But the longer I realize, I'm going farther, and farther from myself…
In one of Hina's enthusiastic live streams…
"Hi everyone! Welcome to my Q & A stream! It's been a month since I debuted! Thank you so much for supporting me in my previous streams, especially when I played Light Souls. I know I suck! But I'll do my best to get better! For some reason, I like the challenge it gives. I will be in your care as we explore these games!"
GMBarriePottom: What games do you like?
"What? Are you going to pay for the games I like? What a way of public courtship! I personally like mind-challenging games with simple mechanics. Shooting games? Nah, I'm a pacifist. Farming games! With fewer survival elements, that is the best ASMR I have!"
CoffeeSwan: PC Specs? You can surely run Wukong in 60 FPS highest graphics!
"Where did you get that name? I would like to see a swan floating in a coffee pond! By the way, I'm not tech-savvy so please don't hate me. But if you want to play a game with me, I will solidly accept your request! Any games! Heavy games or pong! I can also play mobile games, you know!"
swizzylabrador: Any men you like?
"Going personal, aren't we? You're tough, boy! Instead of saying who I like, I want to say what my type is. Tall, good-looking, charming, confident, has a passion, and the list goes on! It's just a typical crush for all young girls like me. Tip for the boys, what we seek is thrill. If you don't have it, sad to say, you're boring. But don't worry! If you want love advice, I'll be here for you!"
KochiMains1: When will you cosplay?
"Cosplay?" Behind the screens, Hina's smile slowly vanished, her stale expression averted her eyes from her camera. Soon, a memory replayed inside her mind:
"You're still looking at that action figure again? You really like those stuff, Rise. In the future, you might become a manga artist or a voice actress… or even a cosplayer!"
With a stooped posture, her eyebrows avoiding Hina's joyful gaze, Rise stuttered, "I–I don't know… I can't talk with people…"
"If you really become one, cosplayer I mean, that would be amazing! I'll be the one who will sew your clothes, craft your accessories, and make sure the costume fits you well!"
After the relapse, Hina pursed her lips and replied to the stream with a lifeless voice. "I'll try that soon! Kazami-san might like it." To avert the dimming of the mood, her lively shout recalled her energy back, "Next question!"
And farther…
After taking a bath, Hina's hair was wrapped in a towel when she took a pile of documents to her coffee table. Her eyes bulged after seeing overlapping schedules of streams. "What's this Gantt chart!? Do we have a thesis paper here?"
Kazami sat on the side couch, her shoulders lowering while she tapped routinely on her tablet. "Ever since you debuted, the growth of your subcount decelerates overtime. It's my job to make you relevant to the trend, or we'll both go down."
Dropping the document lightly on the table, Hina asked, "You seemed relaxed. You're going to make me relevant by assigning me THESE schedules? Do I still have time to even rest?"
"Have you heard of consistency? Once we make you relevant, you can rest easy."
"But these streams mostly last at least two hours! If we're doing eight of these, when should I eat my lunch? On stream? That's a disrespectful act for idols to their viewers. Also, where will I get that energy if this will take my sleeping time?"
"Hina, please understand that this exposure will raise our revenue. In simpler terms, it's a higher income for you."
"Where is the surprise factor for that? How will the viewers miss me if I upload streams everyday? Won't they get sick of me?"
"Isn't it your job to figure that out?"
"What!?"
Kazami stood up and faced Hina with an inch of intimidation. Her glare seemed silent but screamed threat. "You're just a rising star, so I will tell you the truth. No one will anticipate your streams after a week… for now." Kazami sighed back and went towards the door. "We're performers here, Hina. We don't collect trash," she said and left the room.
Hina hissed and clenched her fists, her glare nearly piercing through the door. Soon, she received a notification from one of the Instantgram pages she was following.
As soon as she unlocked the phone, a pop-up of the ongoing Tokyo Girls Fashion Walk alerted her. Her skin flushed, her eyes steadying from the want to watch the event. With her tight schedule, she locked her phone again, her chin lowering to her chest and her fists clenching.
Much farther…
In a cosplay convention, the hosts announced the after-lunch program featuring a special guest cosplayer.
"Did you know!? There are already speculations, but our guest cosplayer will be cosplaying for the very first time! Still, with her energetic vibe, I believe that she can nail the character's personality. What are we waiting for? Let's welcome the internet star, Hina Satou!"
Beyond the dressing room, Hina's first few steps were a byproduct of embarrassment. She walked with a bent spine, her chin dipping down. Her heart rapidly beat, deafening her from external noise. However, when the spotlight hit her skin before the audience, the thudding vanished instantly.
Shoulders back and chest out, Hina walked to the center of the stage, her eyes gleaming and her playful smile attracting the attention of the mass. Her costume is portraying Xian Li of Liberal Fighters game, a female martial artist that aims to overtake her master's dojo by participating in a fighting tournament. For her first pose, she mocked an imaginary enemy in front of her and gestured for it to come to her, smirking, "Come here and have some fun!"
Followed by succeedingly accurate poses, the audience went full uproar, shouting,
"Xian Li!? She had a flexible body but the cosplayer nailed the poses!"
"I've never seen such a good Xian Li imitation before! Was she possessed by the character?"
"Woah! Don't tell me it's her first time! She looked like the character, and her vibes were exactly like Xian Li's!"
Hina was always good at lifting the spirits of those around her, and with her acting skills, it was almost like she was possessed by the character. However, Hina didn't feel any of this was real. Even with her lightened body, her eyes wandered around the room, but it was focused on something farther, deeper. Subconsciously opening and closing her mouth, she paced in a restless stance, a whisper constantly bugging her ears with her sister's voice,
"A pigeon, so light… but you don't own its flight."
The performance ended, and even with the crowd's full support, she shifted away. All noise was blocked, giving her room to whisper an echo to thin air.
"I'm sorry, Rise."
Until the fake me takes over my reality…
10:00 PM, after a straight sixteen-hour routine stream, Hina bid her goodbyes to her viewers. "Goodbye, everyone! I'll promise to give you a bunch of streams and interactions! See you tomorrow–"
The stream ended… but only for Hina. Her head seemed to be wobbling on her neck before exhaustion pulled it on her desk. Though her eyebags were covered in makeup, her heavy eyelids involuntarily convinced her teary eyes to shut. For her, her limbs carried a ton of weight for it to even be controlled. For all she heard was her heartbeat.
The sunshine from her window nagged her to wake up. After a yawn, she flinched back her chair, her eyes bulging. Her monitor was still turned on, and comments flooded her stream. She immediately pressed the Off button, her other hand flying towards her pounding heart.
Even if her channel went viral through sympathy, she was given a warning for sleeping on stream.
Until I lose my smile… Until I become completely lost…
A personal leave, which was rare, was given to Hina to visit home. She opened the door to her new modern apartment, removed her shoes, and said, "I'm home." Sighing at home became a habit to her, knowing that there were no envelopes of bills lying near the doorway.
"Rise?" Hina shouted while wandering towards the living room. Confident that Rise was buying groceries, Hina sat on the couch, stretching and burying her back on it, like she spent her whole life standing up. She planned on getting the remote to turn the television on, but a brown envelope tagged 'Notice' on the table caught her attention.
She paused to examine the envelope, gazing with intense focus, and shook her head, muttering, "I already paid the bills." Slipping the envelope towards her with her hand, she unrolled the yarn lock and opened its contents. A few seconds later, her nostrils flared.
"I'm back!" Rise shouted and came to the living room, wearing a cap and carrying a cotton roll bought from Wuthering Weaves. She subconsciously opened her mouth when she saw her home, but her smile soon wavered when Hina approached her with noisy breathing.
Hina took the paper inside, threw the envelope away, and showed her the paper. "What have you been doing all this time?"
"Sister…" Rise looked at Hina with quivering lips.
"Don't give me your cutesy crap! I'm aging rapidly to give you a good life, and this is how you pay us back!? How is this how I find out that you're failing school!?"
Hina's mouth hung open when she noticed freckles on Rise's face. She wiped Rise's cheek, leaving a smudge at her face and harvesting particles of makeup on her thumb. "What's this? You want to be an ugly wart? Should I question the things I've done for us!?"
"But it's…"
"Tell me, Rise! Where did I lack? Did I fail to provide your needs? Is there something that I've done for you to be like this? Am I not a good sister to you?"
"…I'm sorry…"
"Sorry?" Hina roared, her teeth baring and face reddening. Anger ate her sense of thinking when she rushed to get a water glass on the table and slammed it on the ground. A large glass shard flew across her left hand, slicing an open wound on her palm.
"Hina-nee!" Rise shouted and ran to check on her sister's condition. Hina drew in slow and steady breaths to control herself, but her gaze didn't leave her wounded palm. Weirdly, she giggled, and with the loss of blood combined with her exhaustion, she suddenly lost consciousness.
I never thought I would've wounded my hands ever again.
Hina gasped and jerked back when Rise stood at the center of the spotlight, unaware that her sister was a part of the competition. Rise pointed her weapon prop, a spear, towards Hina as an indicator of challenge. Hina exposed her clenched fist over the table, gripping her pen to death, her nostrils flaring.
Rise's eyelids felt heavy and eyes involuntarily drifted shut. She kneeled on the ground, bowing, her weapon resting on the ground as she gripped it. Her discernible teeth clenched with breaths that saw in and out. A slow smile appeared on her face before her body fell down the ground, her pose representing Marionette Sari's impossible victory in that notable battle scene.
After the last drum beat, the air of calmness filled the air. The room was lit, and the crowd's loud cheers broke the silence, some even shed tears. The judges finished writing their points on the document they have on their tables and readied their number placards. Staring from the left, her points were 8, 9, 8, and 8. Hina's clenched fists shook the judges' table, her teeth baring.
Her protruding eyes exchanged her glare with Rise who stood at the center and squirmed her hands. Her hand quivering, she held the face-down placard and raised it at a snail's pace. The weight of the reveal was palpable. Every eye in the venue was glued to that single piece of cardboard, the collective breath of the audience held in a single, agonizing moment.
A hush fell over the crowd, a silence so thick one could almost grasp the dust motes lingering in the spotlights. All eyes widened, everyone at a loss for words. Hina slammed the placard on the stage and stood up her chair with a violent scrape. She turned and strode out silenced, the heels of her shoes hitting the floor with sharp, unforgiving clicks.
The person I want to be…
In Rise's room backstage, Hina slammed a desk and gestured her complaints, "Ironic, isn't it? I'm the one who has a career. I'm the one who's providing. I've been building my image from scratch, faking my personality, neglecting my wants… Then my sister came, Good Morning, crumbling the tower of cards I'd built. What a lively welcome!" Hina paused to catch her breath and asked calmly, "Tell me… Why are you doing this?"
"Nee-san…"
"You're not content with having a normal life? Not everyone has the privilege to have the life that you have! Sleep, study, cook meals, that should be your job, Rise! That's all you should be doing to help Mom… Not this… Have the career that you need to pull us out of this torment–"
… Is buried within my dreams…
Contrary to what usually happens, Rise shouted at her, "Why are you always like this, Nee-san!? Why does it feel like you're so distant from me, like you're not the sister I know… I didn't aspire for this normal life you wish. I'm not the type to become friends with anyone I talk to. I just can't accept sitting inside my own prison, treating this life as a blessing in disguise."
"What are you suggesting? That my efforts were all in vain? That as your family, I shouldn't have helped!? That I destroyed your life by sacrificing mine!? I shouldn't be the one responsible for being a breadwinner, but what choice do I have!? You're in the same sick state when Mom had the accident! I stepped into this unknown, a hint of danger always lingering, stalkers, threats, kidnapping… Is this the life that you want to have!?"
Rise grabbed and shook Hina's shoulders violently, "Then… Why aren't you asking for my help!? Why are you shouldering all this burden alone!? Why aren't you even telling me what's happening behind the curtains!? Am I really family to you!?"
Hina averted her gaze, but still showed her baring teeth. "I want to but I can't! ... Please, Rise… Just so you know, I'm so tired. Don't make this more difficult. Just study, and pull us out of this miserable life…"
Rise slightly pushed her back, enough to maintain her balance, and gave Hina a glare of regret. "…That's what I hate about you the most." She ran and violently opened the door, escaping her sister's wrath.
Hina extended her hand and shouted, "Rise!" But she only received another glare and a hint of indifference. She slowly clenched her trembling fist, her full body in tremors, lately realizing the tears fell down her eyes.
… Where no digging can reach…
If I only didn't choose this path…
… Would it still be the same?