Change It Or Else

June 26, 2019

Shizuka, Akari, and Chieko all relaxed in a hot spring together, having worked hard the past few days. As Akari sank everything below her mouth into the water to relax, Shizuka said to her and Chieko, “I want to thank you for your hard work these past few days. You both got right to work as soon as you began, and I think the three of us are gonna do great things together. Already, you’ve sped up the process significantly, and because of your help, I think we’ll be able to get my next chapter out a few days ahead of schedule.”

“Thank you,” Chieko replied. “Hiratai-sensei, working on your manga has been a dream come true for me.”

“Already? It’s only been like three days.”

“But those three days have been nothing short of great,” she explained. “Getting to work under such a good mangaka like yourself is something I could only dream of in the past.”

Shizuka downplayed her achievements and skills, clearly humble about her capabilities. “Nah, nah, nah, I wouldn’t say I’m that great. Besides, so far, Break The Ice has remained just a manga.”

“You never know,” Akari then said as she jumped into the conversation. “It could get an anime one day, or maybe even a TV drama.”

“A TV drama wouldn’t be a bad idea,” Shizuka replied. “Shimizu did tell me they were looking for someone to adapt Break The Ice into either form. Maybe a TV drama would be good since the story is pretty grounded in reality.”

“I just hope they don’t change it too much. I hate it when they completely derail from the canon of a manga. I don’t necessarily mind filler, but I despise when they depart from canon entirely and create a totally different story.”

“Me too,” Shizuka nodded. “I kinda like how anime has become seasonal now instead of just running it week after week with filler. If Uncontrollable Battle was running weekly constantly instead of just having a season of twelve episodes once every so often, they would have caught up very quickly due to the fact it’s a monthly manga. We’d have a ton of filler by now.”

“By the way,” Chieko then asked her, changing the subject. “Hiratai-sensei, um… Do you, uh…? Have you found a…?” She was so nervous to ask her this particular question she found herself unwilling to finish it. “Um…”

“I think I know what you’re trying to ask her,” Akari said, taking over for her. “Hiratai-sensei, are you dating someone right now? You’ve been really happy these past few days.”

“Crap,” Shizuka thought to herself. “Was I that easy to figure out? How much should I even tell them?” She took a deep breath and admitted, “Yes, I am. I won’t say who it is just yet, but I am dating someone again. I decided to give it another shot, and so far, things are going pretty good.”

“I figured that was the case. I remember talking to Iwaya-san about it because your behavior reminded me of girls in my high school who were in love with a boy that actually returned their feelings.”

A bit embarrassed that she seemingly acted so childish, Shizuka remarked, “Was I really acting like a high schooler…?”

“You kinda were,” Chieko admitted.

Shizuka then remarked on a different topic: her age. “At least it makes me feel young. I still can’t believe I’m gonna be thirty next year. I’m getting too old.”

Akari asked her, “How old is your boyfriend?”

“He’s six years older than me.”

“Six years older than her,” Akari thought to herself, curious as to who it was. “Six years older… Wait a minute, Anzai-sensei is six years older than her… What if…? No way, it can’t be him! …Could it, though?”

“It’s definitely different from my ex-boyfriend,” Shizuka commented. “He was three years younger than me. Now I’m dating a guy who’s the opposite.”

“Which one was better?”

“Honestly, the age gap didn’t really matter too much in either case. It’s about the person. I will say that I was my ex-boyfriend’s first girlfriend, while my current boyfriend has experience in dating… And sex.”

“I mean, that’s a given,” Akari pointed out. “By that age, most people have done it with at least one person. When did… Uh… When did you have sex for the first time, if you don’t mind me asking?”

Chieko blushed at the topic of conversation. “Se- Sex… Oh my…”

“Well, we can definitely tell Iwaya-san is a virgin,” Shizuka remarked, causing her and Akari to laugh. “To answer your question, I lost my virginity in high school to my first boyfriend. He was the same age as me, making him the only person I’ve ever had sex with who was the same age as me in fact.”

Chieko replied in shock, “In high school?!”

“It happens,” Akari pointed out. “It’s not common, but it isn’t unheard of.”

“H- Have you, um… Have you done it, Kunugi-san?”

“No,” she shook her head. “Honestly, between my art and my studies, I don’t think I have time for a boyfriend. Maybe one day, things will be different, but for now, that’s off the table.”

“When I first met you,” Shizuka said to her. “I could have sworn that you and Hori-san were a couple.”

“No, no, no,” Akari denied. “We’re friends. We’re both fine just being friends. Besides, he’s graduating high school in March next year, and I still have another two years to get through. He’ll be busy with finding a job and going to college after that.”

“That’s what they all say…”

An annoyed Askari replied, “Oh, shut up.”

“By the way,” Shizuka then asked them, changing the topic once again. “Are you guys free in August for something? I wanna take you guys to Summer Comiket.”

“I was already planning to go,” Chieko replied. “I’m still in a doujin circle, and I was going to go with them.”

“I’ve never been to one,” Akari replied to Shizuka. “I heard it’s crowded.”

“It is,” Shizuka nodded. “But I think you guys will have a fun time. I always go to both the Summer and Winter editions, even now. I sell art there on the side, and I’ll often be involved in panels and booths Shimizu runs. I can get you an industry pass for free, Kunugi-san. I assume you already have a pass, Iwaya-san?”

“Yeah,” Chieko nodded. “The doujin circle I’m in will get me a pass.”

“I’ve thought about cosplay before,” Akari then confessed, surprising both Shizuka and Chieko. “But I don’t know if I could pull it off.”

“Well, who do you want to cosplay?”

“I want to cosplay Mary of Truman from Uncontrollable Battle,” she explained, referring to one of the main female characters of Michi’s manga, that being a princess who rode into battle with soldiers. “But it may be a bit too late to get it all ready by now.”

“No, it’s not,” Shizuka assured her. “Summer Comiket is two whole months away. If you need help, I can find you supplies. Just to warn you, though, Summer Comiket can be brutally hot.”

“I’ll be fine,” she assured her boss. “I’m good at reminding myself to stay hydrated, and I’ll use Mary’s lighter battle outfit from earlier in the manga and not her heavier one from later on.”

“Hmmmm, okay. You know, I wonder if I should tell Anzai-sensei about this.”

“Eh?” Akari was worried about how Michi would react to her cosplaying a character from his manga. “Uh, well, uh…”

“Relax,” Shizuka assured her. “I know him pretty well. He loves seeing his fans show their love for the series. He’s told me before that it keeps him motivated.”

“Well, um… I don’t know about telling him, but…”

“I’ll be sure to send a photo of the cosplay to him,” Shizuka grinned.

Akari stood up out of the water and pointed at Shizuka, not caring that she was obviously fully nude. “Don’t you dare!”

Chieko quickly turned away as Shizuka laughed, replying, “Relax, I was joking, Kunugi-san.” She then saw Chieko turning away and remarked, “What’s up? Are you embarrassed to see another girl nude or something?”

“No, um, I’m just…”

Shizuka then stood up as well and shrugged. “I don’t really see the issue. We’re all girls here. Kunugi-san may be the youngest, but that doesn’t really matter here.”

An older woman sitting with her teenage daughter nearby, having overheard this part of the conversation, remarked to the trio, “Sorry to interject, but I remember being like that when I first came here. Nowadays, it doesn’t really bother me.”

“See, Iwaya-san?”

“Alright,” Chieko sighed. “That’s fair.”

As Akari sat back down in the water, she added, “I’m too desensitized to it at this point. When you’ve seen as much, uh… Manga, anime, games, and fanart as I have, you get used to it.”

Shizuka playfully asked her, “Hmmm? What was that? Did I hear that you’re partaking in content made for adults, Kunugi-san?”

“Shit,” she muttered, realizing she had painted herself into a corner. “Uh… I mean… Well…”

“Dude, I don’t give a shit,” Shizuka laughed. “I was reading eromanga online when I wasn’t eighteen yet. Hell, I even illegally downloaded an eroge on my computer when I was seventeen. Honestly, I’m surprised I was never caught by my parents or got a virus on my computer.”

Chieko’s eyes widened with shock. “Woah… You… Did that that young?”

“Wait, you didn’t? Based on some of your doujinshi manga, I’m surprised.”

“I caught glimpses, but I never dared to actually look at it in full. I was always paranoid my parents would find out.”

“So that means you vented your sexual frustrations into your art when you turned eighteen?”

“No!” After a pause when she realized neither Shizuka nor Akari were buying it, Chieko then admitted, “Well, uh, not necessarily…”

…

June 27, 2019

Shizuka was talking on the phone to Akari’s parents in the evening after Chieko had gone home for the day. “She’s doing great,” she told her mother. “We went to a hot spring yesterday and we all got to know each other pretty well.”

“She told me,” her mother replied. “She says working with you has been incredible. I’m really glad to see her coming out of her shell more. I know she has Kazu-kun, but she never really had any friends besides him.”

“Speaking of him, by the way, I actually made him some art for his own book he’s writing.”

“Oh yeah! I almost forgot that Akari said he was making a book, or… What was the term she used again?”

“Light novel,” Shizuka explained. “It’s a light novel. Basically, it’s a novel, but a little bit shorter and with artwork similar to manga inside on some pages. It’s often serialized in multiple volumes too.”

“Ah, that’s it! A light novel! I keep forgetting all of these terms Akari tells us about. I was never artistically-inclined like she is. Her father is, though.”

Curious, Shizuka asked Akari’s mother, “Her father is an artist?”

“Correct,” her mother confirmed. “He works in the graphic design and advertising industry, though. He once had ambitions of making manga in the distant past, but he found good work making advertisements instead. Although we aren’t together anymore, I’m glad she’s still connecting to her father through art. Not to vent to you too much, but I was really worried after the divorce that she was going to hate her father or something.”

“No, it’s fine,” Shizuka assured her. “It helps me understand her better. If I may ask, what happened between you and her father anyway?”

“We fell out of love,” she explained to her. “And in the end, he went out and found a new woman. It didn’t help that he was drinking very heavily back then, and admittedly, I drank quite a bit too. It tore us apart for a while, but we’re just now starting to patch things up, even if I’m married to another man now. I was so worried afterwards that Akari would blame him so much for what happened that she would never speak to him again, and maybe even abandon art, but I’m glad that hasn’t been the case. Even if we don’t get along that well, I still want her to have some kind of relationship with her father. I mean, for God’s sake, it’s her father. Just because we don’t love each other anymore doesn’t mean she shouldn’t love her father, because I know he still loves her regardless.”

“You’re taking all this pretty well,” Shizuka replied. “I’ve heard of some real horror stories. There was this one kid in my high school whose parents’ divorce was so messy that his father’s family forbade him from using his family name and ordered he never acknowledge publicly that he was a member of their family, which also meant he couldn’t acknowledge that he had a younger sister since she was ordered to live with his father. It was some really fucked up shit.”

“Damn, that sucks. I’m glad we never got that messy, even at our worst. That is pretty fucked up, actually. I could never think of doing that to Akari, even when me and her father couldn’t even have a God damn conversation without getting into a screaming match.”

“I’m glad we had this conversation, you know. It really helps me understand how she works and what her background is. Your daughter is destined for great things, at least in my opinion.”

“Hey, your opinion seems pretty important, to be fair.”

“Eh,” Shizuka shrugged. “At the end of the day, mangaka and novelists are largely just working to keep their editors and the executives at our publishing companies happy. Nothing I write or draw gets published without getting cleared by my editor first, and the same goes for when I hire assistants. Initially, he was actually hesitant to hire your daughter due to her age, but a good review of her art from the higher-ups convinced him to allow it. My opinion only goes so far.”

“Wow, even the executives praised her work? As in the CEO and everything?”

“Yep,” she confirmed with a proud smile. “They were blown away when they learned she was still a high school student.”

“Wow… Anyway, Hiratai-san, I’d like to stay and talk more, but I gotta go to bed. I get up around 6 every morning for work, after all.”

“That’s fine. Just let me know if you wanna talk again. Have a good night.”

“You too. Goodbye.”

Shizuka then hung up the phone with Akari’s mother, having learned many new things about her past and who she was as a person. “Hmmm… So that explains it… She got her skills from her father…” As she looked over her pages, she picked up a pencil and began to work on them, having nothing else better to do despite it being pretty late at night. As she did, she thought to herself, “Maybe I can find out how to contact her father through Kunugi-san. Based on what her mother said about her, I’d like to meet him. I wonder if he even knows about what she’s doing for work outside of school right now…”

…

June 29, 2019

Shizuka and Akari were busy working on the finishing touches of the next chapter of Break The Ice that was set to release next week, as well as a storyboard for August’s chapter. As Shizuka drew a panel that contained the two main characters of Break The Ice sharing a rather passionate kiss, she asked Akari, “Kunugi-san, how much implied sex do you think I can get away with?”

Surprised by the question, she turned around and replied, “Huh? Are you gonna have Ichigo and Kazuya go all the way?”

“That’s the idea for August’s chapter. Considering this is running in a shojo manga magazine, I really can’t show much.”

“Hmmm… Well, I don’t know too much about the exact details of what’s allowed and what’s not, but maybe you could just do a cutaway to the day after?”

“That’s my idea,” Shizuka confirmed. “But my fear is Obuchi-san will object to me actually saying the word ‘sex’ at all. I may just call him up and see if I can.”

“Good idea.”

Shizuka then pulled up a videoconference app on her computer and called Daichi, waiting for an answer as her computer rang several times. When he answered, he was sitting down at his home desk, replying, “Hello?”

“Hey, Obuchi-san,” Shizuka waved at him. “I got a quick question to ask you about August’s chapter.”

“Sure, shoot.”

“I want Ichigo and Kazuya to have sex,” she explained. “But I don’t want to actually show it. I was planning to do just a cutaway to the following morning, but what can I have the characters say?”

“Sex? You can’t show that in Monthly Girl Step.”

“I told you I’m not showing it, though. It happens off-screen.”

“Be careful with even doing that,” Daichi warned her. “Even mentioning the word ‘sex’ might get us in trouble. It’s why a lot of manga just use euphemisms for it if they approach the actual topic of sex at all. I think you might be better off just not having them do it if you want to avoid that risk.”

Shizuka sighed, knowing he was going to say something like this. “We can’t avoid it when they’ve been together now for quite some time in the manga. We had the condom chapter at the beginning of the year, after all.”

“I was worried that we would get in trouble for that.”

“But we didn’t.”

“That might be the limit of what we can do,” Daichi then added. “Not once was the actual word ‘sex’ used, nor was there any implication anybody had sex. Hiratai-san, I’m just looking out for you.”

“I know you are, but I’m pretty vested into the company at this point. I’m not a newbie like I was when the manga first started.”

“But your manga has remained just that, a manga. It hasn’t been adapted into anything, and its popularity remains limited as a result.”

“It won’t be stuck as only a manga forever,” Shizuka pointed out. “We got approached for the TV drama idea, after all.”

“Yeah, but that will still be a way’s off.”

Growing frustrated with his distractions and his reluctance, Shizuka proverbially put her foot down. “Ichigo and Kazuya are having sex. That is what many older teenagers do when they’ve been in a relationship for a while, myself included. No way would a relationship between anyone last this long without the topic coming up at least once. If I wanted to show the two of them railing each other like rabid animals, Break The Ice would have been running in Afternoon Riders or have been an eromanga doujinshi I would sell at Comiket or on PictoView. I don’t want to show that, because it’s not relevant to the story. The fact they have sex at all, though, is relevant. The story cannot proceed forward as I have planned unless it happens.”

Daichi paused, taking in her words as he formulated a response in his head. Akari, having overheard the discussion, watched on as she wondered how Shizuka’s editor would respond, thinking to herself, “She doesn’t sound happy at all. I hope Obuchi-san doesn’t say something that will make the situation worse. If he tells her to change the story so it can’t happen, I don’t know how she’ll react.”

“You may have to change the story then,” Daichi then replied, confirming her fears. “I don’t think they should have sex at all within the manga’s storyline. It would push the boundaries too much.”

Shizuka was clearly angered by his response, but did not express it directly to him. “I see. Thank you for your help, Obuchi-san.” She then hung up on him and sighed, looking down at her storyboard and expressing, “Kunugi-san, this is what you’ll have to deal with sometimes as a mangaka. I’m warning you now, you don’t always get what you want, and sometimes, it can derail everything you have planned.”

Akari, worried about her, asked, “Hiratai-sensei, are… Are you okay?”

Shizuka did not reply directly to her. Instead, she stood up from her desk and grabbed the storyboard she had been drawing, crumpling it up and tossing it at the wall in frustration before yelling, “Fuck! God fucking damn it! I’ll have to scrap everything I had planned and drawn already for August, September, and October! That motherfucker put me back at square one, and now I’ll have to really push myself to get three chapters out and still get work started on future ones to stay ahead!”

She then stormed into the kitchen and opened up her refrigerator, pulling out a can of beer and opening it up before chugging much of it. Akari, who could hear her, said to her as she got up, “Uh… Are you…?”

“I’m done working for the day,” she told her as she sat down at her kitchen table. “How far are you into the July chapter?”

“I’m almost done.”

“Alright. When you’re done with that, you can head home. I’ll make sure you still get paid for a full day’s work, though.”

…

Later in the day, Kazu and Akari were hanging out together at an arcade, talking about what had been going on with Shizuka. “Damn,” he said to her. “Her editor shot it down just like that?”

“Yep,” she replied as she put two coins into a zombie co-op rail shooter and both she and Kazu pressed start. “It fucking sucks.”

“I don’t get it. I’ve seen plenty of manga and light novels that just say it happened after the fact. Why can’t she just do that?”

“Her editor thinks it would be too far to even do that, so he doesn’t want Ichigo and Kazuya to have sex at all during the manga’s main storyline, either onscreen or offscreen. He doesn’t even want the implication.”

Bewildered, Kazu pointed out, “But there was that chapter with the condom, though.”

“That’s what Hiratai-sensei said, too, but it didn’t matter. Her editor said that that was pushing the boundaries, and that actually having sex in canon would be pushing them too far.” She then looked up at the screen, which showed a loading menu with several zombies and remarked, “I’ve played this game like five times and I’ve never gotten past the third level.”

“This is my first time playing it,” Kazu replied. “Maybe the two of us can get all the way to the end.”

When the first level began, they found themselves in an abandoned prison. This was a level familiar to Akari, and she was able to breeze through it with no problem, while Kazu lost a life on the level near the very beginning. “Talk about bad luck, huh?”

“Aw, come on,” he replied in frustration. “A zombie right there when I opened the door? That’s bullshit.”

As Akari killed two zombies in a row with headshots, she said to Kazu, “Going back to that thing with Hiratai-sensei, she told me to head home early once I was done with the last page of the upcoming July chapter.”

“Wow, really? She was that demotivated?”

“I’m afraid so. She opened up a beer and finished it while I was there. She was about halfway through another when I said goodbye and left.”

Kazu, surprised she was drinking so much in the middle of the day, noted, “She drinks quite a bit.”

“Yeah, but not during the day like this. From what I’ve seen and heard, she only does it socially. At most, she may have a single beer some days normally. I’m kinda worried she’s gonna get shitfaced and do something she regrets at home.”

“You’re that worried? Do you think she has a problem with alcohol?”

“Not anymore than the average salaryman,” Akari humorously pointed out. “My stepdad doesn’t drink as much as some of his coworkers. Sometimes, they’re so far gone they rent out a capsule hotel for the night because the subway stopped running and they stayed up too late drinking at bars and nightclubs.” Curious if Kazu had ever drank before despite both of them being too young to legally do so, she asked him, “Have you ever drank alcohol before?”

“I’ve had wine and sake,” he replied. “But only at family gatherings. What about you?”

“I don’t think I’d want to drink even when I get old enough,” she said with a sigh. “I’ve seen what it can do to people.”

“That’s fair.” The level then ended, with both of them having made it all the way through to the second one. “Alright, one level down, four more to go.”

“Hell yeah,” she replied as the two hi-fived each other. “Level Two, here we go!” For the second level, the two of them went to an abandoned hospital next, and this time, a new class of zombie emerged that would explode if a player bumped into them, taking away half of their health. “I hope the Exploding Zombies don’t get us. That’s what got me on the third level the last time I played this.”

As they began playing the second level, Kazu asked Akari, “Do you think I should submit my novel to Shimizu for their yearly contest?”

“If you think it’s good enough to do so, why not? There’s only one way to find out if you’ll win or lose, and that’s to submit it.”

“Fair point, but… It would kind of disrupt things if I did win it.”

“I’m sure things would work out if you won. Besides, if you lose this time, you can always try again. Didn’t you tell me you had multiple ideas floating around?”

“Yeah. In fact, I got a second novel I want to write, too.”

“Ooh, nice. What’s it about?”

“You know how a lot of Korean webtoons and whatnot are about time travel and fixing your mistakes?”

“Yeah,” Akari nodded. “We have isekai, Korea has time travel, and China has cultivation stories.”

“Mine is about a guy who gets killed in an accident, and he ends up going back in time five years. Upon realizing this, he decides to stop the death of his girlfriend at the hands of the Yakuza.”

Akari was very interested in the premise. “Ooh, that sounds like it could be a good thriller.”

“It wouldn’t be as long of a story as I have planned for Does Kumiko Actually Like Me?, but it would still be of a decent length.” Kazu then chuckled and added, “Maybe doing something where the stakes are actually high will be a good break from the slice of life stuff in my first novel.”

“It’s nice to mix it up a bit,” Akari agreed. “That’s why I’m a fan of series ranging from violent seinen manga like Uncontrollable Battle to romance shojo manga like Break The Ice. It’s good to get a break from one extreme or the other, especially when you find a manga, anime, or book that’s right in the middle.” Akari then ran into an Exploding Zombie, causing her to lose half of her health in the game. “Ah shit!”

“Looks like you got distracted,” Kazu joked.

“Oh, shut up. We’re both getting sidetracked.” When Akari tried to reload her gun in the game, a zombie latched onto her and killed her, causing her to lose the first of her three lives. “Damn it, there goes one life.”

“I got more coins if you need it.”

“I’ll be fine for now. I’d be more worried about your health. You’re close to losing a second life, Hori-kun.” She then revived herself and began playing again. As she did, she thought to herself, “I really hope Hiratai-sensei doesn’t do anything stupid if she really does get drunk tonight. I saw how she tossed away that storyboard so quickly. I guess my fear is that she’ll throw away more art and set herself back further.”

…

Shizuka was with Michi at his apartment, crying to him about what Daichi had vetoed as the two shared drinks. “I can’t believe he did that,” she said through gritted teeth as tears fell down her face. “God damn it, do I feel betrayed! I had to toss away my plans for the next four chapters all because of this!”

Michi patted her on the back to comfort her. “I’m sorry, Shizuka. I understand. I’ve had whole chapter plots tossed away by my editors before. It’s not fun. It fucking sucks.”

“I had to throw out an entire storyboard for the August chapter. I can’t even begin to plan out what I’ll make to replace it…”

“I’m sure there’s something inside that mind of yours that’ll work,” he said to her with a smile as he wrapped an arm around her shoulders. “You’re a talented woman, Shizuka. You’ll come up with something.”

Shizuka then took another sip of some whiskey Michi had pulled out for them. “Thanks for hearing me out, Michi. I really needed someone to vent to.”

“Of course. Now, are you sure you don’t want me to step in and pull some strings to get that sex plot restored?”

“No, no, it’s fine,” Shizuka insisted. “I’m an adult woman. I can fight my own battles. Besides, you need to focus on your own manga.”

Michi sighed, reluctant to let her fight it on her own but realizing he was not going to change her mind. “Alright… I was just offering, that’s all.”

“Thank you, though.” She then arched her back and stretched her arms. “Agh… I’ve sat down at a desk so much this past week that my back has been killing me. I need to take Sunday off.”

“I won’t be,” Michi replied. “I’m getting right to work the minute I wake up tomorrow. I’m gonna discuss a new story arc with my editor.”

His girlfriend chuckled, joking with him, “You know you could overwork yourself, right, Michi?”

“I could overwork myself? I think I already am a lot of days, Shizuka.”

“That’s why I could never do a schedule as packed as your’s, at least not by myself. You’re fucking nuts, and only slightly less fucking nuts than mangaka who do weekly series.”

“You gotta be fucking nuts to be in this business, whether your manga is weekly, bi-weekly, monthly, or whatever. Same with light novels, honestly. A certain amount of craziness is needed to work such long hours at a desk either drawing or writing almost every day.”

“You’re not wrong.”