One of these days, I want to respond to all of your reader's comments, but... I always end up posting when it's super late at night and I'm too tired.
Anyway... People who are following me on Tumblr know that I have two chapters of an Atsumina story up that I haven't posted here. I wanted to wait until I continued it before sharing it, and now that I've written the third chapter, here it is!
I tweaked a few things in the first two chapters to reflect the re-shuffle and the like, and said re-shuffle actually helped me make chapter three more believable... Not like I think it's possible anyway, but it's fiction, so whatever.
There will be drama ahead, but not too much in these three chapters. Chapter four is where things will start going to crap, chapters five and six are where I'll break your heart, and after that, I have no idea what's going to happen because I can't think of an ending
Oh, I also realized that the title makes no sense since I changed a few things around when I wrote chapter three. So please just ignore that
Second to Last
Chapter One
Even though it was the middle of summer, the sun had not yet risen when Takahashi Minami sat up in bed. She let out what was half a sigh and half a yawn before pressing her lips together in a frustrated expression and looking at the ceiling.
Exhaustion was nothing new to any of the AKB48 members, and many had even collapsed from it at one time or another, but this was different.
This wasn’t hours of rehearsals under bright lights or a hot sun. This wasn’t day after day packed with photo shoots, television recordings, and handshake events. In fact, the night before, she was graciously allowed to return home to her small apartment in Tokyo before midnight. “Rare” wasn’t a strong enough word to describe such an opportunity.
Her cell phone alarm had been set for 5:30am, but it was only a few minutes before 5 when she turned her head to gaze at the figure next to her, still peacefully asleep. Maeda Atsuko was curled on her side, facing Minami, her breathing slow and deep, lips twisted in a bit of a lazy pout. Unlike Minami, it didn’t seem that Atsuko was going to wake up any time soon.
Minami tried to smile, but she had too much on her mind. And with Atsuko being asleep, there wasn’t anyone to see her smile, anyway. She instead reached down to stroke Atsuko’s tussed hair, brushing the short strands away from her peaceful face, not receiving even the slightest of movements or acknowledgements to the action.
With an over-exaggerated jump (because when is Minami not over-exaggerated?) she hopped off of the bed and slid into the slippers next to the bed. Without any light, she couldnt tell if they were hers or Atsuko’s, but they wore the same shoe size, so it didn’t really matter.
After making sure to turn off the not-yet-rung alarm, she quietly shuffled her way out of the bedroom, returning an hour later. This time, she did turn on the light, and she sat on the side of the bed that Atsuko was facing.
“Hey, Atsuko?” Minami softly asked, poking the sleeping girl’s nose.
Atsuko’s face scrunched up for a brief moment before relaxing back into a peaceful expression.
“Atsuko?”
Not even a hitch of breath or a flutter of the eyelashes responded to Minami’s questioning voice. But of course, she had known Atsuko for long enough and had woke her up enough times to know that simple and subtle gestures wouldn’t be enough. In fact, even if the alarm would have gone off at 5:30, it was likely that Atsuko would continue sleeping long past the ringtone’s end.
But Minami wasn’t in the mood this morning to be overly energetic in waking her girlfriend, so she settled for tightly gripping Atsuko’s shoulders and shaking them a bit roughly.
A low groan echoed throughout the room, followed by a soft, “Minami?”
“It’s almost six,” Minami stated, causing Atsuko’s eyes to open wide. “Hey, hey, it’s okay.”
“Sorry. I overslept,” Atsuko apologetically winced.
Minami shook her head and reached down to hold Atsuko’s warm hand in hers. “I got up before the alarm, so it didn’t go off. You can sleep in a bit more, but I wanted to let you know that I’m leaving.”
Atsuko looked up at Minami’s tense profile and asked, “Are you nevous?”
“Just a little,” Minami forced out a bit too quickly to be honest. “It’s the same every year. You’re pretty lucky you don’t have to go through it anymore.”
“Yeah, I’m not jealous at all. I didn’t have to do it last year, either,” Atsuko agreed, finally letting go of Minami’s hand so that she could use both of her arms to push herself up enough to sit against the headboard.
Minami’s hands folded in her lap and she looked down at them, trying to keep her anxiety inside. And then, forcing a smile on her face, she quipped, “Well, my ranking hasn’t really changed each year, anyway. This year’ll just be the same as last year, so I’m not all that worried.” Before giving her girlfriend a chance to respond, she quickly followed up with, “You’ll show up later this afternoon to watch it, right?”
“Of course,” Atsuko nodded. “You think they’ll let me back afterwards to congratulate everyone?”
“I’ll make sure they do,” Minami responded. She then pulled her legs up off the floor and turned her body until she was kneeling on the bed next to her girlfriend. Leaning down slightly (something in which she took a momentary flash of pride, due to her height being somewhat lacking without this kind of advantage), she closed her eyes and placed a soft kiss on Atsuko’s lips before pulling back.
“Good luck,” Atsuko whispered.
Minami shook her head. “I’ll text you later to make sure you don’t sleep though it, okay?”
“I mean it,” Atsuko re-inforced her statement as Minami shuffled backwards off the bed. “I know you can’t do anything about it anymore, but still… Good luck.”
A deep breath and a nod was all the response Minami could give. Not wanting to miss her ride to the Budokan arena, she grabbed her cell phone off of the night stand and rushed out the door, checking her (empty) mailbox on the way.
Chapter Two
When Minami arrived at Budokan, a janitor working the night shift quickly let her in. The back halls of the arena were eerily empty, save for one other janitor at the far end of a hallway. She was the first person involved in the coming event to arrive at the venue, which was to be expected. It was still ten hours before the ceremony would begin. She found it was much easier to navigate the maze-like backstage when there weren’t hundreds of people shuffling around.
She soon arrived at a set of double doors, which she pushed open to allow herself to step onto the right side of the main stage. In just a few hours, the empty platform would be covered in various chairs, but no one had begun to set up yet.
After walking to the center of the stage, Minami sat down on, dangling her feet over the edge next to a small stairway leading from the arena floor to the stage. Even her view from here was empty. The normal theatre seats were fixed in place, but there was a vast empty space between them and the stage. Chairs would soon be set up there, too, in three large groups.
This would mark their fifth year holding these elections, wouldn’t it? She slouched a little, resting her head on her hands, which were supported by her elbows digging into her knees. She ranked fifth the first year, but she never managed to reach that rank or any higher rank since.
Atsuko had teased her about it, though. Just a few evenings ago, she had a few short hours free for dinner, so she went to her girlfriend’s apartment for dinner. With a bright smile, Atsuko had revealed her latest purchase, which was a stack of twenty copies of AKB48’s latest single.
“This makes twenty more votes for you,” Atsuko had stated. And it had only taken a few minutes to complete the short process.
Minami had responded to the support with a shake of her head and a, “Twenty votes isn’t gonna matter that much, you know.”
But Atsuko had just smiled wider and rose from her chair, walking over to her girlfriend and placing a hand on her cheek. “So? I wanted to do it. And…”
“And?” Minami had tilted her head to the side, pressing her cheek against the warm hand.
Licking her lips, Atsuko had responded, “I want something else.”
And when it came to Minami, Atsuko always got what she wanted.
But as warm as the memory was—and as warm as her cheeks flushed thinking about what Atsuko had wanted (and was given)—Minami knew Atsuko also wanted something that was most likely a bit out of reach. The twenty votes that were added to the large pool probably wouldn’t be enough to push her far enough up the rankings for that.
She closed her eyes for a very long time, thinking on the possible ways this day could play out. When she opened them again, she was surprised by a grinning face just a few centimeters from hers, and she shrieked, nearly falling off of the stage.
The culprit clapped her hands together a few times in glee before she ascended the rest of the short stairway to the center of the stage. Her toothy smile was nearly impossible not to recognize. Nor was the tall woman behind her, who swayed out of exhaustion as she slowly climbed the stairs, too.
“Yuko!” Minami gasped. “Don’t do that!”
Yuko just laughed again and plopped down next to Minami. “You looked like you were asleep. Acchan keeping you up late?” she teased.
“N-No!” Minami quickly responded, her cheeks growing red.
“Well, you certainly can sleep anywhere,” Yuko stated. “Just like this one over here. I was too nervous to even close my eyes all night, but she was snoring as soon as she fell on the bed!”
Yuko had gestured towards Haruna, who made an incoherent sound of protest, still too tired to make any noise that would have any sort of meaning.
And then, without waiting for Minami to make a response, Yuko continued, “Is Acchan coming to watch the big event?”
“Later,” Minami nodded.
“How many times did she vote for you?” Yuko grinned again.
Not wanting to make a big deal of it, Minami simply stated, “Twenty.”
“Well, even though I love her like crazy, I still wouldn’t vote for my Nyan-nyan even once!” Yuko declared. “Though… I guess it’s a little different, huh?”
Sometimes, they all forgot that Atsuko wasn’t in AKB48 anymore. She would sometimes come back for the bigger concerts and events, so they still saw her from time to time. It was only times like the small theatre shows or the shooting of AKBINGO when she was missed—and even when back when she had been in AKB48, there were times when she had been missing from those, too.
But the yearly senbatsu election made it much more definite. No one would be voting for Acchan, since she was no longer in AKB48.
Minami nodded.
“You know,” Yuko began with an oddly serious tone to her usually playful voice, “isn’t it about time you follow her?”
“Follow?” Minami blinked, but then after a few clueless moments, she realized what Yuko was implying. “You mean graduate?”
“I know how important AKB is to you,” Yuko stated. “But you’re twenty-two now. You wouldn’t have to follow all of the rules, and you’d be able to be with Acchan more.”
Shaking her head, Minami responded, “No. Acchan had the same idea, but I won’t. AKB is too important to me. And I still see her and… spend time with her, so it’s fine.”
Yuko jumped up from where she was sitting to wrap an arm around the nearly-sleeping-standing-up Haruna, before she grinned. “Just thought I’d suggest it, because I know you’d never think of it yourself! And it’d mean less competition on days like today.”
“If you’re talking competition, shouldn’t you be worried about your girlfriend, too?” Minami asked, turning around to face the other two.
Yuko poked Haruna’s stomach and slyly responded, “Oh, we have an agreement about that, don’t we, Nyan-nyan?”
Haruna sighed in response and shook her head in defeat. While she didn’t like seeming romantic with Yuko in public, she had stopped protesting, which really just added all the more reason to be publically “harassed”.
“An agreement?” Minami asked, her eyes wide. “Acchan and I never had anything like that…”
Haruna seemed to have woken up a bit, because she was able to say in a half-whine, “That’s because neither of you are perverts like Yuko.”
Minami’s face blushed a bright red again, because that statement wasn’t completely true, but she then busied herself with pulling her cell phone out of her pocket and checking her mail inbox again, which was unsurprisingly empty. However, what did surprise her was that it was nearing 10AM, which meant she really had fallen asleep while sitting on the stage.
“Hey, who all is here?” she asked the couple, interrupting Yuko, who was whispering to Haruna things which were most likely more than just inappropriate.
“Oh!” Yuko exclaimed. “Right. I actually was looking for you because our costumes were just wheeled into the first green room. None of the stylists are here yet, though. And I think I saw Mariko on her phone, probably getting ready to tweet about every little thing that happens today.”
Minami giggled. “She’ll be busy.”
Grinning in agreement, Yuko nodded before wiping the smile off of her face in an attempt to seem serious. Her sparkling eyes gave her true expression away, though. “So Great Short Commander Takamina, wanna go check out our green room?”
Minami pointed down to her shoes and insisted, “These heels add three centimeters! So I’m not the shortest one in AKB!”
“Last time you said that, a certain fresh lemon shot up to be taller than you, didn’t she?” Yuko teased.
“Ah, stop it!” Minami pouted, but she did get up from where she had been sitting, and followed Yuko and Haruna back to their green room.
Chapter Three
Minami had meant to text Atsuko before noon, but events just kept happening, and she never got the chance.
She had immediately changed into her dress upon arriving backstage, and after she was finished getting her hair and make-up done by the stylist, she was (also immediately) pounced upon by Mariko to take what seemed like a hundred photos to be put up on Twitter. And then, she was (also immediately) pulled over by a group of wide-eyed kenkyuusei so that they could fawn over her and ask her where their costumes were and where they were supposed to sit. The green room was quickly and without warning erupting into high-pitched teenage chaos.
So instead of texting Atsuko before noon, she instead received a text shortly after two, which she wouldn't even have noticed if not for a certain short squirrel who yelled across the room, "Oi, Takamina! I think your girlfriend is sexting you!"
Minami's eyes widened and she blushed furiously before stammering, "Wh-What are you talking about?"
"Oh, you know exactly what I'm talking about," Yuko grinned, holding up the cell phone which had received the message high above her head as Minami pushed through the crowd of taller girls to reach for it.
"Nyan-Nyan, here!" Yuko exclaimed, carefully tossing the cell phone to Haruna.
"Eh?!" Haruna's eyes widened as she saw the cell phone come towards her, but she managed to catch it against her chest. She looked at it in confusion before asking, "Isn't this Takamina's?"
Minami quickly reached out to Haruna before Yuko had a chance to answer, and successfully claimed possession of her captured cell phone. After pressing a few buttons, the new message came into view. While Yuko was correct in that the sender was Atsuko, it was definitely not a text of an indecent nature:
Minami~!
I woke up just now and thought of you. <3
I'll be on my way to se you soon.
Good luck!
Atsuko
While the message didn't convey any sense of romanticism, Minami still couldn't hold back a small smile. Despite the chaos and her own nerves, she was able to calm down just a little thanks to her girlfriend. She quickly deposited her phone back into her purse, immediately being bombarded with more questions and worries from the other girls.
An hour later, everyone was finally dressed and properly informed of the specifics for the evening's event, and Minami clapped loudly to get everyone's attention. While her efforts weren't exactly successful, she was at least able to alert a few of the others to her cause, and after a few shouts of: "Oi! The Supreme Commander wants our attention!" from a few pranksters (namely Mariko and Mii-chan), all 250+ girls made a long oval in the hallway, their fingers interlocked in a huddle, with Minami in the center of the formation.
Minami looked up and down the line, seeing a few faces she had known for eight years, and many faces which she had only seen once or twice at events like these. Intermixed were all the girls of AKB48, SKE48, NMB48, JKT48, HKT48, SNH48, TPE48, and Nogizaka46, plus dozens of kenkyuusei for each of the groups, and each pair of eyes were fixed on her, waiting for her direction and encouragement.
Pressing her lips together in a serious expression, she began:
"Today is our fifth yearly senbatsu election. Today, we are all nervous and worried about our rank. Some of you will rise, and some of you will fall. Some of you have never been here before, and some of our friends from years before are no longer here. But what makes up AKB48 is everyone who is here and everyone who has been here. Whether you make it to the senbatsu, whether you make it to the undergirls, whether you make it to the theatre girls, or even if you don't rank at all, you are an important person here. You have all done your best in this past year, and I know you will continue to do so as we strive towards new goals. And for those of you who do not rank, it's not a reason for you to be discouraged. There are still a lot of things about each of you that people don't know..."
Isn't it about time you followed her?
"...and it is you who will take the place of those of us who will not be here in the future."
A few of the girls gave Minami a surprised expression as a moment of silence fell over the group, but she was unable to say any more. She had performed this role many times before, but this year seemed different.
Thankfully, as Team A Captain right below her, Mariko continued for her, but she was too lost in her thoughts and nervousness to listen.
~~~
Even though AKB48 was a group which wouldn't function without even the least important members, this yearly event was always stressful and nervewracking. The years passing didn't make it any easier, either. Although Minami had experienced this pressure four years in a row, with more and more publicity and responsibilty and responsibilty each year, it actually became worse each year, not better.
She knew that everyone agreed with her. Despite her speech before they all filed out to the floor and were seated, she knew that she didn't make so much as a crack in anyone's nerves. This was only made worse by all of the events that had transpired since the last election, which threw all of the previous rankings, what they knew and could mentally prepare themselves for, completely out the window.
Putting aside Atsuko's graduation, which had also undeniably affected the election in the previous year, there were still factors that would make the chain of results unpredictable. The huge reshuffle announced at Tokyo Dome shook everyone's confidence, switching around who was shining at the front of the teams, leading from the sides, or even fading away from their former places in the spotlight. With the reshuffle including the assignments overseas, it had been particularly harsh on the popularity of the girls transferred away from the main groups in Japan. But how much of an impact would that have in the end? Each of the girls already had a following from before.
And then there were smaller, yet still numerous, individual achievements and setbacks. A few scandals had rocked the groups since the previous election, and in contrast, Minami had made her solo debut. This would certainly shake the results even further.
Of course, preliminary results had been announced, so they had some basis to form expectations on, but these results could still widely change before arriving at the official announcement in just a few hours. In Minami's case, specifically, she was slated at fourth place, behind Oshima Yuko, Watanabe Mayu, and Kashiwagi Yuki, the top three from the year before.
As she was lost in her thoughts, the lights dimmed and the event began. She could clearly see the painted portrats of Atsuko and Yuko on the back wall of the stage, the previous first place rankers, and a large number of chairs lined up on the ste stage in front of them. But her eyes dwelled on the portrait of her girlfriend, knowing she was somewhere in the large audience behind her.
With that thought in mind, the hours slowly crawled by, as one after another, girls were called forward in accordance to their ranking to be given a plaque and allowed to give a speach of thanks and the will to rise higher. The seats around Minami grew more and more empty as the stage gained more and more occupants, until only ten spots were remaining. She didn't have to look around to know who was yet to be called that would take their positions in those remaning ten chairs.
And then, the names were announced.
At tenth, Kasai Tomomi.
At ninth, Itano Tomomi.
At eighth, Matsui Rena.
At seventh Kojima Haruna.
At sixth, Matsui Jurina.
It was as if time had stopped and sped up at the time moment. At each ranking, a different girl was revealed at that spot, and she expected to hear her own name instead. It was at those moments when time would speed up as she dreaded the announcement. Then, when her name was skipped over in favour of another's, time would stop as the recipient of the rank would take the solitary walk up the stairs to the stage to accept the place they were assigned. The speeches grew more personal; tears flowed more freely, and Minami's pride in each of her members rose, but she still found her hands involuntarily clenching into fists, her long fingernails digging into her palms, as she waited longer and longer to hear her name.
At fifth, Kashiwagi Yuki.
At fourth, Shinoda Mariko.
At third, Watanabe Mayu.
Which left Minami in a one-on-one battle with the previous year's winner, a duel she could never have predicted and one she couldn't quite say she wanted, either. Everyone had a selfish wish to be the center, sure, but as the leader, to take that away from someone who also deserved it made her feel a little sick. To her, everyone in the top ten before her had just as much of a right to be in her place, battling against Oshima Yuko. What could Yuko be thinking right now, as the Camptain and Ace of Team K went up against the Captain of all of them?
And what was Atsuko thinking? She, too, had been in this position three times before, knew the pressure and the self-doubts. During the elections before, when these top positions had been announced, Minami had been nervous for Atsuko's sake in addition to her own, but things were different with their positions and the times...
At second, Oshima Yuko.
Minami's hands shot to her face in shock, and it seemed as if the entire arena gasped along with her. Her fingers touched damp skin, which brought to her attention that she was crying. While that was admittedly pretty common, she hadn't even noticed the tears streaming down her face. How long had she been crying? Where they tears of joy, or...?
But she didn't have time to think, didn't have time even to breathe or blink. She had no hopes of collecting herself or calming down, because she heard a faint echo, seemingly from far away, rattle through her ears.
At first, Takahashi Minami.
---
Btw, I know Togasaki does the “From Team such and such with so many votes”, too, but notice these aren’t quotes, so I don’t have to worry about that. ;-)
Topic: Calyrica's Atsumina Offerings~ Update: 11/15/12 (Read 25612 times)