The glass doors exhale cold air when I shoulder through them, the kind that smells like disinfectant and new paper. It's the kind of chill that doesn't just touch skin but slips under it, settling into the nerves. For a second, it feels almost cleansing, almost like stepping into another world. Then the weight on my hands reminds me what I'm carrying.
I'm still wearing a pajama shirt, washed too many times, the cotton clinging in ways that formal wear never would. The letters across my chest read *No Life is Enough* in stubborn block print, half-faded, but still bold enough to draw attention. The shirt hangs wrong without the blazer I'm supposed to wear over it. The blazer itself is folded inside a garment bag that cuts into my fingers no matter how I hold it. My grip adjusts every few seconds, but the straps keep biting down. Each reminder feels deliberate, like the blazer is scolding me for not putting it on yet.
The tote at my side is heavy with dress shoes. They knock against each other with every step, making a hollow rhythm that belongs in a different place, a different room. The sound makes me stand out, or maybe it only feels that way because I already do.
My hair refuses to cooperate, pointing in three directions at once. I tried, briefly, in the mirror at home, but the strands bent stubbornly back to their own geometry. Every reflective surface I pass in this lobby will remind me.
The air inside hums. Programs shuffle, their pages sounding like restless paper wings. Someone at the far end of the hall rehearses scales, starting strong, dissolving before they reach the octave, dissolving into the ceiling like smoke. A teacher whispers *breathe* to a nervous student, and somehow the word carries farther than a raised voice could. The building itself seems to amplify nerves. Even the fluorescent lights buzz as if their filaments have stage fright.
I aim for the assignment board, but stall halfway there.
Two familiar silhouettes cut into the lobby's flow like rocks in a stream.
Ah yes. These two. How could I forget?
Emi Igawa stands like a metronome, spine aligned as if posture is an instrument she's mastered. She's already dressed for the stage — hair pinned, bow clipped in perfect order, outfit neat to the point of invisibility. The kind of polish rehearsed until it looks like it was never rehearsed. Every detail tells you she belongs here, as much a fixture as the stage itself.
Beside her, Takeshi Aiza wears a white shirt with a flaming skull printed across the front. The skull glares at me, orange and jagged, ridiculous in this place. It's the kind of shirt someone wears when they lose a bet or when they want the world to know they don't care. Except Takeshi *does* care — too much. That contradiction makes the shirt look louder. His sleeves are rolled unevenly, collar crooked, but his posture pushes forward, stride clipped like he's already halfway onto the stage in his mind.
Their voices cut off the instant they notice me.
First, their eyes slide to the words on my shirt. Then, slowly, to my face.
They stiffen. Emi's breath pauses for half a beat, just enough to notice. Takeshi's jaw tightens. Both of them stand like they've seen a ghost that forgot to knock. Maybe I do look like one. My skin pale from weeks of bad sleep. My eyes ringed in circles that won't fade. My shirt more suited for a midnight convenience store than this lobby.
I look them over, noting every small tension — Emi's knuckles whitening around the folder she holds, Takeshi shifting weight between his feet as if ready to pace.
Now I really don't want to deal with either of them.
They don't think I even know them. Why would I, in this version of the story? I've made myself the quiet rumor — the boy who shows up late, leaves first, never joins the group photos, never lingers. Cold. Obedient. Forgettable.
"It's been a long time, hasn't it?" Takeshi says.
The line comes out practiced. I can hear the work in it, the rehearsals he must have run in his head. He's trying to sound casual, as if we're just old friends catching up, but the words bend under the weight of effort.
This time, I don't pretend.
I breathe once. "Long time, Emi. Takeshi."
The words drop between us.
They land harder than I expect. Surprise flares across both faces — bright and unguarded, like someone opened a curtain too quickly. Emi's fingers press into the folder, bending one corner into a small curl. Takeshi's mouth opens a fraction, then closes, caught in the act of forming a response he hasn't planned.
I smile at them — small, deliberate, the kind of smile that can't be mistaken for friendliness. Anything larger would feel like performance, and I'm not here to perform for them. I shift the garment bag higher on my shoulder and keep walking. Their eyes follow me like strings pulled taut, but I don't look back. I can already imagine the questions spilling silently between them, overlapping, clashing, unanswered.
The assignment board waits.
A wall of taped paper sheets sagging from overuse, corners wrinkled, names underlined by too many fingers. Ink blurred by toner running out mid-print, lists pinned over lists. The kind of board that holds everyone's fate in crooked pushpins.
My name. My number. My room. The piece.
Printed where it's always printed, with no ceremony. Names looping back into themselves like circles that can't help but return.
---
Competitor holding is a carpeted room with a *QUIET* sign no one bothers to obey.
It's the sound of nerves being built from spare parts. Mutters, throat-clears, the soft whine of zippers closing and opening again. Instrument cases cough plastic clicks. Pages turn in flurries, then again, then again. A kid rehearses the opening four bars without his instrument, fingers tapping on the cardboard of his score. Another leans into the wall, forehead pressed against paint like he's trying to charge himself with something stored there.
A girl rushes toward the bathroom, hand clamped over her mouth. The door shuts behind her and a moment later the tile answers her stomach.
The rows of chairs line the wall like soldiers waiting to be called. I don't take one. I slide down the baseboard, my back pressed into paint, the tote at my hip, the garment bag propped against my knee. The carpet resists, fibers stiff and stubborn. My head tips back until it touches the wall.
For five seconds, everything goes black — the kind of half-sleep where time stretches. Five seconds begging to turn into twenty. If I let myself fall into it, I'll dream of being late to something I don't want, and then I'll actually be late to something I don't want. Not an upgrade.
The nervous energy of the room swirls around me like fog. It hovers above shoulders, clings to sleeves, trembles in the hands adjusting sheet music. It doesn't touch me. Rivalry, scores, rankings — none of it matters. It never has. Points are for people who need the world to write it down to believe it happened.
I'm only here because I promised. Because last night I decided I wouldn't flunk on purpose. I'll play the way I have to — efficient, cold, perfect. No color I can't afford. No story I don't need. Win by doing the job and wasting nothing.
I almost didn't come. Twice this week, I thought about staying home. Twice, I pictured what would happen if I told her that. Kaori. That's one mention; it's enough.
The door opens. A volunteer calls two numbers. Two kids stand, startled like they didn't expect it to be them. Time slips again. Ten minutes pretend to be twenty. The room keeps rearranging itself around different pulses.
Then — heavy footsteps.
Marching with meaning.
I tilt my head even before I see him. Takeshi's stride — clipped, forward, the sound of someone who doesn't know how to hesitate. He cuts past me without a glance, already halfway into the performance in his mind. He turns the corner and is gone.
His footsteps fade into the hall.
"His turn," I say, too quietly for anyone else to hear. My voice blends into the baseboard.
I stand.
The bathroom is a rectangle of tile, bright and too honest under lemon-scented cleaner. I let the faucet run until the cold water is steady, then rinse my hands. My reflection waits above the basin, refusing to lie for me.
Eyes darker than last month. Mouth a straight line. Hair arguing with itself. I look awful.
I try pressing my hair into a truce with my palms, but the strands spring back, determined to fight. The mirror stares back with the kind of indifference only glass can manage.
The paper towels try to pretend they're fabric. I wipe my hands and listen. Through the wall, faint vibrations reach me — the squeak of a bench leg under weight, the pause of someone settling in. Then music. The first note like paper tearing clean.
Takeshi.
I follow the arrows toward the monitor room.
It's a classroom, desks pushed aside, a flat screen perched on a rolling cart feeding the stage. A woman with a lanyard guards the volume like it's her duty.
A handful of kids cluster in the back, pretending that standing far away makes them connoisseurs. The chairs near the screen are mostly empty, except for one figure who doesn't need to sit to pay attention.
Emi stands near the front. Hands clasped behind her back, hiding the nerves they can't stop from showing. She senses me before she turns, like awareness is another sense she's trained. When her eyes find me, I see the jolt beneath the surface — surprise wrapped tight around calculation. Her gaze flicks to my shirt, back to my face, then to the screen. No words. She doesn't need them.
Takeshi plays.
The camera flattens the piano into a landscape, his body into weather passing across it. His hands move with clean intention, choices executed with a plan. He leans into weight at the edges of phrases, the kind of choice judges reward. He pulls back where softer makes the whole seem larger. He builds the illusion that the music was always destined to go this way and no other.
Beautiful. Predictable. Not insults, unless you're chasing something else.
"He worked hard, you know..." Emi murmurs. Her voice is small but sharp, like a needle through cloth.
"Yeah," I answer. He did.
On screen, he adds a little extra emphasis on a line I've heard him underline since we were children. His profile catches the stage lights — hair outlined silver, a photograph someone would frame. A page turn whispers through the front rows. The air tightens. The last run gathers.
He lands where he always meant to. Clean. Solid.
For a heartbeat, the hall holds still.
Then applause detonates. Hard. Wide. It shakes through the floorboards, climbs the walls. Even here, in this monitor room, the air vibrates. Someone whistles in the back. The lanyard woman silences it with a glare, fingers tight on the volume.
Emi exhales through her nose. A tiny nod. Checking a box only she can see.
On screen, Takeshi bows. Shoulders squared, eyes lifted, soaking in sound earned with precision.
I watch pixels brighten around him, the stage glowing in a frame. Beautiful. Exactly what I expected. Clean lines. Big breaths. No surprises. He wants me to feel it, wants me to see him.
I get the shape. Not the pull.
Around us, kids murmur about tempo, touch, judges' faces. None of it matters. I'm here because I said I would be, because Kaori pushed me through the door, because sometimes showing up is enough.
The applause refuses to end, rolling like a train with no brakes. Emi tilts her head, already rearranging her plan.
Takeshi straightens. Breathes. Bows again.
I feel nothing I didn't choose.
Let them cheer. I've already decided how this ends.