jam practice
Usually Hina was the one who laid on the roof of their house in the middle of the night.
Sayo kept her phone at arm's length, one finger constantly refreshing her conversation with her sister.
Nothing.
She didn't know why she had it in the back of her mind that anything else would happen. Hina was in the middle of a deserted forest with that pint-sized, loud-mouthed pile of nonsense star-gazing. For all she knew, there was a good chance that her younger twin was either in jail or battling the yakuza right now. Out of all the friends Hina had made, the Hello, Happy World leader was probably the one that annoyed Sayo the most.
And they were together all. weekend.
And Hina had barely messaged her since she left yesterday.
It's probably the bad signal, Sayo-ch~an~
"Oh, shut up!" Sayo snapped out loud before blushing. She really hated when the logical side of her mind tried to act cute. Cute wasn't going to get them more album sales. Cute wasn't going to get them the fans they needed. Roselia had a stern image to uphold, and she couldn't break that by getting flustered from within herself.
Sighing, she rested her head and shut her eyes for a minute, ignoring the vibration that was coming from her cross-band group chat. Since Roselia was the only band fully intact for the weekend, she had wanted to get in a little extra practice to stay ahead of the competition, but her intentions fell through. Yukina was surprisingly sick, despite sounding perfectly fine, Lisa was ignoring all of her texts (which, Sayo thought with a hint of aggravation, she was pretty sure had a strong connection to Yukina's illness), and Ako and Rinko had prescheduled a weekend video game marathon with a couple of Afterglow's members.
A full commitment to the band was hard to keep sometimes.
Instead, she sent messages in the cross-band group chat, asking around if anyone was interested in some jam sessions, praying that no one in Hello, Happy World actually knew how to use a phone. In fact, if she saw that big, fleeting giant, Kaoru, anywhere within a kilometer of her property, she'd be highly tempted to call the police. She needed a few competent people to play with…she'd even take slightly less than competent…
Bzzzt….bzzzt….THUMP.
Sayo bolted upright, hugging knees together as she suddenly noticed an object by her feet. A flip phone. On the top screen, the background was a picture of a rabbit surrounded in flowers. There could only be one possible culprit, and she quietly groaned "Hanazono-san!" she called out below. "Do you have the wrong house?"
Out in the shadows, it took a moment for Tae to respond. She really had the mannerisms of a rabbit. Her eyes looked back and forth and then held their gaze straight before they finally made the connection to the roof, along with a small smile. She waved. "Ah, Hikawa-san. Lovely weather to star-gaze, isn't it?"
Sayo felt her cheeks flare. Of all the…"Wrong sister, Hanazono-san. I don't do idle things like star-gaze." Putting her nose up in the air, she put on her best Roselia airs. "I asked you if you have the wrong house?"
"Nn? I think you sent this address. I have my guitar. It made me happy that you wanted to play together…I got lost."
"Y-yeah.."
"I turned on my bike a couple of wrong streets and I found myself at this place that sells doughnuts late at night. So, I spent an extra hour trying to figure out which flavors everyone would like. There's chocolate…cream-filled…raspberry…strawberry…swirl….ahhhh…."
Sayo's airs faltered as she reached over for the roof door that her parents had installed for her and Hina years ago and unlatched it. It wasn't like Tae was incompetent or slightly less than incompetent; on the contrary, she was on her way of becoming one of the top guitarists in the area. It was just…she wasn't sure if they ever interacted. They played the same instrument and went to the same school, but Tae was so quiet and rarely talked to people outside of Poppin' Party. Even Hina didn't have much information about her when they last talked about other band members.
"She has a lot of rabbits," Hina's words echoed through her brain.
But as much as she wanted to be annoyed, she just couldn't. While Tae continued to list off doughnut flavors, Sayo frantically waved her hand, flinging open the roof door. "Fine, fine, fine! I'm gonna let you in!" she cried, feeling her face flush again. "Just…don't wander! God, if you get into an accident in the street it'll put our property value at risk…"
They were in the twins' shared room upstairs, quietly eating doughnuts on the blue, shaggy rug that they had owned since they were five. Sayo savored the sweet, savory taste of her raspberry-filled doughnut while Tae was humming to herself. They'd been in the room for an hour, but their jamming session hadn't amounted to much. Both of them had strong sounds, but they were going in completely different directions. While Sayo's guitar sounded dark, Tae's guitar was grittier, heavier, but also with an underlying sweet tone?
It just wasn't working.
They weren't communicating. Or, rather, Sayo wasn't sure how to communicate with her. It wasn't like communicating with RInko; Rinko also had similar taste and instinctively knew most of the time what to do without being told. But if Sayo was A, then Tae was B, and their practices kept overlapping each other. It sounded awful.
And Hina still hadn't texted her.
She almost bit her finger, not realizing that she finished the last of her treat. Cursing under her breath, she looked over to see if Tae was finished. She was. Nodding her head back and forth, she was not only humming now but mumbling words along to her melody with a small smile on her face. Sayo kicked her knee and bit her lip, fighting back curiosity. Normally this would've been a piece of cake. Perhaps she was getting too used to Yukina always backing her up now in situations like these.
Also, why was she several centimeters closer to her fellow drummer?
"Hmm, did you wanna try again soon?" Tae asked, staring right at her with those big, green eyes of hers.
"No. Uh, I mean yes." Sayo grimaced and kicked her other knee. "Is that a new song for Poppin' Party?"
"Welllll…maybe. I wrote it for me. Kasumi-chan and the rest of us could play it sometime, though. Mmm…I'm more of a guitar player, though. Do you sing, Sayo-chan?"
"Huh? Don't act so familiar with me. I only sing when Yukina is unable to properly perform."
"You guys are always on top of things. Here, you can sing along while I play, Sayo-chan."
Tae handed her a crumpled piece of paper. Sayo wanted to remind her about her singing ability once again, but she felt like the argument would go nowhere. Tae wasn't much of an arguer. Sighing, she grabbed her reading glasses from her desk and sung along to the scribbled kanji.
"Kiss and Beck and Jimmy Hendrix too
I wonder if their hearts were pounding?
Rabbits and cheeks and dumplings are
Mochi mochi happiness
My fluttering heart is shaking
We can still make it! Gather up!
Shine! Hanazono electric guitar! Fly!
I want to echo out a melody that can break the galaxy
Welcome to the Hanazono land!
Don't think, Feeeel! Let go of hesitation!"
Her hand lingered in the air, outstretched, as her cell phone suddenly vibrated. Face fully flushed red, Sayo scrambled to read the message while Tae continued playing. "Sayo: 'Y'know, if you and Tsurumaki-san get in trouble, I'm not asking Mom and Dad to bail you out, you know.' Hina: 'Haha, I know, I know. Service's been terrible. Lighten up a little, Sis, ilu. :)'"
Sayo let out a small chuckle and let her hair fly in front of her face, replying with a stern, "'Don't stay up too late. I'm not around to boss you around. Good night.'" She didn't even notice until a few seconds later that Tae's chin was just lightly resting on her shoulder. "Ah, Hina-chan? She's with Kasumi-chan, isn't she?"
"What? Oh, is she? I don't really keep track of my sister's affairs…"
"Mm, yeah. They met up. I wanted to go too, but I don't want my parents to worry about feeding the rabbits." Tae looked right at her, centimeters from her face, and smiled. "You have a softer smile than I expected. Can I introduce you to some of my kids? I mostly use my phone for pictures of them…"
She leaned forward and grabbed her phone, and soon Tae was right behind her, almost sitting right underneath her. It was like Sayo was in her lap….oh, no. Blushing wildly, she flung her glasses across the room and buried her face in her hands. If people kept discovering her weaknesses, she might have to move across the country. She really was getting too soft.
"Yes, please…"