“Idol News”

The office situated in Shibuya was alive with the sound of mediocrity with phones ringing., keyboards clacking, and the distant hum of the printer coughing up another report no one would ever read.

Airi Komatsu sat in her little beige cubicle, surrounded by motivational posters that had long stopped motivating anyone. One read “Dream Big!” in cheerful pink font which is ironic, since the only dream Airi currently had was of quitting.

Her monitor glowed with a spreadsheet full of numbers that made no sense and, honestly, didn’t need to. She typed, clicked, sighed, and wondered if her soul had also been filed into the company’s database—

“Airi! Airi, you’re not gonna believe this!”

The voice sliced through the office din like an alarm clock from hell.

Airi winced even before she looked up. Saki Morimoto, the marketing department friend was approaching at full volume, holding her phone like it contained the meaning of life. She was grinning so wide that half the office turned to look before she even reached Airi’s desk.

“Saki,” Airi hissed, lowering her voice as her friend skidded to a stop beside her cubicle. “You’re causing a commotion.”

Saki ignored her entirely. Of course she did. Her short, sleek brown bob bounced as she leaned over Airi’s desk, practically vibrating with energy. Her pastel blazer which somehow matched her nails, lipstick, and entire aura stood out like a burst of color in the sea of gray suits around them.

Airi didn’t even glance up from her screen when the telltale clicking of heels stopped beside her cubicle. She could feel the energy radiating off her friend.

“What is it, Saki?” she asked, already bracing for impact.

“Airi!” Saki squealed, practically bouncing in place. “You will not believe this!”

Airi sighed, swiveling her chair toward her. “You say that every time, and you’re right about half the time. Which half is this?”

Saki ignored the sarcasm completely, her eyes shining with excitement as she shoved her phone into Airi’s hands. The case was an explosion of pastel pink and glitter hearts which are very Saki-coded.

“Look! Look! Ren Ichijō was caught at a local karaoke bar!”

Airi blinked. “Ren… Ichijō?”

“The J-pop idol!” Saki said, like she was explaining who oxygen was. “The Ren Ichijō — you know, ‘King of Tokyo,’ ‘The Voice That Launched a Thousand Fangirls,’ that guy!”

Airi’s stomach dropped.

“Wait,” she said slowly, staring at the screen. “Karaoke bar?”

“Yesss,” Saki said, grinning. “Someone posted a video this morning. It’s all over social media. Look!”

Airi hesitated before pressing play. The grainy video showed a dimly lit room; one of those small karaoke booths with neon lighting and peeling posters. The camera wobbled as whoever filmed tried to zoom in. She heard a voice, warm and velvety, singing over a faint instrumental track. Her pulse quickened. She knew that voice because it was her voice blending in with Ren’s voice from that night in the karaoke bar a few days ago.

The more she watched, Airi was thankful the angle was bad, because whoever filmed it had been seated diagonally, catching only the man’s profile and the side of another figure’s arm. Her face wasn’t visible, just her hands gripping the mic and her voice singing the wrong notes in all the right ways.

She swallowed hard, trying to keep her expression neutral as the video continued. Ren’s face came into frame briefly, but clear enough that even the grainy footage couldn’t hide how infuriatingly good-looking he was. The white hair. The star-patterned mask. The same voice that had wrapped around hers like a lullaby.

Saki squealed again, snatching the phone back to scroll through the comments section like a raccoon going through shiny trash. “Can you believe it, Airi? He was in our neighborhood!”

Airi blinked, still processing the fact that she had not only sung a duet with a literal pop idol, but was now accidentally viral material.

“I… can’t believe it,” she managed weakly.

“Oh, look, look!” Saki said, zooming in on a blurry still frame. “You can barely see the girl he’s with, but everyone’s talking about her! ‘Who is the mystery karaoke girl?’ ‘Ren’s secret duet partner?!’”

Saki giggled, scrolling through comment after comment, her voice filled with giddy delight. Airi stared at the phone, horrified, as if sheer willpower could make the post disappear.

“That girl is so lucky,” Saki said with a dreamy sigh.

“Yes,” Airi murmured, her voice thin. “She must be… very lucky.”

Saki nodded enthusiastically. “Right? But—” She lowered her voice conspiratorially, glancing around as if sharing classified information. “She’s also going to be so hated.”

Airi blinked. “What?”

Saki stuck her tongue out playfully. “You know how fangirls are! If Ren so much as looks at another human being with two X chromosomes, they start forming cults online. That mystery girl’s about to get digitally obliterated once her identity is found.”

Airi’s face drained of color.

“Destroyed,” Saki continued cheerfully, oblivious. “Public enemy number one. People are already dissecting the angle of her elbow trying to identify her.”

“That’s… horrifying,” Airi said faintly.

Saki shrugged. “Eh, the internet is scary but passionate. Anyway, I’m more focused on how he ended up here. Like, what’s Ren Ichijō doing in a karaoke bar in our district? Maybe he’s slumming it for artistic inspiration. Or maybe—” she gasped dramatically, “—he’s secretly dating someone normal!”

Airi forced out a laugh that sounded like a dying printer. “Yeah. Maybe.”

“Oh! Imagine if that girl didn’t even know who he was!” Saki said with a laugh. “Like, she’s just vibing, singing her heart out, and has no clue she’s harmonizing with Japan’s most famous man!”

Airi let out the most convincing noncommittal hum of her life. “Yeah… wild.”

Saki sighed, tucking her phone away. “Anyway, I love Ren, but I’m jealous of that girl. Even if she’s probably crying from the hate comments right now.”

“Probably,” Airi said quietly.

Her friend grinned and patted her shoulder. “Don’t work too hard, okay? I’ll bring you something from the café later.”

“Thank a lot, Saki.”

And with that, Saki strutted back to her desk, humming one of Ren’s songs under her breath. Airi sat frozen, staring blankly at her monitor. The rhythmic typing and ringing phones faded into background noise. Her mind replayed the grainy video on a loop from Ren’s voice, her voice, the spark between them that no camera could capture but was still there, undeniably real.

Airi decided to focus back on her work, but curiosity itched the back of her brain so much that her fingers hover over her keyboard, searching up Ren’s name on the internet. She should be finishing her report. She should be pretending to work like everyone else in this gray, half-dead office.The search engine practically explodes with results. Headlines everywhere:

“Ren Ichijō Spotted Singing in Local Bar!”

“Mystery Woman Duets with Idol — Who Is She?”

“Fans Speculate Identity of Ren’s Karaoke Partner.”

Her stomach twists as she clicks one of the articles. A grainy still image loads of that same dimly lit booth, that same angle that barely shows her hands holding the mic. The caption underneath reads, “Lucky fan or secret girlfriend?” Airi almost snorts. Lucky? That’s one word for it. Mortified might be another. She scrolls down and finds the comment section, which is, as expected, a digital warzone.

“Who does she think she is???”
“That girl’s voice was awful omg”
“If Ren’s dating, I’m DONE.”
“Lucky girl TT I’d die to sing with him!!”
“They should find her. I need to know who she is!”

Airi’s hands tremble as she scrolls faster, the words blurring together with hate, jealousy, disbelief, speculation. Some comments are harmless; others, less so. People analyzing the color of her sleeve, the angle of her wrist, the shape of her hands.

She exhales shakily and leans back in her chair. Her monitor reflects her face: pale, wide-eyed, a mix of guilt and dread. For the first time, the reality hits her. This isn’t just a weird memory of an unexpected duet. This is news. This is thousands of people talking about her, dissecting her existence like she’s some kind of mystery puzzle to solve.

Airi closes the tab before her brain can spiral any further. Her phone buzzes a second later and its Saki, probably sending more links, more updates, more noise. Airi flips it over, screen-down.

She can’t seem to shake off the thought of the stranger she sang with was no one other than Ren Ichijō! Japan’s top idol, and she had sung with him like a fool in a dingy karaoke booth, and now his crazy fans are trying to look for her.

Airi pressed her hands to her face and groaned. “I’m so doomed.”