Uninstall

chapter six

The officer's words rang in Neru's ears throughout the night. It had been the only night in years that she hadn't slept. As tired as she was, there was too much to think about.

First things first, Neru thought, I need to get a job.

She had never had a job before and didn't even know where to start. But she had to get one today. And with that thought, Neru left at the brink of daylight.

No one else was awake yet, and Neru moved quietly as to not grow attention to herself. She shut the front door, noticing that it clicked into place.

Her eyes wandered the streets, trying to recognize anything. She tried to remember the roads they had taken last night from the bar. Unfortunately, however, Neru had terrible memory and found herself completely lost when she found it. A Help Wanted sign.

Without thinking of anything else, Neru pushed open the door and stepped inside. It was a small office with a total of five rooms. The front desk was empty, as were all of the workplaces in the next room.

"Hello?" She called out, walking through the abandoned building. Most of the lights were still off, and she made her way to the only room with the lights on.

A man was sitting, typing on a dingy white keyboard. He didn't look up until she was standing directly in front of him... Or at least as directly as she could considering there was a desk in the way.

"Can I help you?" he mused, giving her not so much as a second look before returning to his computer.

"Yeah, um... I need a job."

"Okay. What are your qualifications?"

Neru paused and began playing with her ponytail. She glanced around the room. On the wall the company name was big and bold. It's a publishing agency.

"On who?"

Think, Neru thought, Who's important enough to matter?

"Hatsune Miku," she said after a few seconds.

His interest piqued at Hatsune's name and he began to give Neru more attention as he asked, "How?"

"I go to school with her. It'll be easy to get drama on her. Which will lead to more readers for you."

"I'll give you a trial period. 700 yen each hour and 1,000 yen bonus for each article. When you aren't researching for your own articles, you would be editing other's works. Any questions?"

"How long is the trial period?"

"One week."

"Well I better be off then. I'll give you the best article on Hatsune Miku you've ever seen."

"We'll see," he said, returning to typing on his keyboard.

With nothing else to say, Neru left and walked back into the world. Her feet kept going down winding streets until a gleam of teal hair twirled in the wind.

It can't be this easy, and yet it was. Hatsune Miku was only a few feet away.

"Hatsune-san!" Neru cried out, running up to the teen idol.

"Huh?" Hatsune turned around and immediately met Neru's eyes. "Oh. You're from choir, right?"

"Yes, I'm surprised you remember me! I just wanted to apologize for yesterday. I really am a fan of your music, its just been super stressful just moving here and all," Neru kept talking, unsure of when to stop.

Hatsune's face broke out into an award winning smile as she said, "Don't worry about it! People get off on the wrong foot all of the time and end up being great friends."

"Can we be friends, Hatsune-san?"

"I would love to be! But my friends call me Miku-chan."

"Okay, Miku-chan! You can call me Neru-chan!"

Miku smiled and so did Neru, both not really believing another's words.

"Oh... One more thing, Miku-chan?"

"What is it?"

"I'm a bit lost, can we walk to school together?"

Miku laughed but agreed right away. They walked to school together making small talk along the way. And Neru had never felt more fake before in her life.