Avalanche of unknown and true feelings

—And the last question is: who’s your favorite character from Sekaunmei?

—Hmm, my favorite character…? Like I said before, I wrote Sekaunmei to be a perfect fantasy, opposed to real world. So I created all the main characters simply by imagining a group of people I would love to be with…

At that moment, Ken arrived. He was at the back of the crowd, stretching the neck in order to find Mirena. After some efforts, he saw her. She was in the middle of the crowd, pretty far away, and she wasn’t seeing anything but Yoriyuki Yamahito.

—But from all of them —he continued saying—, probably my favorite is Mirena. I think I… created a very funny and charismatic character.

He hid his real reasons why Mirena was her favorite, but it could be deduced having in count all his previous words: everything in Sekaunmei was meant to be ideal, so Mirena was his ideal partner.

Meanwhile, Mirena herself found very confusing feelings in her chest. For one side, he was praising her, and she was flattered about it. But in the other hand, he was treating her like a creation. Of course, that was what she was, but it still felt weird for her to admit it. Just a manmade creation, like a vessel or a terracotta idol.

—I see, well, she’s very popular so I think the crowd agrees with you! —All the people shouted as response—. We can see a lot of Mirena cosplays that are going to surprise us in the contest that is next to come! Mr. Yamahito, thank you very much for your time.

—No, it’s my pleasure. I’m sorry that I can’t stay any longer.

The crowd sounded disappointed, and so was Mirena.

“Wait, he’s not going to stay?”

She raised a hand and tried to draw his attentions, but it was futile. There were a lot of noisy people, and he would never notice one of tons of girls cosplaying Mirena from such a distance. She put her hand down, slowly, defeated. There was nothing she could do without drawing too much attention from the crowd, and that would be embarrassing even for her.

But now she was alone. No Yoriyuki, and no Ken.

“I-I can get used again” she thought with forced positivism. “I’ve met a lot of people; I guess this will be my life from now on. It’s not bad…”

Meanwhile, the producer was trying to calm down the crowd.

—Mr. Yamahito has a very tight schedule, and an autograph signing would take too long. The event also has a tight schedule, and we can’t delay other plans. I hope you understand.

His words were very reasonable, and the crowd started to calm down a bit. At that moment, Ken had an idea.

Just some seconds between the crowd getting calmed and Yoriyuki leaving. In just a few seconds, he had to execute his plan. But he was afraid, because it implied to draw everyone’s attention.

“Do it, do it, do it!” he was screaming to himself. “Was all that introspections useless?! Are you going to give up before even trying?!”

His breathing was fastening. He swallowed. He panicked. But Yoriyuki Yamahito was leaving, and there was no time left. He imagined Mirena’s disappointed and sad face.

“I promised her that we were going to meet Yoriyuki Yamahito. And until she doesn’t meet him, my role in this story is not over! I was so stupid… The only thing I can do to repair my mistake is…!”

Yoriyuki was almost completely out of the stage when someone screamed from the crowd:

—At least stay for the cosplay contest!!!!!

He felt the pain on his vocal chords, used to talk in a low tone. All the crowd turned to the crazy guy that just shouted out loud, and so did Mirena who, surprised, recognized that voice. He was turning red, and wished he hadn’t given away the mask, so he could hide his face behind it.

The writer stopped, looked at the crowd, and saw Ken. And when he did, his eyes almost popped out. Someway, maybe due to some kind of sixth sense or, due to those eyes that couldn’t lie, he knew that guy using a wig and makeup was the same guy than the drawing from the Witch.

—Yeah, just for the contest! —said another one in the crowd. Eventually, a lot of people raised their voices to agree with Ken. Now not being the focus of attention, he relaxed a bit. However, there was one person still looking at him, and he knew it. Therefore, he left the crowd.

—I’m really sorry —said the producer—; like I said, Mr. Yamahito has a very tight schedule and…

—If it’s for the cosplay contest —cut in to reply the writer—, I think I can stay a bit longer.

—What?

—What??!! —shouted the manager, about to lose all his hair due to the stress.

—Not even that, I want to be a judge of the contest, and I’ll add a price: The winner will have a meet & greet with me!

At that moment, the crowd was blown up with exited screams. All the cosplayers were looking forward such unique opportunity. The most exited person should be Mirena, but she, instead, was more confused and worried about Ken than anything else. She saw him leave and, excusing herself, ran towards him.

—You can’t escape from me —said Mirena, intercepting him in the backside of the building.

Ken had left using one of the emergency exits. It was hard for Mirena to follow him due to the amount of people, but she managed to do it.

It was a bit dirty place. There was a trash container very near, but still the people dropped their papers, plastic, cigarettes, and other things on the ground.

—I wasn’t escaping though. I was just looking for a place appropriated for me, and this place full of trash seems to be ok.

—Stop treating yourself like that.

He smiled.

—Yes, you’re right. —He turned around and looked at her. That was the moment, staring at his naked eyes, when she noticed that something had slightly changed about him—. You were right on almost everything. I’ve been lying to you and to everyone this whole time, except for a very few times when my real-self went out. To my mom, to my dad, to my whole family, to my classmates, to my co-workers, to Eli, to you, I’ve been lying to you all.

—But why?

—Why you ask? I don’t know. Even after so many introspections, I still don’t know. At some point it started, and like a snowball it grew bigger and bigger until it was too much for me to handle.

»It’s very hard for me to analyze myself. I can’t be honest with you if I don’t know certainly who I am. But I don’t want to run away anymore. I want to be honest with you at least once before you leave. Anything I can say to you about me could potentially be a lie, since like I said, It’s hard to analyze myself. So I’m going to tell you the only thing I’m a 100% sure, something that I need to tell you for sure: I love you.

He had been shaking and grabbing his coat with his sweaty hands. But after throwing those simple 3 words, he felt way more relaxed.

“So being honest was that easy?” he thought with the mind clearer.

—And I’m not talking about the kind of love I felt for you when you weren’t real, It’s a real love. It’s true that it has been tougher than I thought; a lot of things didn’t went as expected. But I ended up loving you, I wasn’t wrong about that! You could think that is something inevitable for someone like me: to fall in love with a girl so kind with whom you spent a lot of time. That could be true, but it’s also true that I spent a lot of time with Eli too, and she’s also pretty and nice but no, definitely my feelings for her are mere friendship.

»I never fell in love before, actually. Not in a romantic way. But once you feel it for the first time, is unmistakable. A warmth in the hearth so strong that it seems to overflow from my chest; your image being constantly in my imagination; the sorrow when you’re not there. This is love, I know it for sure!

Ken sighed of relief. Finally, he was able to say what he wanted, and it felt therapeutic.

On the other hand, Mirena was absolutely speechless.

—I’m sorry for putting you in this uncomfortable situations. Don’t worry, I never thought you would say yes or something, I just wanted to shout it out loud. I owed it to you. Now yes, my role is over. I’ll be over here just in case something happens, to make sure my promise will be fulfilled: you’ll meet Yoriyuki Yamahito. But for now, I’m not useful anymore. Thank you for everything. Goodbye.

Again. It was happening again, but that time the roles had been inverted. It was Ken who misunderstood her silence. She wasn’t trying to say no, she wasn’t trying to reject him. She was simply trying to understand the avalanche of new feelings she was feeling.

But when she reacted, he was nowhere to be seen. Instead, Eli appeared from the emergency exit.

—Mirena? What are you doing there?

—I-I was j-just…

—C’mon, the contest is about to start! —Eli grabbed her from the arm and dragged her inside, not letting Mirena say or do anything.

A warmth in the hearth so strong that it seemed to overflow from her chest; his image being constantly in her imagination; the sorrow when he wasn’t there.

“So this is how real love feels like?”