Pink Beat
Written for Into The Rainbow: Vrains Shipping Week
Turn 1 #VSWPink
Ship: Zinniashipping | Aoi/Miyu
Fandom: Yu-Gi-Oh! Vrains
Title: Pink Beat
Word Count: 1,483
Rating: T
Warnings: No Warnings Apply
Tags: Alternate Universe - Skip Beat, Developing Relationship, Pre-Slash, Handholding, Swearing, Past/Referenced Ryoken/Miyu
It was pink. It was a bright and garish pink, no less, Miyu observed in absolute misery. Pink was so not her colour but this jumpsuit had to be atrocious even by the most girly of girly-girl standards.
This was what she got for how the auditions went though, Miyu sighed externally upon that realisation.
She thought she had done great but in retrospective, it was bit of a disaster. Nothing like the performances that the other girls had done. They had all been sat down in a plastic chair and one by one, they had to react to a scripted message they had never heard before recorded on a flip phone. The other girls had done lovely, twee performances, nothing what like Miyu had done since she was fresh off her break up with Ryoken.
She had supported him for ten, long years. She had cooked and cleaned for him, she had been a dutiful childhood friend to him. She paid more rent than he did in their shared apartment whilst he chased dreams of getting famous, she was scrubbing toilets. His parents had been so disappointed in them both when they ran away together to chase the coattails of the rich and famous rather than take over the family business of innkeeping in the boonies and now look at them. They didn’t even have a scrap of friendship left to show for it because at the end of the day, Ryoken was just using Miyu as free labour.
“I know how things ended the other day,” that husky, male voice said in the phone as Miyu listened, “but I still love you. Don’t leave me, I’m coming soon to get you from the train station.
Oh. Hell. Fucking. No.
Miyu couldn’t describe it but she just felt rage burn inside her. Her heart rate went up immediately and she couldn’t control her words or actions. She heard Ryoken’s voice in that phone recording rather than some generic male actor that belonged to this studio she was trying to get picked up from at.
She flung the phone on the ground and she broke the goddamn prop, stomping on it, she railed and cussed and it was an entire ordeal. Nothing like the graceful, serene forgiveness this shitty ex-boyfriend character got from the other girls, especially that Zaizen Aoi girl. Miyu wasn’t even acting, she was just venting. She wasn’t even trying to be like other girls as she whinged and wailed in her misplaced furor, she just wanted to get all the feelings in her head out.
What a waste that would all turn out to be. Miyu had gone to class after class, she had thrown herself at her part-time job right up until she quit. She made the most beautiful cabbage rose on stage as her unique skill for that portion of the talent section and then, when she finally made it all but to curtain call, the acting exercise had turned into that. She had tried so hard to get that far and she had blown it on that. Kind of worth it though. Save for that disgustingly pink jumpsuit that she was expected to wear as part of her induction to the Skip Beat programme.
See, whilst Miyu may have blown her shot at becoming a normal actress, she did have a saving grace. The director saw something in her. Some kind of shine in her eyes, she was different, he had to give her that and so, just for her - and one other girl in the same boat as her, though she didn’t know who yet - he created two casual positions as part of the Skip Beat programme. Basically, she was their odd-jobber, everything from cleaning to actual minor parts on variety shows, everything she would need to rebuild her career from scratch and maybe learn to behave along the way, too.
God she wishes she could have been like that Zaizen Aoi girl.
Miyu doesn’t even remember seeing Zaizen at the prior rounds. Maybe there were other rooms or days they were hosting from or maybe she had called ahead to say she couldn’t make it because the first time they saw each other was at the final acting round of the talent scouting and she had been a show stopper. Everything about her took Miyu’s breath away. Her performance had been that stunning, she had been the first to go in the acting round and she left a very high standard.
She heard that very same phone call as Miyu and whilst she did break the performance, it was hearts she broke, not the prop itself. At just that word, a magnificent tear was shed and streaked down her cheek as she graciously was saved by the ex-boyfriend character from herself. Her performance was nothing less than divine and convincing, like an angel of performing arts had stepped down from heaven just to appear on that woody-coloured stage and sit in those plastic chairs.
“Yes, of course,” she cried, majestic and demure, not overly dramatic yet her drama was delectable, “I understand. The engagement is back on. I love you, too.”
Everything about her was beautiful. Her tone of voice and her makeup, her coiffed, brunette hair and her brown eyes. Yet even so, she had a humble serenity about her. It was obvious that out of everyone here today, she was the likeliest to become the next big thing, a mega-star of fame and fortune with her acting and her beauty and yet. She didn’t have an air of arrogance about her, she graciously thanked her competitors for being her competitors and the judging panel all the same, and also the crew who were doing the lights and sounds, the prop master. She had the most immaculate etiquette.
Miyu couldn’t help but be a little bit envious as there was no way in hell that the Zaizen Aoi would ever-
There was a knock on the change room door and someone came in. Someone with brown hair and brown eyes, wearing that very same ghastly pink jumpsuit as Miyu and Miyu couldn’t believe it. Her jaw dropped with the utmost, awestruck confusion as this person came in through the staff only door.
“Aoi?!” she exclaimed.
Aoi’s eyes went wide and she blushed, averting her eyes. Miyu got the feeling from it that she was remembered from the audition, but not for any good reason but. This didn’t make any sense. Aoi was an undiscovered gem of actress, why on Earth would she be the other half of the Skip Beat programme?
Aoi came closer and she sat down on the bench that Miyu had been miserating sitting upon. They sat somewhat close and Aoi kept her knees primly together, placing her hand atop of them and speaking more to her cuticles than to Miyu, she explained exactly what she was doing here.
“You seem surprised to see me.” Aoi awkwardly said. “I can’t say I’m shocked to see you here.” She giggled. “Your acting audition left quite the impression.”
“Yay, woo…” Miyu sarcastically mumbled to herself.
“But it was all your own hard work. You clawed your way through the trials but… but I bought my way in.” Aoi said. She frowned. “I didn’t want to, but my ever doting older brother paid for me to skip to the final round. I begged and pleaded but the money had already gone through. It was obvious but I still informed the adjudicators of this and was disqualified but… But the director gave me a second chance in the form of being part of the Skip Beat programme, with you.”
“With me.” Miyu echoed.
“So we will be seeing a lot of each other now, as co-workers.” Aoi stiffly said.
“Yup, so we better get along, eh?” Miyu laughed. She reached out for Aoi’s hand and she moved it to between them, Miyu placed hers atop of Aoi’s. “It’ll be us against the world, ‘cause look at us? We’re a joke! I’m Little Miss Anger Issues and your Little Miss Trust Fund Baby, lol, what a pair we make. And in these horrible outfits the director wants us to wear? Ew! But we’ll make it to the top, we have to.”
“Yeah, we do, I want to prove my older brother wrong, that I can make it in the world without his micromanaging.” Aoi huffed.
“And I want to out-famous my B-List ex!” Miyu raised her voice and she held Miyu’s hand tightly before thrusting them up in the air. “To the sisters of the Skip Beat Program, cheer for us!” she yelled.
“To us!” Aoi cheered, feeling weirdly befriended by Miyu in a matter of minutes. Their words resounded through the empty changeroom, echoey and with bad acoustics, and naturally, that was when the director walked in: the working day was ready to begin.