Vol 2 Chapter 14 – Nozomi Shiramine

Bride File 1: Top Idol “Nozomi Shiramine”

I, Nozomi Shiramine, am an idol. A being who shines brighter and is cuter than anyone else.

I’ve loved singing since I was little, and I adore dancing. That’s why, for me, being an idol was my calling and my reason for living.

While everyone else was playing with friends, I was sweating through lessons. I don’t have a single person I could call a friend.

But I never thought of myself as lonely. Because when I stand on stage, there are thousands, tens of thousands of my fans out there.

As long as I had my fans, I didn’t need friends at all. This wasn’t me trying to act tough; it was a fact. And indeed, for the first sixteen years of my life, I was able to live happily without any friends.

With not a single friend to my name, it goes without saying that I didn’t have a boyfriend, nor had I ever even been in love. I threw away love and friendship—I threw it all away and chose to be an idol.

There is nothing in this world I could be more passionate about than being an idol! I’m going to live my entire life as an idol!

…There was a time when I, too, thought that way.

That resolve of mine was shattered to pieces the moment I met him.

I fell in love at first sight.

I want to get my hands on everything about him, I want to stand by his side. If I could just become his and only his idol, I don’t need anything else!

From the day I fell in love with him, my life began to revolve around him.

Huh? What about my lessons and concerts? I don’t know and I don’t care!

Huh? Am I abandoning my fans? Even if you put 10 billion fans on a scale against him, the scales would tip overwhelmingly in his favor!

I was certain that I had been born to marry him.

I mean, it makes sense, right? You’d have to be at my level, a world-class top idol, to be a match for him.

No, it’s questionable if even a top idol like me is worthy of him…

My eyes could see no one but him.

So I let go of my microphone and retired from being an idol.

First, to understand everything about him, I went online and bought every secret tool imaginable… listening devices, tracking devices, miniature cameras, telephoto lens cameras…

Individually, they weren’t that expensive, but I bought so many that the total came out to quite a sum.

But thankfully, I had more money than I knew what to do with from my idol days. For me, it was a drop in the bucket.

However, the problems started from here. No matter how many times I tried to plant a bug or a tracker on him, his annoying little sister would find and dispose of them.

Thanks to her, the only thing I have to show for my efforts are a few pictures of him…

Aaaargh! I wish he would just pop out of the photo… I want to kiss this face… I pick up my favorite one and bring my lips toward his face.

Smooch♡

A sensation of heat washes over my entire body. I can’t breathe properly.

My heart pounds in my chest, and an overwhelming sense of euphoria rushes over me.

ba-dump, ba-dump

If just kissing a photo can feel this good, I wonder how happy I would be if I could kiss the real him…

Just thinking about it makes me blush, and I writhe in my sheets.

I never knew that this thing called love could make you lose control of yourself like this.

Almost the entire world is crazy about me, so why won’t he be crazy about me…?

It’s so frustrating, so unbelievably frustrating.

How can I get him to notice me? I thought about it every single day.

But I never once came up with a good idea, and before I knew it, stalking him had started to become my daily routine.

I continued to gather information on him by stalking him… and as a result, I stumbled upon a truly unbelievable scene.

It happened while I was following him on his way to school, just like always.

He was walking with someone wearing a deeply pulled-down hat.

I instinctively hid behind a telephone pole and decided to watch them.

I couldn’t hear their conversation at all, but the two of them seemed to be talking very happily.

What’s this… with that sappy look on his face… Don’t tell me that’s his girlfriend?

The person walking with him was tall.

They were clearly taller than him, so there was no doubt they were probably older.

When he smiled at the person in the hat, they smiled back in the same way… It was an expression he’d never once shown when talking to me.

Well… when I really think about it, it’s not like I’ve ever even had a conversation with him, is it…

If he’d just come to one of my handshake events, I’d talk to him so much, I’d even give him all sorts of special treatment…

How can I get him to look at me?

I didn’t know what to do anymore.

Just then, the person in the hat handed something over.

No, not handed. They were pointing it at him…

“No way…”

The words escaped my lips before I could stop them.

What was pointed at him was a handgun… In a safe country like Japan, there’s no way someone would just happen to be brandishing a gun on the side of the road.

So that means… the person in the hat came all the way here just to kill him?

My heart was pounding violently, like an animal sensing danger.

Should I jump out there to save him…? But even if I did, there’s no way the situation would improve.

I didn’t know what to do. I was frozen, unable to move…

As the person in the hat pointed the muzzle at him, he put both hands behind his head and knelt on the ground… Then the two of them seemed to be talking about something, but I couldn’t hear.

He’s going to be killed… I don’t want that, I will absolutely not allow that!

As I mustered the courage to show myself, the person pointed the gun at the ground.

And then… they pulled the trigger!

BANG!

The fired bullet slammed into the ground with a tremendous roar… its power was immense, gouging the asphalt. If he had tried to fight back against the person in the hat, the bullet might have hit him…

The fear of death enveloped me once again. My legs gave out, and I collapsed onto the ground.

That bullet hole was like a gaping hole that had been blown right through my own heart…

I can’t save him anymore…

I thought I was the only one who could save him, but I can’t do anything.

I ended my own first love myself… I couldn’t even risk my life to protect the boy I yearned for so much.

I thought he was more precious to me than my own life, that I loved him that much, but when it came down to it, I couldn’t do a thing.

This was the same as me denying my own love…

I had my heart broken…

At that thought, tears began to stream from my eyes…

And then the person in the hat forced him into a car and drove away.

All I could do was watch in silence… The pain of my broken heart left me unable to move.

After that, in a daze, without even contacting the police, I just went home all by myself.

I decided to die.

There’s no point in someone like me being alive… A life without him isn’t worth living…

I wrapped the rope I’d bought for stalking him around my neck, put my head through the loop, stood on a chair, and looked up.

The preparations for my death were complete.

I’ll give the him in this photo one last goodbye kiss, and then I’ll die.

I share a final kiss with the him in the photo…

Smooch… Ah, so this is my last kiss… Well, I guess it can’t be helped. They say first loves never come true, anyway…

It was at that moment. I heard his sister’s voice coming from my listening earphone.

I frantically put the earphone in my ear.

That’s when I remembered. Out of spite for having all my bugs disposed of, I had planted just one listening device in his sister’s bag.

Luckily, it hadn’t been found, and that’s how I was able to listen in like this.

But he and his sister didn’t get along, so I rarely heard any useful information or conversations. Today, however, was different.

His sister sounded extremely panicked, like she was talking to someone.

The person she was talking to seemed to be a doctor… I pushed the earphone deeper into my ear so as not to miss a single piece of information from his sister.

Apparently, he was alive and currently hospitalized.

Learning that he was safe, I felt the strength drain from my entire body, and I collapsed onto the floor…

Oh… thank goodness. He’s alive.

This time, tears of relief streamed from my eyes.

I was so, so relieved that he was alive…

And I made a decision at that moment. The me from before is dead!

From today on, I’m going to live as a new me!

I’m going to work harder and harder and become someone who can make him notice me!

At that thought, a vitality I had never felt before surged through me.

And so, I picked up a microphone once again.

And today, one month after my first love began… I stood on stage with a renewed sense of determination.

Well, when I say stage, it was just the one in the school gymnasium.