Even though we arrived at the show’s venue—the school gym—twenty minutes early, it was already packed full of students. There was no need to worry about lack of space, considering that school-wide assemblies were held in that gym pretty regularly, but it was still a little shocking to see just how many people had shown up.
“Actually, is it just me, or is it nearly as packed now as it is for school assemblies?!” I exclaimed. Just looking out across the crowd had me worked up.
Koganezaki, on the other hand, seemed unperturbed. “This has been a rather hotly anticipated event,” she noted.
“Wait, really?”
“It baffles me that you—a member of the class putting it on—were somehow unaware of this, but of course it has. It’s a show starring a real-life idol and the Sacrosanct, aided by a publicity campaign tailor-made to fan the flames of everyone’s excitement. This is most certainly the must-see event of the festival’s first day. I’m to understand that most of the other classes’ offerings have been put on hold so everyone can come see it.”
“Whoooa...” I muttered. That’s Koganezaki for you. Always ready to lend a healthy helping of context!
“What’s ‘the Sacrosanct’?” asked Mio.
“Oh, right, you wouldn’t know!” I said. “Umm, so, a pair of girls are gonna be performing as idols with Makina, right? And ‘the Sacrosanct’ is basically a nickname for them, more or less.”
“They’re performing with Maki...? What sort of sadistic punishment is that?”
“Heh heh heh! I know what you’re thinking, and you’re way off base!”
For any ordinary high school girl, having to perform alongside a genuine top idol would, to use a sorta scary turn of phrase, be more or less equivalent to a public execution. Mio’s reaction was natural, especially considering how well she knew Makina as an idol. I, however, knew Yuna and Rinka well enough to very confidently declare that she was dead wrong!
Mio took one look at the grin on my face, then let out a little “hmm” in response. Oh. That means she doesn’t believe me, doesn’t it?
“Ah, Hazama!” a voice rang out.
“Mukai!” I exclaimed as I realized who it was. “Just look at this crowd! Isn’t it incredible?”
“I know! I’m just glad that I managed to find you,” Mukai replied with a slightly bashful smile. I had a feeling she might’ve been lingering near the gym’s entrance, waiting for me to show up.
“Hello, Mukai,” said Koganezaki.
“Oh, hi, Koganezaki! And, umm, is this...?” Mukai said as she glanced over at Mio.
“U-Umm, I guess she’s my friend, more or less,” I babbled, only for Koganezaki to cut me off.
“She’s the girl we discussed earlier. Ideally, she’ll accompany us to the second floor.”
“Oh, got it! That’s fine, of course!” said Mukai.
Huh? This conversation just took a weird turn. I wasn’t keeping up at all, but thankfully, Mukai decided to clue me in so I didn’t have to keep standing around in a befuddled daze forever.
“Koganezaki already told me about your situation,” said Mukai. “She said that you had a very important guest you had to bring to see the show. I didn’t know who that guest was...but I guess I was expecting her to be a little less, well, normal.”
“Oh! Koganezaki said so? I see...”
“That’s right! Only members of our class are allowed in the second-floor gallery, right? It’d be terrible if an audience member got too excited and fell over the rail, after all. That’s not a super strict rule, though, and when I asked around, everyone else said that it was totally fine as long as Koganezaki was vouching for her. She has a lot of clout, you know?”
“I get it now,” I said.
The Sacrosanct fan club, while not an official organization, was still one of the biggest groups at our school, and everyone knew that Koganezaki was its vice president. She actually felt a lot more like its leader than its actual president, Akksy, ever had. I’d heard that the fan club had been going through a bit of an uproar about whether or not Makina should count as part of the Sacrosanct ever since she transferred in, and the fact that that decision had ultimately been left in Koganezaki’s hands was a pretty clear sign of just how much respect its members held her in. Of cooourse, having that responsibility foisted onto her had led to Koganezaki going through a complete breakdown...but no way in heck would I let anyone hold that against her!
Anyway, it went without saying that a lot of kids in our class were in the Sacrosanct fan club. More than there were in most classes, actually, probably since all of us were exposed to Yuna and Rinka on a daily basis. In that sense, Koganezaki was an influential figure in the school at large, but especially in my class!
Woo! You go, Koganezaki! And it looks like you’ve been pulling strings to help me out behind the scenes too! Thanks so much! Love you, girl!
Thwack!
“Gyaaah?!”
“Your face was loud.”
My forehead! She flicked it! Again! Are forehead flicks, like, her thing these days?!
“We’d be glad to take you up on your generous offer,” said Koganezaki. “Let’s go, you two.”
“Hey,” said Mio, “can I flick you in the forehead next? I bet I could get a really nice sound out of you!”
“Please don’t,” I moaned. “This really isn’t the time or place for everyone to be flicking my head...”
“Can, umm... Can I try too?”
“Not you too, Mukai?!” Was the sound of Koganezaki’s flick just so satisfying, it turned my head into some sort of festival attraction?!
I decided—in no small part to keep my forehead from getting turned into a flicking bag—to hustle everyone along up the stairs to the second-floor gallery, where we found a spot that would give us a full-on view of the stage. I ended up clustered together with Mio, Koganezaki, Mukai...
“And me, indeed!”