Opening her eyes, she saw an unfamiliar wooden ceiling.
‘Huh?’
Where did this ceiling come from… No, wait—why am I seeing a ceiling again?
Haruka stared at the wood grain above her head for several seconds.
Her first thought was: hospital.
After the car accident, the scene of “opening your eyes to an unfamiliar ceiling” had become a psychological scar.
She jerked her head down to look at the blanket covering her and the clothes she was wearing.
A thick cotton quilt, a plain duvet cover, a beige wool sweater, and a wool skirt.
She didn’t see the hospital-style white sheets or patient gown she’d imagined.
The body beneath her lay on a tatami mat with a futon, not a hospital spring bed.
‘Thank goodness, that scared me to death.’
Haruka let out a sigh of relief and sat up from under the covers.
She wanted to look around more carefully, but her eyelids felt heavy and wouldn’t open easily.
She tried rubbing them with her hands and realized they were swollen beyond belief.
Her brain was still in its startup self-check mode, sluggishly turning for several seconds before finally loading the last complete memory fragment—
The living room.
Under the sunset, she was crying like a three-year-old in her grandma’s arms.
Grandma had calmly seen through her, yet accepted her.
Then, just like a three-year-old, she’d wiped all her snot and tears onto Grandma’s shoulder.
And then…
Nothing after that.
‘No way, did I actually cry myself to blackout in Grandma’s arms and fall asleep…?’
Haruka buried her face in her hands, her ears burning hot.
In her previous life, she’d been a nearly thirty-year-old man, and she’d actually curled up in an elder’s arms and cried until she blacked out.
‘No, wait—what man? Now I’m a fragile sixteen-year-old girl. What’s wrong with crying when you’ve been wronged?’
She forced herself to find a way out, straightened her slightly wrinkled clothes, and folded the blanket.
Pushing open the sliding paper door, she heard the steady thump-thump of a knife on a cutting board coming from the kitchen, along with an enticing aroma mixing miso and grilled fish.
“Grrrrrr—”
At the smell, her stomach betrayed her with an honest growl.
‘Okay, food comes first. I keep forgetting I have a fast metabolism and get hungry easily.’
When she looked up, she saw Grandma’s back, busy in the kitchen.
Haruka tiptoed out of the room and pulled the door shut behind her.
Grandma was working at the counter.
She heard the sliding door but didn’t turn around.
While still chopping vegetables, she said in a perfectly ordinary tone, “Go wash your face and hands. Lunch is almost ready. Today I made your favorite grilled Pacific saury and oden.”
“Ah… oh, okay.”
Haruka was taken aback for a moment, then obediently replied, looking dazed as she headed for the bathroom.
Grandma’s reaction just now was as if the soul-baring conversation that had stripped away all disguises that afternoon had never happened.
Watching Grandma’s back from a distance, Haruka didn’t know what expression to make for a moment.
Lunch was an ordinary yet hearty Japanese home-cooked meal—grilled Pacific saury browned to perfection, neatly sliced tamagoyaki, piping hot miso soup, and pickled radish and oden carefully arranged in small plates.
At the table, Grandma, like any doting grandmother in the world, verbally complained about her:
“You’re so thin your chin is all pointy, and your arms are like chopsticks.”
But her hands never stopped piling food into Haruka’s bowl until it was overflowing.
It was as if she were just an ordinary granddaughter who hadn’t come home in a long time and needed a good feeding.
And Haruka completely let go of that tense shell.
She stopped obsessively thinking “What would Hoshino Haruka say now?”
“What expression should Hoshino Haruka make?”
Instead, with her bowl in hand, she muttered complaints about Tokyo’s prices, grumbled about how devilish her manager was, and shared which convenience store rice balls tasted the best.
“Grandma, I swear, Lawson’s tuna mayo rice ball is pretty good, but FamilyMart’s mentaiko rice ball is also seriously competitive, and it’s ten yen cheaper.”
“Oh yeah, and that manager is so annoying. I hate that he’s like a block of wood.”
An old woman and a young girl spent an incredibly leisurely afternoon together like that.
That evening at 6:30, the intercity train station.
She had an early call tomorrow, so Haruka had to head back to Tokyo tonight.
Grandma accompanied her to the station by taxi.
The night breeze was cool.
Haruka still wore her “anti-paparazzi three-piece set.”
“Make sure to text Grandma when you get home to let me know you’re safe. If work ever gets tiring or you feel wronged, call me anytime.”
Grandma stood in front of her, adjusting the scarf around Haruka’s neck.
“I know, Grandma, I’m not a little kid anymore.”
Haruka smiled and nodded.
“Whenever you feel like coming back, just call Grandma. I’ll come pick you up myself.”
“Okay, okay.”
“And remember, don’t push yourself too hard at work.”
“Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.”
“It’s getting cold—dress warmly. In winter, don’t drink cold stuff. It’s bad for your stomach.”
“Grandma, you’ve said that three times already.”
“Mm…”
Grandma thought for a moment, felt she’d covered everything, then thought again—still felt like something was missing.
“Work stuff… don’t push yourself. Health comes first.”
“I know, I know—”
Haruka was drawing out her reply in a lazy singsong when suddenly the station broadcast for the train’s arrival rang out.
“Ah, the train’s here. Grandma, I have to go.”
“Wait.”
Grandma called out, fumbled in her coat pocket for a moment, then pulled something out and held it in front of Haruka.
It was an old charm—an omamori that looked like it had seen years.
The once-bright colors had faded slightly, and the edges were even worn and frayed.
“When Haruka was little, I got this for her from Senso-ji Temple. She always said she was unlucky, a jinxed kid.”
“Back then, other kids wouldn’t play with her. They made fun of her for not having parents, called her a wild child without a mom or dad.”
“She was always getting scraped up and bruised… so I told her that if she carried this, the gods would share a little luck with her.”
Grandma took Haruka’s hand and gently placed the old charm in her palm.
Her gaze was warm and full of strength.
“Now I’m giving it to you.”
“I hope this charm can also bless you to become a child who has luck.”
Haruka looked at the faded charm lying quietly in her palm, and her nose suddenly stung.
“Thank you, Grandma… I’ll keep it with me for sure.”
She gripped the charm tightly.
“Go on. Take care.”
As the train-closing chime sounded, Haruka stood at the car door and waved energetically at Grandma.
The door closed.
Haruka watched Grandma through the window until the train left the platform, and that stooped but warm figure disappeared completely into the night.
Only then did she turn around and find a window seat.
She pulled the charm out of her pocket.
The worn corners and slightly faded string—every mark was the weight time had left.
Outside the window, the lights flew backward.
She stared at the scenery, feeling the boulder that had been pressing on her chest for over a month shatter completely at this moment.
Late night, 9:30 PM, Haruka’s apartment.
After a shower, Haruka wore a loose pair of pajamas and walked to the bedroom vanity, drying her wet hair with a towel.
The face reflected in the mirror was still one that a million people would recognize in an instant.
Fair skin with a hint of pink, her freshly washed hair clinging softly to her neck.
Those sparkling eyes blinked without pause, staring at herself in the mirror.
A little over a month ago, she had sat in front of this same mirror, looked at herself, and asked, “Who are you?”
Last night, she had sat in the exact same spot, staring at that face in the mirror, caught in a mental spiral of “Who am I? I’m a monster,” even thinking about ending it all.
But today, the same mirror, the same face.
Haruka put down the towel, placed both hands on the vanity, and leaned closer to the mirror.
For the first time, she studied the face with pure appreciation.
She tilted her head left and right, examining the flawless proportions of her features.
“I gotta say,”
She stared at the girl in the mirror, a smile tugging at the corner of her lips.
“I am really pretty.”
“I really am a beautiful girl. I’m almost falling in love with myself.”
Suddenly she remembered what Grandma had said to her today—
“You didn’t desecrate or ruin that identity. You didn’t destroy her life just because you became someone else. You’ve done well—you’ve kept the idol name ‘Hoshino Haruka’ shining bright.”
‘Hmph, isn’t it only natural to keep going?’
Haruka stood up and walked to the bedroom window, looking out at the night view.
“Just you wait. Whether it’s the Budokan, the Dome, or an even bigger stage—”
“I’m coming!”
“Buzz buzz—”
The phone on her bed vibrated, interrupting her narcissism.
She saw the name on the screen and tossed the phone aside with a look of disgust.
Because no one else would bother her at this hour except that man.
But the ringtone kept going.
She let out a disdainful snort, then reluctantly reached over, grabbed the phone, and pressed the answer button.
“Hello, Manager-san, good evening~”
Haruka picked up, her tone lighter and more relaxed than ever.
On the other end, Ritsu seemed taken aback by her unusually high energy.
He paused for two seconds before speaking.
“Already back at the apartment?”
“Just finished my shower. Getting ready for bed.”
“Tomorrow’s schedule has changed. The originally scheduled exclusive interview at Shibuya TV Station this morning is postponed. Instead, you’ll be on a morning info show at Fuji Television. The location is Odaiba, which is farther away—at least a forty-five-minute drive.”
“Tomorrow at 6:50 AM, Uehara-san will pick you up downstairs. Do not be late.”
“6:50?! That early?”
“Because you need to arrive with base makeup. The TV station’s makeup room will be packed in the morning. To save time, you’ll have the makeup artist at the office do your base first.”
Ritsu’s tone was strictly businesslike, leaving no room for negotiation.
“Also, you won’t be a smiling background prop this time. In the program, you have about five minutes of solo interaction time.”
“Interaction?”
“Yes. I just sent the program’s script outline and likely questions to your LINE. Go over it tonight. Don’t be clueless in front of the cameras tomorrow.”
“Roger that~ Consider it done!”
After hanging up, Haruka opened LINE.
Sure enough, Ritsu had sent a PDF over a dozen pages long.
It was packed with the day’s program flow, the host’s background, other guests’ information, and script prompts about which jokes she should drop and when.
Haruka looked at the dense file, and suddenly a scene from a few days ago flashed through her mind—the time she went to the magazine office for an interview.
If she hadn’t crammed a ton of interview techniques beforehand, read that anonymous entertainer’s Interview Secrets, and then reviewed all her past interviews, she would have made a huge fool of herself facing the editor-in-chief’s tough questions.
‘Then let’s just use the same trick again.’
Haruka quickly wiped her hair, casually tied the half-dry strands into a high ponytail with a hair tie, then walked to her desk and opened her laptop.
“Let’s get to work.”