Rumi’s pulse begin to race. Reflexively, she took a step back. Then another. As if following her, the figure stepped out of the shadows, suddenly revealed by the slash of sunlight. It was a man. She could tell that he was wearing a T-shirt and jeans, but his face was harshly backlit and impossible to discern.
For a moment, Rumi wondered if he was the assistant director. But an AD would have given some kind of greeting—and besides, the green room was for talent; an AD had no particular business loitering there.
Again, Rumi asked, “Who are you? What are you doing here?”
The man muttered something deep in his throat.
“Tell me your name!” Rumi demanded, as bravely as she could muster. “If you don’t, I’ll call for help.” She knew that an approach that confrontational might jolt the man to attack. She tensed her muscles, ready for the worst.
Remaining silent, the man approached her on unsteady, drunk-like steps.
Rumi held a hand to her mouth, to keep her scream bottled up inside.
The man staggered closer. He waved a scrap of paper at her. On instinct, she took it.
He bobbed his head at her, then turned on his heels. The next moment, he was fleeing out the emergency exit. The metal door slammed shut behind him.
The hallway went dark.
IV
Mima watched Music Town on the in-house feed of the green room’s television monitor. The room was a small, dreary, tatami-matted affair, furnished with only the monitor and a vanity. Whenever work brought her to this station, she typically used the space as her personal lounge. Over time, she’d developed an unexpected fondness for the dingy place.
Music Town was doing a segment on this week’s hot songs. The program’s host was a snobbish, middle-aged man who had been a newscaster before jumping ship for the entertainment world. He was infamous for barraging his guests with bad jokes and fancied himself hilarious. That, however, couldn’t have been further from the truth; his guests only laughed out of courtesy.
In short, Mima hated him.
Appearing on the segment was Ochiai Eri, a new pop idol who debuted the year before; she had been an immediate hit. Her latest song, “Rock, Love, Dream!” claimed number three on the charts.
Apparently, according to an idol magazine interview, she viewed Kirigoe Mima as her rival.
“Good evening, Eri-chan,” the snobbish, middle-aged host said. “Your new song is a smash. Dare I say that you don’t need to worry about Kirigoe Mima anymore?” Behind his glasses, the host’s eyes glimmered in a way Mima didn’t care for.
“Oh, I don’t know about that…” Eri demurred, but her smile said otherwise.
Mima stuck out her tongue at the monitor. “Go fall off a bridge,” she muttered. She hated them both, the middle-aged host and the full-of-herself newcomer.
Ochiai Eri had supposedly turned sixteen this year, but Mima placed her at eighteen or even older—though, admittedly, the singer’s facial features and figure did still retain a girlish quality. She appeared innocent enough, but her eyes gave her away.
To put it positively, those eyes shined with a strong-willed ambition. More negatively, they were eyes that saw others not as people, but as tools to be used.
The one and only time Mima had appeared on the same TV show as her, she fell under the withering glare of those eyes. Though three years a veteran, when Mima saw the white-hot flames inside the newcomer’s gaze, she felt such a powerful aura of intimidation it was almost tangible. In that moment, Mima knew this woman would do anything to worm her way to the top—even if it meant putting her boot to those who stood in
her way.
On the television screen, however, those eyes appeared gentle and kind. It was no wonder her debut single carried the slogan, “Blue-Eyed Angel.”
Mima heard once that Eri had badmouthed her off the record. Supposedly she’d called her “old,” and asked, “How long is she going to keep up that innocent girl act?”
Mima generally ignored the rookie, instead choosing to keep on being herself, to follow her own path, no matter what anyone else said. But she couldn’t help but feel a loathing for that woman. The emotion bubbled up from somewhere deep inside. She’d never felt this way toward another idol before. On the whole, Mima’s nature was kind, and she did her best to try to keep less benign emotions from surfacing—but it was a futile effort.
On the monitor, Eri began performing “Rock, Love, Dream!”
Sulking, Mima switched off the monitor and laid her head on the vanity. She couldn’t help but feel a little disgusted with herself.
V
The office of Moon Kids Talent Agency occupied a single unit in a small but sleek apartment building recently built in Roppongi. Aside from the nearby elevated Shuto Expressway, where traffic never ceased, the neighborhood was quiet.
Tadokoro Bon approached the building’s entryway with an armful of books. Not very trendy digs, he thought with a wry grin. A small, flowering arch over the entrance evoked an atmosphere more akin to a love hotel than an apartment.
Reaching the doorway, Tadokoro sandwiched his books between chin and chest as he punched in his entry code. The indicator light went on, and the door opened smoothly. The manager entered the building’s single elevator and pressed the third floor button.
As he waited for the elevator to make its trip, Tadokoro thumbed through his books. His thoughts, however, were drawn inexorably toward the deviant harassing Mima. The guy must be some kind of freak, the manager thought. He says he’s going to come see her…but how many people actually follow through on something like that?
Tadokoro pushed the delusional man from his mind and stepped out of the elevator.
Opening the door to the agency’s office at the corner of the hall, Tadokoro found cameraman Murano Yuji already inside, seated in the small reception area. Tadokoro offered him a cheerful, “Good morning, be right with you!” and stepped into the interior office.
His receptionist, a young woman named Tomo, continued reading her memo pad as she acknowledged the manager with a curt but formal, “Morning, sir.”
“Tomo-chan, has Mima called?”
Tomo shifted her eyes to the manager. “She said she’ll be here soon,” she said, then she went right back to the memo pad. Tadokoro suspected the receptionist was going over plans for a date with some guy friend. He returned to the reception area with a wry grin.
He sat on the sofa opposite the cameraman, a table in between them. He lit a cigarette. “Yu-chan,” he said, using his nickname for Yuji, “Have you thought about it? Will you do it?”
Yuji ran a hand through his shaggy hair and smiled pleasantly. The photographer’s facial features were on the larger side, and he typically came off as stern. When he smiled, though, those thick eyebrows lowered just a little, and it brought a gentleness to his face.
“If Mima-san is up for it, I’m ready any time,” Yuji declared crisply.
On the table, Tadokoro spread out his books—magazine-sized photo books of various idols. The market for photo collections was experiencing something of a boom at the moment. Many of the pictures were borderline pornographic. Yuji glanced to Tadokoro, who grinned and nodded.
“A bit of a surprise—huh, Yuji-chan? This is how far the latest idols are going these days. Or rather, if they don’t, they won’t make it as idols for very long.”