The Art of Undressing

Kaito had one rule in life now: Never trust a velvet couch.

Especially not one that had mysteriously reappeared in the middle of Studio Undress, looking smug and freshly Febreezed. It had been in storage ever since The Incident™—where a model attempted a reclining pose and accidentally discovered its true purpose as a slippery trap of sensual chaos.

Haruka was the first to notice it that morning. She walked in, saw the couch, and immediately narrowed her eyes. "Who brought back the Lust Throne?"

Kaito flinched. "It's not a throne. It's furniture. Practical, tasteful furniture."

Yuuto poked it cautiously, like it might hiss. "It smells like regret."

Rei didn't speak. She just stared at the couch with the same intensity she usually reserved for dissecting her own psychological darkness. Then she drew it. And then set the sketch on fire.

It was going to be one of those days.

The schedule was packed. Ever since the article aired—"Tokyo's Strangest Therapy: Naked, Honest, and Uncensored"—the studio had been flooded with inquiries. One woman offered to pose nude with her iguana. A man in his seventies insisted he only modeled lying down "because of jazz-related injuries." Someone mailed them a dreamcatcher and a note that simply read "I am ready."

But the biggest surprise came at 11:04 AM, when Kenji burst through the door like a caffeinated flamingo in mesh.

"Kaito!" he cried, throwing his scarf dramatically (it landed on Yuuto's head). "I'm back!"

Yuuto, muffled: "We didn't know you left."

Kenji struck a pose on the velvet couch, which instantly made everyone uncomfortable. "My channel, Butt & Beyond, just hit fifty thousand subscribers. They demand... a collab."

Kaito groaned. "A collab?"

"Yes! A live stream. Tonight. From here. I brought a fog machine."

"Why would—?"

"And a backup fog machine."

Haruka clapped her hands like a child promised violence. "I love this."

Kaito didn't. But the fog machines were already being plugged in.

By 7 PM, the studio was transformed. The velvet couch glistened under soft LED lighting. Haruka had taped a sign above it that read THE THIRST THRONE. Rei glared at the sign, then at Haruka. Haruka winked.

Kenji stood front and center, clad in gold lamé shorts, cradling a banana like a microphone. "Welcome, dear viewers, to Art & Arse, the collaboration you never asked for but deeply deserve."

Kaito was going to need aspirin. And possibly therapy. Or an exorcism.

Haruka posed dramatically on the couch, one leg draped over the armrest, a fake sword in hand. "This one's name is Brenda Too," she said. "Because the original Brenda is in sword rehab."

Yuuto, working from a wobbly easel, whispered, "This doesn't feel like art anymore."

Rei replied, "It never did."

Still, the livestream audience was loving it. The comments flew fast:

Is that couch single? Asking for a friend.

Sword girl can step on me.

This is the most honest thing I've seen all year.

Kaito found himself behind the camera, accidentally becoming the director of a surreal, barely-legal fever dream that was somehow... healing?

As the session continued, something strange happened.

Yuuto's hand steadied. His sketches stopped trembling.

Rei began drawing with her left hand, experimenting, freeing herself from perfection.

Haruka laughed—really laughed—and it didn't sound like deflection. It sounded genuine.

And Kenji?

He paused mid-banana monologue and said, softly: "Y'know, I used to hate my body. But here? I feel like it's... a poem."

There was silence.

Then Haruka whispered, "A weird poem. But yeah."

Kaito blinked, overcome. Again.

Damn it. This wasn't just chaos. This was healing, disguised as performance art, hidden in glitter and banana metaphors.

After the stream ended and the fog machines wheezed their last dramatic puffs, the group gathered in the soft, smoky aftermath.

They were sweaty, a little broken, a little beautiful.

Haruka flopped on the couch. "I'm keeping this thing."

"You'll regret it," Rei muttered, sketching it anyway.

Kaito sat beside them, exhausted. "We just went viral for accidental emotional nudity. Again."

Yuuto passed him a juice box. "You okay?"

Kaito sipped. Thought. Then nodded.

"Yeah," he said. "I think I am."

Because in this mess—this glittery, half-naked mess—he'd found something real. Something he never found in the fashion world, in sleek runways or critic-filled galleries.

He found people.

Beautiful, complicated, emotionally unstable people who weren't afraid to undress their fears alongside their clothes.

Maybe that's what art was, in the end.

Not perfection.

But permission.

That night, alone in the studio, Kaito looked at the couch one last time. It was slightly smoking. Possibly haunted. Definitely sticky.

But it also held laughter, tears, healing. Secrets.

And maybe... the future.

He pulled a sheet over it, sighed, and turned off the lights.

Behind him, someone had written in charcoal on the wall:

Hope lives here. Also swords.

He smiled.

Fair enough.

End of Chapter 18.