“Touji, you use this place all by yourself?”
Riku sounded impressed the moment he stepped into my sweet home.
Which made sense. He had just heard that a high-school student was using a 3LDK apartment, about 960 square feet, all alone. Anyone would react like that.
I hung my coat on the clothes rack and answered.
“Until I graduate middle school, I only use it on weekends.”
“Professional writers really do live differently from ordinary high-school students.”
Riku nodded to himself as he looked around the apartment, then turned to me and asked.
“So what should I do?”
Yukimura and Kano had gone home as soon as the meeting ended.
So the only person currently visiting my apartment was Riku, and the reason Riku had come here alone was simple.
He was here to help with various things before we began making the movie in earnest.
I sat Riku down in front of the computer in the living room.
Then I pressed the power button.
The computer started up with a loud whir, and Riku looked startled.
“Is it okay if I mess with this? Don’t you have important files on it?”
“Oh, it’s fine. This one is for games. The computer I use for work is separate, in the workroom.”
Separating my workspace and living space also meant keeping my hobbies strictly inside the living space.
Otherwise, there would be no point in separating them.
So I had prepared two computers.
A gaming computer and a work computer. Those two.
Creators received plenty of inspiration from games, so creators also had to keep playing games steadily. But if there was only one computer, the unfortunate incident of opening a game while trying to open a word processor could happen.
For the sake of work efficiency, buying two was absolutely the correct choice.
“You play PC games too, Touji?”
Riku asked, sounding slightly surprised.
It was not so much that he found it surprising that I played games. He was purely surprised by PC games themselves.
In Korea, PC games had been popular since the early 2000s, but Japan was different.
In Japan, the perception that PC games were something enjoyed only by a small minority of core gamers existed until the mid-2010s, and that had not changed here either, whether this was a parallel world, a love-comedy world, or whatever else it was supposed to be.
Even when people played games, they played console games. They did not really play PC games.
Especially not minors.
I answered calmly.
“I enjoy most creative works without much discrimination.”
“Does that help you as a novelist?”
“In general, yes.”
Instead of preaching to Riku about the creative theories I had accumulated so far, I checked his ability level.
“Are you familiar with computers, Riku?”
“Somewhat?”
“I trust you, so I won’t bother testing you. Now, what do we need for movie production?”
At my question, Riku moved his eyes around and fell into thought.
A moment later, Riku slowly spoke.
“A camera?”
“And besides that?”
“Editing software? Actors? A scenario? Lighting? Props? Costumes? Microphones? A recorder?”
“All correct, but you missed the most important one.”
“What is it?”
“Music.”
Film was a representative composite art form.
Well, I personally thought the pinnacle of composite art forms was games, but that did not mean film was lacking in variety.
Film required skills from truly many different fields.
Scenario, art, filming, acting, editing, CG.
And music.
Music that could be used only in video, theater, and games had an absurdly overpowered performance.
For example, if writing wanted to create a situation where tension intensified, it had to spend all day writing psychological description. Film? Ten seconds of drums and it was done.
A depressing situation could be handled with a single piano melody, and if an OST was inserted into a climax scene, excitement automatically rose.
Seriously overpowered.
Nerf it already.
Sigh.
Anyway.
Music was important in film like this, and we were planning to make a movie, weren’t we?
So we needed to prepare music in advance.
“Music? How am I supposed to get music? Don’t tell me I’m making it.”
“In this world.”
“Yeah.”
“There are free sound sources that can be used commercially. Now you just have to dig through them and pick out anything usable. I’m counting on you. Music director.”
“Is that what a music director’s job is supposed to be? Something feels off…”
Still uncertain, Riku began searching.
His search query was “sound effects that can be used in movies.”
Hmm.
“I’ll just tell you some websites that collect free sound sources. Look there.”
“Efficient. I like it.”
And so Riku clicked a sound source on the first of the three sites I showed him.
Immediately afterward, a bizarre scream of “Kieeeeeeeek—” rang through the apartment from the speakers.
“…Touji.”
“Yes.”
“Will we need this?”
“I’ll leave that entirely up to your judgment, Riku. Though there is a list.”
I showed Riku the A4 page I had placed facedown beside the computer.
Riku read the A4 page I handed him and muttered quietly.
“Footsteps, heartbeat, old wooden door closing, crowded city noise, wind…”
“I wrote down the movie flow and the direction I’ll use too. Even if something isn’t on the list, collect it at your own discretion if you think it might help.”
“O… kay.”
As a bonus, I took out a headset and connected it to the speakers.
Since he was choosing sound effects, it would be better to use a headset to judge sound quality too.
I placed the headset in front of Riku.
Then I said.
“You’re sleeping over, right?”
“Yeah. I already told my parents I’d sleep at a friend’s place.”
“Then we need to decide on dinner. What would you like? Pizza?”
“I’m fine with anything.”
Anything.
Generally, that phrase was an idiom meaning, “I don’t know what I want to eat, so you figure it out.”
But my greatest friend Riku would never use such a horrific manner of speech.
Obviously, he must mean “anything” in the true sense.
“Great. Then I’ll make something myself.”
“You cook too, Touji? You really are amazing.”
I planned to make my secret weapon, the dish I always fed guests when they came over: Swedish meatballs.
Riku also seemed ready to start working and picked up the headset, but I spoke as if something had suddenly occurred to me.
“Riku.”
“Yeah? What is it?”
“Do you want to participate in the movie production?”
“Isn’t it a little late to ask that now?”
Riku gave a small laugh and put on the headset.
Then he answered normally.
“I came all the way here because I want to participate. Did you think I might’ve just gotten swept along somehow?”
“That’s Riku for you.”
“And I want to get closer to you too, Touji. Other kids would be surprised if they talked to you, you know? You’re funny, unlike your image at school.”
“I am quite the clown.”
A small explosion sound went “Kwaaaang—!” from the headset. Riku had set off in earnest to search for sound effects.
I watched Riku closely for a moment, then picked up my coat. I was going out to buy groceries, but…
Bzzzt.
My smartphone vibrated at that exact moment.
[Kubota Yoshihiro (Editor)]
When I checked, Yoshihiro was calling me.
First, I went outside. Air that was gradually approaching spring hit my face.
Nice weather.
After stretching lazily, I brought the smartphone to my ear and spoke.
“What is it, Mr. Yoshihiro?”
[Touji, how have you been lately?]
“That’s really out of nowhere.”
I counted the number of times Yoshihiro had called me for this kind of purpose.
Hmm.
Not once in about nine years.
“Mr. Yoshihiro. Be honest. Something happened, didn’t it?”
[You’re the one something happened to. I heard you’re making a movie.]
“Who did you hear that from? Are you still in contact with Ryuji?”
Among the members of the movie production group, the only people connected to Yoshihiro were me and Kano. Kano had no reason to contact Yoshihiro, so there was only one possibility.
Kano must have told Ryuji how I was doing while mentioning the movie, and that had apparently reached Yoshihiro.
Yoshihiro sighed.
[I told you to rest. Writers never listen. Never.]
“This is resting.”
[How is that resting? You sent me a new work by email yesterday too.]
“How was it?”
I had continued writing <My Childhood Friend Isn’t Interested in Me>, the one I had started and then left unfinished at the café last time.
Because after reading the prologue and chapter one, Yoshihiro had said, “…How am I supposed to tell from this?”
Thanks to that, the amount of <My Childhood Friend Isn’t Interested in Me> I had gathered now came to about fifteen chapters.
Enough to judge whether it was entertaining.
At my words, Yoshihiro was silent for a moment.
In other words.
That meant it had been answer enough.
Yoshihiro murmured quietly.
[You should stop writing it.]
“Understood.”
I had expected it, so it did not leave a bitter taste in my mouth.
It only made my head complicated.
[Don’t overthink it too much. That’s how slumps are.]
A slump.
Actually, I had used the word myself any number of times out of habit, but now that I heard the word again from Yoshihiro’s mouth, a part of me wanted to argue back.
So.
Am.
I.
Really.
In a slump?
[—Touji?]
“You’re right. Slumps get better with rest. But if a person only rests, the brain rusts. Movie production should be a decent stimulus. No?”
[…Yeah.]
Yoshihiro muttered softly.
From the other side of the receiver, I heard him roughly scratching his head. Chk. That was the sound of a lighter. He had put a cigarette in his mouth.
A little time passed.
Then Yoshihiro called me in a calm voice.
[Touji.]
“Yes.”
[If you write something new, tell me. I don’t have much work these days, so I’m bored to death.]
“I’ll send it tomorrow.”
[I didn’t mean send it that quickly… No. I’ll wait.]
The call ended.
I quietly leaned against the railing and let out a long breath.
Haa.
What am I supposed to do about these adolescent hormones…
After messing up my complicated hair, I soon straightened up.
I needed to hurry, buy groceries, and work with Riku.
“…”
“…”
And then I froze when my eyes met someone down below who had been looking up at the sky.
Between vivid blond hair, I stared at equally vivid blue eyes, then calmly waved.
As Saito had once said, Yuna’s house was near my apartment.
Considering my future stepsister was appearing near the apartment on a walk.