Chapter 27

Aisha Kim

Tokyo...is a weird place. And I've been to a lot of weird places, so that's saying a lot. Most of the natives and tourists didn't bother us. There was an occasional fan who found us, but they said nothing about Jongin and I, which I was thankful for. Maybe...just maybe...things will be okay here. I took a lot of pictures, mostly of how ridiculous Tao and HeeYoung looked while he was chasing her. When it was getting late, and after countless money mistakes courtesy of Sage, we headed back to get ready for the signing. The attitude at the signing, however, was extremely unexpected.

"Pearl?" A smaller fan near the beginning of the line asked. I almost didn't catch her voice.

I looked up at her. She smiled. She didn't look much older than 12.

"Hello." I signed, before signing what she wanted. She tapped on the table. I looked up at her again, confused. What did this girl want? She raised her hands up and began to sign. My eyes widened at the surprise.

"I was mute, too. I got into an accident and I was told I wouldn't have a chance at speaking either. But, because of you, and what you've been doing, being successful, happy, and the bold move you did in China, I began to try again. Thank you. Thank you for giving me hope." I stared in awe, touched that I could do that. The guard standing beside me looked at us questionably. I waved him away and he stopped paying attention.

"What's your name?" I signed.

"Yuzuki." She said, her voice barely audible.

"Yuzuki, thank you for telling me this." I signed, smiling wide. She giggled, cheeks flushing.

"Can I have a picture?" she signed. I nodded, and right there we took a Selca.

"Tag me in it." I signed. She giggled and nodded. She had to move on. I don't think I'll ever forget her now. I didn't realize how much of an impact I had on the fans, especially in what I did that didn't involve dating Jongin. I'd gotten so used to fans just seeing me as "Kai's girlfriend" and not seeing me as a mute dancer, trying to make a mark on the world.

"Pearl, you alright?" HeeYoung asked beside me. I nodded, smiling to myself. I do believe that signing was the happiest one.

"Kon'nichiwa Tokyo!!" HeeYoung's Japanese ran out. It was refreshing to hear her say actual words in Japanese other than swear words. She's such a paradox. SunJung and Minji knew a few phrases, but only because the Fist required them to learn them for the concert. They also knew the words from our Japanese song, so by extension I knew those words too.

"We hope you have a lot of fun tonight! Tokyo is so beautiful!" Minji said, nailing her phrase. The fans cheered and clapped, happy that their idols could at least speak a little bit of their language. Our Japanese song began to play and got into formation. This was a special choreography for me, because HeeYoung asked if I could sign the part instead of her singing it.

I spun in my special points shoes and began to sign her part. It was like a music box at the beginning, so being the 'Tiny Dancer' it refers to in the song, I had to really emphasize and take extra care of my ballet moves. I nailed each move perfectly, sometimes hearing soft gasps. The music box sound died away as the chorus played and we switched formation to where HeeYoung and SunJung in the front while Minji and I took to the back with dancing. Her hip hop with my ballet gave a powerful contrast. I lost myself in our own song, putting my all into this song, and as it died down to our final pose I could feel the sweat rolling off me.

The audiance cheered and screamed happily. We stepped out of the pose and I noticed something out of the Japanese fans. A lot had lifted posters, but I couldn't read most of them. I motioned for HeeYoung to come over. I pointed to one in particular. It had two people holding hands. I signed, "What does it say?"

"Oh my gosh...it says, 'We support Kai and Pearl!'" She translated for me. My heart warmed at the thought. Suddenly posters were popping up everywhere, bearing the same message. The emotions I was feeling was overwhelming. Relief, hope, and happiness came like a tidal wave. The Japanese support us.

They weren't going to hate.

Oh my gosh...

I'm going to love Japan.

"Arigato!!" I said as clearly as I could in HeeYoung's mic. They finally stopped giving me a microphone when I actually want to speak. What are the odds? The fans squealed as they heard me speak. It really was something of a miracle. I wondered if Yuzuki was in the audiance. I waved and said, "Keep Shining!" In English, before HeeYoung went on with the program.

"Ohmigosh, the Japanese love you guys as a couple!!!" Sage exclaimed as we made our way out of the Nagoya area. We stayed for three more nights in Tokyo before leaving to Yokohama, and Sage couldn't be more relieved. After that spider incident, she really didn't get much sleep the entire time we were in Tokyo. Off we went to Yokohama, stayed for a few days, and then moved to Nagoya. We had one more destination before going to America, finally.

She was typing away at her laptop, talking to fans as the plane took off for our last destination, Osaka. We had to wake up early so she had on her glasses and her hair up in a messy bun that Luhan kept batting around. He wasn't too happy that he couldn't sit beside her, but best friends came first today. At least he was sitting behind her. Jongin was playing with my hair as well, but I didn't mind.

"What do you mean?" Jongin asked.

"The fans that are coming to the Osaka concert demand that you two do something on the stage. Well, the ones that I've translated and the ones that were written in English say so too...ugh. Stupid laptop, stop loading so slow... You know what? I'm just going to dump all duplicate messages together to get an exact number....Ohmigosh...that's a lot of people."

"Mwo?" I asked softly. I looked over at the laptop and gasped.

"20,000 people? And climbing?" Jongin asked in disbelief.

"Yeah. You two are greatly supported....." Sage said, and continued to type away. "Aye, Luuuuhan why'd you stop playing with my hair?"

"Bec