Kiri's brother in law's mother passed away that night. He called and informed them in the morning, and told Kiri that they'd be home the day after.

Kiri was able to pick his nephews up that afternoon, and began the arrangements for them all to be released from school on Friday.

Hikaru had a job, so she was not too surprised to see them tucked in and asleep on the futons when she made it home. She was surprised to see Chisaki sleeping on the couch again.

At breakfast she learned that Chisaki had indeed been grounded again, and that her mother had threatened to take away her allowance if she didn't return to Kiri's and behave.

Chisaki glared at her and said spitefully, "Don't look at me like that, like you've never been grounded or had your allowance withdrawn."

Hikaru thought about it for a moment, then replied bluntly, "I've never had an allowance, though my mother has bought me things sometimes, and I don't believe I've ever been grounded, though I did have to deal with a curfew after she remarried."

Chisaki and Mizuki stared at her with disbelief.

Hikaru shrugged.

Chisaki exclaimed, "You may not have an allowance, but you're letting my uncle pay for things!"

Hikaru blushed and Kiri leaned in and interrupted his niece firmly, "Stop there. I already have enough trouble getting Hikaru to let me buy her anything. I don't need you adding more difficulties."

Chisaki stared at her uncle in disbelief and then turned to Hikaru and declared, "If you're marrying a rich older man, you really need to change how you do things and take some advantage of it!"

Hikaru shrugged and replied uncomfortably, "I don't need to take advantage of Kiri."

Chisaki argued with her, and Kiri laughed and told his niece, "If you can persuade her to buy more dresses, I won't mind."

Chisaki gasped and asked Hikaru disbelievingly, "You don't own any dresses?"

Hikaru replied firmly, "I own two, and they are both very nice, I don't need any more right now."

Kiri laughed as his niece spluttered.

--

Thursday night their parents collected them. His sister thanked him and then hesitantly turned to Hikaru. "I spoke with my mother about you," she began.

Hikaru looked back at her in surprise, and fiddled nervously with her tea cup. Kiri frowned at his sister and slid his arm around Hikaru's waist.

Kiri's sister continued reluctantly, "She said she approves of you."

Hikaru blushed and replied quickly, "I like her too."

His sister frowned and told her, "I'm sorry I slapped you when I met you. Thanks for helping take care of my children. Please come have dinner with us sometime after the memorial and everything is over. My husband and I would like to meet my little brother's fiancé properly."

Kiri grinned at his sister and his brother in law leaned over and said, "Please do, though I doubt dinner with the six of us is going to feel very proper and formal. Thanks Kiri-kun and Hikaru-chan, we'll take these brats off your hands now."

Hikaru mumbled, "I didn't mind that much."

They said their goodbyes, and Hikaru smiled and ruffled Yue-kun's hair when he hugged her and said, "See you later oba-chan."

--

After they left Kiri said, "Sometime I need to introduce you to my eldest sister and my other sister too."

Hikaru sighed and replied, "I suppose so."

Kiri kissed her and asked, "You don't want to?"

She hugged him and thought about how to reply for a moment. "In general, I do want to Kiri. But your family is kind of overwhelming. I never really thought that my family was small before I met you, I just thought that Risa's family was enormous."

Kiri smiled wryly and replied, "Sorry."

She leaned in and kissed him, then said seriously, "I'll get used to it eventually."

He teased quietly, "We'll add to it later."

She blushed.

--

Friday while Kiri's family was attending the memorial, Mirage was filming the second to last video scheduled to be released before Hikaru graduated. Ryuske was a little worried about it, because Inline had asked to produce this one.

When Hikaru asked why they were going along with it, Rin said, "Hatsuharu and I both think it'll be pretty cool. A couple of fairly famous actors apparently requested to work with us as soon as Inline started letting people know there would be another two videos. That's a really lucky chance, and Ryske said that if we were both in favor there was no point in putting it to an official vote. Should we have?"

Hikaru shook her head and followed Takeda and Ryuske into the hotel. She did look around and say thoughtfully, "It never occurred to me how many videos might have been taken in hotel rooms."

Takeda laughed and called back, "About as many are filmed in quickly rented apartments."

--

The film crew was set up in a suite, and they were given scripts and a tense middle aged woman explained the stage cues that would be used to the members of Mirage.

Hikaru listened but looked around at everything with interest. The woman snapped, "Young man, you'll cost us money if you're not paying attention."

Hikaru looked back curiously to see who she was talking to, to find her staring at Hikaru. She blinked in surprise and Takeda walked over and said calmly, "Haru-san, maybe you should take a moment to go over the information I gave you on the people you're working with today, and I'll have a word with the group."

Haru glared at Takeda and said stiffly, "Fine." She walked into the next room and Takeda looked at Hikaru who promptly spoke.

"I don't mind, I'm used to it," Hikaru told him reassuringly.

His lips quirked and he replied, "She's not wrong, the longer this takes, the more it will cost Mirage. And what will you do if you don't realize what an instruction means?"

Hikaru frowned and looked at Ryuske, Rin and Hatsuharu. She asked worriedly, "Even though Inline asked to do this we are still paying for it directly?"

Ryuske nodded and replied, "Yes, some of it. Because of the way our contract is written. Don't worry about it."

Takeda said dryly, "That's not exactly the point I was going for."

Hikaru looked back at him and said calmly, "If the instructions she listed so far are all, it's fine. They are the same ones we used in my drama class first year."

Everyone regarded her with surprise and she said a little defensively, "Kao-ji-chan said it would be a good idea to take it if I planned to play on stage someday, because all kinds of stages can hold musicians."

Ryuske reached over and patted her shoulder, and said, "It was a good idea. Did you learn any shortcuts for remembering it all for the rest of us? I know some from doing videos and choreography with Edge."

Hatsuharu volunteered, "I learned some helping my kids with their plays in school."

It turned out that Rin was the only one of them with zero experience with stage terms. He shrugged and said, "I've done a few photo shoots and videos, but I was always just in the background, when someone told me 'stand here', I stood there."

Hikaru shrugged and told him, "I don't know any shortcuts, sorry."

Takeda fetched Haru back to continue instructing them.

--

When they met the two famous actors who had volunteered to work on Mirage's video, Hikaru worried that maybe this had been a terrible idea after all.

She wondered why Keito Kirari had decided to do Mirage's video until Keito bounced over to her directly after the introductions had been completed, and said smugly, "When I saw that your group needed someone small and beautiful to work on your video, I knew that I'd be perfect for it, so I asked Emri-san to get me assigned!" And she whispered, "And my new manager says that if I'm seen getting along well with you it will quell the rest of the rumors at Inline, so you had better start acting like you're really happy I'm here!" She gave Hikaru a radiant smile.

Hikaru tried not to grimace, and said, "Oh, cool?"

--

When Hikaru was shut in the wardrobe in the suite's largest bedroom with Keito, she tried to think on the bright side. At least she didn't have to worry about missing a cue, because Keito was determinedly, though quietly, repeating their instructions as if she was certain Hikaru would forget if she were left in silence for a moment.

At the first cue, Keito slipped out of the wardrobe and Hikaru watched her practically float to the bed where the handsome actor, Shinichiro, tossed and turned. Hikaru granted that Keito was very graceful.

At the second cue, the actors froze, and Hikaru stepped out of the wardrobe playing the line, "I was frozen in time until I found you."

Rin stepped out of the bathroom at the next cue, and played the next bit.

The bedroom scene was finished successfully.

--

Everything ground to a halt when they reached the scene in the bathroom. It wasn't even Mirage's fault, though Ryuske had taken his spot balanced behind the shower curtain with prayers against slipping and breaking something.

The two actors had a terrible row with their director who kept insisting that neither of them looked passionate about the embrace that went with the line, "Sometimes I want to wrap my arms around you and just hold you in one place."

After listening to them go back and forth for awhile Ryuske stepped out of the shower and snapped, "That's enough!"

The startled crew all stared at him. "I wrote this song," he said, "and I'll decide what their expressions should be."

Everyone outside of Mirage, except the actor Shinichiro argued with him. Finally, he turned to Hikaru and said, "Please, I don't care how, just make it work. Take Keito-san out and convince her she needs to keep a cool calm expression.

Hikaru stared at him with open mouthed surprise while he turned to Takeda and said, "We are having to pay for this mess, so if you can't convince him to cooperate, fire this director and bring in Seoshi." He moved on to Shinichiro and said, "That guy isn't entirely wrong, you do need to look more passionate, but also more desperate. While everyone else sorts out the rest, I'll go over it with you."

Keito grabbed Hikaru's arm and dragged her out of the room. In the hall she turned to Hikaru and whispered triumphantly, "This is perfect, you can take me on a date and convince me to cooperate!"

Hikaru replied with alarm, "I'm not sure that's a good plan."

Keito ignored her and dragged her to the elevators.

Hikaru figured the elevator was probably as private as it was going to get at this rate and stepped in first.

As they descended she turned to Keito and asked seriously, "You do know I'm not a guy right? I mean, it would definitely change the rumors about you if I really took you on a date."

Keito stared at her. After a moment she said as though Hikaru were rambling on about nothing, "Of course. We're going shopping."

Nervously Hikaru replied, "Mirage is paying for all this, I don't want to take very long."

Keito turned and told her with exasperation, "You're supposed to be convincing me, that will take at least an hour. I won't be convinced in anything less, it will give people ideas!"

Hikaru rolled her eyes and went shopping with Keito Kirari.

--

When they returned, everyone was waiting patiently to all appearances. The director hadn't been replaced, but he was wearing that bland face that she'd seen Kiri and Takeda use sometimes.

The next take went well, and they proceeded to the final shots. Everything proceeded smoothly, only a few shots had to be repeated.

When they all exited the hotel, a reporter approached Hikaru, and since she was somehow expecting a question about Keito-san, she was frozen with shock when the man asked, "Hitoshi-san are you planning to follow in Akira's musical footsteps?"