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Her advance turned to a security deposit and key money, Claudine turned the key in her new apartment. She had submitted her new address in Kachidoki to Futaba, and overheard Kaoruko call it ‘gauche’, an insult to her French upbringing if ever she heard one. She almost smirked as Maya submitted the same address and Futaba sputtered in realization.
“What are you talking about?” Kaoruko had asked, now fully paying attention.
“I was living in Sumida City by the museum,” said Maya. “My commute was 35 minutes on a good day, and I had to go through Kachidoki anyways. Now it’s 14 minutes, and via bus, I don’t even have to climb down the stairs.”
“Oedo line is the deepest subway,” added Futaba, shooting a sympathetic gaze at Maya. Claudine assumed Kaoruko did not take public transportation and therefore needed these things explained.
“I’m not asking why you moved,” said Kaoruko. “I’m asking why you moved together,” she said. “I pay you plenty, you don’t need to worry about affording a place in that district.”
“We did splurge a bit so Saijou-san could have her seaside balcony,” said Maya.
Claudine wanted to elbow her. She was making them sound like newlyweds. “Don’t you live with Isurugi-san?” she asked Kaoruko. She needed to get the attention off of them, if only for a moment.
Kaoruko’s death stare had been enough to confirm Claudine’s intuition, though Claudine was sure it was also enough to incur some future wrath. She bought them some time, at least.
Now, here she was by herself for the time being, ready to move into this new apartment. Maya would be along soon, she was sure, but she had spent the morning completing the workout she was sure to miss that evening. Claudine wondered why she bothered - they were sure to do plenty of activity setting up the apartment.
Claudine’s parents had helped her pack up her things over the past few days. In fact, they had done most of the work. With her packed schedule and nearly hour-long commute, she didn’t have much time to dedicate to helping when she got home. The boxes she packed were sent along with a courier who had dropped them off right in the corridor outside the apartment door, so Claudine set to work bringing them inside. The larger items - her bed, for instance- would just have to sit in pieces in the hall until Maya arrived.
It seemed their high-rise building hosted many families on the lower floors. When Claudine visited the lobby earlier, she saw many young children preparing for outings with their mothers. Her floor, closer to the top, was much quieter, and the only occupant she saw in the time she spent moving boxes was an older man in a suit who looked like he was getting ready to attend a business meeting on a Sunday.
She was happy with the camera at the door entrance, just as she was pleased with the key fob entry for the elevator and the doorman who stood in the lobby. There was an attendant who could call her if a delivery arrived for her, and she could indicate if it was expected. She would still have to walk from the building to the bus station, but… she wasn’t that famous. No one really cared about Saijou Claudine that much, she was just paranoid in her old age. Suddenly tired of lugging boxes, she opened the door to the balcony. They intentionally chose a west-facing apartment on the very west edge of Kachidoki. Her hair blew in the breeze a bit as she stood looking out at the water.
She wasn’t sure if the water that stood before her qualified as the Sumida River or a tiny part of Tokyo Bay. She supposed it didn’t much matter. All water was the same when you panned out far enough. It was busy water, with ships here and there and bits of land, both natural and artificial jutting out everywhere. There were bridges, docks, railroads, islands, birds… a colorful array of chaos. It was nothing like Yokohama.
Claudine decided the sight was too much, but the smell and the sounds weren’t bad. She didn’t have a chair, but she pulled an old blanket from one of her bags, laying it out on the narrow balcony. She laid down, closing her eyes and feeling the sun’s warmth. She was wearing only an old t-shirt and denim shorts, so it was comfortable to rest here for a while, listening to the seagulls and the trains and the children laughing at the nearby park.
“You’re going to get a sunburn like that,” said Tendo Maya, casting a shadow over her.
Claudine woke up from a nap she didn’t know she had been taking.
“Look at you, your cheeks are all… flushed,” Maya said, crouching down to sit on the threshold of the doorway to the balcony.
At times like this, Claudine found it difficult to look at Maya. It was like staring directly into the sun. Maya was shining too brightly, she was too radiant. Her features were too beautiful, Claudine had to look away. A bad habit overtook her, one she used too often with her mother. Unable to deal with her adoration, unable to directly show her affection, she turned to teasing, to cruel words.
“I look better than you, coming here after a workout.” It was untrue. She hated herself for saying it. She could never match the way Maya looked, flawless as the day they met, taking Claudine’s breath away without trying.
“I’ll have to do better next time,” was all Maya said. “But come inside and get out of the sun before you really do get burned, your skin is too fair to sleep out here.”
Deciding it was better to just keep her mouth shut than risk insulting Maya further, Claudine did as she was told and walked back into the apartment. Maya kept the door open, allowing the sounds of the water and the sounds of the children to drift inside still.
Maya had hired some professional movers to set up her couch, bed, and desk, and asked them to set up Claudine’s as well. Grateful she had cash on hand, Claudine tipped them generously, pleased when they didn’t seem to have any inkling who she was and just seemed appreciative of the cash. Once they were gone, they set to work unpacking clothes, both seeming to have relatively few boxes of other possessions.
Their apartment had a rather open floor plan, with the entrance opening into a small entryway with a shoe rack and closet, and then one step up into a kitchen that faced the living room which then opened onto the balcony. To the left of the kitchen was a laundry room, and to the right was a small hallway with their two bedrooms and a bathroom in the middle. Claudine would have preferred two bathrooms, but if that was her only complaint about this apartment, she supposed she didn’t mind.
As she was hanging up some sweaters in her closet, she heard a crash in Maya’s room and rushed over. Maya stood barefoot with what seemed to be some sort of award or trophy smashed at her feet. “Don’t move,” Claudine instructed her. “Let me get the broom.”
Annoyed at her own unpacking priorities, Claudine had to dig through several boxes to find the hand-broom and dustpan and bring them back to Maya’s room. When she did, she found Maya sitting on her bed, her feet miraculously unharmed, but her finger bleeding as she held a glass shard in her hand, the sunlight refracting through it casting a distorted rainbow on the wood floor.
It was nauseating, the half-unpacked room, the shaking rainbow, the dripping blood, the shards of glass- a remnant of an award now shattered. “Why did you touch it?” Claudine asked. “You can’t get injured, you need to look perfect for photos.”
Maya nodded, putting the piece she picked up back on the ground gently. It was now stained red. The rainbow was gone. Claudine noticed she had grabbed for the part with the inscription, but it was too small to read from where she stood. “My apologies. I have probably caused difficulty for the company. I just… forgot myself for a moment.”
Claudine put down the broom and dustpan, stepping carefully over the glass to grab a clean handtowel and bring it to Maya. She sat beside Maya on the bed, pressing the towel carefully to her cut. “I’ll run to the drug store and get some antiseptic and bandages. I think I saw one by the bus station.”
“There’s no need, I can go myself,” said Maya.
“And drip blood the whole way there? There will be rumors about you in the neighborhood in no time. I’ll go, you order something for dinner. And don’t leave the bed, I’ll clean up this mess as soon as I get back.”
Claudine put on her typical going-out accessories: her sunhat, mask, and sunglasses, and tucked her phone and wallet into the pockets of her shorts. She grabbed her keys to call the elevator, and walked out of the apartment, slipping on low-heeled sandals as she left. A quick search on her phone told her a large convenience store was nearby and would stock the necessary items. She walked there and picked up the first aid items, along with some standard medications, ice packs, and some other household items she had a feeling they were lacking. At the register, there was a sale on some pastries, so she picked up a small baumkuchen because it seemed like the kind of weird treat Maya would like.
Both hands full with bags, Claudine made her way back. She walked along the river, wanting to take her time gazing out at the water flowing by, but knowing Maya would appreciate her hastiness. She checked the notifications she had been ignoring all day. One from her mom, asking how the move was going. One from Mahiru, sending that week’s draft schedule. One from Yachiyo.
She hadn’t heard from Yachiyo since the tabloid had been published. Undoubtedly, Yachiyo had come under fire from her agency for that incident, since Edel and Siegfeld were notoriously strict. She tapped the message to read it. “Heard you’re living in Tokyo now. Are you actually working again? We need to talk.”
She pulled up a message to reply, annoyed at the weight of the bags pulling her arms down. “It’s all a secret. Who are you even talking to?”
She greeted the doorman and the girl at the desk, who keyed the elevator for her so she wouldn’t have to fumble with her fob. She felt her phone vibrate as the elevator ascended. “Michiru gets all the good gossip. I don’t know her sources for sure…”
Claudine didn’t reply. She did like Yachiyo, she was one of the few friends she had made during her first bout of modeling, but based on the disaster of their last meetup, she wasn’t sure she was ready to plan a second.
Claudine set the bags on the kitchen counter, pulling out the bandaids and antiseptic ointment and brought them to Maya’s room. To her annoyance, Maya had swept up the glass shards with the cloth still wrapped around her finger, though at least she now wore slippers on her feet. “I told you to stay on the bed,” she said.
“It’s my room,” said Maya. “And… I’m older,” she added.
“What? We’re both 23,” said Claudine, watching Maya apply the ointment and wrap a bandage to her hand. Maya then went to the bathroom to rinse the stained cloth.
“Yes, but my birthday is July 24. Yours was August 1, our first day of work. And you didn’t tell anyone.”
“I don’t like to make it a big deal. Futaba knew, I told her to keep it quiet.” Claudine wasn’t sure why Maya was bringing this up. Maya of all people didn’t seem like one to want a big birthday celebration. “Well whatever, you’re older, you cleaned up the mess, good job. What was that award even for, anyway?”
“It was an award for preservation of traditional Japanese culture and heritage. I won it during my college studies for my work with some texts and woodblock prints.”
“It’s a shame it’s broken,” said Claudine. “I liked the way the light hit it.”
“Nevermind, it’s no matter,” said Maya. “I ordered sushi for dinner. I hope you like that.”
“Fine with me.”
They ate in relative silence, Claudine thinking of whether or not to reply to her mother. In the end, she sent her mother a quick response, telling her their move went smoothly and they had settled in well. She wondered what Maya was thinking about as she ate her meal with almost robotic motions.
Maya was a mystery. Claudine had limited interactions with Maya so far, but Maya was difficult to read. It seemed that Maya was distant, almost purposely so, but she did strange things like offering to become Claudine’s roommate. Claudine was offended by Maya’s brash way of speaking, and her bold claims of reaching the top, but at the same time Claudine found herself drawn to Maya, wondering what was beneath that strange veneer she showed the world.
Claudine wondered if it was worth it, this interest in Maya. She wondered if Maya thought of her at all- if Maya thought much of anyone at all. She had hoped there was more to Maya than the carefully crafted presentation she gave to the public, and she thought she could peek bits of it shining through from time to time, but even now, relaxing over dinner, Maya was as careful as ever. Claudine wanted to ignore her, she wanted to shake her, to slap her, to kiss her. Anything to wipe that strange, boring, calm expression from her face.
This time, at least, she didn’t indulge herself, preferring to wait and watch Maya for a little longer, at least. Before bed, she opened a journal her mother gave her, but wasn’t able to write anything at all. Frustrated, she prepared an outfit for work the next day and went to bed, mind racing and anxious about her first ‘real’ week back in the modeling world.
Chapter 6
Her advance turned to a security deposit and key money, Claudine turned the key in her new apartment. She had submitted her new address in Kachidoki to Futaba, and overheard Kaoruko call it ‘gauche’, an insult to her French upbringing if ever she heard one. She almost smirked as Maya submitted the same address and Futaba sputtered in realization.
“What are you talking about?” Kaoruko had asked, now fully paying attention.
“I was living in Sumida City by the museum,” said Maya. “My commute was 35 minutes on a good day, and I had to go through Kachidoki anyways. Now it’s 14 minutes, and via bus, I don’t even have to climb down the stairs.”
“Oedo line is the deepest subway,” added Futaba, shooting a sympathetic gaze at Maya. Claudine assumed Kaoruko did not take public transportation and therefore needed these things explained.
“I’m not asking why you moved,” said Kaoruko. “I’m asking why you moved together,” she said. “I pay you plenty, you don’t need to worry about affording a place in that district.”
“We did splurge a bit so Saijou-san could have her seaside balcony,” said Maya.
Claudine wanted to elbow her. She was making them sound like newlyweds. “Don’t you live with Isurugi-san?” she asked Kaoruko. She needed to get the attention off of them, if only for a moment.
Kaoruko’s death stare had been enough to confirm Claudine’s intuition, though Claudine was sure it was also enough to incur some future wrath. She bought them some time, at least.
Now, here she was by herself for the time being, ready to move into this new apartment. Maya would be along soon, she was sure, but she had spent the morning completing the workout she was sure to miss that evening. Claudine wondered why she bothered - they were sure to do plenty of activity setting up the apartment.
Claudine’s parents had helped her pack up her things over the past few days. In fact, they had done most of the work. With her packed schedule and nearly hour-long commute, she didn’t have much time to dedicate to helping when she got home. The boxes she packed were sent along with a courier who had dropped them off right in the corridor outside the apartment door, so Claudine set to work bringing them inside. The larger items - her bed, for instance- would just have to sit in pieces in the hall until Maya arrived.
It seemed their high-rise building hosted many families on the lower floors. When Claudine visited the lobby earlier, she saw many young children preparing for outings with their mothers. Her floor, closer to the top, was much quieter, and the only occupant she saw in the time she spent moving boxes was an older man in a suit who looked like he was getting ready to attend a business meeting on a Sunday.
She was happy with the camera at the door entrance, just as she was pleased with the key fob entry for the elevator and the doorman who stood in the lobby. There was an attendant who could call her if a delivery arrived for her, and she could indicate if it was expected. She would still have to walk from the building to the bus station, but… she wasn’t that famous. No one really cared about Saijou Claudine that much, she was just paranoid in her old age. Suddenly tired of lugging boxes, she opened the door to the balcony. They intentionally chose a west-facing apartment on the very west edge of Kachidoki. Her hair blew in the breeze a bit as she stood looking out at the water.
She wasn’t sure if the water that stood before her qualified as the Sumida River or a tiny part of Tokyo Bay. She supposed it didn’t much matter. All water was the same when you panned out far enough. It was busy water, with ships here and there and bits of land, both natural and artificial jutting out everywhere. There were bridges, docks, railroads, islands, birds… a colorful array of chaos. It was nothing like Yokohama.
Claudine decided the sight was too much, but the smell and the sounds weren’t bad. She didn’t have a chair, but she pulled an old blanket from one of her bags, laying it out on the narrow balcony. She laid down, closing her eyes and feeling the sun’s warmth. She was wearing only an old t-shirt and denim shorts, so it was comfortable to rest here for a while, listening to the seagulls and the trains and the children laughing at the nearby park.
“You’re going to get a sunburn like that,” said Tendo Maya, casting a shadow over her.
Claudine woke up from a nap she didn’t know she had been taking.
“Look at you, your cheeks are all… flushed,” Maya said, crouching down to sit on the threshold of the doorway to the balcony.
At times like this, Claudine found it difficult to look at Maya. It was like staring directly into the sun. Maya was shining too brightly, she was too radiant. Her features were too beautiful, Claudine had to look away. A bad habit overtook her, one she used too often with her mother. Unable to deal with her adoration, unable to directly show her affection, she turned to teasing, to cruel words.
“I look better than you, coming here after a workout.” It was untrue. She hated herself for saying it. She could never match the way Maya looked, flawless as the day they met, taking Claudine’s breath away without trying.
“I’ll have to do better next time,” was all Maya said. “But come inside and get out of the sun before you really do get burned, your skin is too fair to sleep out here.”
Deciding it was better to just keep her mouth shut than risk insulting Maya further, Claudine did as she was told and walked back into the apartment. Maya kept the door open, allowing the sounds of the water and the sounds of the children to drift inside still.
Maya had hired some professional movers to set up her couch, bed, and desk, and asked them to set up Claudine’s as well. Grateful she had cash on hand, Claudine tipped them generously, pleased when they didn’t seem to have any inkling who she was and just seemed appreciative of the cash. Once they were gone, they set to work unpacking clothes, both seeming to have relatively few boxes of other possessions.
Their apartment had a rather open floor plan, with the entrance opening into a small entryway with a shoe rack and closet, and then one step up into a kitchen that faced the living room which then opened onto the balcony. To the left of the kitchen was a laundry room, and to the right was a small hallway with their two bedrooms and a bathroom in the middle. Claudine would have preferred two bathrooms, but if that was her only complaint about this apartment, she supposed she didn’t mind.
As she was hanging up some sweaters in her closet, she heard a crash in Maya’s room and rushed over. Maya stood barefoot with what seemed to be some sort of award or trophy smashed at her feet. “Don’t move,” Claudine instructed her. “Let me get the broom.”
Annoyed at her own unpacking priorities, Claudine had to dig through several boxes to find the hand-broom and dustpan and bring them back to Maya’s room. When she did, she found Maya sitting on her bed, her feet miraculously unharmed, but her finger bleeding as she held a glass shard in her hand, the sunlight refracting through it casting a distorted rainbow on the wood floor.
It was nauseating, the half-unpacked room, the shaking rainbow, the dripping blood, the shards of glass- a remnant of an award now shattered. “Why did you touch it?” Claudine asked. “You can’t get injured, you need to look perfect for photos.”
Maya nodded, putting the piece she picked up back on the ground gently. It was now stained red. The rainbow was gone. Claudine noticed she had grabbed for the part with the inscription, but it was too small to read from where she stood. “My apologies. I have probably caused difficulty for the company. I just… forgot myself for a moment.”
Claudine put down the broom and dustpan, stepping carefully over the glass to grab a clean handtowel and bring it to Maya. She sat beside Maya on the bed, pressing the towel carefully to her cut. “I’ll run to the drug store and get some antiseptic and bandages. I think I saw one by the bus station.”
“There’s no need, I can go myself,” said Maya.
“And drip blood the whole way there? There will be rumors about you in the neighborhood in no time. I’ll go, you order something for dinner. And don’t leave the bed, I’ll clean up this mess as soon as I get back.”
Claudine put on her typical going-out accessories: her sunhat, mask, and sunglasses, and tucked her phone and wallet into the pockets of her shorts. She grabbed her keys to call the elevator, and walked out of the apartment, slipping on low-heeled sandals as she left. A quick search on her phone told her a large convenience store was nearby and would stock the necessary items. She walked there and picked up the first aid items, along with some standard medications, ice packs, and some other household items she had a feeling they were lacking. At the register, there was a sale on some pastries, so she picked up a small baumkuchen because it seemed like the kind of weird treat Maya would like.
Both hands full with bags, Claudine made her way back. She walked along the river, wanting to take her time gazing out at the water flowing by, but knowing Maya would appreciate her hastiness. She checked the notifications she had been ignoring all day. One from her mom, asking how the move was going. One from Mahiru, sending that week’s draft schedule. One from Yachiyo.
She hadn’t heard from Yachiyo since the tabloid had been published. Undoubtedly, Yachiyo had come under fire from her agency for that incident, since Edel and Siegfeld were notoriously strict. She tapped the message to read it. “Heard you’re living in Tokyo now. Are you actually working again? We need to talk.”
She pulled up a message to reply, annoyed at the weight of the bags pulling her arms down. “It’s all a secret. Who are you even talking to?”
She greeted the doorman and the girl at the desk, who keyed the elevator for her so she wouldn’t have to fumble with her fob. She felt her phone vibrate as the elevator ascended. “Michiru gets all the good gossip. I don’t know her sources for sure…”
Claudine didn’t reply. She did like Yachiyo, she was one of the few friends she had made during her first bout of modeling, but based on the disaster of their last meetup, she wasn’t sure she was ready to plan a second.
Claudine set the bags on the kitchen counter, pulling out the bandaids and antiseptic ointment and brought them to Maya’s room. To her annoyance, Maya had swept up the glass shards with the cloth still wrapped around her finger, though at least she now wore slippers on her feet. “I told you to stay on the bed,” she said.
“It’s my room,” said Maya. “And… I’m older,” she added.
“What? We’re both 23,” said Claudine, watching Maya apply the ointment and wrap a bandage to her hand. Maya then went to the bathroom to rinse the stained cloth.
“Yes, but my birthday is July 24. Yours was August 1, our first day of work. And you didn’t tell anyone.”
“I don’t like to make it a big deal. Futaba knew, I told her to keep it quiet.” Claudine wasn’t sure why Maya was bringing this up. Maya of all people didn’t seem like one to want a big birthday celebration. “Well whatever, you’re older, you cleaned up the mess, good job. What was that award even for, anyway?”
“It was an award for preservation of traditional Japanese culture and heritage. I won it during my college studies for my work with some texts and woodblock prints.”
“It’s a shame it’s broken,” said Claudine. “I liked the way the light hit it.”
“Nevermind, it’s no matter,” said Maya. “I ordered sushi for dinner. I hope you like that.”
“Fine with me.”
They ate in relative silence, Claudine thinking of whether or not to reply to her mother. In the end, she sent her mother a quick response, telling her their move went smoothly and they had settled in well. She wondered what Maya was thinking about as she ate her meal with almost robotic motions.
Maya was a mystery. Claudine had limited interactions with Maya so far, but Maya was difficult to read. It seemed that Maya was distant, almost purposely so, but she did strange things like offering to become Claudine’s roommate. Claudine was offended by Maya’s brash way of speaking, and her bold claims of reaching the top, but at the same time Claudine found herself drawn to Maya, wondering what was beneath that strange veneer she showed the world.
Claudine wondered if it was worth it, this interest in Maya. She wondered if Maya thought of her at all- if Maya thought much of anyone at all. She had hoped there was more to Maya than the carefully crafted presentation she gave to the public, and she thought she could peek bits of it shining through from time to time, but even now, relaxing over dinner, Maya was as careful as ever. Claudine wanted to ignore her, she wanted to shake her, to slap her, to kiss her. Anything to wipe that strange, boring, calm expression from her face.
This time, at least, she didn’t indulge herself, preferring to wait and watch Maya for a little longer, at least. Before bed, she opened a journal her mother gave her, but wasn’t able to write anything at all. Frustrated, she prepared an outfit for work the next day and went to bed, mind racing and anxious about her first ‘real’ week back in the modeling world.