzy because I wasn't sure what she was doing. Two weeks was a long time. Maybe she also felt some sort of uncontrollable urge. She put her hand on my shoulder and drew her face to mine, and I think I gulped a lump of nervousness down. I watched her move a bit to the left, and she then planted a kiss on my cheek. She drew back with a calm expression on her face, taking her hand away from my shoulder so that no parts of us were touching at all.
I looked at her and tried to figure out what she was thinking. It seemed like a final kiss. Like this would be our last meeting ever. And there I had been thinking that things were going to be okay between us. Then she went and did something confusing like that.
Then right before my eyes, she winked. Winked and smirked. That was her silly, 'chill out' face. The face she made whenever she told me not to worry about something small and trivial. The face conveyed to me that everything was okay and that I should not look on the dark side. With that look, I knew that she wasn't saying goodbye. I wasn't quite sure what she was saying, but it wasn't the worst thing I could think of.
"Best friends, right?" she asked brightly.
Best friends? Really? But what about anything else? Did that include everything, or was it just regular best friends, the kind that good friends all around the world claimed to be?
No. No more. I could tell that we weren't back to where we were a few weeks ago. We were back to a pre-Kobe level. In all honesty, that was disappointing. I couldn't just stop my feelings for her. I couldn't look at her without remembering what she felt like and how she touched me - my heart and my skin.
But wait, I thought. She's right. We had to cut that part out because I wasn't ready for it. I knew that she also wasn't ready. I wasn't entirely to blame, but I did have more issues to work through. Issues about myself. She could help me, but I had to make the biggest effort.
"Yeah," I agreed.
We were best friends. We'd just gone through some hellish times and things still weren't entirely okay between us, but our job as best friends was to work through it in a civilised, rational manner. I had to quit with my hypersensitive, paranoid way of thinking and she had to stop holding back important things about herself that were okay to tell just to me.
I smiled at her, this time bigger and happier. She smiled back.
"Well, I'll get going now," she said, and my heart sank.
I'd thought she'd stay and that we could talk. I could skip a koala documentary if it meant getting to talk to her.
"Oh, okay," I said out loud, trying not to show my disappointment.
"Yeah, it's getting late. I'd better prepare for tomorrow," she said with a hint of nervousness in her voice.
It could have just been my hope, but something made me think she also didn't want to leave. She ended up taking off, though. We said goodbye to each other, and we agreed that we should get together soon to talk. I let her out and watched her walk down the hallway until she turned the corner, not looking back at any point. I closed the door quietly and rested my forehead against it.
I hadn't succeeded in my mission of making her hate me. I was glad because I didn't want to ever have to hate her back.
For the first time in years, I felt inspired. Truly inspired. Aya was on my side. She believed in me. If she could believe in me, I could believe in myself, too. I could make myself better and stronger. It wouldn't just be an act anymore. I'd outshine my current self.
I had forgotten what self-respect was. I demanded respect from everyone around me, but I never gave myself any. But now that I was remembering the past, I could feel that confidence coming back. It wasn't an instantaneous thing, but I could almost taste it, it was so close. I had forgotten that it was there. I could see that it wouldn't be too hard to get it back.
I locked my door and walked away from the door, back to the couch. The koala documentary was in its final moments. The narrator was making a conclusion. I smiled and watched the last minute, turning off the TV when it was done. I sat on my couch and looked through my notes. They were messy and mostly just doodles. But I liked to think of myself as having some sort of deeper layer that nobody (except Aya) knew about. I picked up my pencil and it hovered over the paper, wondering why I had an intense desire to write something.
I let my hand go naturally. A-YA. I wrote out her given name neatly at the top of the page. I drew a very poor smiley face beside it.
And then I put the paper down and went to prepare dinner.