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For the nth time within the past hour, Haruno checks her watch and phone simultaneously, visibly annoyed at her friend’s tardiness. It wasn’t new to her. The countless times Eijun had promised to be on time but failed to comply made Haruno realize that he was hopeless when it comes to punctuality. It doesn’t mean she no longer gets annoyed by it, though.
As if on cue, Eijun arrives at the venue, drenched in sweat and out of breath like he had just ran a twenty-kilometer marathon—an exaggeration, but also slightly true. (He did, in fact, run like his life depended on it, the reason being that the public transport he rode broke down, and he was already running late so why not just make a run for it?) Haruno notices his peculiar choice of clothing, khaki shorts paired with a black shirt that was a size too big and written on it is the name of his friend’s band, the reason they’re attending this battle-of-the-bands concert. KIRAI, in chunky kanji characters, each stroke alternating between white and green. Haruno thinks it’s tacky, but who was she to judge?
“The tickets?”
“In my bag,” Eijun stammers in between pants. The boy hands over his backpack to the red-haired girl, relief washing over his face at the freedom from the weight on his shoulders.
Haruno takes out the tickets, a towel, and a bottle of water from the bag and hands the last two items to Eijun. In all honesty, Haruno feels more as if she’s babysitting rather than attending a concert. She didn’t even know anyone from the band they’re here to support. All she knew was that the bassist slash vocalist slash leader of the band is Eijun’s childhood friend from Nagano, Wa...? Wakaba? Wakasa? She couldn’t quite remember, but that was fine. Surely, Eijun would mention her name again somewhere down the road.
Eijun finally regains his composure, and the two make their way to the concert grounds, securing the best section to watch the performances: middle barricade, the closest to the stage with a wide-range view. Surprisingly, there aren’t many people yet, despite the event being twenty minutes away from starting.
“How many bands are gonna play before KIRAI?” Haruno asks while inspecting the stage. On the far left stands the drum set, and on the far right, a guitar. In the middle, there stands the microphone in between two more guitars, but the one on the left, exactly parallel to her, only has four strings. She wonders why, being someone who has no knowledge on musical instruments. A guitar is a guitar, what else is there to know?
“They’re the first one to play actually.”
Ten more minutes before it starts. To Haruno, it felt like the longest, most gut-churning ten-minute wait in her whole life. But when the sun starts to set, the venue starts to slowly be engulfed by the darkness before the stage lights flash and flicker, rainbow strobes start dancing around and illuminating the crowd, and the emcee’s excitement-fueled voice floods the open-space area with his greeting, the churning feeling in Haruno’s stomach goes away, and what fills her now is the high of the adrenaline seeping through her veins. She screams at the top of her lungs with the crowd to match their energy, and Eijun copies while jumping up and down, and flailing his arms in the air.
“And without further ado, give it up for our first band, KIRAI!”
Smoke floods the stage while the band members emerge from the left wing. First, the drummer, then the guitarist at the back, then the guitarist on the front right, and finally, the guitarist right in front of Haruno. She locks eyes with the member in front of her, and for a second, she forgets to breathe, starstruck by the beauty looking down at her. The loud sound of the drums, electric guitars, and bass playing the first succession of notes all at the same time make Haruno come back to her senses and get goosebumps all over. With the feeling of electricity running through her body, she screams “Go, KIRAI!” the loudest she can before her voice breaks and focuses her attention on the girl playing the four-string.
“Some boys kiss me, some boys hug me, I think they’re okay—”
For the second time, all the air gets knocked out of Haruno’s lungs, and in replacement is the power of the band’s instruments and the vocalist’s voice, vibrating inside of her, feeling every strum of the guitars, every thump of the drums, and every word of the song.
“If they don’t give me proper credit, I just walk away—”
The rest of the crowd turn into crashing ocean waves, and the song, a luring tune of a siren, drawing prey in. Haruno finds herself in too deep with the girl hovering over her, drowning in the field of brown in her eyes, enticing.
“And I am a material girl—”
And then, she smirks.
She smirks, ephemeral, and it does something to Haruno, because she can feel herself losing control of her body as she leans into the barricade that separates her only a few centimeters away from the stage, her arms pushing her up to get closer to the vocalist, the aforementioned continuing to strum through the instrumental part of the song while stooping down to meet the red-haired girl’s face, so close yet so far, before abruptly pulling back to sing again. A tingling feeling creeps up to Haruno’s cheeks as she processes what had just happened.
“Some boys romance, some boys slow dance, that’s alright with me—”
“If they can’t raise my interest, then I have to let them be—”
All throughout the performance, only two things were taking up most of the space in Haruno’s brain: how attractive the vocalist was, and how badly she wanted to kiss her.
But of course, Haruno would never admit that out loud.
“You know that we are living in a material world, and I am a material girl—”
Chills travel down Haruno’s spine at that final line, the vocalist’s broken-sounding scream of the lyrics, so dominant and enthralling. One final “Material!” from her and the song ends with them playing the last succession of notes. The crowd erupts into screams and whistles, chanting the band’s name like desperate call for them to play another song. Haruno can feel the vocalist’s lingering gaze on her as the band carries their instruments (besides the drums, which are being taken care of by the concert staff) and exits the stage to let the next band prepare for their turn to perform.
An allotted five-minute preparation for the next band gives Eijun enough time to talk to Haruno before the venue crashes back into chaos.
“Do you wanna watch the next band or do you wanna head over to where KIRAI is?”
Eijun, being Eijun, didn’t even give Haruno a chance to speak before answering for her. “I know you can’t wait another thirty or so minutes to meet your new crush, so let’s just bounce.”
There it is again, the tingling feeling in her cheeks, except this time, it isn’t limited to her just her cheeks. A burning feeling (out of embarrassment, or maybe nervousness) flushes throughout her body, leaving her sweaty and lightheaded, and she almost passes out from the overwhelming feeling, but Eijun is quick to pull her out of the crowd, and the two pace their way to where the band agreed to meet them.
“Ei-chan!” There she is, the star of the night, the girl who got Haruno so smitten just by simply existing. Eijun engulfs the vocalist in his arms before letting go and starting a conversation, and Haruno takes this time to soak in her appearance, as she was too out of it to do so while they were still performing (that, and it was hard to take note of how she looked from head to toe when she was moving around the stage so much, along with the smoke clouding them as they performed).
Her black arm sleeves or arm warmers or whatever they’re called were taken off, leaving her in a loose, gray tank top with arm holes too big for her. Her brown hair is tied up into a bun, exposing her ears loaded with various piercings, but what catches Haruno’s attention the most is the heart-shaped industrial piercing. Her black cargo pants were adorned with hand stitched characters of the word KIRAI on random spots and holding it up are chains used as a belt.
“So, Haruno, was it?”
Haruno blinks away her thoughts and responds. Her words get stuck in her throat, though, and she ends up being an incoherent, babbling mess. How does a single person, someone she doesn’t even know, manage to conjure up a storm of warm, tingly, bubbly, giddy feelings in the pits of her stomach and make her fall in too deep into these emotions? Haruno doesn’t know.
“I’m Aotsuki Wakana, by the way, in case Eijun forgot to mention me to you.” She smiles at Haruno, and oh God, she could feel herself falling harder and harder. Being so smitten over someone’s smile? Haruno has it down bad. Down horrendous even!
Wakana. It fits her, Haruno thinks. She doesn’t know how she came to that conclusion, but it just makes sense. It was a common name, but she is the only Wakana that Haruno knows, and probably the only she would ever know, given that every other Wakana that isn’t her Wakana is now deemed irrelevant to her.
“You’re really pretty, Haru-chan.” Wakana states while looking deep into her eyes, and Haruno feels like she’s about to melt from the softness in Wakana’s gaze.
“Thank… you… You’re really pretty too.” Haruno says, softly, not wanting anyone else but Wakana to hear.
“Is that why you tried to kiss me on the stage?”
Wakana’s ears turn red, and she hides her face in embarrassment while Wakana lets out a chuckle.
“You’re… you’re the one who leaned down though…!”
“I did.”
“Hah! So, YOU’RE the one who want to kiss me!” Haruno retorts, trying to turn the tables, but it backfires when Wakana flashes her a smirk, the same smirk she sent at her on the stage.
“And if I do?”
Those four words are what it takes for Haruno’s brain to go completely haywire, and her guts fill with butterflies, multiplying by the second. She’s absolutely, completely, utterly weak when it comes to Wakana.
“Say, if we win the battle, would you give me your socials?” Wakana bargains (though Haruno is only ever active on WhatsApp and Instagram).
Haruno stares, then blinks. And blinks again. And again. And again.
“So?”
She must’ve said yes, because now, Wakana is dragging her back to the concert grounds, just as the last band was finishing up their performance. Haruno indulges in the roughness of Wakana’s fingers interlocked with hers, most likely caused by years of playing the bass. Wakana lets go as they find a spot near the stage to stay at while waiting for the results, Haruno already missing the warmth she emitted. She would give up the world just to hold Wakana’s hand for longer.
“And that was our last band for tonight! In just a few more minutes, we would have our results for tonight’s battle of the bands!”
Anxiety starts to form in Haruno’s stomach, thinking of all the possible outcomes. She has confidence in KIRAI’s performance, but the what ifs never seem to go away. What if they don’t win? What if the judges are biased? What if—
“Our second runner up is… LUNAR!”
Okay, it’s not KIRAI. They still have a chance. Oh God, but what if—
“Our first runner up is… Time Machine!”
It’s still not them. This is the last call. If KIRAI doesn’t win, Haruno might just—
“And our champion for the battle of the bands… give it up for…”
“KIRAI!”
The crowd cheers three times louder as the band climbs back up to the stage, along with Eijun and Haruno because Wakana pulled them up with her. In the heat of the moment, Haruno plants a kiss on Wakana’s cheek, the latter responding with a blush on her face. Haruno was scared of falling in love. The thought of her feelings not being reciprocated or just straight up ignored and tossed aside prevented her from freely falling in love. And maybe it’s too early to say so, but she would if it’s Wakana. No, she would walk into love with her, eyes open with every step she takes.
Because it’s Wakana. Haruno would gladly let her keep her heart.