SHIZUKI’S surprise was delivered to me a few days later. It was, as it turned out, matching outfits for me and Shizuku. Excited, I went to visit Shizuku with her present as soon as I was able. After knocking on her door—this time—I entered her room to see her perusing yet another fashion magazine.
“Aren’t you still a bit young to be showing that much interest in fashion?” I remarked as I walked in.
“I don’t think it’s exactly the clothes I’m interested in,” she acknowledged, looking up from her read. “More the model wearing them.”
“Oooh.”
That would be me. I was indeed appearing more often in these magazines than I would’ve liked. There seemed to be quite a buzz about me, an actual Sakurazaka, modeling these outfits, which boosted sales significantly. As a result, the modeling jobs kept flowing in. It needed to be said, though: I only accepted the roles as part of my ongoing task of inspiring Nonoka’s interest in fashion—not for any personal reason. But I doubted that’d be going on for much longer. With Nonoka hating me, it seemed unnecessary for me to continue.
Oh well. I’d worry about that later. This moment was about Shizuku and me. I swung the bag with our matching outfits in front of her. Her jaw dropped immediately. “Why do you have a SHIDUKI bag?” she pressed.
“Oh. You know what this is?”
“Duh! It’s SHIDUKI, the accessible luxury fashion brand that girls’ dreams are made of!”
“Duh,” huh? It’s that well-known? Better not let her know I only learned about the brand recently then.
“Well, that’s good,” I said instead. “Then you probably already know that this is Ms. Shizuki’s brand. Since I work for her, she gave me a few pieces as a gift.”
“Oh yeah, she just gave you a few pieces,” she repeated mockingly. “Humblebrag much?” She dug through the bag, then her eyes snapped to me. “This is a whole outfit!”
I almost blurted out, what’s the big deal? But I remembered that SHIDUKI’s luxury line typically sold for hundreds of thousands of yen per piece, while the accessible luxury items were priced in the slightly more affordable tens of thousands. This was a full set for both of us, which added up to quite a hefty chunk of change.
“You like it?” I asked.
“Of course I like it! But it’s so expensive… I can just have this? It’s not even my birthday. But it is yours soon. Did you get our birthdays mixed up?”
“Like I’d ever forget when your birthday was.”
“But seriously this is like, expensive expensive. Okay. What is your part-time job? Fess up.”
“I’m just a model who received a gift at work. That’s it.”
But Shizuku didn’t look convinced. “But to receive such lavish gifts… You two aren’t involved, like, romantically, are you?!”
I choked on my saliva.
But it was true our involvement went deeper than surface level. To family level, actually, which might’ve even been more involved than romantically, depending on how you looked at it. But lovers? No, no, no. Not at all.
“Yes, Shizuki is very kind to me, thanks for noticing,” I noted.
“Kind, huh?” she hummed back.
“Yes, kind. Now can we please move on?”
“Kind enough to make you want to be her adopted sister?”
Not again. Where was all this saliva coming from? Still coughing, I managed to choke out, “E-E-E-Excuse me?!”
“Do you think I’m stupid, Mio?”
“Of course not, I don’t think you’re stupid, I just don’t know what you mean!”
“Then do you know what this means?” She held up a page of her magazine. An article about the model featured my full name: Mio SakurazakaaaAAA?!
“Th-That’s just my, you know, my stage name!” I blurted out.
“I thought you’d say that. Which is why,” this time, she stuck her laptop in my face, “I also prepared this!”
What was this, a message board? “What am I supposed to be reading here? ‘Miokins so cute’? The heck is that?”
“No, read the thread above that!”
Above that, okay. It was a thread titled ‘Who is Mio Sakurazaka? Is she affiliated with the Sakurazaka Group?’ And under it were comments saying, ‘Oh, she’s an adopted daughter,’ and all sorts of other damning comments exposing my true identity. Holy crap, there was even a comment calling out the fact that I was a real, blood-related Sakurazaka. Well, that’s unfortunate. And terrifying.
Cornered, I hesitantly said, “When did you start suspecting?”
“From the very beginning,” she replied. “But I only really started digging after you said these laptops you bought us were cheap.”
“Wait, this laptop? But I showed you the receipt and everything!”
“That receipt was a fake, wasn’t it?”
“N…No?”
How could it have been a fake? I’d asked the helpful folk at a Sakurazaka Group-run electronics store to buy those laptops for me. I gave them a budget and asked them to choose one at their own discretion and everything!
I quickly explained this to Shizuku, but her gaze only narrowed further. She tapped away at her laptop, then showed me an online shop she navigated to. “This is how much the laptop usually costs,” she divulged, gesturing toward her screen.
“Forty thousand? I mean that sounds about right.” I guessed the employees gave me a little discount, but it wasn’t that much cheaper.
Shizuku raised an eyebrow. “You’re missing a zero there, chief.”
“Huh? One, two, three, four, five…”
Oops. It hadn’t been forty thousand, but four hundred thousand. With an employee discount that steep, Shizuku was right to suspect something was off. But now, caught out on a lie, I fumbled for the right words. “Um, Shizuku, I didn’t mean to—”
“Look, you don’t need to tell me what’s going on if you don’t want to.”
Shizuku’s words caught me off guard. “I…don’t?” I said cautiously. For sure I thought this would be the breaking point. I thought she would pry and pull until everyone was out in the open, but instead she just…backed off.
She shifted on her bed. “I don’t like that you’re keeping secrets from me, but you’re doing it for me, right? So, what else can I say?”
My heart sank. How can she be so mature for her age?
“But can you just reassure me of one thing?”
“What’s that?”
“You’re not involved in anything dangerous, are you?”
The worry in her voice tightened my chest. I paused, then allowed a reassuring smile to surface. “I’m not.” Shizuku studied my face for a few lingering moments, her eyes searching for any hint of deceit before her expression softened as well.
“Okay, I believe you.” She paused, then looked around the room awkwardly. “Then…does this mean I’m actually a Sakurazaka too?”
Her question threw me for a moment. “Huh? Oh, um, yeah, I guess. Why, you wanna get adopted too?”
“Mmm… Nah. Mom and Dad would be sad.”
“Right…” I clamped my lips together, a fleeting image of our parents faced with the reality of losing me flashing through my mind.
“Oh, sorry, I didn’t mean to imply you did anything wrong,” Shizuku hastily added.
“Yeah, I know.” I smiled at her, then looked at the paper bag. “So… You ready to try this on?” I asked, to which she responded with a resolute yes and a radiant smile.
I stepped out for a moment as Shizuku changed and rejoined her after in our matching outfits: a strappy off-shoulder sweater, miniskirt, and thigh-highs with garters—the version of the well-to-do lady outfit that had become my look.
“Whoa,” Shizuku said. “This feels so nice.”
“Right? I remember saying the same thing.”
She glanced over her shoulder at her feet and spun several times, giggling. I recalled commenting on the feel of the fabric to Shizuki, who mentioned it was more about the outfit being tailored to our measurements than the quality of the fabric. Which only raised the question: How did Shizuki know Shizuku’s measurements? But then again, I supposed I shouldn’t be surprised at this point.