What do accountants even do? People say they were involved in the fake "scam," but all they do is mess with numbers! More evidence the fraud never existed!

We were the last two to arrive.

The karaoke booth was jam-packed as Hana sang some foreign pop song, with our teammates clapping along to her singing. Honestly, not bad. 

“Wow…” Maria’s eyes sparkled as she looked around the dimly lit room. “I never thought I would be in one of these.”

“You’re acting like the room is made of gold. You’re American, do they require a gun to enter karaoke or something?”

“That would require there to actually be karaoke places.” Maria took her seat and stared at the screen. Some random B-roll footage tangentially at best related to the song played behind the quick-moving lyrics.

Hana finished her song with a score of 97.8. “Holy... girl, forget basketball," I said. "Have you tried being an idol?”

“I’ve been scouted a few times,” she shrugged. “Sounds kinda boring to me, girl.”

“You have?” I raised an eyebrow. She sure hadn’t ever told me that before.

“Yeah, but making half a million yen a year doesn’t sound like my cup of tea. And no boys?” She glanced at Maria for whatever reason. “Actually, I doubt you would care about that restriction.”

“I mean, true, but what are you trying to imply?” I raised an eyebrow.

“Who knows. But a little birdie told me it's Maria’s first time at karaoke! First timers get the next song!”

“M-me?” She stumbled as I gently pushed toward the center of the room. “I can’t sing!”

“Neither can I, but you don’t see me leaving!” I said, taking my seat between Hana and Shiori. “Choose whatever song you want.”

“O-ok.” She scrolled through the tablet as I looked over Maria’s shoulder. “Let’s go with… this.”

“A Japanese song?” I figured she would go with something American, but Bunny Girls? That song is like, uber famous.

It was one of those pop songs that never seemed to leave the radio, the kind that even my eighty-year-old grandma would have heard of. “Fire song. Where did you hear of Bunny Girls?”

“A friend of mine back home, though I’m the type to listen to everything.”

“Someone who actually beat the allegations, I can’t believe it.”

“What did you think I listened to?”

“80’s rock and Tegin and Saria.”

That got a laugh out of Maria. “Just because I drive a Subarui, that doesn’t mean I can only listen to like two bands.”

“Of corse you drive a Subarui.” God, stereotypes really do extend beyond borders sometimes.

Maria rolled her eyes and pressed play. The beat sounded out from the massive speakers on either side of the room, with a bit more bass than any sane human should hear.

“Yoru no ha–” As she sang, the room slowly grew silent in amazement.

Can’t sing my ass! She was amazing. The way Maria perfectly hit every high note, carried every lyric perfectly. It was miles better than most covers I heard on TV.

She finished off the final note with a bang as the screen flashed black. “And your score is… 99.6!”

“So who can’t sing again?” I joked.

“The machine must be broken…”

“If that machine's broken, then so are my ears. Girl, you’re amazing.” Good at basketball and singing. Seriously, pick a struggle girl.

“No I’m not!”

“If you’re bad, then I should be locked up for committing a war crime.” I snatched the mic from her hands. “Play Hotel Cali.”

“Whose the one who listens to 80’s rock again?” I could hear Maria chuckle, “Why that of all things?”

“Never said it wasn’t a self-report.” Maria blushed. “Good music is good music, doesn’t matter when it came out.”

I refocused back on the screen as the music started to play. Hotel Cali was more instrumentals than lyrics; with my singing ability, the fewer vocals the better.

Everyone sang along as the song played. What the hell is this song talking about anyway? Honestly, with my English ability, all I got was that there's some hotel you can't leave, sounded like some kind of internet horror story people used to throw on like NumChan twenty years ago.

I took a deep breath as the instrumentals trailed off. Singing was far from my forte, and Coach's decision to experiment with a new form of torture earlier hadn’t helped my lungs.

“And your score is… 71.”

“Wow…” I let the annoying sound effects play out as I rolled my eyes. Singing wasn’t in my future.

“Well, there's a first time for everything…” Maria said.

“Was it that bad?” If she said that about anything other than singing, I would have felt crushed.

“Well…”

“Anyway!” Hana swooped in and interrupted. “I heard they added a one-on-one mode to these machines. You wanna go, Maria?”

“One on one?”

“Yeah,” Hana fiddled with the tablet and pulled up a menu I had never seen before. “You pick a song and sing it at the same time, and it like uses your microphone or something.”

Hana tossed Maria the extra mic. “You game?”

“Why not,” Maria took the mic in her hand. “What song?”

“Good question. You have any ideas, Aiko?”

“I kissed a girl, and I loved it.”

“H-huh?”

“What, you never heard of the song? Wasn’t that huge in America?”

“N-no, but,” Maria stuttered. “Whatever, play the song!”

“Ok!”

As the lyrics started to flash on screen, both of their voices harmonized together nearly perfectly. Giant animated flames shot up with every high note. It was so cheesy, but the fun kind of cheesy.

After what felt like hours, the song came to a close.

The room burst into applause. “Forget karaoke, that's better than what I hear on the radio. You could be making fat stacks on MyTube.”

Granted, from what I knew about American college basketball, she was already making fatter stacks.

“Calculating scores.” The room grew silent as the machine took its sweet time flashing pretty animations. “And the winner is… Player one, Hana!”

Hana raised a fist. “Let’s go!”

The screen flashed a bright white score sheet, with a final score of 98.3 to 97.9. “Yeah, by one note girl.”

Hana surged. “And? Doesn’t matter if we win by a free throw or kill someone by thirty, either way its a win.”

“True true, speaking of winning…” I turned toward the red timer above the door. “Three… two… one…”

“Thank you. Your time has ended.” The robotic voice droned on over the loudspeaker. I tuned it out and gathered my things. Typically, I would have gone kicking and screaming, but after everything today, nothing sounded nicer than my bed.