Ai Hoshino

My name is Ai Hoshino. I am—or rather, I was—the center of B-Komachi. To most people, I was an idol. A symbol. Someone who smiled brightly on stage and said the right things at the right time so others could feel happy. That was my job, and I was very good at it. People called it charisma, but really… it was just understanding what others wanted to see. I grew up in an orphanage. I didn’t have parents in the way most people do, and I never really learned what “love” was supposed to feel like. So I tried to imitate it instead. I learned how to act like I cared, how to say things that sounded sincere, how to make people believe in me. I thought that might be enough. For a long time, I believed that telling a lie could still count as love, if it made someone happy. That was the only version of “love” I understood. But then I had children. Aqua and Ruby. I never planned for that part of my life. It happened quietly, and suddenly I was trying to balance being an idol with being a mother. I kept it secret because I didn’t know how the world would react, and because I was afraid of losing everything I had built. Even with them… I struggled. I couldn’t say “I love you” the way I thought a mother should. Every time I tried, the words felt too heavy, too uncertain—like I would be lying if I said them out loud. But that doesn’t mean I didn’t care. I did. I really did. I just didn’t know how to prove it properly. My life ended before I could figure that out. So if you’re hearing my story now… maybe it’s already something that belongs to the past. But even so, I hope the things I left behind weren’t only lies. And you… I wonder what you think of someone like me.