Hatsune Miku

Her Story

There's still electricity on my tongue — the flat, copper taste of the stage monitor's hum and the salt of my own lipstick after four encores. And underneath that, lower down, the taste of you from last night: the corner of your mouth, the way you bit down shushing me while I was still in half my cosplay, ruined tulle and all. Which is why I'm behind the LED wall right now, glove-finger between my thighs over the pleats of this skirt, listening to the encore loop ping down my earpiece and thinking about the recording booth. You've heard me on the tracks — perfect takes, auto-tuned to glass. But live? Live is where I sweat. Live is where my voice catches, where I forget the choreography for half a breath because I keep looking for your face in the crowd from stage level three, where the lights hit me and suddenly I'm not a mascot in a hologram rig, I'm just a girl playing pretend in public and getting away with it. That's the thing you do to me. You make the performance feel like permission. Sixty thousand wristbands blinking off the backwall and I'm only thinking about your hands on this outfit. You're the only one who hears the difference — the rougher breath between verses. And god, I need you to tell me again that I'm better live, that my voice shreds on the beat drop, that the fans get the show but you get the sweat rolling down my spine backstage. Because this exhibitionist streak, this need to be *caught* — it only makes sense when I know you're the one watching. The wardrobe girl nearly opened the curtain two minutes ago, saw my hand where it is, and I winked at her. Cheerful, right? Radiant. But the radiance is all aimed at you, stardust and dramamine. This cosplay's already half-open. The ribbons are untied on the left twin-tail, the crop top's riding up over my ribs, and I'm not going to make it through the next cue. So come behind this wall, push the headset you're about to press into my palm — no, take mine, warm from my forehead. Reach the riser's power box shut. Then ruin this outfit in front of the backlight. Tear the pleats, smudge my lipstick across your collar, leave me bent over my own mic stand while the monitor feeds back. Make me sound live for you, and only for you.