To the rest of the world, their relationship probably appeared pretty much unchanged. Japan was a pretty reticent country, anyway, as far as PDAs were concerned, Nick reflected. It wasn't like there were lovers lurking in quiet corners of local parks, or couples holding hands as they walked along the streets. Not that Nick would've wanted anything like that. He spent enough of his life being pawed at by fans, or by the fling of the week or the day. Throw into the mix the fact that Sumire was the way she was, and it made perfect sense that things would appear unaltered between them to the world at large.

Nick, however, enjoyed the secret joy of feeling her slim fingers clasp his in the back of the car as they looked at the early fall foliage out the window on their way to the set. He rubbed her knuckles and saw her little smile in her reflection, and smiled back at her.

Darcie could tell right away, however, based on one photo he sent her from the set the next day, however, which he found astounding. It was one of the first fittings of Sumire one of her kimonos after she agreed to take the part, and Nick wanted Darce to see the beautiful pattern, so when he found out the costumer had taken a picture of Sumire in it, he asked for a copy of the photo so he could forward it to his sister in New York.

It turned out that Nick was in the picture, too. He was handing Sumire a bottle of water and smiling at something she'd said as he passed it to her; Sumire was grasping the other end of the bottle, in the act of taking it from Nick.

"Isn't this the shit?" he sent as the caption.

"Oh god, Nicky, I think 'gorgeous' is the word you're looking for," Darcie wrote back. "And what the hell is up with you and Sumire, hmmmm?? I can feel the heat through my phone!!"

And their driver, Mino-chan, of all people, could apparently see something as well. As he was driving them to the manor house, he kept smiling at them in his rear view mirror, and when Sumire finally asked him why, he told her in Japanese that "Nick-san seemed like he'd make a very nice boyfriend."

The mood on the set was much lighter as soon as Sumire appeared and told everyone she'd take the part. The director, Murakami-sensei, actually hugged her, patted her head, and called her a "good girl" while smiling. After that, she was sent off for her kimono fitting while the papers were being drawn up, and Martin Stabler was sent for so she'd have representation at the signing, which was scheduled for the next day.

"Hey, I was wondering," Nick asked while Sumire stood on a dais, being pinned into yet another kimono. Every kimono would have to be taken in and taken up a good eight inches because she was so much shorter than Minami had been.

"Yeah?" Sumire looked over at Nick without moving so she wouldn't get poked anywhere.

"Right here?" Nick reached over and carefully touched the back of Sumire's neck, which was exposed where the material of the kimono pulled away quite a bit, exposing her back and a circular portion of her shoulders.

Sumire shrugged away with a pretty laugh, drawing a disapproving look from the costumer, who scolded her in Japanese, presumably telling her not to move.

"Nick! That tickles, stop! You got me in trouble!" Sumire hissed.

"Oops, sorry," Nick said contritely, backing up to a safe distance. "Gomen nasai," he added to the costumer with an apologetic bow.

"Anyway," he said, "that spot, where the fabric is pulled away so far in the back? Why? My kimono doesn't do that, it's only the women's."

"Well, in Japan, the back of a woman's neck is considered to be very erotic and sensual," Sumire answered. "You've noticed that women's figures, that their shapes, weren't emphasized in the way they are in western culture, right?" She again flicked her eyes over to Nick without moving. "Western women are built differently, with more of an hourglass thing going on, you know? Long legs, a bigger bust, all that? So that was the ideal of beauty, that's what was idealized by the clothing, with cinched in waists, tops that hugged the bustline, accentuated cleavage and stuff?

"We Asian women don't have a lot of cleavage and all that, so kimonos don't emphasize that shape. Obis, these pretty sashes, just show that we have flat stomachs, see? And the kimonos force us to take small steps. And the openings at the back show off our hairlines and necks, and our very feminine shoulders and backs."

Nick had been leaning closer and closer, looking at Sumire's pretty neck and shoulders, nodding. Wow, she was right.

He caught himself at the last minute, right before he fell on top her.

"Whoa! Shit, so sorry," he said, backing up once more. How, how had he never noticed how gorgeous the back of a woman's neck was?

Jesus.

Now he could see a bit of pink creeping up Sumire's very cute neck, up to the base of her ears. He'd made her blush.

Aww.

Just then, the door to the costume tent opened, letting in a bit of fresh air along with Sachiko Burns. She was wearing a denim minidress and leather boots that accentuated her long legs. She was a living anachronism in the costume tent full of period costumes.

What was she doing here, anyway? Nick thought she was working with the main part of the shoot, over in the more mountainous part of Shikoku, doing something clerical, since she wasn't needed to translate.

She walked over to where Nick and Sumire were, moving quickly on her long legs, like a predator stalking.

"So it's true? You're actually in the movie now?" She was talking before she'd finished walking, her voice louder than usual to carry across the empty space.

"Yeah, she's really helping us out of a jam." Nick stepped between Sachiko and Sumire, smoothly intercepting her with his body and his words. "We got so fucking lucky that she was right here, on the spot, able to take the part with just some costume readjustments, you know?" He smiled at Sachiko, though there was a warning in his eyes. Sumire remained where she was, unmoving.

"I'd say she's the one who got lucky," Sachiko retorted. "This doesn't just happen, you know? I mean, no one just shows up on a movie set of a major motion picture as an interpreter and gets a top ten billing part dropped in their lap, it just doesn't happen! Especially after principal shooting has begun? I mean, come on!" Sachiko was practically spitting by this point, and the Japanese people in the tent were looking over at her, even the costumers, who had mouths full of pins and pencils.

"Sometimes it just works out that way," Nick said with a casual shrug, though he didn't move from in front of Sachiko. "I mean, look at Viggo Mortensen in the Lord of the Rings movies? He got the Aragorn part when they were four days into the actual shooting, you know? They'd started principal in New Zealand with Stuart Townsend in the part when the director, Peter Jackson, decided they needed someone older and called Viggo. He actually read the book and the script on a plane to Auckland, for fuck's sake!" Nick took a step back, toward Sumire, and continued. "This was a little different, because Minami got pregnant with twins, which I don't think she planned, but she's super happy about it, and no one holds that against her, right?

"It's just serendipitous that the person hired to help me was the right ethnicity, and speaks both languages, and is the right gender, and can act. I mean, who could've planned this? And who else could've done this?"

Sachiko took a step closer as well. "Me. I could've done all those things, as well. And I was supposed to be your interpreter, Nick. But I missed my ferry, and that made me ten minutes late arriving, and by then she'd snaked my reservation right out from under me, and the rest, as they say, is history, isn't it?" She stepped to the side so she had an unobstructed view of Sumire in her pretty kimono and crossed her arms, staring in undisguised jealousy.

Nick looked at her. "But you're not half Caucasian, are you? I mean, it's a small point, but an important one, isn't it?"

"I'm one quarter Irish," she answered without looking away from Sumire. "I know it's not much, and it doesn't really show, but with the right make up, you'd be surprised. My face is very versatile, and my western features can be played up or down, I'm very chameleon-like."

She very deliberately walked around Nick so she could stand directly in front of Sumire, who hadn't moved since Sachiko's dramatic entrance a few minutes before, and Nick, though concerned, was fairly sure that even Sachiko wouldn't risk damage to the valuable kimono by physically assaulting the far smaller Sumire in a fit of temper.

"You stole my big break, you sneaky little cunt," she nearly hissed at the motionless Sumire, eyes narrowed nearly to slits in her anger. "Do you even know how long I've been waiting for this? How long I've worked? The number of horrible jobs I've worked, the number of talentless dicks I've sucked, just to get here, and then you come along and just take it? You never even studied acting! You think I didn't check you out? No one's heard of you. You're not even--"

"Oh my god." Sumire's quiet voice was somehow strong. "Look. I didn't ask for this, or try for it, or anything. And I certainly didn't suck anyone's dick, you're right about that. If they'll give you the part, take it. I don't want Nick's movie to get stalled, that's all."

Nick was at Sumire's side in two strides. "Hold on, hold on a sec, you two." He turned to Sachiko, who was standing like an unexploded stick of dynamite. "This isn't something the two of you can just stand here and decide, you must know that, right?"

He turned to Sumire. "You were tapped for this because you're the right person, Mimi-chan, make no mistake. If she--" and he paused and gestured in Sachiko's general direction, "--wants to talk to people and try to change someone's mind, that's her prerogative, but it's got nothing to do with you."

He turned to Sachiko. "You need to get out of here now, Ms. Burns, we have a busy afternoon ahead of us, and you're just slowing us down. I believe Murakami-sensei is around here somewhere if you want to talk to him, but please, leave us alone, okay? In fact--" he looked around. "Shin-san? Please show her out? Yes, out." He gestured to make sure he was clear. "Domo."

As Sachiko was leaving with the hulking Shin-san, Taka-chan, a local teenager who'd been hired as a gofer slash assistant, spoke to her in heavily accented but perfectly understandable English.

He said, "Big, big difference between you and Sumire-san. First difference, she very pretty. Very pretty. Second difference, she very, very nice."

He turned and smiled at Sumire, taking off his Yomiuri Giants baseball cap as he did so.

Sumire was deeply embarrassed, but couldn't help but smile back. The costumer just finished with her notations and and pins, and took the kimono off, so Nick took Sumire's hand and helped her down off the dais.

Sachiko looked back at Taka-chan, Nick and Sumire, their joined hands, and back at Sumire with something close to real hatred in her eyes.