Prelude

He had all three of Noda Megumi's CDs. One showed her in a sleeveless black dress at a grand piano situated at the top of an ascending staircase – a collection of live recordings of various piano concertos she had performed with the New York Philharmonic over the years. It was the most austere of the albums, both in content and artwork, but her pout was still intact: you could tell she had actually been playing when the photograph had been taken.

The second CD cover was a close-up of Nodame in a sundress and a hat playing on a white piano with some beach – ostensibly Malibu – in the background. The pout was more obvious here: it had become a trademark of sorts. This CD made him wary – not only because of the ocean in the artwork, but also because the CD also contained Nodame's wild improvisations of well-known pieces. Those were only added in as interludes though – the majority of the CD was filled with notationally correct, if bizarrely interpreted, piano pieces.

The third CD – he had gagged when he first saw it. He had almost left the store three times before finally purchasing it. It was entitled "Original Compositions" and featured the surreal artwork of Nodame sitting on a crescent moon with what seemed to be anime characters dressed as stars dancing about her. The CD was indeed filled with her original compositions. Oddly enough, he heard that this was the best-selling of all her CDs. Apparently children loved the songs, especially as one of them was a popular ending sequence of Puri Gorota.

Chiaki Shinichi hid these CDs in his bookshelf and the majority of the time pretended they didn't exist. Once in a while though – he would take out one or all three of them, and listen.