"A cameo appearance? I know you’re on good terms with Director Gotanda Taishi, but haven’t you never actually worked together before?"
- Yes. Still, I should manage things as much as I can on my own. He’s incredibly talented, so there’s nothing to lose.
"But... ngh. I’m just glad it’s not airing in the same time slot as the getsuku we’re filming now...."
After searching online for the drama Kaoru had agreed to cameo in, Rentaro scratched his head and checked the ratings trend and the cast list.
Until Kaoru had said he would make a cameo, Rentaro hadn’t even known this drama existed. But as someone in the industry, he quickly recalled the basic information about the cast, the production company, and the agencies the actors belonged to.
A textbook rookie PR drama. Frankly, it was almost a waste for Director Gotanda, whose independent films, dramas, and directing work had all been well received, to be handling something like this.
The ratings were a little low compared to the production budget, and the broadcast time was Wednesday at 9 p.m. It wasn’t a bad slot, but for a school drama, airing at 9 p.m. on a Wednesday seemed like a stretch.
Rentaro let out a long sigh. He had spent eight months getting to know Kaoru and working with him, so he knew very well that Kaoru wasn’t the type to suddenly decide on a cameo without even consulting anyone.
Was it just because they knew each other? Or was it Director Gotanda’s move to turn the ratings around? Whatever the reason, Rentaro clicked open an Excel file and checked the sheet organizing Kaoru’s schedule.
"Let’s coordinate the schedule on our end first."
- Yes. I’d appreciate that.
"Ugh. Got it. Get some rest."
- Yes, President. Thank you. And please don’t overdo it either.
"Haha. You’re worrying about me too? As expected, there’s no one like Kaoru. All right. I’ll wrap things up and head in."
After hanging up, Rentaro stretched and sank back into his chair.
Back when he never imagined he’d be working late, the overtime that had become part of his daily life after gaining a heavenly ally like Kaoru...
"I don’t hate it."
With a bright smile, Rentaro pulled out his calendar and notebook and got back to work.
-
Five days later, the long-awaited shoot day arrived.
"Hello! I’m Ai from Ichigo Production! Please take care of me today."
"""Please take care of us."""
"......"
Director Gotanda, leaning against the window with his arms crossed, watched Ai as she politely greeted the staff.
He pushed off the windowsill and strode toward her with a stern expression, then looked down at Ai.
Now that he was seeing her in person, he couldn’t help thinking that if not for the insurance policy that was Kaoru...
"What is it, Director?"
Ai asked awkwardly with a nervous smile as Gotanda stared at her.
"No. Just wondering."
Avoiding a direct answer, Gotanda turned his gaze and then had no choice but to frown again when he saw the little children who looked about two or three years old.
"Who are those kids?"
"Ah... they’re my children?"
"The manager brought the kids to the set? Don’t tell me... is this because of labor reform?!"
"......"
So the administration changed, and changes are starting in strange places! Feeling the atmosphere on set shift, Gotanda let out a quiet sigh.
"What a time we live in. Well, people even bring their pet dogs, so kids are nothing."
"Hohoho. R-right. I’ll be careful not to cause any trouble."
Gotanda gave Miyako’s apology a perfunctory nod, scratched his head, and was about to turn away when he spotted Aqua.
"......Hm?"
He couldn’t help tilting his head.
As if he had noticed the stare, Aqua also flinched and looked away from Gotanda.
"......"
Gotanda couldn’t understand why this tiny little kid gave off such a strangely familiar sense of recognition.
His eyes narrowed slightly.
'Feels like someone I know, but I can’t quite place it.'
Ruby, standing nearby, seemed to feel the same way and quickly looked away as if pretending not to notice. Aqua was even breaking out in a cold sweat.
A face that felt familiar in a way that made someone seem just about to come to mind.
Blond hair, blue eyes, and somehow... a nose bridge and facial shape with a familiar air.
Gotanda unconsciously turned to look at Ai.
"?"
"Hmm... no, maybe not."
Something felt off.
Something about it felt off.
Director Gotanda stroked his chin with a thoughtful expression, kept tilting his head, then turned back and went into the set.
The kids had suspicious features. For the manager’s children... their looks were...
"Tch... well, that’s not what matters."
Gotanda scratched his head. He hated headaches like this, problems he couldn’t solve no matter how hard he thought about them.
He touched the cigarette pack in his pocket and stepped back outside.
"......Hoo."
Blowing out smoke, he thought carefully.
Hijacking Kaoru for a cameo had succeeded thanks to sheer luck.
Since they were filming a getsuku drama, he couldn’t keep using him for long. The industry had its own rules, and making enemies of everyone and getting criticized for being tactless would be stupid.
So what, exactly, should he shoot with Kaoru?
If he were honest, he’d love to go crazy and film exactly what he wanted.
"......"
The art a director wants to create and the image the public or the higher-ups want are always different.
Bridging that gap and bringing out the right balance of entertainment and artistry is precisely a director’s skill.
Watching the cigarette burn down, Gotanda recalled one saying.
The time spent enduring is bitter, but the fruit born from endurance is sweet.
It was like only getting to test-drive a top-class luxury car, which would leave you wanting more, but once you saved up enough to buy it, you’d be overjoyed.
"Hah."
After finishing his cigarette, Director Gotanda clicked his tongue and walked down the hallway, absorbed in planning how to blend this damn drama and Kaoru into the perfect scene.
Then he spotted the little kid he’d seen earlier, plodding toward him from the opposite side.
"Huh? It’s the manager’s kid."
"Ah."
"I don’t care if you’re on set, but if you start bawling and get in the way, I’ll kick you right out."
Gotanda, a lonely artist who was not at all kind to children, warned Aqua with a stern expression.
Startled, Aqua waved his hands and shouted, "N-no! We’re babies, but we’ve been thoroughly taught not to commit such discourtesy, and we fully understand that not interfering with the progress of the set is the minimum rule! Please continue to look upon us kindly!"
"What the—?! Y-you, what are you?! How old are you?! Where did you learn words like that?!"
Gotanda shouted, stunned by the vocabulary, sentence structure, and behavior that were impossible to believe from such a tiny child.
No, what kind of kid is this smart?!
"I-I learned a little from YouTube."
"YouTube is no joke, huh?!"
In that instant, Gotanda thought of a face that flashed through his mind and flinched all over as if struck by lightning.
He immediately scooped Aqua up and examined his face closely.
"......"
"...Huh?"
"A kid this age... I’ve seen one like this before. The more I look, the more he resembles him! That precocious vocabulary and that intelligent way of speaking too... He really does resemble him."
"......Haha, I’m not really..."
"......"
Aqua could confidently say that coming to the set was the worst decision of his 26-month life.
He had only heard that this was a director who knew Kaoru, but he never imagined he’d be such a troublesome old man who would keep saying someone seemed familiar the moment he saw him.
Ruby was a girl, and since she looked more like Ai than Kaoru, she could avoid suspicion. But he was a dead ringer for his father to anyone who knew him.
And now, having failed miserably at his pointless attempt to act like a baby, he had only made the suspicion worse.
Aqua looked away and frantically worked his brain to get out of this crisis.
"Hmm... well, there are still plenty of lottery winners showing up all the time, so I guess there are kids who look alike too. Anyway, do you know how to do this?"
"...Waaah... I don’t know anything about acting..."
"You’re good at it. Acting. It’d be fun to see how you look on camera too. I’d like to try using you somewhere... Hmm. Here’s my business card. If you ever join an agency, contact me."
Gotanda casually pulled out his business card and handed it to Aqua. Having had Kaoru, that treasure, snatched away from him in all directions and only left with a bitter taste in his mouth, it was more important than anything to mark promising talent early.
Aqua took the card and said with a slightly troubled expression, "Ah, no. If you’re going to give work to anyone, it should be... Ai..."
"That idol? Well, she’s got the looks, aura, and charm. She doesn’t lack a thing. If she gets lucky, she’ll survive in this business just fine. If that happens, she’ll get plenty of work from other places besides me."
Gotanda admitted it coolly and nodded.
He had already said as much to Kaoru. As a director, as a filmmaker, his judgment was already complete.
Perhaps deciding to kindly explain things to this "precocious baby" who might cross paths with him in this business, Gotanda, with time to spare, pointed toward the classroom interior with his chin and said, "There are three kinds of actors. First, the ‘headline actor.’ Their first job is to draw in the audience or viewers. Most people are basically coming just to see that actor’s face. There’s also the role of ‘ad top,’ so the pay is pretty hefty. Next is the ‘skilled actor.’ Their job is to maintain the label’s brand. And finally, the ‘rookie actor.’"
Gotanda stood up, straightening his bent knees, and continued.
"Nobody expects much acting skill from this group. If they can at least bring some freshness to the screen, that’s a passing grade. It’s also meant to give the next generation of stars some experience. You could say the entire industry is mobilized as an investment. In other words, they’re all at the stage where they’re being invested in. Of course, nothing’s free, and it’s the ultimate version of ‘the ones who make it make it, and the ones who don’t, don’t.’ If you survive, it’s a huge success. If not, you’ll drift through bit parts until you end up in a small theater.
The ones who survive... in any field, are only the first-rate ones."
Gotanda thought of that fierce, feral guy who had flashed through his mind.
A beast who devours not only the camera, but the other actors, the staff, and even the entire production itself.
The desire to capture that violent, ferocious, genius-level acting on camera as soon as possible surged up, and Gotanda swallowed dryly without realizing it.
"...Ahem. So, do you get the picture now?"
"Mm. Then there’s no problem."
"Hm?"
"Ai is first-rate as an idol too."
"What good is being first-rate as an idol?"
At Gotanda’s blunt question, Aqua’s blue eyes, which had been fixed on Ai, flashed with something unusual for a moment.
Certainty.
A firm, unwavering gaze that only someone filled with absolute conviction could show.
The seasoned artist did not miss that pulse of emotion.
"Soon, she’ll stand as first-rate as an actor too."
"...You say that like you’ve got something to back it up."
As Gotanda frowned slightly and asked back, pressed by doubt and curiosity, Aqua let out a faint, indifferent smile.
"!"
The moment Gotanda saw that precocious kid’s smile, Kaoru’s face overlapped with it for an instant.
His mind went blank with the feeling that his heart had dropped straight through the floor...
"Director. The main shoot test is finished."
"Ah, uh, yeah. Haa. Ahem. I’ll just watch from here. Give the cue."
Startled, Gotanda nodded hastily at the assistant director and gave the order.
That smile just now. It wasn’t just similar; it was a dead ringer. A smile on the level of the original was not something you could casually imitate.
Feeling a chill crawl up his spine, Gotanda looked down at Aqua and checked the child’s acting.
"Should I ask Touma-kun?"
"......I see."
His way of delivering lines, emotional immersion and expression, careful control of his voice, and the way he threw away his own self in front of the camera to become the character in the story.
Feeling a strong sense of someone’s lingering presence in Ai, Gotanda smirked.
Maybe that affair rumor...
Wasn’t false after all.
So that was why? Gotanda exhaled slowly as he recalled Kaoru’s acceptance of the cameo a few days ago.
Maybe it wasn’t that he had brought Kaoru into this... but that Kaoru had, in reverse, dragged him into this world.
Whatever the truth was, all that mattered was landing the target. In any case... the collaboration with Kaoru had been pulled off splendidly.
Very satisfied with Ai’s performance, which was dense and natural for a first attempt, Director Gotanda murmured quietly, "Born with it."
"...Right?"
Even the precocious Aqua smiled with pride at Gotanda’s praise and said so.
-
"Hey, Seiji! What the hell do you mean by that?!"
"Exactly what you heard. Including the shares my late father left to me. If you add everything up, even you’ll be in trouble, brother."
"......When we don’t even know whether that will is real? The lawyer who notarized it died in a car accident too. He was the last person to see the will besides Father, wasn’t he?"
"You’re mistaken, brother."
In an instant, the air in the room sank cold.
Kaoru quietly lifted his blue eyes, empty of emotion and filled with an abyss, and stared at his scene partner.
At that gaze so cold it felt like blood might freeze.
Even the director, Kogoro, who was watching the scene, along with the actor playing the second son, swallowed dryly as their heartbeats began to race.
The second son acting opposite Kaoru forgot he was acting and could no longer meet that stare; his gaze wavered.
Within those blue eyes bloomed a horrifying, dark starlight.
And when that dark light seemed to seize his throat, he could no longer respond at all.
"Do you really think I’m so carefree that you can say something like that to me, brother?"
"......"
The second son flinched at Kaoru’s line. His throat bobbed as he swallowed, and his tightly sealed lips trembled.
Watching that pulse of emotion from beyond the camera, Director Kogoro shouted for cut with an excited burst of energy.
"Cut!!! That was excellent! Ahh! Great!"
Clap clap clap
So satisfied that he even clapped, Director Kogoro’s reaction left the rest of the staff on set looking at the actors with brightened expressions.
"Thank you. You worked hard, senior."
"Yeah. Hoo... Kaoru. You really don’t have even a speck of consideration for your seniors, do you? You’re ruthless, you know that?"
He patted the younger actor’s shoulder, pleased with the good performance, and said it in a voice that sounded exhausted. Kaoru only smiled silently.
On the way to the waiting room for the next shoot, his work phone rang.
"......"
Director Gotanda.
All morning, Kaoru had been sending messages and calling to cheer Ai on and tell her to do her best, since today was her shoot day.
Thinking the call was probably about that, Kaoru looked around to check for people nearby, then quietly opened the door to the prop room right beside him and stepped inside.
"Yes, Director."
- Oh. Are you in the middle of filming?
"We just finished. What’s the matter?"
- Nothing much. I just thought I should give you a report as thanks.
Hearing him use such a grand word as "report," Kaoru realized anew that Director Gotanda had been waiting for him with his neck stretched out.
With a faint smile, he brushed back his long hair, which he had grown out for the shoot, and replied in an indifferent voice.
"You didn’t need to go to all that trouble. It’s a little embarrassing."
- Heh, really? Hmm... well, it wasn’t bad. That girl.
"...Is that so?"
Kaoru realized he was about to smile and forcibly bit down on his lip to hold it back.
Gotanda spoke with the sound of a turn signal clicking in the background, as if he were driving.
- That girl... she definitely learned how to act. I could see you in the way she performed. She stole the whole focus from the lead. It was pretty impressive.
"...I only taught her for a few months. The rest is probably the result of Ai’s own efforts."
- Yeah. She really is naturally gifted. A talent and instinct for swallowing the camera whole. The more I look, the more you come to mind—ah. Damn it, that idiot cut in without even using his blinker.
"......"
- Hmm. The person who came to the set as that girl’s manager. He brought two babies with him. Do you know them by any chance?
At Gotanda’s words, Kaoru’s blue eyes widened in shock.
Ah.
Oh no.
There wasn’t anyone reliable to look after Aqua and Ruby, so they’d had no choice but to bring them to the set!
Kaoru squeezed his eyes shut and let out a sigh before Gotanda could hear it.
"...I’m not sure. I did hear in passing that she had children, though."
- Really? One of them, was it Aqua? That boy showed quite a bit of talent. He had a lot of similarities to you, so he left a strong impression. Now that I think about it, he’s sharp and quick on the uptake, just like you. He’s got quite a few useful qualities.
"Is that so? I’m sure you wanted him."
Kaoru barely managed to hold back the urge to grin at the praise for his child, then cleared his throat and said, "You really went out of your way to accommodate a friend. Thank you."
- ...Yeah. What’s so bad about using the word ‘friend’? This is exactly the kind of time to use it. Anyway, just keep that in mind. I already contacted your president separately. I’ll send the script by the end of today, so let’s meet the day after tomorrow.
"Understood."
After hanging up, Kaoru exhaled quietly, checked for sounds and movement outside the door, then immediately opened the prop-room door and stepped back out.
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