My Stepsister Is the Idol Everyone Wants to See novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: The Girl Who Hadn't Heard

Kokone wakes to find Emi has never heard a single song of hers, and the manager says tonight's livestream will happen in this flat.

Emi worked her shift, came home at six forty, and found her painting full of footprints.

They were small, bare and pink-toed, and they ran in a loop from the futon to the kettle and back.

Kokone sat cross-legged on the futon in Emi's spare sleep shirt, drinking tea out of a chipped mug.

Her hair stood up on one side.

Without the stage makeup she looked plain and tired and very real.

"You slept on my painting," Emi said.

"I know. I'm so sorry. I woke up with the whole city stuck to my face." Kokone turned her cheek.

There was a faint blue line across it, shaped like a river.

Emi had to look at the kettle for a second.

"There's a patch by the window that's ruined," she said. "Shibuya. I have to repaint it."

"I'll pay you. How much is a Shibuya?"

"It isn't about money. It took me two nights."

Kokone put down the mug.

"Then let me help," she said. "I'm good at following instructions. I've followed instructions for six years."

Emi opened her mouth to say no.

What came out was, "Can you stay inside the lines?"

"I can stay inside a chalk mark on a stage while three hundred people scream. I can stay inside a line."

Emi laughed, a short one, and was annoyed with herself for it.

She sat on the edge of the futon, because it was the only furniture there was, and ate half a rice ball.

Kokone watched her eat.

"You didn't ask me anything last night," Kokone said. "Everyone asks. Where were you, who's the man, is it true."

"You said it wasn't anyone you knew."

"I said that out loud?"

"You said it in your sleep. Very clearly."

Kokone pulled her knees up.

"It isn't true," she said.

"I've never seen that man."

"I was at a TV station that night, and then in the van, and then in the dorm."

"I don't know how they made it."

"But nobody believes me, because I would say that."

Emi looked at her.

"I believe you," she said.

"Why?"

"You have no reason to lie to me. You don't even know me."

Kokone blinked, and her eyes went bright and wet at the edges.

She pressed the sleeve of the sleep shirt against them quickly.

"Everyone else already decided," she said, and her voice shook a little.

"Okay," Emi said.

She didn't say anything else, and she didn't touch her.

She went to the sink and put a second tea bag in the mug.

When she came back, Kokone was smiling again, a wide, practiced smile with her whole face in it.

"Sorry. I'm done. Tell me about you. Misaki says you're a painter."

"An art student. I work nights at a convenience store."

"Do you go out much?"

"Not much."

"Do you like the new Tsubomi Seven single? The one with the whistling?"

"I don't know it."

Kokone smiled harder.

"The one before? 'Spring Is Late'?"

"No."

"Our first big single. The cherry blossom one. It was in every drugstore for a whole year."

"I don't listen to music while I paint," Emi said. "I listen to the trains."

Kokone stared at her.

The smile slipped off and was replaced by an expression of pure, delighted shock.

"You haven't heard any of my songs," she said.

"Not one."

"Not the cherry blossom one? Not even by accident?"

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be sorry." Kokone put both hands against her mouth. "This is the best thing that has happened to me in a month."

She started laughing, so hard she tipped sideways onto the futon.

Emi watched her, and her mouth did something she had to turn away to hide.

The door buzzer rang.

Misaki came in with a bag of groceries, a laptop and a very bad night's sleep.

She took one look at Kokone laughing on the futon.

"What did you do?" she asked Emi.

"Nothing. I told her I don't know her songs."

Misaki closed her eyes.

"Of course," she said. "Of course you didn't."

She set the laptop on the low table and opened a calendar full of colored boxes.

"House rules."

"Kokone does not go out, does not open a window, does not use her own phone, and does not post anything not approved."

"She still has her scheduled content."

"What content?" Emi asked.

"Her livestream."

"Every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday at nine at night."

"It has forty thousand paying viewers."

"If she vanishes for a week, they leave and don't come back."

"She's hiding from a scandal. Why is she on camera?"

"Because the company says a silent idol is a guilty idol," Misaki said, and Emi could hear that these were not her own words.

She looked at the calendar.

"Tonight is Thursday," she said.

Kokone sat up.

"Tonight? Here?"

"Here," Misaki said. "The company says there's nowhere else."

Emi looked at the floor, at the wet city, at the one patch of wall with no cables.

"There isn't anywhere else," she said, "but I'm not in the shot."

← Chapter 1 · All chapters · Chapter 3 →

Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend