How to Date Japanese Idols (The Tenshi Series)

by Cilia Jaspers

  "Sure."

  "I will call you, and we will make plans."

  "Sure."

  "You continue to say sure, but you don't seem like yourself."

  She smiled.

  "I will see you soon," he said, though, it sounded almost like a question.

  "Sure." she said, again, making a promise she didn't know she could keep.

  *

  A part of him knew, even as he told her he would see her soon, that he would never see her again. The minute he had seen her outside of his apartment he had known. She wouldn’t enter his apartment on her own, even with the key he’d given her, so she couldn’t possibly have decided to enter his heart, too. Her words made him bleed more and more. Did she really think that she didn’t know him? Did she even--or ever--want to?

  He had done his best to hold on to her, to keep her with him, but she’d gone. She had slipped away like air. He knew she’d left for good even before he saw his spare house key laying, not in the bowl with his keys, but on the table next to it, carefully placed and all alone.

  *

  As she boarded a plane a few hours later and buckled in, she looked around her, wanting to see at least one face that registered the same fear that was written on her own features. She needed one more person to feel the anxiety she felt. That would mean that all of her feelings of foreboding weren’t about Gakino. It would mean that this feeling she had that the world had titled off its axis wasn’t just her, that, instead, something really had happened to the world, to everyone.

  She knew that the world wasn’t going to end. She hated trite clichés as much as the next guy, but it felt like something big, almost as big as the earth, was ending. Something bigger than nations, and language, and men and women and time. Something all at once global and personal, bigger than her and yet too small to touch.

  Her world had narrowed to Gakino and who she might be with him, and that was over. Yet she knew the mourning would cease eventually. She knew that even if it didn’t, her routine would return. She would go to work, come home, make dinner. Her feet might feel heavier, her head might hang a little low, but she would smile, laugh, cry. Life would go on as it had before the star entered her orbit. No changes had happened that couldn’t be undone. Like Gakino was the moon, the tides of her life had rose and sunk according to his presence, his pull undeniable, but as he went away, she would return to what she was, and she would go on.

  She tried a smile, just to see if she could, and her chin trembled. So she couldn’t smile, not yet, but she would. That was as sure as sunrise. Soon, it would be as though he had never been. She would go back to admiring him from afar. When she could smile, one day, she would smile with him, too, as she used to, dancing to his songs, laughing at his shows, wishing to attend a concert. She would return to being his fan. Life would be normal, again, and she would learn to be grateful for that.

  *

  __________

  From: Eloise <886-42539-5011>

  To: Gakino<886-4-2539-5011>

  Don't worry, but I thought you should know that I changed my ticket. I'm flying back to Taiwan today. The plane door is closing.

  07/27/2013 09:03

  __________

  Out of fear from her message he responded quickly.

  __________

  From: Gakino<81-3-5330-5250>

  To: Eloise <886-4-2539-5011>

  How are you? Or should I say: how are we? I should be in Taiwan in a few days. Would you prefer to pick me up at the airport or would you like me to hire a driver? I have received permission from my manager Yoshida to stay for a week, but if you are too busy I could stay as little as a day. I just want to see you. The look on your face as you left terrifies me.

  07/27/2013 09:04

  __________

  She saw the message when she exited the plane in Taiwan. She did not return it.

  *

  When she didn't reply, Gakino told himself it was because she must still be in the air, flying. He understood. Really. She needed some space from all that had happened in Japan, but she would answer...eventually. Once Eloise was in her home with her things around her, she'd be better. She’d see his things mixed in with hers, and she'd remember who they really were together and text him back. But it hadn’t happened yet.

  For hours all he could do was sit on the floor in the hallway across from his key bowl, staring at the cold metal key she'd left on the table.

  __________

  From: Gakino <81-3-5330-5250>

  To: Eloise <886-4-2539-5011>

  Did you receive my last message? I mailed you earlier. Did you see it? I plan to fly to Taipei Saturday. Is that ok? Please reply, if only to tell me no. I hope you are fine.

  07/27/2013 14:00

  __________

  From: Eloise <885-4-2539-5011>

  To: Gakino <81-3-5330-5250>

  I am fine.. . . but I think we should spend some time apart.

  07/27/2013 13:12

  __________

  From: Gakino <81-3-5330-5250>

  To: Eloise <886-4-2539-5011>

  You promised. You promised that you would try. You said that we were not saying goodbye. Have you changed your mind?

  07/27/2013 14:12

  __________

  From: Eloise <886-4-2539-5011>

  To: Gakino <81-3-5330-5250>

  I am trying. I will e-mail you when I have something to say . . .

  07/27/2013 14:30

  __________

  She waited, hoping he would say something magical, something that would make it all better, though even she couldn't imagine what that might be. Not even he could fix what was broken. Nothing ever went back to what it was.

  She loved him. She really did, but he needed to let her go. There was too much between them. He had accused her of confusing him with her family, and she wanted him to see that she was trapped in a pattern, unable to act in a different way. She had to protect herself. She had tried to lower her guard and be more open. But no number of friends or therapists had been able to tell her how to do it. She wished that she was transparent to Gakino, that he could see all that she couldn't say, but he probably found her confusing or frustrating. She had never opened up or fully loved him. There had always been part of her holding back, a part of her that was always turning away. Gakino gave fully, but she did not, could not. It wasn't fair to him. She knew it. And he would probably blame himself for the problems between them, but if he blamed her, he might get angry enough to be free of her.

  Gakino closed his phone with a snap and dropped it on the floor as though it were a piece of burning metal. The sun had set a long time ago. He sat in darkness on the wood floor. His legs had long ago stopped hurting from the cramps that came with sitting in the same position. He drew his knees up even further and buried his forehead against them.

  Gakino grasped his hair with both hands, pulling the hair taut between each of his fingers. He dug his thumbs into the back of his neck and squeezed as hard as he could, yanking at his scalp. He howled in frustration and pain before his legs slumped loosely and flat to the floorboards, defeated. He'd get up soon. Maybe.

  *

  “I can’t believe she dumped you like this after everything you did for her.” Ryo’s voice beat through Gakino’s thoughts like a jackhammer.

  “She had her reasons.”

  “Incredible. You’re still defending her.”

  “What were her reasons?” Sano interrupted Ryo deftly, coming to sit beside him in the dressing room.

  “Could there be any reason good enough, Sano? Really?” Ryo was standing by the window, restlessly shaking the dice he normally kept in his pocket. Every once in a while he would twirl one across his knuckles, belying his angry tone and exposing his worry for Gakino.

  “At least all of this wasn’t for nothing. We got rid of Sugiyama.” Shun fussed with his hair until he got it more tamed in a stylish ponytail.

  “I liked her.” Hiro said.

  Ryo shot Hiro a dirty look, but
otherwise ignored their leader’s soft interjection.

  “I liked her, too.” Sano followed up before Ryo could throw his two cents in again. “What reasons did she have Gakino?”

  “She wouldn’t want me to tell you.” He couldn’t even look his friends in the face. Instead, he tilted his head back on the couch and stared at the ceiling thinking about what he should have been doing this entire time.

  “I don’t think that matters much now, does it?” Ryo shoved the dice back into his pocket before leaning against the window.

  “It matters to me. It should have mattered more to me before all this.”

  “She matters to you more though, I suspect. Otherwise you wouldn’t be this big of a mess.” Shun stretched his long legs out as he sat down on the other side of Gakino, shoving Gakino’s legs over with his knee so he could take over that side of the couch.

  “I think what Shun means is that maybe we can help you look at this differently or figure out a solution if we knew all that was involved.” Sano’s voice cut through Gakino’s determination and he sighed more to himself than the others.

  “I’m the same as her father. Worse really. I’m just like the guy who broke her heart.”

  “Care to expand a little on that?” Gakino barely noticed as Ryo joined the others by sitting on the coffee table between Gakino and Hiro’s solitary chair. Hiro didn’t seem to mind except that he poked Ryo in the back until Ryo absently handed him the plate of cookies by his thigh.

  “Her father was a Senator. He adopted her to advance his career. She grew up in the camera with her father using everything from the way her bedroom was decorated to her school grades as ways to keep himself likable in the public eye. He used her over and over and that’s something Eloise never wanted to be again. It’s why she ran away from home and is working in Taiwan. She didn’t want to be anybody’s paper doll.”

  “Gakino, that’s not what you were doing. Is that what she thinks?” Sano asked.

  Gakino ignored him, the words coming out faster and faster, now that he’d started.

  “Her first love turned out to be just as much a user and a liar. He took her to a special place one night and there were candles spelling out ‘I Love You’. So she gave him her first time, thinking that he loved her, that someone finally loved her for her. A few nights later, she gets a message to meet her boyfriend in this same place. She goes there and finds the same thing. Only this time, her boyfriend’s friend is putting the last touches on the whole scene. When she asks where her boyfriend is, the guy doesn’t say anything and runs off. She waits for him. She thinks he’s going to surprise her. And he does surprise her. He walks through the door into their special place with a new girl. She’d been lied to again. Nothing but liars her whole life.”

  “She must have been so upset.” Sano breathed heavily through his nose, angry in sympathy.

  “That was a long time ago.” Hiro suggested.

  Gakino met Hiro’s eyes at his statement.“Yeah, but Hiro, for her, it’s always right now. It doesn’t matter what I did it for. It doesn’t matter that I do love her. It doesn’t even matter that I would give it all up for her. To her, it’s all the same show and she doesn’t want to be a part of it.” Gakino scrubbed at his eyes with the heels of his hands.

  “I guess that’s a reason.” Ryo said it quietly. He wasn’t asking for a response.

  “Give it some time, Gakino. You have to give her some time to realize it’s not the same thing at all. That it’s not a show for you.”

  “Sano, time is all I have. I don’t have anything left to give.”

  They exchanged a look of worry they didn’t often all share at the same time and tried to continue on with the day as planned. Gakino got up and moved away from the group, stepping up to the window to quietly look out, his back to his friends.

  *

  She just wanted to be home. She had been repeating that to herself for hours. I just need to get home. On the four-hour flight, in the line at customs, as she waited for hours to get a driver. She just wanted to be home. She wanted it so much, now that she was in the car, she was actually grateful for the break-neck speed of the town-car as it tilted her around corners and rocketed down the highway. Normally, she’d be terrified and squeezing the seat. But tonight she offered the driver a tight-lipped smile.

  The faster he drove, the faster she would be home.

  An hour and a half after she got in the car, Eloise was home. She handed the driver two thousand NTD, signed his receipt, typed her passcode in, and entered the lobby. Finally.

  A short elevator ride and she walked in, tossed her bag down, and left the lights off, hoping sleep would silence her mind But the streetlights outside crept in past her curtains, and she knew her former sanctuary wasn’t going to bring the relief she'd expected.

  Gakino’s ghost was everywhere. He’d left clothes here. On the backs of chairs, a hoodie on her coat rack. There was even a pile of his folded shirts sitting on the dining room table. Things she'd laundered and hadn't put away.

  Walking past the couch, in the dim light from the street, she placed her keys down on the coffee table and saw one of his books. As she walked to their—her—bed there was another. The last night he was here, he’d been reading The Wizard of Oz. Clicking on the bedside lamp; she flipped the book open and stared at a picture of a mannish Witch of the North. Glenda smiled, surrounded by munchkins who bowed to Dorothy and Toto.

  Was she supposed to mail this book back to Gakino? Would that hurt him, seeing a package from her, and finding all of his things packed up and tossed back?

  Returning the book to the table where he'd left it, she laid down on his side of the bed and rested her head on his pillow, but she knew sleep wouldn't come. The pillow still smelled like him.

  Opening her eyes, she saw the quilt Bethany had made her folded at the end of the bed. Sitting on top was the parrot Gakino had surprised her with at the zoo months ago. Everything about it annoyed her. She kicked it, sending it flying into a far corner, and rolled over, facing the opposite wall. Hugging Gakino’s pillow, pushing her face into the crinkling down feathers, she cried, for once, uninspired by irony or symbolism.

  Her star had been close enough to touch, but Gakino was back again in his proper orbit. Tears continued, her face wet and cold, her pillow catching tears instead of dreams. She would throw out this pillow and that parrot tomorrow. If you had a place for tears, you made a place for sadness, and neither would help her.

  Her life had meaning on its own. Gakino’s did, too. They would both move on. He was busy, terribly so. He never admitted it to her, but taking the weekends off meant he had to work doubly hard when he went home. She suspected that the other members of Tenshi had to cover for him, too. She’d been a burden on him—on all of them. He would miss her at first. At least she hoped he would. Maybe he would be too angry to miss her. Maybe he hated her already. As her stomach twisted and her tears ran faster, she reminded herself that his anger would make things easier on them both. A clean break.

  They had work to get back to. She had students that she’d neglected. Every teacher knew doing the job right meant lesson planning and prep on the weekends, especially at a boarding school. She hadn’t attended a house competition on a weekend for months, and her students missed her. They took and shared photos with her because she asked them to, but she knew they wanted her there. She loved her work. Work had often—almost always—come first for her, and doing a good job felt right. Sometimes, knowing she’d done her best was the only way she got a good night’s sleep. She’d be able to focus on her teaching and her scholarship again. Her life would finally return to normal. As much as she repeated this to herself, her tears would’t stop. Though her mind was resolute, even calm, she cried still, her subconscious understanding things she would not allow herself to feel.

  She glanced at the clock. She’d been home for an hour. Crying.

  She stood up to get a glass of water, grabbing Gakino's book off the bedside table.
As she walked to the kitchen, she gathered more of Gakino’s things, averting her eyes as she walked past the parrot. She picked up Gakino’s book in the living room and his shirts off the dining room table. Then she walked to her bathroom cupboard and unfolded one of Gakino’s duffle bags. He’d left that here, too. She carefully set his things in it and then went around the house to collect more. She went room to room, putting everything in. She pretended to forget his pillow on their bed and the bird which she felt guilty about kicking. She put the now full duffle back into the cupboard and walked over to the peacock.

  She dusted it off, although there wasn’t anything on it, and mumbled a soft sorry. Carrying it by its soft downy little wing, she took it with her into the kitchen. Setting the doll on the counter, she pulled out a cup and then opened the fridge and found water. She filled her cup, sat on a stool, and put the glass pitcher on the kitchen counter. She’d drink the entire thing. After all that crying she needed it. Thankfully, as school was starting back up, she had to teach tomorrow. She watched the little bird and it watched her as she swallowed cup after cup.

  CHAPTER 17

  Gakino was so angry he couldn’t feel anything but that. When Eloise had closed the door so many weeks ago, he had known she was gone. Really gone. And not coming back. He had known it. But he had still tried to call her, hoping. He couldn’t even talk to her because she wouldn’t allow it.

  The things he could say, would she even hear them?

  Gripping the handles of the bag in his hand more tightly, he released a heavy breath he hadn’t known he was holding.

  What else was there to say except that they loved each other? What else really mattered?

  His feet made staccato echoes against the pavement as he walked toward a familiar three story building on the corner of a nice neighborhood. The sun was beginning to reach the golden, red, and orange tips of the leaves on the trees, and the morning mist was clearing. Residual dew hung on the edges of window ledges and the tips of grass, already beginning to turn brown. When he came to the wooden door in its dark frame, he easily pushed it open.