Episode 1 – A girl who was told she was a ‘failure to nurture’
Source
https://kakuyomu.jp/works/16818093093152263860/episodes/16818093094350221549
I, Kuga Ryo, was frozen in front of the TV.
There is a ridiculously cute girl on TV. Clear eyes, well-defined face, mature expression. She is still small, but has an overwhelming aura that attracts all who see her.
Her name is Asahina Touka–a prodigy girl who is very active as a child actress. At the time, I was fascinated by this child prodigy, muttering “Touka-chan, wow ……” every week. I was impressed even as a kid, saying, “This girl is amazing …… even though she’s the same age as me.”
I never thought that a few years later, that girl would be lying face down on the desk next to me!
“Soooo …… soooo ……”
“No, don’t fall asleep! It’s not even morning homeroom yet!”
“Hmm?”
The girl sitting next to me was rubbing her eyes listlessly – Asahina Touka.
The eyes are sleepy, black hair is shaggy, the uniform tie is loose and the skirt is shabby. She looks up at me with a lazy look on her cheek. I rubbed my eyes over and over again to make sure.
“You’re that beautiful child prodigy, Asahina Touka, the one they said was the best child actress in Japan, right?”
“Probably.”
“No, it’s not a probably!”
Asahina made a tired face and returned to her previous position. No matter how I looked at her, I couldn’t feel even a millimeter of the aura she had back then.
No, I’d heard rumors about it,…….
When I was going into junior high school, I think it was around the time I was going to be a junior high school student. I saw her on the internet, but she was not exposed in the entertainment world.
I saw on the Internet that child actors in the entertainment industry dare to make a period of time when they do not appear in the media. Apparently, this is because the growth of puberty sometimes destroys the image they had as child actors.
However, a favorite weekly magazine tries to follow the growth process of the child actor. Maybe it was a quote from such an article. I found a summary of it on the Internet.
[Sad news] Former prodigy beautiful girl child actor, Asahina Touka, failed in her upbringing.
It was a very malicious image. Her eyes were half open and she was in a dumb pose with her hands outstretched. She had probably just tripped on the road.
Because it is a photograph, it can look like this depending on the scene to be cropped out. I know in my head that she is ……, but as a fan who was fascinated by her, I was surely shocked in no small way.
That’s how overwhelming she was to me, or rather, to our generation.
“That’s Asahina Touka, isn’t it?”
“Isn’t it bad? Her hair is so shaggy.”
“Hasn’t she gained weight? She used to be so thin.”
“Did she have such a round face?”
And now, even my classmates are saying that to me. I understand why they want to say that. because it’s just too different from the image she had in the past.
“……, why don’t you get a grip on yourself? You’ve been sleeping ever since you entered school.”
“Soooo …… soooo ……”
“You enjoy sleeping twice at school?!”
Asahina Touka, a former nationally popular child actress. However you look at it, her upbringing was a failure.
◇
“Haa….”
On the way home from school, I remember my classmates, who now look like dried-up animals.
Why, why am I frustrated?
I think celebrities are a mysterious existence that should be far away from us, yet somehow feels close to us. It is even more so when they are the same age as you, and even more so when you have been watching them since you were a child.
I had always supported her, and I thought she would continue to be active for a long time to come. ……
–everyone thought that Asahina Touka would have a bright future ahead of her.
As I was walking along thinking about this, I saw the person I was just now thinking about. Asahina Touka was sitting on the concrete by the river, sitting on her knees.
“What is that girl doing? ……”
It’s hard to tell from a distance, but Asahina is looking at a photo of something. She crumples it up with a rock and throws it into the river. Ripples form in the water where it was thrown. Asahina is gazing at the ripples with a faraway look in her eyes. She has a fragile and somewhat dangerous vibe. A little scary.
I’m starting to get worried.
“What’s wrong?”
Unable to bear it any longer, I called out to Asahina Touka.
“…… is it Kaga-kun from the same class?”
“Kuga! I’m Kuga Ryo! It’s been a week since we started school, at least remember the name of the guy sitting next to you!”
“Hmmm… ……”
Without looking me in the eye, Asahina threw another pebble into the river.
“Is that fun?”
“It’s not fun.”
I’m able to talk to Asahina Touka more normally than I thought I would. I thought I’d be more nervous since she’s someone I look up to.
“There’s something I want to ask you.”
“Hmm?”
I tried throwing a stone into the river, imitating Asahina. Maybe it was because she felt closer to me than I thought, or maybe it was because she had become a listless high school girl, but I found myself rudely asking such a question.
“…… Asahina, don’t you feel anything when someone you don’t know calls you a ‘failure to nurture’?”
“…..”
Asahina’s hand stopped.
“….What is it suddenly?”
“I’m sorry, I was a big fan of yours. I’ve always thought you were an amazing girl even though we’re the same age as each other since I was a kid.”
“…..”
Asahina narrowed her eyes and watched the ripples caused by the stone I had thrown in. It was so quiet that you could hear the sound of flowing water.
“…Of course it’s frustrating. But, it can’t be helped, since that’s what happened”
Asahina told me this with a lonely look on her face.
“No one expects anything from me anymore. No one is even paying attention to me anymore. So, I’ve just stopped expecting anything from myself.”
Asahina said something I hadn’t expected.
“Well, it’s about me anyway….”
And then she mumbled those words as if self-harming.
I was shocked. The girl I thought was in a glittering, glamorous world was hurt by those words in a normal way. I regretted from the bottom of my heart that I had unknowingly uttered those words.
-That’s why, I realized, so I said something like this to her.
“That’s not true! I know that Asahina Touka was awesome!”
“Eh?”
“So don’t tell me you don’t have any expectations! I don’t think of Asahina like that!”
“….. but you’re right, I’ve been called a ‘failure to nurture’.”
A nurturing failure is when a child actor does not grow up to everyone’s expectations. The term is used when a child actor’s appearance and attractiveness changes as he or she grows and no longer matches the expected visuals and impression.
If that’s……!
“If you’ve been called a failure, I’ll redevelop you! I’ll make Asahina Touka regain her old ……SSR radiance!”
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