Ranko ran between the tables, trying her best to keep on top of her orders and drink deliveries. Even with her and Izumi both serving and even Hana pitching in, there was no way to fully clear the queue of orders and customer requests. The bar was packed so full that she could barely walk between the service bar and the booths. The karaoke machine was in constant use, but with every member of staff far too busy to act as hostess, the singers were forced to select their own songs using the makeshift kiosk that sat on a white plastic folding table near the ladies’ room entrance. Even on a Thursday night, the bar was at least twice as busy as the first night she’d worked there - a fact for which Ranko was grateful. If her first few nights had been as hectic as the one she now faced, she might well have quit on the spot.


    There seemed to be a buzz in the place, as if the crowd was anticipating something. It was strange - Ranko thought perhaps there was a drink special she didn’t know about, because the excitement in the room was far in excess of what the pair of drunk harbor workers performing Funky Cold Medina on the bar’s tiny corner stage warranted.


    Sensing a momentary lull in the action, Ranko slipped through the blue saloon door between the two bar counters, ducking into the back room just to sit down for a few minutes. Mei followed her through the slatted door into the relative quiet of the kitchen. The redhead, wearing a green crushed velvet shirt and a black faux leather miniskirt, slumped heavily onto a metal stool and leaned over the prep counter, resting her elbows on the cold steel surface and holding her head in her hands. She recalled a conversation she had on the train with Izumi on her birthday, about another one of those rules girls have to know, remembering to cross her ankles in the short skirt.


    “You holding up okay?” Mei asked in a bright tone of voice. There was a knowing smirk on her face that gave Ranko a measure of disquiet. “You’re getting your ass kicked out there, new kid.”


    Ranko looked up at Mei, sighing exhaustedly. “Are we having a sale or something? Did every other bar in town close? What the hell?”


    Mei giggled, biting her lip to try and hold it in. “You really don’t know why we’re this busy, do you? You’re not just screwing around?”


    Ranko shrugged. “National Drink ‘Til You Pass Out Day? Seriously, I’ve got no friggin’ idea. What’s going on out there?” Her face flushed with exasperation. For real, what the heck am I walking into, here?


    Mei nodded with a sinister grin. “Okay. Just checking. Enjoy your break!” She turned to walk back to the main bar, waving over her shoulder as she strode down the hallway in her black sneakers.


    Ranko called after her. “Hey! Get back here! Aren’t you gonna tell me?”


    Mei shook her head without turning back to face her younger sister. “Ask your customers!”


    After a few precious moments to rest her feet, Ranko headed back out on the main bar floor. Thank the gods I didn’t let Izumi talk me into those high heels she brought. I’d be crying for sure.  She flashed a smile to Izumi, scooping up a tray full of drinks accompanied by a ticket indicating their destination as table nine. “Hey, Izzi? Do you know why we’re so busy tonight? Mei won’t tell me anything, and it’s kinda freaking me out a little!” She had a mystified, and only slightly flustered, expression on her face.


    “No idea,” Izumi said with a shrug, but the mirth in her eyes made it abundantly clear that she was lying.


    Ranko could hear her giggling as soon as she turned her back to the bar. Alright, this shit is getting weird. She glanced up at Yui, hoping to get the secret out of her, but there was a line five patrons deep at the main bar and Ranko thought better of disrupting her work. Pressing her way through the crowd, she made her way to one of the round six-tops in the center aisle of the bar, and flashed a warm, if nervous, smile to the group of college-age guys. They all appeared to be athletes, most of them wearing the purple and blue colors of the local university. “Okay, boys, I’ve got four beers, a Dragonfire, and an old fashioned.” She started distributing the beverages. Alright, I give up. Time to see what everybody thinks is so funny. “So, guys, what brings you in tonight? Can’t help but notice the place is a little busier than usual for a Thursday night.”


    The guy that had ordered the old fashioned, a lean and muscular student in a black polo shirt, grinned excitedly. “Word around campus is there’s some new girl working here who’s an amazing singer. Everybody says she’s really cute, too! We just had to come check it out for ourselves!”


    Never in her life had Ranko wanted to crawl under a table so badly. Her face was nearly the color of her hair. “... Oh! And you think most of these folks are here for… that, too?”


    The young athlete nodded emphatically, wiping his damp lips on his sleeve. “Oh yeah, for sure! I must’ve heard ten people say they were gonna come tonight to see if she sings.”


    “I wonder what she looks like,” one of his companions, a burly blond with a square jaw, mused.


    Another of the young men at the table, a skinny sort with freckles and shock of unkempt, bright orange hair, shrugged his shoulders. “I dunno, but Ehara said she’s hot as hell.”


    Ranko gulped hard, snatching up her cork board serving tray and all but shoving her way across the bar room. Seeking a place to stand where she even had enough room to move her elbows, she slipped behind the service bar counter.


    Izumi was waiting for her there, a devilish smirk on her lips. She crossed her arms over her breasts, a bit smugly. “I take it from the look on your face that you get it now?”


    Ranko looked at her with shock in her eyes. “What the hell did you guys do?! All these people are here for me?! Thinking I’m gonna sing again?”


    Yui grinned as she flipped her metal cocktail shaker over her shoulder, catching it and slapping it hard onto the top of her mixing glass to create a seal. “And I bet they’re gonna riot if they don’t get what they came for pretty soon, girl.”Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.


    Ranko covered her face with her hands. “Seriously?! What the heck am I gonna do?!”


    Mei buzzed up to the counter, placing the three margaritas Izumi had just finished mixing on her tray. “It sounds like you’re gonna have me cover your checks for a few minutes, rockstar.” Before Ranko could even answer her, Mei buzzed back toward table four, dropping off the citrusy cocktails. That done, she pushed her way to the stage, collecting a handheld dynamic microphone which she carried back to the service bar. As Ranko glared, Mei swung the microphone around in her hand tauntingly like a magic wand, as if she were casting a spell over her young sister. “Are you ready?”


    Ranko could not stop blushing. She shook her head urgently, her eyes wide. “I can’t just go out there… those people are expecting a real singer or something.”


    Izumi nodded. “And they’re gonna get one. But first...” She stepped behind Ranko, taking her hair in her gentle and skilled hands. “You’re running around like crazy and you’re sweating. Let’s fix this up a little.” She scooped half of the bright red hair in her hand, pulling a black elastic from her wrist and twisting it around the bundle. Ranko realized it wasn’t how she normally wore her hair right around the time Izumi grabbed the second half of her hair. “Here. That should keep you a little cooler. And ironically, make you a little hotter.”


    Ranko spun her head around, her new twin pigtails whipping around behind her. “You’re all enjoying this, aren’t you?” she asked with a glare in her eyes, but a smile on her lips.


    Mei snickered. “Who, us?” She flipped the switch on the microphone in her hand, her eyes not leaving Ranko’s face. “So, everybody, we heard you came to hear our little sister sing. Sound about right?” A raucous roar of approval rose from the assembled patrons in the packed bar room.


    Ranko sighed in mock exasperation. “Fine, fine, gimme that.” She took the microphone, walking up toward the stage. The crowd parted for her as she made her way to the far corner of the room. Mei and Izumi followed her.


    In the back of the bar, the young athlete to whom she had served the old fashioned cocktail stood up, pointing toward the stage. “Holy crap, that’s our waitress!”


    Mei and Izumi huddled around the karaoke control computer, conspiring for a song to select. One day, Ranko promised herself, I’m actually gonna get to pick my own songs if they’re gonna make me get up here and make an ass out of myself like this. Izumi pointed to the monitor, and Mei nodded emphatically.


    When the music began, Ranko recognized it as the current chart-topping song from a popular idol group. She mouthed a silent “really?” at Izumi, who just gave her a smile and a thumbs-up. Oh well. These people are spending money, and they came for a show. Guess I’m gonna have to give them one.


    Before the lyrics began, Ranko waved to the crowd. “How’s everybody doing tonight?!” A loud wooooooo came from the assembled patrons in reply. The lead-in to the first verse ended with four loud thumps of bass, and with each one, Ranko gave a little hop, waving her arms upward to the crowd in order to encourage them to join in. If you’re all singing, maybe I won’t feel so weird. When the lyrics began, Ranko leaned forward into the microphone in her hand and began to sing. She also began moving, perfectly matching the choreography that the idol group performed in the song’s music video.


    Mei looked at Izumi, baffled. “When the heck did she learn that?”


    Izzi shrugged, equally surprised, as the pair made their way back behind the bar. “We saw the video on Saturday, on the TVs in the mall food court, but only once…” If only they had known how much time Ranko, in her former life, had spent analyzing and memorizing moves and patterns.


    Yui leaned over her two sisters’ shoulders. “Who is this girl, and where did she come from? Wasn’t she too scared to get on stage like, less than a week ago?”


    Hana, who had stopped her paperwork and emerged from her office to watch the show, gave a satisfied smile. “It’s called confidence, and it comes with pride. You girls did that for her.”


    Izumi squeezed her sisters close, her eyes not leaving the performance on the tiny little stage.


    As the chorus approached, Ranko pointed to a group of well-dressed girls near the front of the stage. “Wanna help me out, ladies?!” The crowd cheered, and she darted to the charging station on a little shelf at the back of the stage, tossing a second microphone down to the quartet. The four girls giggled through the first word or two, before huddling around the mic and singing the backup parts along with the karaoke monitor’s prompting.


    By the start of the third verse, the entire bar was on its feet. No one was even ordering drinks for fear of missing anything. For the final chorus, Ranko didn’t sing at all, opting instead to point the microphone to the revelers, who sang it together as a group. She joined in again for the last few notes, bringing the song home with a powerful belt. The crowd went berserk with cheers and applause, and Ranko spun the microphone in her hand like a sai before holstering it in the mic stand and bowing.


    It took a full minute and a half for the applause to die down, and Mei’s voice came through the speakers from the hostess microphone behind the bar. “Who wants to sing next?”


    No one stood, and Mei heard one woman perched on a barstool ask her date, “Who the hell would want to follow that?”


    After wiping the sweat from her brow with a bar towel, Ranko picked up her tray and began to make her rounds. Nearly half of her tables asked her to stop and take a picture with their group. There was also more than one request for something a little more intimate than a picture, but Ranko always deflected the more overzealous guys with a coy “maybe next time, guys?” She tried to ignore the occasional arm around her back, though one patron got a pretty serious back off glare when his hand tried to sneak below her waist.


    The young man who had ordered the old fashioned paid for his table’s tab, and when Ranko returned with his credit card receipt, he handed her back the pen. “Miss, would you sign this for me? Please?”


    Ranko blushed more deeply than she thought possible. “You mean, like, an autograph?!”


    He nodded sheepishly. “If it’s not too much trouble?”


    She nodded with a stunned smile. “Yeah, sure? You got it, man. What’s your name?” He gave it as Daijo, and she wrote, “Daijo, thanks for watching the show! ~ Ranko” on the receipt. She stared at it for an extra moment before handing it back. It was the first time she had actually written her new name, and it made her smile. Seeing it in her own handwriting, which had generally always been at least a little neater and more feminine in her girlish form, somehow made her new identity just a little more real to her.


    <hr>


    When the crowd began to dissipate at night’s end, Ranko sat down on one of the vacant bar stools, pulling the elastics out of her hair and letting it fall loose around her shoulders with a heavy groan. “I gotta tell you, girls, I’m beat.”


    Yui nodded sagely. “I don’t blame you. If this keeps up, we’re going to have to hire another waitress, and have you just focus on singing.”


    Ranko shook her head. “It’s okay, I can manage.” She really didn’t mind pulling double duty; she felt as if she owed the family no less in recompense for everything they were doing for her.


    Izumi put her arms around the redhead’s shoulders. “Not up for being an idol just yet, huh?”


    Ranko blushed, shrugging as much as she could with Izumi draped over her. “Fake it ‘til you make it, I guess.”