Living For Her. {A Skip Beat! FanFic}

Hopes and Dreams

It was in the way Kanae tensed, Kyoko knew this was her first step towards a past she had tried running from. A past that she had been hiding from the world for so long before she met Kyoko. Kanae had seen her life as something to be ashamed of, something that would only make people look at her with disgust and disdain.

"Are you ok Moko-san?" Kyoko asked quietly as she stepped up beside her best friend.

She could see the way her friend's breath was coming quicker. William Starr had asked all of the girls about their own experiences and of course this had been his starting point for each of these days of giving where they would be filmed handing out the gifts and other items.

This was Kanae's care hostel for the under privileged. This was the place Kanae had gone to as a young child for food, company and to simply play. Standing at the gates of the place that had been like a sanctuary to the young woman she found herself standing on the edge of a knife. Now for some people this may seem silly but for Kanae who had been running and hiding from her past for so long this was a fear.

Not just physically, but emotionally. Kanae was a very proud person. She was now not only an actress of good repute but also a very well known member of the Japanese entertainment industry. What would people think of me? What would this do to all my hard work? Yet this was something she could do... something she could do to make the children have a happier time. A time where they could simply be children, something she had only had in this place...

"Moko-san?" Kyoko asked again when Kanae didn't answer her. She could see the apprehension in her friend's eyes and simply acted on instinc. Taking her best friend's hand she smiled when the lost and confused older woman looked at her.

"Shall we go in?" Kyoko asked.

It was the slight squeezing of her hand at her words that let her know just how scared Kanae was. That slight tightening let Kyoko know just how much she needed Kyoko in that moment. And Kyoko was there. The one who had started this all and given Kanae not only friendship but courage. She had opened the older girl up when she had been ready to accept a lonely life.

A life when only acting mattered, but along the way she had added amazing people to the list of people around herself. Chiori, Maria, Kuon, Lory, Jelly, the Hizuri's and even the man she was now completely in love with Yukihito. It was his hand which came to rest gently on her lower back in not only comfort, but reassurance.

She had not admitted to anyone but Chiori and Kyoko how much this place had meant to her. But she knew she didn't need to put it into words for Yashiro. He just simply seemed to understand, to know that she needed him there in that moment, as did the rest of the named people standing around her as they waited for her to make the first step. The first move into facing her past.

With one last deep breath Kanae took strength from the people around her. The people she called friends. She no longer hated her family. She no longer held the discontent and vexation towards them. she had. She had even called upon them to help her save her best friend's life with their own blood. Yashiro had told Lory just how amazed and emotional Kanae had been upon seeing not just one or two members of her family ready to give up blood and time. Every single one of the older family members had turned up including her father who had hugged his daughter tight.

"OK let's go and see what Mr Starr has planned." And with those words Kanae took her first steps into facing her past, her childhood and her own malcontent. Though she did not relinquish the hold on Kyoko's hand.

"Kotonami-san! It's wonderful to see you."

Kanae again stopped as they approached the lower steps into the traditional wooden building. "Marisa-Sensei?" Kanae asked. This time her body didn't seem so much scared. Rather she was shocked as the elderly woman nodded and smiled at the young actress before her.