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Mahiru chewed her lip as she watched Hikari slip into the back of the meeting room, a blue beret covering her long black hair and a sketch book in her arms. Certainly her late entrance would not be overlooked by Kaoruko, who was currently looking at her cell phone as Futaba pulled up a presentation on the projector and erased the marks of the previous meeting from the whiteboard.
Hikari slipped into the seat beside Mahiru, her simple blue canvas one-piece dress belying the fact that she worked for one of the top fashion companies in Japan. Mahiru herself wore an oxford button down and a houndstooth pencil skirt with black ankle boots. It was not a typical summer outfit, but Kaoruku Hanayagi’s company, HANA, was not typical in many ways.
“Ah, Hikari-han is here, we can begin,” Kaoruko said, putting her phone down on the table. She stood at the head of the long conference table where the twenty or so marketing and production staff gathered around.
“Sorry, Kaoruko-san,” said Hikari, “The line was extra long at the coffee shop downstairs.”
Karouko chose not to comment on this, raking her fingers through her distinctive bobbed hair. “We’ve reached the end of summer,” she said, walking over to the projector screen, which displayed the date, July 15th. Our designers, myself included, are working morning til night to finish up on the winter line. The fall line is already in production. The focus of this meeting is not fashion, obviously,” she said, glancing at a few underdressed attendees, “But marketing, events planning, et cetera. What are some concerns? Ideas?”
Kaoruko’s second-in-command, Isurugi Futaba, stood at the whiteboard and uncapped a marker.
“Well, I was thinking that since your fall line is all about strong contrasts, especially with black and white, that it would be nice to utilize that into a lot of our themes,” said Junna, who was in charge of the catalogue layouts. “For example, the catalogue title could be a bold black or white, our runway show could be themed around black and white elements, the models-”
“Let’s shelf the models for the moment,” said Kaoruko quickly. “But I like the rest of that idea. This past summer there were a lot of rich, jewel tones. If we transition to something like black and white, I think it would capture attention well.”
Mahiru took notes. Kaoruko’s intuition was never wrong. If she thought black and white was the way to go this season, then that was what Mahiru would follow.
“But perhaps,” Kaoruko mused aloud, “Instead of simply black and white…”
“Light and darkness?” Hikari suggested. Mahiru nudged her with her elbow for interrupting their company head.
“Exactly, Hikari-han. This is why I keep you around.”
Mahiru turned away so she wouldn’t have to see the shit-eating grin on Hikari’s face. On the other side of Hikari, she could see the new intern Karen watching the interactions closely, trying to follow the fast pace of the meeting. Mahiru was fond of Karen, she was hoping she wasn’t going to take after Hikari too, too much.
Nana Daiba, the head photographer, spoke up then. “I was also thinking that since a lot of the designs this season, and for HANA in general, are for very classic elements… traditionally tailored jackets, cardigans, dresses and such, that it would be fun if the elements of our print marketing and our runway were more non-traditional to contrast that, though I’m not sure what that means exactly.”
“That’s alright,” Kaoruko assured Nana, “That’s why we’re brainstorming. Hmm… something non-traditional to contrast the clothing designs… anyone?”
To Mahiru’s surprise, Karen spoke up then. “Some non-traditional settings for the print backgrounds would be fun. Some taken in nature would be nice, I think, or at the beach. My dream would be a Hong Kong nightlife shoot.”
“Bring me some ideas,” Kaoruko said, and Mahiru smiled. The new intern had brought something useful to the meeting. She nodded at her encouragingly. At the whiteboard, Futaba was frantically taking notes to ensure they captured all the ideas brought up.
Hikari cautiously raised her hand. “Yes?” asked Kaoruko, smirking a bit.
Hikari cleared her throat. “Maybe it’s still taboo to talk about models, but, I think we could get some unexpected models?”
The room was silent for a few seconds. Their last main model, Akira, had left the company after receiving an offer from HANA’s rival company, and a few of their other ‘mainstay’ models had left with her. HANA had used models from agencies to fill their summer catalogue and do their summer runway shows, but Kaoruko had always insisted on keeping in-house models both to keep their image consistent and to make sure their models were part of their staff just as the marketing team or the designers themselves were. The last group of models leaving all at once had been a shock and a difficult blow.
“What do you mean by unexpected?” Kaoruko asked, leaning forward a bit to look at Hikari. Hikari was one of the few attendees of the meeting who was also on the fashion design staff, so Kaoruko took a keen interest in her vision. Mahiru leaned back in her seat so as to not block Kaoruko’s view with her own face.
“Well, I’m not exactly sure. I mean, I was thinking it would be kinda fun if she were a bit unknown, honestly. Or if she looked a bit unique and caught people’s attention that way. Or…” Hikari trailed off, as if contemplating something she wasn’t ready to say.
Kaoruko looked like she was considering the pros and cons of Hikari’s proposal.
Mahiru sighed. She didn’t know why she was bothering to help Hikari, goodness knows Hikari never went out of her way to help her. But somehow she felt she could verbalize what Hikari could not. She leaned forward. “Hanayagi-san, I think what Hikari-chan is trying to say is that Junna’s idea with the strong contrasts could be actualized with the correct models. If you find two contrasting models to lead the campaign, one to represent light, and one to represent darkness, this theme could carry forth across our catalogue, and across our runway shows. If you find the right people, this could be our most successful marketing effort in recent memory.”
Kaoruko nodded, a fire lighting up in her eyes. “I like where your heads are at, Mahiru, Hikari. I think the public needs a new, consistent face from us, from the fall catalogue through the summer shows. And they’ll need to be older. I can’t have any teenagers running around here all year.”
Kaoruko began quietly giving instructions to Futaba who quickly began typing into her phone. Mahiru, too, continued taking notes. Finally, Kaoruko turned back to the staff. “Hikari, Mahiru. I’m putting you in charge of scouting. Take the intern with you.”
“What?” asked Mahiru, promptly covering her mouth as she realized she’d made the outburst aloud. Beside Hikari, who remained as emotionless as ever, Karen was beaming.
Mahiru could feel the eyes of all the other staff on her as she realized they were putting their trust in her to not let them down. “Understood.”
The rest of the meeting continued, and though Mahiru took notes, she wasn’t truly focused. She was partially responsible for picking the next models for the company? The faces that would be on their catalogues, other magazines, huge advertisements, and if they were lucky, the sides of buildings and inside department stores. She could be launching or advancing the career of a model, or, if she made the wrong choice, dooming the company to a year of bad marketing, and dooming the girl to several years of nasty comments and possibly being forced to leave the industry. She picked at her nails nervously until Hikari tugged at her sleeve to get her to stop.
After the meeting, Mahiru got lunch with Hikari and Karen at one of their favorite restaurants around the block from the company’s headquarters. The company was located in a high-rise in the Ginza district of Tokyo, and Mahiru knew the most delicious hole-in-the-wall restaurants down particular alleys so they wouldn’t spend their entire paycheck on one meal. They talked while they took a short walk after they ate, knowing soon enough lunch would be over and they’d need to return to the HANA highrise.
“I can’t believe we’re scouting models!” Karen said.
“Wow, I can’t believe it took you that long to say it,” Hikari said.
“How are you calm about this?” Mahiru kicked a pebble in their path. “Well, I guess this was kind of your idea. Ooh I got so nervous when you spoke up, oh my gosh!”
Hikari laughed gently. “I don’t know why. What’s the worst that happens? Kaoruko says it’s a bad idea and we move on.” She sighed. “But you’re right, it’s a lot of pressure.”
“What kind of person are you going to look for?” Mahiru asked. They turned off the path to head back to the office.
Hikari considered for a moment. “I don’t know if I’m looking for two separate people. I think we need to search together and find the pair. They need to complement each other correctly. A sun and moon. ”
Karen smiled. “Hikari-chan is so thoughtful.”
Hikari laughed. “It’s for the good of my clothes. What about you, Mahiru?”
Mahiru sighed. “I have no idea. I only got this assignment two hours ago because you couldn’t keep your mouth shut.” They walked in silence for a few minutes. “I guess, if I were making this my issue, and I were putting the HANA line clothes on someone, with the light and darkness and the untraditional themes in my head… I would want a ‘girl crush’ style model.”
Hikari snorted a little. “You just want a girl crush.”
Mahiru blushed, which was unfortunate as they had just approached the building entrance. “Do not,” she said, pushing past Hikari as they walked to the elevators. She got back to her desk on the 7th floor two minutes before her hour-long lunch break was over, and set to work assembling a collection of models to look over with Karen and Hikari.
Two hours later, she had finished, even adding short bios and descriptions below each model’s profile. She emailed the package to Hikari and Karen to review before they met up the next morning, but headed upstairs to her scheduled meeting with Kaoruko at 3PM, feeling rather nervous for no particular reason.
She took the elevator up two floors to Kaoruko’s suite, and greeted Futaba, who checked to make sure Kaoruko wasn’t on any calls and then let Mahiru through. Kaoruko was sitting at her desk, but her drafting table off to the side in her office looked recently used, as did the yoga mat on the other side.
“Tea?” she asked, gesturing to the electric kettle on the window sill.
Mahiru shook her head, settling onto the chair across from the desk. She’d been in her boss’s office many times, but every time she was impressed with how much the space reflected Kaoruko. It was simple, yet fashionable. On trend, and yet timeless. She glanced at Kaoruko’s expression to try to make out what the purpose of this meeting was.
“Mahiru, do you know why I have you and Hikari on staff?” she asked.
“Because I won a contest in junior college and got an internship, and you took a liking to Hikari the one time she tagged along to the office?” Mahiru asked, knowing already this was not where Kaoruko was going with her story.
Kaoruko smiled fondly at the memory. “Even then, I saw something in the both of you. I saw your potential. Both of you only have junior college degrees, and yet you’re my main event planner and Hikari’s designing a quarter of my winter line? Why is that? Because you never let me down. Everyone here has good days and bad days, it’s fine, I expect that, but you two? Remarkable, every time. Truly a testament to my leadership and foresight.”
Mahiru shifted uncomfortably from the praise and smiled a bit at Kaoruko’s trademark ego-stroking. Despite her final remark, she knew everything Kaoruko said was genuine, and that her boss rarely gave out compliments.
“Oh, I’m not saying this to put pressure on you, though I guess I inadvertently did. I just meant, you deserve to be where you’re at. Your work is consistently excellent. I have you two to thank for some of my recent success.” Mahiru knew Kaoruko was constantly receiving pressure from her parents, the owners of HANA Corporation. As their daughter, she was put in charge of the fashion company, just a small facet of a conglomerate of businesses the Hanyagi’s owned under the HANA name.
“Thank you,” said Mahiru. “I will do my best. Though I’m really not sure about finding you models.”
“I know we are sort of cursed when it comes to models. After Akira left and the rest of our main models left to work for that thorn in my side, Siegfeld, it’s been nothing but trouble. If we can get two to lead this campaign, we can reinvent ourselves. I am counting on you.”
Mahiru slapped her cheeks gently, trying to get herself into form. “I’ll do my best, Kaoruko-san. But I’ve been meaning to ask. Don’t you have scouts for that?”
Kaoruko laughed gently. “I do. It’s you three. I just spent the last few minutes telling you how you and Hikari have such perfect vision, how it’s pretty much always the vision I didn’t know I needed for my clothes until it’s there in front of me, right? I’ve been watching that intern as well, and she has good intuition. And then I realized, who better to envision the faces of our newest campaign? You can do this, Mahiru. And if, for some ungodly reason, you pick some duds, I’ll only ride you about it for a year or so.”