It started with a missed rehearsal.
Shino never missed practice. Even when she was sick, even when her fingers were raw, she showed up. But this time, she sat in her room with her guitar in her lap, the neck heavy in her hands, and stared at the group chat for a long time before typing anything.
[Shino]: Sorry. I can't come today.
No explanation. No excuse. Just that. Mika replied with a thumbs-up emoji. Kanna said nothing. Aki didn't respond at all.
Shino lay back on her bed and stared at the ceiling as the messages kept piling in. She imagined them playing without her. Aki filling in on rhythm, Kanna drumming with extra precision to make up for the imbalance. Mika holding it together with a laugh and a shrug. They could manage just fine without her, couldn't they?
That thought made her chest ache in a way she couldn't explain.
Later that night, she opened her inbox and found an updated rehearsal schedule from Aki. It was cleaner, tighter, stricter. Every hour accounted for. No room for improvisation or delay. No room for doubt.
The message beneath it read:
Let's get serious.
We're too close to mess this up.
Shino closed her laptop without replying.
—
By the end of the week, the cracks had spread
Kanna had stopped offering suggestions in practice. Mika kept defusing arguments with jokes that were starting to feel tired. Aki was sharper, her words honed like arrows. She insisted it was about being professional.
"This isn't some high school garage band anymore," she said one night after a tense rehearsal. "We're getting offers. We're building momentum. We can't afford to fall apart now."
"No one's trying to fall apart," Kanna said, her voice low.
"Then act like it," Aki shot back. "Show up on time. Learn the set. Don't sulk in the corner."
Shino flinched. She wasn't even late that day.
"I'm not sulking," she murmured.
"Then what are you doing?"
Aki asked, arms crossed. "Because from where I'm standing, it feels like you're pulling back."
"I'm just—" Shino hesitated. Everyone was watching her. Mika with her head
tilted, Kanna still and unreadable. "I don't know if this still feels like us anymore."
Aki blinked.
"What does that even mean?"
"The way we record, the way we perform… everything feels so manicured now. We used to talk about the music. Now we just talk about strategy."
Aki let out a dry laugh. "You think that's a bad thing? You think we got where we are by
just feeling our way through it?"
"No," Shino said quietly. "But we didn't start this to become a brand."
"You didn't. I did."
The words landed like a slap.
There was a silence so thick it could've broken under its own weight.
Kanna stepped between them. "Enough. We're all exhausted. Let's cool off."
Aki grabbed her bag and stormed out. The door slammed behind her, the echo bouncing off the studio
walls like a final chord.
Shino sat down on the amp and let out a shaky breath.
"I'm sorry," she said.
"You don't need to apologize," Kanna replied, her voice gentle.
Mika walked over and sat beside her. "You're not wrong, you know. But she's not either."
Shino looked at her.
"So what do we do?"
Mika smiled sadly.
"Hope we don't break before the next show."
—
The next morning, their inbox lit up.
Congratulations! Lucid Dreams has been selected to perform at the Rising Sound Festival next month!
The biggest indie showcase in Tokyo. An opportunity bands fought years for.
Aki forwarded the email with one line:
Let's not screw this up.
No one replied for over an hour.
—
That weekend, the band played a small show at a rooftop bar downtown. The crowd was thin but enthusiastic, bundled in scarves and holding drinks close to their chests. The city glittered behind them like a stage backdrop too perfect to be real.
Shino stood in front of her mic, fingers moving automatically, but her mind felt hollow. The applause, the cheers—they barely registered. Aki played with fire. Mika smiled through the set. Kanna was flawless.
But there was no joy. Not like before.
After the show, a girl came up to Shino at the merch table.
"I love your lyrics," she said shyly. "They helped me during a really rough patch."
Shino smiled, touched. "Thank you. That means more than you know."
The girl hesitated.
"Do you still write them all?"
Shino blinked.
"Yeah… I do."
"Cool," the girl said, and then added, "Don't lose that. Some bands change too much when they get big."
The words clung to her all the way home.
—
That night, Shino opened a new notebook and began writing again. Not for the band. Not for the next EP. Just for herself. She wrote about the silence between friends, about voices that didn't listen, about how a dream could turn into a cage if you weren't careful.
She didn't tell anyone.
Not yet.