Episode 13: This Could Go On Forever, Part 2

The school was decorated with blue and gold streamers and balloons, and all the teachers just dressed in the school’s colors for the occasion as well. If the students weren’t participating in anything that required a different outfit (like a maid cafe or a haunted house or whatever), they were still in their uniforms.

Overall, the adrenaline was high… especially for Naoko.

For my last festival here, it’s pretty decent.

Surprisingly, Naoko actually felt like she was going to miss her middle school after she graduated from it. After all, for the first time in her life, she actually felt like she was enjoying life and was having fun, despite her habit of “sinning” things.

Anyway, Naoko was walking around by herself for the moment, since the main classroom she was in had none of her friends in it. Her class, by the way, was doing a takoyaki station, which she helped paint the sign for. She was definitely not needed for help or anything like that, which relieved her.

“I kinda wish Mari was here,” Naoko said to herself, as she was getting in line for a second-year’s booth that was making fruit smoothies.

As she was pondering what flavor to get, she saw a head of hair in front of her that looked oddly familiar.

Is that Henry? Is he here as well? To be perfectly honest, the man hadn’t been very present lately. Naoko believed he probably had some wizard-y things to do or whatever.

When the boy turned around, however, she discovered it was not him—Instead, it was a kid that looked almost like him, except with braces and acne on his face.

Damn. I was kinda looking forward to seeing him.

“Who’da thunk it?” a derpy-sounding voice said behind her. Knowing who it was immediately, Naoko turned around and sure enough, it was Mari, with Behami right behind her.

“Oh. Hey, Mari.” Naoko said in a chill voice.

Mari cackled and then continued in her normal voice. “Lemme guess, you thought that guy was Henry?”

Naoko blushed. “Y-yeah,” she admitted. Why am I getting all flustered all of a sudden? “Yeah. I don’t know, I thought it just looked like him kinda. Ding.”

After the girls got their smoothies, they sat down together at a small table by the window that showed a garden and a pond. It was a nice view, Naoko had to admit. And another thing that she’d miss about her school.

The girls talked for a while, they drank their smoothies, and somehow half an hour passed during that.

Their performance was drawing nearer and nearer.

Oh god. Only half an hour left before our show.

“We gotta get going,” Naoko told her friends as she stood up and tossed her cup into the garbage can. The girls did the same.

With a deep breath that was deep enough to last for ten minutes underwater, Naoko texted her other friends and made her way to the middle school CDAC club room.

★

Once the girls got to the club room, they found Nick and Kuroe already waiting outside. Oh. Look who’s early.

“You have the keys, right?” Naoko asked the boy. She knew that he had the keys to the club room but she just wanted to make sure.

“Yup.” Nick got them out of his uniform pocket and jingled them.

“Good.”

Naoko, Mari, and Behami filed into the room and began changing—not before they put Nick on watching duty, of course.

Once the girls got their outfits on, Mimori, Kasumi, and Tomo walked through the door.

“Alright!” exclaimed Kasumi in an excited voice. “Who wants their makeup done first?!”

Yes. Kasumi was on makeup duty. It was only natural.

Naoko raised her hand steadily.

“Ah, good! You being first makes sense. You’re only the lead and all.” The girl grinned and got the makeup stuff out of her kit. After setting it on the table, she paused. “Oh, right. Gotta change first, duh. Hold on a sec, Naoko-chan.”

Naoko then waited… but “waited” was an understatement, considering the girl changed at a speed that no human being could ever compete with.

Did she get super speed too upon getting her powers back? Ding.

It was rather impressive, to say the least.

Following the speedrun of Changing Clothes, Kasumi sat in a seat and scooched it closer to her. And for whatever reason, Naoko suddenly got the urge to tell her about her plan.

Why? Naoko wasn’t sure… but it probably had to do with the fact that she wanted at least someone to know about the surprise. (In case, God forbid, Naoko got so wrapped up in their performance that she forgot to do it.)

Also, Mimori was playing Fall Out Boy songs rather loudly so the other girls definitely wouldn’t hear her talking, even at a somewhat regular volume.

“So Kasumi,” Naoko began.

“Yeah?”

“I have an idea.”

“Okay. What is it?”

“I’ve got an idea for our performance. So, towards the end of the show, I wanna…”

Once she told her, Kasumi’s eyes widened. “Oh, yeah. That does sound cool!” She smiled big and nodded quickly as she was dabbing a bit of blush on Naoko’s face. “You’re not concerned about personal gain or whatever?”

“Nope.” Naoko wanted to smile herself but she would ruin her friend’s makeup job so she decided not to. “Remember, our powers evolved?”

“Oh, yeah yeah yeah, right. Nice.” Kasumi giggled as she put the blush away and clapped her hands together. “Okay, Naoko-chan! You’re done! Go look at yourself in your mirror!”

By “your mirror” she means “phone camera,” I assume. Ding!

Curious about how she looked, Naoko indeed took out her phone and used the camera function to look at herself in the mirror.

“Ah. I do look prettier, I suppose.”

The makeup didn’t make the biggest difference on her, but at least it made her look a bit more grown up. Probably.

I’m not a makeup person but I’ll pretend to understand what Kasumi did and what it did for me.

The girl looked up and saw that all of the girls were in the room now, and Kasumi was making the rounds, doing all the girls’ makeup.

Nick stuck his head inside, tapping on the wall as well. Mimori turned off her music.

“Ten minutes, guys!” he relayed.

“Woo~!” She could hear Kuroe cheering from the outside.

Naoko gulped. Oh God. It’s almost showtime.

Her masterful plan was this close to being put into action.

★

“And now, Yoshima Middle School’s 37th annual Cultural Festival will begin with a special opening act, put on by the literature club!”

Oh, yeah. By the way, the CDAC was scheduled as the first performance for some reason. Actually, Naoko could guess why—it was because their song felt very opening-esque.

The audience cheered, and the lights dimmed in the PA room. Since a curtain was in her way, Naoko could only assume that Kuroe was the one who turned the song on (which was a pretty easy task to do, obviously).

The retro-produced sound of the guitar, drums, and the works (including horns) filled the large room, and the curtains lifted. The girls, in the poses, began to dance around.

Oh, boy. Here we go. Ding!

Naoko was the first one to mime, and she had one hell of a part to do.

“‘Can feel smell it, hear it today

If you can’t, then it doesn’t matter anyway

You will never understand it cuz it happens too fast

And it feels so good

It’s like walking on glass!’”

Naoko glanced at Ean. She was next and went forward while the other girls continued to dance. (How? Just imagine some Jpop-style dance moves. I don’t have much to go off of this time.)

“‘It’s so cool, it’s so hip, it’s alright

It’s so groovy, it’s outta sight

You can touch it, smell it, taste it so sweet

But it makes no difference
Cuz it knocks you off your feet, yeah!”

Naoko glanced at Tomo next. It was her turn to mime.

“‘You want it all, but you can’t have it!’”

Tomo mimed that while trying to imitate the singer by arching her eyebrows and widening her eyes.

Miharu was next.

“‘It’s in your face, but you can’t grab it!’”

Then, while Miharu was up, Mimori was on the left side of the stage, doing her dance and miming the “Yeah, yeah, yeah” part.

The girls then got into a formation of sorts, in two separate groups, and the lights began to flash (in a non-epileptic way, of course).

“‘What. Is. IT?’” Behami mimed.

“‘It’s IT!’” Erica mimed back.

“‘What is IT?’” It was Mari’s turn, and she had a creepy look on her face while saying it.

“‘It’s IT!’” Jopi jumped to the front to mime that, and after that, the girls launched into a wave-like dance in the background.

Alright. It’s time.

Gulp. (Ding!)

Looking very briefly at Kasumi, Naoko nodded the tiniest nod ever and started to do her thing.

The girl closed her eyes, focusing on her body, and in the next moment…

She lifted herself five inches off the ground.

Five inches, she decided, was enough to fool people into thinking what she was doing was fake. As for the purple aura around her, it was nigh noticeable in the light, she noticed, which was obviously a good thing.

She heard the audience gasp in amazement.

Heh. This is what I wanted to happen.

She heard her friends making little gasps as well.

Naoko giggled and lowered herself back down to the ground, right as the guitar solo ended and the final chorus started up.

When it ended, the audience erupted into an applause that she’d never heard before. One that had wjhoops, hollers, and whistles in it.

The club bowed and as they saw the emcee come back onto the stage, ran behind the curtains, out of breath.

“Thank you, literature club!” the woman yelled enthusiastically into the mic. “That was an amazing reference! Nay, epic!”

The audience laughed and clapped some more. Naoko cringed.

Ugh. A fuckin’ pun.

“What a way to start off tonight’s showcase! Up next…!”

As the girls headed back to their room to change, the girls couldn’t stop talking about how awesome her use of magic was. To her delight, none of them were angry about it—okay, Ean was because she wanted to use her magic instead, but that wasn’t actual anger.

When the club got to the room, Naoko heard someone call out her name. She didn’t even have to turn around to know it was Nick.

“Hey. I just wanted to say that your performance was awesome.”

“It really was!” Kuroe said, grinning from ear to ear. “What you did out there was super brave and super impressive! So congrats!” She fanned her hands out on either side of her face.

Okay, that’s pretty cute.

An actual smile formed on Naoko’s face.

“Thanks!”

Naoko then walked into the club room to change. She could hear Kuroe squealing about how “adorbs” her smile was, which made Naoko cringe again.

Once the girls were done changing back into their uniforms (much to Mimori’s verbal disgust), Erica posed a legitimate question.

“So, uh… are we gonna take this makeup off or not?”

The girls were silent for a moment.

“I’m gonna keep mine on, duh,” Kasumi said, annoyed at the idea of the question.

“I’m taking mine off,” Ean said, scratching her scalp. “I fucking hate makeup, it’s gotta go!”

With mixed reactions, some of the girls went to the bathroom to wash it off and some stayed in the club room, waiting for… nothing, to be perfectly honest. They just didn’t have anything to do now that their performance was over.

Yes. None of the girls wanted to go back and watch the showcase. None of them even had any other performances in (Suika’s got shot down by the committee since they already had too many applicants at that point).

“So… what now?” Behami murmured, looking up at the ceiling.

No one responded, until…

Tomo shot a hand up, clearly brimming with a groundbreaking idea. “I have an idea, I have an idea!”

“Wow, what’s got you so hyped?” Mari said, cackling. “Do you want us to go to a Backstreet Boys concert or something?”

Tomo shook her head, her eyes still crazy with excitement. “No! Even better! It’s something that we’ve never done before!”

Kasumi rolled her wrist and then pointed her hand at Tomo, with a look on her face that read “And?”.

“Let’s do our own talent show, but we can use our powers to do whatever we want! Isn’t that a slammin’ idea?!”

“Slammin’”? Like, “Come on and slam now”?

Naoko didn’t know what to do with her outdated friend.

“What’s the point of it being called a ‘talent show’ if we’re using our powers?” she said in a monotone voice.

“Oh.” Tomo blinked. “But, uh, still! It’s a wicked idea!”

The girls who took their makeup off came back into the room, so Naoko caught them up to speed on Tomo’s kinda-absurd-but-kinda-actually-great idea.

“Okay cool,” Miharu said, undoing her hair from a small ponytail (that she apparently had on her at all times??? Okay then). “But where’s it going to be held? Not at the school, I hope.”

“I’ll make the place!” Tomo said, almost immediately. “Now, does anybody need to grab anything before we go? Anything they could possibly use for their performance?”

The girls paused for a moment and then began searching.

“Hey, uh…?” Nick said hesitantly. “Can I join you guys in on this?”

★

The area that Tomo created and teleported them into looked like it was from a music video or a backdrop for a music video.

It was a beautiful open area with the greenest grass Naoko had ever seen, and in the middle of it was a simple light pink chapel and a set of twelve seats that she could only call “fancy lawn chairs.”

For all intents and purposes, it didn’t look real. But it waaas!

Once the girls all got situated in their nice seats, Tomo got up to the front of the chapel and picked up a cordless microphone that just happened to be laying on the ground.

“Alright, everyone!” she announced in a bubbly tone. “Who’s brave enough to go first?!”

Not me, certainly. Ding!

The girls murmured amongst themselves, and after about a minute of discussing, Tomo answered.

“Me!” Mari said, shooting her hand up. “I’ll be the brave one!”

Tomo pointed a finger at her like she was on a game show or something. “Alrighty then! Come on up, please!”

“Thank you, thank you!” Mari said, pretending to be bashful. “I don’t deserve this really!” Once she reached the stage, Tomo handed her the mic and got off, sitting in a (purposely) empty chair in the front row.

“Now, you all know that I can do different voices, of course. But how about stand-up comedy? Huh, huuuh?”

Naoko snickered. She sure can. If she doesn’t try hard enough, that is.

As you can probably guess, Mari’s one of those people who doesn’t have to try that hard to be funny but isn’t aware of that fact.

“Now, where shall I begin…? Hmm, let’s start with a simple enough story: Gym class today. So, there’s this boy…”

★

“And then Korubi whacked Caesar in the shin with his surfboard, and Korubi’s all like, ‘Sorry, dude,’ and Caesar’s all like, ‘SPOILER ALERT FOR GAME OF THRONES!”

Everyone in the audience, but Naoko was certain that it was because it wasn’t actually funny. (Yes, just pity laughs. How sad.)

When Mari was done, Tomo came back onstage and began searching for potential people again.

“I’ll go!” Behami shouted. “Jopi’s coming along with me, too!”

Jopi nodded nervously.

“Oh, alright then?”

The braided girl chuckled. “What was that, a question? Why is it so weird to see us together?”

“It’s not! It’s just not that common.” She clapped her hands together. “Okay, then. Come on up!”

Behami nodded and took Jopi by the hand to the stage, wherein Jopi transformed her and her friend’s uniforms into nun outfits. The girl also summoned a Bluetooth speaker that now lay on the “stage.”

Where is this going…? Naoko couldn’t resist sinning that one. Ding!

Behami cleared her throat. “We’re going to be singing ‘Sister Christian’ by Night Ranger!” she declared.

That song? Why? Ding!

Jopi nodded eagerly, standing on her tiptoes to reach the mic. “Because for whatever reason, I really like to sing cheesy 80s songs!”

Behami chuckled and then cleared her throat once more. “Ready?” she said quietly.

“Hmm…” Jopi began to hum.

Naoko assumed that was how the girls tuned each other in choir.

Then, with a press of Jopi’s phone, the song began.

★

The show continued, each act somehow getting more and more ridiculous than the next, but it was all amusing in Naoko’s book.

It was like a real-life episode of America’s Got Talent or whatever, but it was Japan, and it wasn’t exactly talent, so it was more like Japan’s Got Some Magical Girls.

Nick and Kuroe did a sketch, Kasumi and Miharu did a thing (that Naoko wasn’t even sure what to call it), Tomo sang a seventies disco medley, Suika did an interpretive dance to some songs that Naoko knew were all Drew references, and then finally…

It was Mimori’s turn. Hooray.

The girl walked up to the chapel, looking notably nervous (as she tended to do. It was only natural to have stage nerves, after all).

“U-um, this is my favorite Chili Peppers song!” she announced rather passionately.

After taking an awkward minute or two to get her phone to connect to the speaker, she then pressed play.

Mimori took a deep breath and began to sing.

“‘I’ve got a bad disease

Out from my brain is where I bleed

In sanity it seems

You’ve got me by my soul to squeeze’”

For the first time ever, Naoko was amazed at how beautiful Mimori’s voice sounded. It wasn’t loud and brash and chaotic like it always usually was whenever she sang in the club room, or for karaoke.

It was softer, gentler, more mature.

A side of Mimori she’d never heard before.

“‘Where I go, I just don’t know

I’ve got to, got to, gotta take it slow

When I find my peace of mind

I’m gonna give you some of my good time’”

As the song continued, Naoko found her mind wandering to all of the fun times that she had with her friends the past year and a half. They were times that she never would have replaced, ever.

My life would be so much different now if it wasn’t for these girls.

I don’t know what I’d do without them.

After the final note struck, the girls erupted into applause, and Mari and Nick whistled annoyingly.

“Thank you, the Can Do Anything Club!” Mimori shrieked like she was a rockstar or whatever. “Thank you, and have a great night!”

Welp, Naoko thought, smiling a little. A tear trickled down her cheek.

I don’t know if we’re going to top that one.