The place where we spent time together.
It had to be romantic, clean, luxurious, perfect.
This is why I had my father build the salon for me immediately after I revived the club two years ago. It has my favorite antique furniture. Curtains and matching carpets in the color of my choice. Soundproof walls to keep our secrets. A complete kitchen for an all-out afternoon tea. An extensive library of rare books that reflect my professor’s tastes.
We talked in the salon until we were tired of speaking. We cherished each other. And made love with insatiable passion.
The Literature Club was merely camouflage for our affair. I had no plans to invite any other members besides Sayuri. I wanted the salon to be a space where the professor and I could nurture our love without any intruders.
But it wasn’t enough.
Something was missing.
The salon was my castle. It was a space with everything I could want, built just for me. And yet, it wasn’t enough. What else could I want?
Everytime I closed the salon door behind me after a “council” with the professor, that was all I could think about.
✦ ✦ ✦
As we nurtured our love, the seasons changed and I became a second-year student.
It was a dazzling spring. I leaned over the balustrade on the terrace and stared down at the courtyard. After the salon, the terrace was my second favorite place at the academy. From there I could see all kinds of girls: girls reading on the lawn, girls eating their lunches, girls lying on the grass and chatting, girls playing badminton. They had such lovely faces. Bodies bursting with vivacity and glittering with youth.
We are beautiful.
Everything about high school girls is beautiful—our long, straight hair, our supple skin, our sparkling eyes, our soft lips, our dainty shoulders, our voices as sweet as a gentle breeze, our nearly-ripe bodies on the cusp of maturity.
I am fully aware, however, that I am lovelier than the others by far. And because my father is the chairman, this academy’s students and teachers acknowledge my superiority at once.
We only have the privilege to be high school girls for three short years—a magical time protected by our campus and our uniforms. Once we graduate, our existence is no longer particularly special. Once we leave the sanctuary of a girls’ high school, the magic instantly vanishes.
My first year flew by in the blink of an eye. With only two years left, a small sense of impatience foamed at the bottom of my heart.
At least while I am here, I want to be the lead.
If I can’t be the star, then no one else can.
I have to shine more brightly than everyone else.
Then, it dawned on me. I realized what was missing from the salon: the supporting characters I need to glorify my story.
Sidekicks. I had to choose them wisely.
The real thrill of being the main character comes from taking people beautiful and intelligent enough to lead a story on their own, but forcing them into the role of a sidekick. So I couldn’t pick just anyone.
Who would be a good sidekick for me?
I wanted a tough, intelligent, and attractive girl—and suddenly, the face of an underclassman popped into my mind.
Shiyo Takaoka. After winning a prize for her light novel in junior high, she not only gained a lot of attention from our school, but also from the whole country. She was not only skilled, but also meticulous and chillingly alluring. When the press came to campus, the principal and nuns curtly turned them away, but take just one step outside the academy gates and you would see them: a mob of paparazzi lying in wait, cameras and microphones at the ready.
I decided to move in on Shiyo Takaoka.
✦ ✦ ✦
Seize people’s secrets, and you will command their actions.
Since I was young, this was what my father had lived by. He uses this technique in both his private life and career, and it is why his businesses are so successful.
I wanted to know Shiyo’s secret.
And by sheer coincidence, my wish came true.
At first, though I studied her, Shiyo didn’t seem to have any notable problems in school or at home. At the time, she had just announced the next installment of the Kimikageso series and was becoming enormously popular.
Hmph, so I guess Shiyo doesn’t have anything to hide, I’d thought to myself, about to give up.
At the same time, I was also in contact with a pen pal from our sister school in France. Our academy lets us communicate with students at our sister schools across the globe. My pen pal asked if I’d read anything interesting lately, so I told her about Kimikageso and sent her a copy.
She then told me that a very similar short story had been published many years ago, and proceeded to translate it into English and send it to me. When I read it, I was shocked. The content of the two texts wasn’t just similar, it was identical.
So I’d found it. Shiyo Takaoka’s secret. And, oh, how vile it was.
✦ ✦ ✦
“Hey, Shiyo.” One day, after school, I approached her as she was packing up her things.
There was no one else in the classroom. The rays of the setting sun spilled in through the window, casting shadows of the desks and our two figures on the linoleum floor. Shiyo was surprised. It was the first time I’d ever spoken to her.
“Hey, do you know this novel?” I held up a printout of a book review from a regional French newspaper. In the light from the sunset, her face suddenly paled.
“Th-That’s…” Shiyo stammered, her voice hoarse.
“I was surprised how similar it was to your book. You probably figured you wouldn’t get caught if you just kept it from being translated.”
“I…never thought I’d win the prize! When I lived in France, I heard someone describing that story, I never even read it. Then when I was writing my piece for the contest, I remembered it and then, before I knew it…Since everyone made such a fuss after I won, how could I say anything?”
“But I don’t think they’d forgive plagiarism, do you?”
“Please don’t tell anyone. I beg you.” Shiyo trembled. “I’ll do anything,” she begged, tormented with fear. Her gaze was desperate. I was consumed with the pleasure of knowing that I now controlled her fate.
Money alone will never get you that power. Devotion. Faith. Total subordination. As long as I knew her secret, I could take anything from her that I wanted.
“All right. This is a secret between me and you,” I told her.
Shiyo looked up at me with surprise. Her eyes were rimmed red with tears. Another surge of pleasure ran down my spine.
“I’m the president of the Literature Club. Would you like to join?”
“H-Huh?” She looked perplexed. “Yes, yes. Of course. I’d love to. But…why?”
“I want you to stay by my side. How does that sound?”
Shiyo nodded frantically. She must have thought it was a small price to pay if it would cover up her plagiarism.
She must have had no idea how uncomfortable and miserable being a sidekick would be. She had no clue how much it would wear down her soul.
This brainy schoolgirl had become my puppet. She would stay near me, laughing and crying as I told her to. From that point on, she would speak the lines I wanted her to utter and follow the stage directions I provided.
I had obtained my first sidekick.
After Shiyo became a member in the second year of its revival, club activities went into full swing. The academy, Mr. Hojo, and my father, who was the sponsor of the Literature Club, were all satisfied by Shiyo’s addition to the club and by the fact that our activities were really picking up. I also began to realize how interesting literature was. I spent the days I couldn’t see the professor reading and experiencing the worlds of his favorite books. I thought of him as I wrote poems and stories. Sayuri and Shiyo critiqued my work, which turned out to be meaningful, even enjoyable, in its own way.
But I derived my most intimate joy from knowing that Shiyo, the girl who had captured everyone’s attention, was fearfully inquiring about my health, rejecting all television appearances and magazine interviews, waiting on me in the salon, and doing every little thing she could to serve me to the fullest.
This was completely different from the relationship between my father and his maids. In the unique environment of an all-girls high school, in the castle I had built myself, I had a servant who lived only for me.
The sidekick added a splendid dimension to my story. It was only natural that I’d want a second one.