Episode 10: Singular Noun

Have you ever been really, really obsessed with someone before? Like, really obsessed?

Fourteen-year-old Suika Sakura was. But who exactly was she obsessed with, you ask?

That guy from That One Show. You know, That One Show. The one about the three sisters who are witches.

The man fascinated her. Captivated her.

And that was why she was trying to become him… in a way. The only element she was borrowing from him was his hairstyle, which was what she wanted to get done soon.

She just liked his hairstyle, okay? It looked good.

★

It was the moment she’d been waiting for.

There she was. Suika was sitting on the toilet seat in the bathroom, being as patient as she could be as her older sister, Ryoko, cut her hair. Getting Ryoko to cut her hair wasn’t even hard, since she did it all the time anyway (she was studying to become a hairdresser).

“How short did you want it again?” she asked.

“Just slightly under my chin,” Suika said, gesturing to the spot. “I want to look like how Chris did in the season six premiere.”

“Um, so again… You want to look like a boy?” Suika didn’t even have to look up (well, she couldn’t anyway) to see her sister’s confused facial expression.

“No, not exactly. I just admire his hair. I’d like for you to just trim my bangs though. I like them the way they are.”

Ryoko sighed, and for a moment there Suika felt a bit sorry for her sister.

She didn’t understand her. (well, nobody really understood her.)

For the past year, all that Suika was obsessing about was Chris. It didn’t go beyond the character either—it was just Chris.

Everything about Charmed’s universe, characters, and lore were beyond Ryoko, she just knew it. A feeling welled up into that the feelings Suika was inhabiting right now were ones that parents felt when trying to understand what their child was obsessing over.

As the scissors were snipping away at her hair, Suika felt a sense of refreshment wash over her.

Next part of my life: Start.

★

After that whirlwind of a weekend, it was finally, finally time for school, marking only a few days until Valentine’s Day.

Yes, Suika was making a big deal out of school. Not being one for sending pictures of herself over the phone and social media, the eighth grader simply wanted to surprise her friends and best friends, and nothing else.

The element of surprise was key.

When Suika walked into her first hour room (of which she shared with none of her friends because they were older and younger than her, duh), she made a mental note to herself of something she thought of as important: Ah, I’ve gotta post that chapter of the Super Club so I can then finally publish it! How exciting.

Yes, what you read was true. Suika was, in fact, writing a story that was a big ol’ nonfiction piece about her friends in the CDAC (an acronym for “The Can Do Anything Club.” Fairly clever, eh?).

For the looks of it, girls and boys in her class were giving her brief looks like, “Hey, Suika got her hair cut and dyed, didn’t she?” and it made her feel excited inside.

People are noticing!

There was never a problem with Suika attracting attention. She was always a stand-out in whatever class she was in, simply for the fact that she was a bit odd. She never let those opinions affect her, though. The kids never bullied her or teased her, they just thought she was amusing.

As she sat down in her seat, waiting for the bell to ring, she could feel someone’s presence beside her.

Ah. Behami. Sneaky as always.

“Oi, nice hair,” the voice whispered cheekily.

It was then that Suika looked beside her and sure enough, there was the friend in question—but not just Behami. Asuka and Jopi were there as well.

“Playing hard to get, huh, Sui-chan?” Behami said smugly.

Suika stifled a chortle as she saw her friends’ reactions to her new hairstyle.

“What do you think?” Suika asked in her usual flat voice, still strong even in this kind of situation.

Behami straightened her mouth. Suika could tell she was thinking hard. “Very Chris-core. I do like it, though.”

“It looks alright,” Asuka conceded.

“Yeah! You rock brown hair pretty well, too, Suikanyu!” Jopi said, fists balled up under her face. Any more anime-esque and she’d have smoke puffing out of her nostrils.

Wait. Where did “Suikanyu” come from? Was she trying to be a gyaru or something?

“Good.” Suika gave a thumbs up, trying to let what Jopi had said go through one ear and out the other.

Switching her glance to the whiteboard (just to see if her teacher had arrived yet—no dice), an idea popped into Suika’s head. And as with all ideas birthed in this series, it was an idea that was kind of brilliant, kind of horrible, and all kinds of fun.

“Uh-oh. Suika’s got an idea!~” Behami said energetically.

Asuka groaned. “Oh boy…”

Suika looked at her two friends as the first warning bell rang. “Details to come after school,” she said determinedly.

★

Afterschool. Club time. The main culprits, as well as Nathan, were all watching over Suika as she looked for a good picture of The Pretty (also known as Chris).

The plan? To make Behami shapeshift into Chris for Valentines Day, per Suika’s words. Today was Phase One of her idea: Testing the shapeshifting out.

At the moment, Suika was scrolling down her phone’s photo gallery for any good reference pics she might have saved.

“Ah! Found one!” she announced not even two minutes after looking.

Behami raised her eyebrows. “Damn, that was quick.” She then held out a hand. “Alright, lemme see.”

Hands suddenly shaking, Suika handed the phone to her friend.

“Full body picture,” she noted even though nobody asked.

Behami peered at the picture for an excessive amount of time and then spoke. “I can work with this.” She then turned her attention to her fellow club members. “Do you mind leaving for a sec? I prefer not having an audience when I shift.”

“I can totally relate,” remarked Nathan. (Relating, of course, to the various times the girls made him age regress.)

All the members left… and it was just Behami and Suika. (Suika being there to make sure the shapeshift looked accurate enough, I guess?) However, she still had her back to her friend as she was transforming.

“Season 6 episode 4,” Suika murmured to herself, playing with her fingers. “This better be good.”

There was a brief moment where the room was almost silent, save for the sound of rustling clothes, probably as a result of the shapeshifting or something(???).

After those strange noises, a voice that was not Behami’s was heard.

“Suika-chan?”

The titular girl snapped out of her daydreaming about, I don’t know, the complexities of Asian trade when she heard what she had been wanting to hear for the longest time (but not really).

“Eh?”

“I hafta admit, I really like this guy’s clothes… and he's pretty tall!” Chris—er, Behami chuckled. “Not bad, Sui.”

Suika would never stop being amused by her friends calling her “Sui.” Every time they did, it just reminded her of that song that Mari really liked (really liked was actually a major understatement).

Speaking of Mari, she and the rest of the members filed back into the classroom at the reasonable-volume shout that Beha-Chris emitted (“emitted”? Like a light?).

Uh oh. Suika, for the briefest moment, forgot that she had an enemy when it came to obsessing over Chris (although her enemy liked Drew just as much).

Mimori. Mimori saw Beha-Chris.

And even though she already knew who Behami was going to turn into, she still freaked out anyway.

“Oh my God! Chris! Chris-chan!”

Kasumi’s nose crinkled. “Augh. Mimori-chan, for the love of all that is holy, please, never say that nickname ever again.”

By that point, Mimori was in the midst of hugging Beha-Chris, which definitely made Suika feel peeved, but yet again the Chris before her wasn’t the real deal.

The girl looked at Kasumi, eyes wide. “Ohmigod I just now realized what I said! Oh god, eeeewww!”

Tomo raised a timid brow. “I don’t get it. Should I know who this is?”

“Heh. Nah, you’re better off not knowing,” Beha-Chris condeded. Afterward, however, Suika could hear her muttering something about a “love quest” to no one in particular. (She wasn’t that desperate for love, though!)

“CONTINUING ON,” Suika said, raising her voice at an almost lethal volume, “Behami-chan’s going to stay like this until the end of the meeting. Right now, we’re going to help each other with homework!” She looked at her Beha-Chris with ultimate determination. “You. Me. Homework. Now.”

Beha-Chris sighed. “Of course. Is it math? Please don’t tell me it’s math. I hate math!!”

Suika screwed her mouth up to the side. “Uh, no.” (Imitating Chris in front of what was basically his duplicate was now her designated joj.) “It’s science.”

Mimori stood up from her chair, puffing out her chest. “Hah! I’m already done with my homework!”

Why does anyone care?

And so the club began to work, finishing up their homework at an almost lightning speed, which was rather impressive for a club that was known to muck about every day after school. It helped, however, that the club members were all diverse enough in what subjects they were good at. Suika had to wonder why they didn’t focus on finishing up homework and tutoring in the clubroom, but then the answer was most obvious:

The club simply wasn’t meant for it.

Yet here she was in the midst of it all, her friend in the form of her crush, helping her with her worksheet. Despite the awfulness of doing school work after school hours, life actually seemed to be the best right now.

★

The rest of the meeting wasn’t that noteworthy, besides Mimori trying to hit on Beha-Chris, which angered Suika quite a bit (which, if Suika hadn’t forgotten about Mimori being her enemy, could’ve used to her powers to see if this situation was going to happen, but alas).

When Suika came home, her mind had switched immediately from School Mode to Writing Mode—And of course, she already knew what she was going to do.

“I have to publish it,” she said aloud determinedly.

As she was walking up the stairs, muttering to herself, Suika could hear her mind sighing from the kitchen. Likely a “What am I going to do with you”? Sigh.

I know. I know I’m hard to handle.

But—

“Gotta make a cover too, gotta make a cover too!” Suika was now saying a new mantra aloud as she set down her bookbag and turned on her computer.

It was time to write.

Yes, as casually mentioned before, Suika loved to write fanfics. Besides singing and choir and being a member of the Can Do Anything Club, writing was one of her hobbies. She wasn’t particularly good at it, but it was something that brought her joy, and in the end that’s all that really mattered.

So what kind of fanfiction did she write? Well, obviously stories about Chris… and her OC, Opal, who was luckily not a Mary Sue (not writing Mary Sue characters isn’t that hard!). The stories were essentially just Chris and her having various adventures together.

However, her new story was something different.

It was nonfiction.

“But wait,” I’m sure you’re saying, “Shouldn’t she know better?” Yeah she probably should, but she’s a teen so cut her some slack. Her story, The Super Club, was something that she wrote occasionally (basically whenever something fun or interesting happened). She also changed the names of the club members enough so that no one would recognize them.

Why was she writing about what happened in real life?

… Well, isn’t it obvious?

Her life right now was (probably) more exciting than your average fanfic. Well, she wasn’t going to Hogwarts or anything, but she was teleporting to any place she wanted with her friends. (It could happen though!)

After changing out of her school uniform into some casual clothes, Suika was poised in front of her laptop, working on a for her story. It was easier said than done because all she did was slap the title of the story onto a solid color background (it was temporary, don’t worry).

And there she was.

Her fingers were poised over the “enter” button on her mouse.

“Let’s go,” Suika said, an evil grin forming on her face.

And then, finally, she pressed “enter.”

Her story became officially published.

… Well, at least online, but she thought it still counted.

★

“What are guys gonna do for Valentine’s Day?”

The next day. CDAC clubroom. The day before Singles Awareness Day—er, Valentine’s Day, as noted by Erica.

“Absolutely nothing,” responded Mimori in a glum tone immediately.

Mirroring the previous episode where the girls were silent upon the question of who was attending the dance, they were silent here as well.

Well, until Naoko spoke.

“Nathan and I are going to hang out together. We’re probably gonna watch a bad movie or two.”

Kasumi smirked. “Yeah, same. Me and Peter are going out to a nice restaurant first though. Mom gave me money!” Suika could tell she was struggling to maintain her excitement by swinging back and forth in her chair.

Man. Lucky duck.

Mari raised her eyebrows in response to what was said. “Damn! I’m happy for you! Have fun and let me know how the food is!”

Kasumi pouted and looked away for a brief second. “I-I guess. We’ll see how busy I am.”

Mimori started giggling uncontrollably after she said that. “I’m laughing for real right now! Kasumi, you’re such a tsundere! But seriously, can we please stop talking about boys? They’re not that fascinating, unless their names are—”

“We know, we know.” Behami groaned. “Been him, heard you fangirling yesterday.”

Suika jerked up from her seat and looked to her friend with puppy dog eyes. Anything can be saved right now if Behami becomes Chris again.

“Not today!” Behami waved her hands quickly. “It was nice, though, being him. I just didn’t like Mimori freaking out.”

Mimori wilted. Then, she brightened. “Oh, yeah! What am I talking about? I can just travel back in time and hang out with a real young Chris/Drew!”

Kasumi facepalmed and Suika felt that energy. (From her observations, her friend facepalmed at least twice a day.)

As the girls were chatting about, as they usually did, Erica suddenly shouted something out of seemingly the middle of nowhere.

“FRANCE!”

Tomo gasped. “Ooh, good place!”

“Yes, yes indeed! And, I was thinking… Instead of holding a Valentine’s Day party, since all but one of us doesn’t have a boyfriend, why not go to Paris, France tomorrow? The most romantic place on Earth.” She said that part in a daydream-y tone.

Asuka’s eyes were narrowed. “Or at least people say it is,” she said, sounding skeptical.

“It is, trust me,” Tomo reassured, nodding enthusiastically. “Let’s do it—just us girls!” She got out of her seat, fist in the air. “Girl power!”

The girls giggled. Suika’s expression did not change.

Paris, huh? Sounds neat.

But if Behami became Beha-Chris tomorrow when they went, then…

It would be the perfect Valentine’s Day.

★

“I’m home!” Suika yelled once she got in her house, letting her parents know of her presence before she ventured up into her room.

Once she got into her room and did all her usual stuff she went onto Wattpad, her hands trembling with excitement.

And there it was.

Wait. It can’t be!

It totally was.

Somehow, overnight, her story was read over 1,000 times, even making it onto the “How New Stories” list on the main page.

No. Fucking. Way.

Suika felt like she needed to celebrate the only way she could think of.

She got out of her chair and threw her hands up in the air, saying “Yes!” in an underplayed tone. She liked adding on “I’m back!” to it but that didn’t fit the context so she stopped her imitating Chris and sat back down.

As she did, she felt complete—well, as complete as she could feel. After all, she hadn’t even gone to Paris yet with Beha-Chris and friends.

Actually, something that would really make me feel complete would be going back in time and meeting the real Chris… Wait, why haven’t I done that yet?

They say to never meet your heroes.

While online Suika decided that, since she had no homework, to watch episode fifteen of Charmed season 6 for the twenty-fifth time because why not? It was only her favorite episode of the series ever… and that was mostly because of the outfit Chris was wearing in it, to be perfectly honest.

For the next thirty minutes Suika was glued to her chair, watching every movement on screen intensely. Although she knew just about every single line, the episode still kept her engaged.

That was, until…

“Suika. Oi, Suika!”

The thing about Suika being glued to her seat was a lie because she almost fell back onto the ground due to being disturbed.

Is Chris talking to me? Or am I just tripping like mad?

Suika looked behind her and sure enough, there he—well, she was.

Beha-Chris.

Suika scrambled back into her seat to pause her show and close the lid on her laptop.

“Behami-chan!” she exclaimed, hands to her mouth.

“We texted each other, remember? I said I was coming over at four o’clock.” Noticing the shock on her face, Beha-Chris added, “Tomo teleported me here, by the way.”

I completely forgot that Behami was coming over! And I didn’t know she was going to do it in Chris’s form!

“Ah. Ah, wow. Yeah, I completely forgot.”

“Knew it. Oh, and I saw that you were watching Charmed when I came in and wow, is Drew wearing a lot of lipstick in that scene he was just in.”

Redness creeped across Suika’s face. “Yeah, he does.” She giggled nervously. “But I think it suits him very well.”

Right after she said that, there was a knock at the door.

“Suika? Suika-chan?”

“Y-yes?” the girl said hesitantly. Ryoko nee-san!

“I’m going shopping for some last-minute Valentine’s Day presents for my friends. You wanna come?”

Suika blinked and looked at Beha-Chris answer, to which she mouthed, “Say yes.”

Really? Suika thought. I mean, it doesn’t sound like an awful idea. And plus, it’s almost like… like… a date!

“Yeah, sure,” she concluded, face trying to maintain its stoic demeanor.

“Alright, let’s get going then!” Ryoko was swinging her car keys around in her hand absentmindedly. “And, um… who is that, Suika-chan? He looks super familiar.”

Suika jolted. Ah, shit. Now what am I going to do? Behami basically just got caught red-handed. What dumb excuse is she going to use? Or is Ryoko nee-san just going to be dumb?

Beha-Chris sighed, a stressed-looking smile on her face. “My name’s Chris. Suika-chan calls me that because I look a lot like that guy from that TV show that she really likes. We one day on the way home from our schools.”

Smooth as butter…

“Ah, okay then. Look at you, Suika-chan, getting a guy already!” Ryoko giggled, eyes lowered teasingly.

It was Suika’s turn to sigh. “Sure, sure.”

Under her usual stoic face, manic feelings were flying.

★

And thus, the three were off on their adventure—to the mall, to be more specific. Beha-Chris whispered along the way that she wished that she turned back into her regular form before Suika opened the door, but by the time she did, she likely would’ve still been in the midst of her shapeshifting (it wasn’t instantaneous, you see—a drawback, definitely).

So there Suika and Beha-Chris were (and also Ryoko, let us not forget) in a store called Choco World, which was full of every kind of chocolate you could imagine. (Say it ain’t so-ooh-wo-wo!)

“I want all the chocolate,” Suika said stupidly. She was in a daze.

Ryoko and Beha-Chris elbowed her at the same time.

Suika jolted (again, huh?), which snapped her out of her strange state. “Ah. What was that for?”

“You were dazing out like crazy,” Beha-Chris explained. “I mean, I probably know why, but are you gonna buy anything?”

Ryoko raised an eyebrow. “Damn, you must know her well. I was thinking the exact same thing!”

Suika chortled as the two were talking about how well they knew her (Beha-Chris was doing her very best not to be like Behami).

The rest of the time spent in the chocolate store, as well as the rest of the mall, was pretty well-spent. After all, Suika got all of her friends chocolate bars (yes, even Beha-Chris), Ryoko got a box of chocolate samplers for her boyfriend, and Behami bought a bunch of different-flavored lollipops at a candy store, which was unique in her opinion because it wasn’t chocolate.

★

Finally, it was Valentine’s Day. For Suika, she didn’t mind anymore. With her story becoming mildly popular on Wattpad, boys confessing to her and giving her chocolate was the last thing on her mind… which was fine because she didn’t get any guys confessing to her anyway.

However, the most important thing of the day was now here.

The trip to Paris, France, of course!

And the girls were all ready.

All gathered in the clubroom, backpacks on their backs or in their hands (filled with things like snacks and money, of course—their school stuff was on the table), waiting to teleport away.

“‘How long, how long will it take… to get to France?’” Mimori sang, truly wondering the important questions.

“Soon,” Tomo said, tapping her fingers on the table. “Have you got the map on you, Mari-chan?”

Mari held it up over her head. “Hai! We’re really gonna use a book, though? And not our phones?”

Tomo sighed lightly. “This generation. They don’t know. They don’t understand.” She took a deep breath to refresh herself. “Okay, guys! Are you ready?”

Unsurprisingly, Mimori went “I’M READY!”, with Kasumi even joining in on it—further proving that the two are actually inseparable.

“Alright!” Tomo clapped her hands together, which was the signifier that the girls were to be on their way, so they all got in a circle and held hands.

The adventure was imminent.

★

The girls ended up behind some building on the streets of Paris, luckily out of sight from other people.

“Well, now what?” Asuka asked a bit dumbly. Tomo let out a sigh and began to explain what was going to go down since she hadn’t experienced going to different countries before (yes, they haven’t done that in a long while).

“Mari has the ability to change her voice, right? Well, on one of our first trips to another country, she discovered that by touching someone, they too can have their change—or rather, the language that they speak.”

“Well that’s oddly convenient.” Asuka’s eyebrows were raised. “I don’t exactly want to be touched but at the same time I can’t say that I know any French at the top of my head besides the most basic words.”

Mari made a gesture that basically said “Welp, it can’t be helped.”

Suika already gauged a guess that none of the other girls knew a lick of French as well, so that meant that they’d all have to be touched.

Mimori raised her hand. “I volunteer to go first! I volunteer as tribute!”

Kasumi, expectedly, groaned at that.

After an awkward bout of Mari patting each girl’s head and having them say something only for it to come out in (expectedly) French, the girls then had to figure out what to do next.

“I think we should get something to eat,” Behami suggested ultimately. “I haven’t eaten anything since lunchtime, which feels like forever ago!”

Erica looked around at her friends for a moment, and Suika was sure she was reading their minds all at that time. (Finally, something useful for her power! … Implying that it was useless before.)

“Jury says yes,” she declared.

Tomo stepped out from behind the building. Suika did as well.

Damn, are there a lot of fast food places here. Not too different from back in Japan.

“Well, it looks like we have a lot to choose from,” she murmured. Then, she turned to her friends, speaking clearly. “Like a McDonald’s!”

“No, no, no! No thank you!” Mimori shrieked, shaking her head back and forth. “I’ve got PTSD from eating there! No thank you!”

Kasumi put a hand on her friend’s shoulder. “I have to agree with her. I was there to see it happen.”

Oh. Well, that’s not good, whatever it was.

★

And so the girls chose a Subway, and after eating there farted around in Paris for a while. (Sadly, I can’t really tell you the details because, again, I know next to nothing about France and I don’t feel like doing any research for this part—but rest assured, they had a good time!)

Anywho, when Suika got back from the trip (all de-Frenchified, no worries), she immediately decided to go on her computer to check up on her (still continuing, mind you) story and silently scream at the fact that it got so many views.

The first thing she was greeted with was her bell button had twenty notifications on it.

“What’s this?” she wondered aloud, mouth agape. She had to click.

During the day she apparently got another 200 or so reads and eleven reviews, which made Suika wonder if the people reading it were either at school as well or were on the other side of the world, which couldn’t possibly be the case because she typed her story up in Japanese.

Anyway, her story also had 981 likes and 5 dislikes now. Whuuh?

This is crazier than naming your cat The Chad or your husband Cheesy Weesy, she reasoned in her mind.

The reviews, luckily, were in favor of her writing style and characters. The lowest score she got so far was a 3 out of 5 stars, and that still meant that they thought it was decent.

Suika grinned a great, big grin, breaking out of character for a brief moment. She didn’t care that that said grin was a horrid, lopsided mess.

Because even Chris smiles sometimes, right?

Her life couldn’t be any better now, her obsession with Beha-Chris be damned.