Chapter 15: The Enthusiastic Actors

"Everyone know they have messed up, which brought them to kneel before us here. Well, I must thank Aki for suddenly losing his voice while acting as someone possessed." - Tori. 

All eyes were on them.

The three of them knelt on the floor, ducking their head for repent. Another five students secured them in a circle so that those three would not run away whenever they obtained the best chance to do so. They were infuriated, disappointed, and jumbled up inside, though they were smirking at those on the floor. In fact, no word could picture how negative their overwhelming emotion was.

Aki, Kishi and Ito could not collide eyes with any of them, outstandingly Tori and Hiro towards Aki. The apprehension they have been sustaining for the entire lesson was wasted, totally in vain. Aki was actually holed up in the media club room and brought Mori who happened to arrive the earliest at the moment, to the rooftop.

“Who wouldn’t get panicked when someone originally cheeky suddenly grabbed you on the collar and pushed you to the wall? The reason was that he wanted to show me something, whereas he could do it just casually without a hint of threat!!” Mori raved in pure dissatisfaction.

Who could speculate that Aki would do such dramatic play just to testify the effectiveness of his acting class with Kishi and Ito. Those two prompted Aki to show his acting to Mori and the whole media club, promising him that Mori would be surprised at his polished talent. Therefore, they came up with the idea of reassuring Aki to practice using the clean script <0001>, and display it in front of the media club. They never thought Aki would act ludicrously like that.

“I’m sorry, Mori-senpai! I don’t mean to hurt you,” Aki timidly fidgeted with his entwined fingers between his thighs. “I’m sorry, Tani-san, Ono-san, Hiro, Tori.”

“Well, it can’t be helped. The damage has done,” Tani exhaled a long sigh, probably in frustration or disappointment. His commonly happy face was embittered which bothered Aki a little too much. Ono only nodded and let his head bounced a little.

“What damage, Tani-san?”

“You! You’ve caused me trauma!” Mori shrieked in high pitch. “For your information, I am mentally traumatized of you, Aki!”

This Mori was really absurd. Hiro and Tori shifted simultaneously at the freaked Mori, squinting as they disliked Mori’s abruptness in fundamentally everything, including in making up resolution. It would be fine if he determined over the correct solution, yet lately he has been creating more mistakes since the day he provoked Aki to go meet Kishi.

Tori crossed his arms, pressing his lips against each other to hold his welled up tears. He was utterly disappointed because Aki even chose to deceive him, whereas they were close friends to begin with.

“Ever since the last day you visited the media club room, Mori-senpai kept on forgetting things,” told Tori as calm as he could yet his shaky voice notified everyone that he wasn’t. “You didn’t come to the club room because you were pursuing Kishi-senpai, and even accepted Ito-senpai’s preposterous objective. None of those plan, you never intended to back off, huh? Aki?”

Hiro and Tani stealthily exchanged glances. Ono swerved around, masking his amazement over Tori speaking his mind out. Even the president of the media club fell into deep silence as he just realized his stimulus has brought despair since day one without him knowing. At first, he was madly taking it as Aki fooling around, and his initially unapparent instinct was strengthened as the weird rumour about Aki and Kishi doing secret stuff together roaming across Izumi Junior High School.

Kishi and Ito rose from their kneeling on the floor. They agreed to clarify the truth so that they could clear their names from the misunderstanding. They could not bear seeing Aki being isolated from his own club whereas he was doing it for the sake of Mori’s selfishness.

“On behalves of these students and myself, I would like to apologize to everyone here,” Ito kicked off, firmly without qualm. His eyes safely met with every single pairs available there, including Kishi and Aki on his sides. “It’s all my plan, so that I could lash my anger on Kishi in a profoundly lenient way.”

The listeners widened their eyes, whether in astonishment or satisfaction, over Ito’s honest confession. Kishi scowled at the emotionless Ito, enduring the urge to yell at him for causing the mishaps including the diarrhoea.

“I was the one complotting with Aki in doing all those towards Kishi, Mori,” Ito purposely mentioned their names one after another, “I couldn’t forget how Kishi’s treatment was towards you last time. No matter how I scolded him, he never considered of apologizing or even accost you normally every morning. It isn’t cool, is it?”

There was a straining weight pressing against Mori’s chest. It was his feeling, his very own emotion full of disheartenment that he then figured out Ito could notice it too. He has been detaining his disappointment inside, without really portraying it towards other people, yet it accumulated when Kishi refused to lend a hand for the club’s project. He tried to put his pain aside and lowered his ego by asking for Kishi’s help, however it turned out that Kishi has submerged himself in unbounded fame which then erased the need to thank Mori.

“Though Ito was planning all those, it was my fault in the beginning,” Kishi stepped forward, shrinking the gap between him and Mori. “I’m sorry for hurting you, Mori. I didn’t think of your contribution in my life. I shouldn’t abandon you, my childhood friend.”

The Kishi in front of them has, somehow, changed to a much better personality. Wondering if it was because of the existence of Aki in his life or Ito’s merciless punishment bestowed on him, the other club members remained quiet. It was a moment between Kishi and Mori, therefore they would be the one dissolving their matter together.

Mori faced away from Kishi, flustering the latter because they were confronting each other. Has Mori rejected his apology? “Mori, I know I’ve wronged you. I’ve hurt your feeling. I’m a bad friend, yes I know that,” he suddenly grabbed both Mori’s wrist, startling the latter. “With these hands, you can do anything to me. You can hit me! Punch me! Anything, just name it! I will accept it wholeheartedly!”

Upon Kishi’s wish, Mori evaded Kishi’s hand on his. Punch him? Kick him out? Slap him? Curse at him? Mori did nothing of those. Instead of taunting the one who has frustrated him, he seized Kishi into his embrace. He wrapped his arms around Kishi, as if he was telling Kishi that he would not break their friendship just because of overwhelming egoism.

“You idiot!” Mori literally cried right at Kishi’s ear, blasting his emotion onto him. Kishi, the childhood friend of his, must listen everything from the bottom of his heart. “How could you ignore me after you’ve become popular like how you are nowadays? How could you reject me when I asked for your help? I just want us to be like how we used to be!”

“I’m sorry! I’m so sorry! Please don’t hate me!”

They unexpectedly bawled in each other’s arms, weeping their heart out. The spectators were engrossed into the atmosphere, relieving and relaxing, as Mori and Kishi have finally made up. Ito assisted Aki to get up and celebrate their victory together. Though the method was unacceptable, and Aki even hesitated for a long time before executing it, they have successfully accomplished their main purpose – to reconcile Mori and Kishi.

Tani leant himself against Ono who has already rested against the wall. “I hope Kishi isn’t just acting, though.” It was agreed by Ono, without a word.

Hiro saw Tori lowering his head, possibly in shame. He accused Aki for disregarding their friendship. Since day one, Aki has always shared his activity in order to attract Kishi so that Kishi would agree to teach him on acting. Frankly, Aki did not hide anything from Tori except his dramatic acting on the rooftop. If only he did not hurt his throat, everyone (excluding Kishi and Ito) would strongly believe that he was possessed.

Both of them confronted Aki to settle the issue together. They exchanged looks, in the middle of hesitation to believe, frustration for the deceit, and relieved because Aki was fine enough to even prank people. Aki was about to apologize too as Tori and Hiro simultaneously ambushed him with a hug. They drove him to fall onto the floor, bumping their heads against each other while Aki had the most painful impact in between them and the floor.

“Aki, you idiot!” Tori complained and slammed his face into Aki’s chest. “Don’t do dangerous thing again!”

“You should take it easy, Aki!” Hiro blurted. “Mori-senpai is already dumb so you don’t have to endanger yourself to such extend.”

“What did you say, Hiro?” Mori grunted in dissatisfaction. “I heard you!”

“No, you didn’t,” As a protective big brother, Tani blocked Mori from touching Hiro.

“I believe I did!”

“It’s a wild imagination of yours.”

“Are you saying that I’m deluding?”

“I do think so.”

“Tani-nii, enough,” Hiro could not bear the sight of Tani pranking Mori, and Mori would always trust everything he has said. “The missing document that you’ve lost, it’s in Tani-nii’s bag. He hid it to tease you.”

“No, I don’t think Tani will betray me like that,” Mori shook his head in denial to Hiro’s honest revelation.

Hiro and Tani shifted at the perplexed Aki. “See? He’s dumb, I told you.”

The ruckus was shut by Ito’s claps as a sudden interruption. Everyone concentrated their focus on him, expecting another news to be exposed by this mysteriously dependable boy. Ito cleared his throat before beginning.

“I believe we’re here to show to Mori that Aki has already learnt acting and, as one of his teachers, I would like to recommend you to take Aki as the voice of the main character in your project,” Ito said confidently.

It was a great help by Ito to promote Aki, like a producer promoting his artist under an entertainment label. Compared to Kishi, Ito did seem much more reliable in term of teaching because he had knowledge. Perhaps he learnt on acting by reading in likened to Kishi who studied by experience. There were times when Kishi could describe how to do this and that, yet there were times when Ito’s explanation helped the best of him.

In conclusion, both Kishi and Ito have greatly assisted Aki as seniors of more experience in acting. Thanks to that, Aki could act much properly than voice imitation. They could proudly show Aki to other people now.

“You don’t have to show me anything. I’ve had enough. Besides, I’m really going to appoint him as the voice of my main character either,” Mori flatly said as his squinting eyes glimpsed at the puzzled Aki. Ever since Kishi and Ito have disclosed themselves, Aki has been keeping quiet possibly because of his lost voice. “Hiro and Tori are bad actors! I couldn’t take them as my character’s voice. They don’t want to even act as side characters!” He lamented.

“It’s because you were being unfair to Aki. We opted to protest,” Tori undoubtedly replied, almost to everyone’s shock. In Kishi and Ito’s view, Tori was supposed to be the kindest among the three first years in that room. They never presumed that Tori would direct the blame on Mori instead. “If Aki agreed to be the actor, we will take other roles, even a female character.”

Hiro at Tori’s side nodded concurring to Tori’s deal. It was brilliantly constructed to lure Mori so that he would have no choice but to employ Aki right away. The deadline of the project was around the corner, and the vaguest part of the remaining task was only the voice acting.

“In short, you only need to voice act. Everything has been done. You can even watch the animation first to grasp some emotion,” Tani joyously encouraged Aki to start right away.

Everyone in the room congratulated Aki for finally given the main character role. Only he had the most passion in voice acting though he lacked quite a lot, yet he has boldly accepted Mori’s challenge and eventually improved himself. From a boy who imitated, Aki could now call himself an actor now.

“By the way, Mori,” Ito nudged at Mori’s arm, jokingly, “Whenever we are short in actors, can we call Aki to help us?”