Archive of Our Own

#1

The first of the three girls to sit down by an instrument was Marinette. She strode over to the drum kit, dropped her bag of sticks carelessly down on the floor, and smiled at the other two. “Well, what are you waiting for? Let’s get playing!”

The other two viewed her, and each other, with suspicion. After a short while, Kagami walked forward and sat down at the grand piano. Once she'd done that, she opened her suitcase and took out a well-used copy of the Real Book, which she placed carefully and reverently onto the music stand. At that point, Marinette had already unzipped her drumstick bag and taken out two metal-wire brushes — which were the wrong way around — and started tapping the drums and cymbals with the thin triangle at the back end.

Juleka was the one who needed the most preparation, as she had her double bass case slung around her back. As Marinette drummed backwards, Juleka put the case down and undid the zip, pulling the bass’ foot out as far as it could go and then placing the bass sideways on the floor.

“Are you sure you’re a qualified drummer?” said Kagami, frowning at Marinette.

“Sure am!” said Marinette, slapping the snare with her fingers. “Been playing fifteen years!”

Kagami did the mental calculations. “You started when you were three?”

“Nah, two and a half. You?”

“Thirteen years.” The admission seemed to make Kagami a little uncomfortable. “Why aren’t you playing the drums right?”

“Oh, the sticks? I don't want to do big noises until we’re actually playing. Gotta check the tone is right. Plus, it’s a cute sound like this, don’t you think?”

Juleka had put up one of the room’s polished-brass music stands at that point, and also placed her remarkably scuffed copy of the Real Book onto it. It didn’t even have a cover anymore, and every page looked like it had been chewed on for a long time by something without teeth. She remained quiet through the other two’s discussion, other than the necessary clicks from setting up the bass itself.

None of them were here by choice. The school was their choice, sure, but not this room. The teacher had just gotten bored with Marinette’s constant drumming on the desk and by Kagami’s incessant questions. So he had decided to send them off to a practice room where they wouldn’t disturb the other students, and Juleka had been sent along with them because she had brought her double bass into the classroom, where it stood blocking the fire escape. It was their first day of music college, their first time meeting each other, and their first time visiting a practice room on campus, and they were sent here basically for causing trouble.

In other words, there was no need for any of them to expect any of the others to be good at music, or good to play with, other than the fact they’d gotten into France’s most prestigious jazz academy and therefore had to have the skills to do at least that. Not that Marinette’s current behaviour could possibly make either of the other two confident about that assessment.

When Juleka stood up and put the bass into position, Marinette stopped her half drumming. “How long have you been playing, er, whatever your name is?”

Juleka held up all the fingers on a single hand.

“Five? Just five years?”

Juleka nodded.

“What’s your name?” said Kagami. “I’m Kagami.”

“—,” said Juleka, bass player to her soul.

“I’m Marinette!” said Marinette, voice bursting like a cymbal. “But, um, I didn’t catch yours?”

“Jlk.”

“Juleka,” said Kagami, nodding. Juleka nodded along with her.

Marinette’s frown seemed more jealous than upset. “How did you catch that? I just heard ‘glk’.”

“Because I am good at listening,” said Kagami.

“Oh.”

They all tried to listen to each other for a moment. Not for the music, because even Marinette had stopped playing, but as a test. None of them knew what the others could do yet, but they all knew that a musician needed to be able to work with silences and pauses. To hear what everyone else was doing. There was no small amount of competitiveness in that, either; who could be silent the longest? Who could be the most silent? It was the wariness of people who were asked to play together while knowing squat about how the others played.

Of course, only a few seconds later, the drummer was the first to crack — by flipping her brush, still held in its sheath, and slamming the sheath hard into the ride cymbal. “Okay!” she said. “I’m losing out on valuable education being here, so I wanna make the most of my time. What should we play?”

“We don’t have to play anything,” said Kagami. “We were just told to leave so we wouldn’t disrupt class for everyone else.”

“But you want to play,” said Marinette, perceptively. “And Juleka already unpacked her whole shnozzle. I’m taking this as an opportunity, and I wanna see what we can do together. People to play with on the first day? That’s great!”

Juleka, whose face had gone very red, said “‘snot a shnozzle.”

“Wait, what did I say?”

Kagami cleared her throat. “Since we all seem to be prepared, I suggest we all open our Real Books to a random page and pick whichever one of the outcomes we prefer — yes?”

“I don’t have a Real Book,” said Marinette, lowering her hand. “I don’t do notation.”

“You need to do notation. You’re in a college for music. The whole point is to do notation. Notation is what lets us play together. ”

“Just tell me how many rounds we’re playing of whatever, and I’ll catch on. It’s all improv anyways, right?”

Kagami looked like she had just been told by a chef that he would prepare her food by randomly mixing ingredients together and slamming them in the oven at a temperature decided by consulting a five year old boy. “What?”

“I’ll catch on! I’ve played all kinds of stuff. I don’t need the chords anyway, I just need to hit the drums.”

Juleka sighed. Her face clearly suggested she had played with drummers before. Rather than argue, because she couldn’t exactly make herself be heard over the other two’s voices, she opened her Real Book and flipped to a random page — then, because Marinette and Kagami were still arguing, she rolled her eyes and flipped again, because she was so bored of Fly Me To the Moon at this point that she would rather eat plastic than risk playing it again.

“It’s just standards anyway,” said Marinette. “Come on. Open your book, I swear I’ll keep up.”

“Very well,” said Kagami, giving up. She opened her own book and let about half the pages flip past her thumb before stopping. “Duke Ellington. It Don’t Mean A Thing.”

“Played it loads,” said Marinette, smiling with what must be self-confidence. “Easy. How about you, Juleka?”

They both turned towards the bass player, who looked frightened for a moment before relaxing. “Giant Steps,” she said, slightly swallowing the second half of the first word.

Kagami smirked. Famously, one of the most difficult jazz standards, but she knew it in and out and had performed it on stage at her lycée graduation, with a three minute piano solo — twice as long as the saxophonist’s. She could handle this piece, but she had her doubts that Marinette could. “I think we should play that one,” she said.

“Sure!” said Marinette. “I’m in. I’ve played it dozens of times.”

“Y-you have?”

“Hasn’t everyone? Wait, Juleka — are you up for Giant Steps? Last two bassists I played it with had a real hard time.”

Juleka nodded. “I c’n play it.”

“You’re that confident with just five years’ experience?”

“Been doin' ‘lectric eleven years.”

“Oh, good! So we’re all feeling Giant Steps, then?”

This was the point where Kagami realised she had made a critical miscalculation. Because the main reason that Giant Steps was difficult wasn’t the tempo or anything that affected the drummer, it was the rapid chord changes and the hurried improvisation across them for the tonal instruments. Marinette just had to keep time. If her goal was to make things difficult for Marinette, then the best thing would be to go outside the Real Book entirely and go into specific compositions with time signature changes and complex drum parts.

But if the purpose was to show off what she could do… then Giant Steps was still a good call. “Yes,” she said aloud.

“Y’s,” said Juleka.

“What tempo are we on? It’s 148 on the original, right — should we take it slower?”

Kagami cleared her throat. “I can play it that fast, but let’s start in half time. I want to know what you both can do before I commit to this fully.”

“74. Got it. I’ll take us to 148 along the way.” Marinette didn’t seem to notice that both of the others were watching her in something like exasperated disbelief — surely, she was just overconfident. Marinette didn’t even have a metronome by her; she just had her drumstick bag, and a smile that suggested she was the most excited person in the world. “Everyone ready?”

The other two slipped out their metronomes and placed them next to their music sheets. They set up for 74, without sound, and held ready to start the timer off. “Yes,” said Kagami.

“One… two… one, two, three, four,” said Marinette. Juleka and Kagami both started their metronomes on the second ‘one’, and were annoyed to see the red light blinking at the exact same speed as Marinette’s timekeeping.

And then the music started.

Kagami’s experience in classical music quickly shone through. She played expansive chords that rested, sometimes arpeggiating to get an even greater width to her note span, and she placed the melody on top. The chord changes came confident and precise, and while she coloured them with additional notes from time to time, none of them were particularly spicy. She just painted the entire space with lush harmonies.

Juleka started off reasonably simple. She played the bass notes clearly and in a middle register, only occasionally walking between them despite the slower tempo. It was the kind of playing you might expect from someone who had recently learned the song, but the presentation — the way she didn’t even look at the sheet music, the way she closed her eyes and just let her hands move, it was obvious she could do more if she wanted.

And Marinette — she smiled like she was in her element. She had swapped the brushes for sticks, and she played the standard bebop ride-heavy rhythm, although she adapted it to the slower tempo with frequent visits to the toms. It was very easy to tell she was used to harder-hitting music, perhaps rock or metal or drum n’ bass, and her fills were playful and jumpy. Even so, she kept the rhythm steady and driving the whole time.

“Alright!” she said, after the first whole round. She was nodding her head as she played. “Yeah, I’m into this!”

The other two didn’t reply. But they both felt it, too: they were into this. They were all in a room with two other people who clearly loved playing music, and were good at it — in fact, everyone had to be better than they were already letting on. That was exciting not just in the sense that they still had more to see, but also because they were looking forward to showing off their own chops.

As they were halfway through the second repetition, Juleka looked down at the metronome again and was baffled to see they were still perfectly matching the red blips for time.

“How are we feeling about solos? Kagami, you’re burning to do one,” said Marinette. It apparently didn’t affect either her speaking or her drumming to be doing both at once; she was casual as could be as she talked. Kagami nodded in response, her lips perfectly level.

“Juleka, how about you? Want to solo?”

Juleka’s playing fell behind for a moment; she completely missed two chord changes. Then she shook her head and went back to playing, but with her head turned down.

“Alright! I wanna solo too, but I don’t need a long one. I’ll start speeding us up now, and Kagami, you can just start yours whenever!”

As they started on the third repetition, she did indeed start speeding up. Without consulting the other two, her drumbeats started getting faster, not rapidly but enough that they could both feel it. She was, in that moment, blissfully unaware that the other two were silently cursing her name for not consulting them on this progression. But a bout of professionalism made them keep quiet on the matter, because right now there was music to play, and they would be damned if they weren’t going to do it well.

That was also why Kagami started to up her pace independently, playing more percussively and without laying the chords as wide or for as long, even before starting her solo. That was why Juleka forewent the long notes to walk more frequently, keeping pace with Marinette’s accelerando. And it was why Marinette didn’t just speed up, she also started playing even more notes. They weren’t just playing together, they were competing, and at the end one of them would be crowned as winner — as the Best At Jazz™.

They met each other’s eyes several times as the tempo increased, only for moments at a time — until Kagami began her solo at the start of the fifth repetition. It was a simple solo at first, building with simple though swift melodic lines in the right hand, with occasional chord fills in the left hand. Marinette answered with a grin, nodding along and shouting “Yeah!” over the din of everyone’s playing.

Juleka kept pace, but at the start she was ticked off to find that not only did they land exactly on 148 BPM after Marinette’s speed increase, they even landed so that every other beat they played was punctuated with a red blip on the metronome. Marinette was either exceptionally lucky, or her control over time transcended normal human capacity. To take her mind off that latter possibility, Juleka threw her all into playing. She was now Kagami’s support, binding the drums and the piano together. Her playing style gained a more rhythmic edge, adding octaves, suggesting that she had experience with funk or disco. She would have faded into the background for many, but Kagami and Marinette knew their stuff well enough to appreciate her lines as they weaved into the whole.

They played three more repetitions through that piano solo, but it seemed that Kagami didn’t want to recreate her previous three-minute attempt. She built up bigger, with extended lines that saw her right hand run races up and down in complex scales. After an increasingly intense last round, she went back to only laying chords.

Marinette cheered and complimented her. Then she went into her own solo, almost like an afterthought, but she quickly built it up to a dramatic crescendo. Keeping the rhythm steady with her hi-hat foot, she fired away on every other piece of the set in a wonky off-beat manner that very nearly had Juleka losing her place at one point.

And then the drum solo ended with a drumroll, which broke right at the end of a repetition. Marinette immediately started singing the melody at the top of her lungs, and it took the other two a little while to catch on that it was the final round and not just more soloing. Around the first Gmaj7 they settled into a normal pattern, with Kagami playing just the chords and not the melody.

Soon thereafter, it was over. The three of them took their hands off their instruments, breathing heavily from the exertion they’d just underwent. Marinette shouted, “All right! Good… good stuff!”

“Well played,” said Kagami. She seemed slightly annoyed to admit it.

“Yh,” said Juleka.

“You sing well, Marinette.”

“Aw! Thanks! Your solo ruled. Loved your playing too, Juleka!”

Juleka didn’t reply. Kagami nodded and also, quite redundantly, said “Indeed. Yes.”

There was a short pause. Then Marinette cleared her throat. “Hey… you girls wanna start a band?”

The three of them looked at each other. So far, they had only played together for four, maybe five minutes. That really wasn’t enough to know if they truly gelled musically, particularly since all they did was pick a hefty jazz standard and pump through it at maximum effort. There wasn’t enough there to know if they wanted to keep making music together.

But as they thought about it, they all realised the same thing. The three of them were, first of all, incredibly good at their instruments. Marinette was probably the steadiest timekeeper the other two had ever played with. Kagami’s solo had been blistering, and her tonality flawless. Juleka had perfectly slotted into the open spaces, and her attack and intonation were spot on. They all knew they were on top of their own game, and from that experience they were pretty certain they had just played with musicians who were — if not the best in school, though that was also possible — then at least in the top 10%.

And that led them all to the same conclusion. They had to keep playing together, just to keep an eye on each other. To vie for the top position and be crowned Best At Jazz™.

“I want to,” said Kagami.

Juleka nodded.

“Amazing! Let’s do it!”

They didn’t make plans for how to proceed after that. They had started a trio, and that was that, come hell or high water. And they obviously weren’t going to flake out, because if they did, they would lose their chance to be Best At Jazz™.

Also, they all individually had to admit… finding someone to play with so fast, basically at their teacher’s decree, was probably the best option for someone as socially awkward as themselves. They wouldn’t have to talk to anyone else to start playing, they already had a group.

Would it be good? Only time could tell. But it would at the very least be interesting.

#2

“Your musical idols,” said Kagami, over a lunch the three of them shared by a secluded table in the cafeteria.

“Huh?” said Marinette, possibly because she didn’t know what was being asked for, and possibly because the way she chewed her burrito made it hard to hear sounds from outside her head.

“Who are your musical idols?” repeated Kagami, mostly but not fully hiding her annoyance.

“Oh! Midorin, Cindy Blackman, Tony Austin, Linda-Philomène Tsoungui, Sophie Alloway, Meg White, Rashied Ali, Terri Lyne Carrington, Elvin Jones of course…”

“I see.”

“Gigi Lansch, Kahokiss, Art Blakey, god I have so many… Seb Rochford, Jon Theodore, Annette Aguilar, Louis Cole…”

“That is quite enough. Thank you,” said Kagami. She went back to eating her lunch.

Marinette frowned at her. “You’re not going to give me yours?”

Kagami, apparently perplexed, swallowed her first bite. “You haven’t asked me.”

“Who’re your idols,” said Juleka, the first time she spoke that lunch. She almost seemed bored.

“Hiromi Uehara,” replied Kagami.

“Hah!” said Marinette, a self-satisfied expression on her face. “I knew it. When I heard you play I was like, ‘Hiromi’.”

That reaction earned her two furrowed brows from Kagami, who put down her sandwich and said, “Tigran Hamasyan.”

“Yeah. That also makes sense.”

“Rai Thistlethwayte. Amina Figarova. Herbie Hancock. Carla Bley.”

“Absolutely.”

“You are speaking nonsense,” said Kagami. “Those pianists sound nothing alike.”

Marinette shrugged with her face but not her shoulders. “Well, they don’t have to, do they? You just have to sound a bit like them.”

“But I don’t!”

“Your vibes match them. But mostly Hiromi.”

Kagami’s stare was one of disbelief. She ended it after a few seconds and a “What?” from Marinette, sighed, and went back to eating.

Clearly giving up, Marinette turned to Juleka. “What about you?” she said. “Who are your idols?”

Juleka, faced with the horrid challenge of actually speaking out loud and clearly, swallowed without any food in her mouth. “Um… Tal Wilkenfeld… Mononeon… E, Esperanza Spalding… James Jamerson… Ida Kristine Nielsen…”

“Who’s that last one?”

“Played with Prince,” said Kagami.

“Huh,” said Marinette. “Know what, Kagami?”

Kagami’s answer was to raise both eyebrows in a type of challenge.

“You don't give off Prince vibes at all.”

“You’re speaking nonsense.”

“Juleka gives off Prince vibes, though. She’d be cool on stage with him.”

Juleka cleared her throat. “Prince, um, died.”

“How do I not give Prince vibes, but I give off Herbie Hancock and Carla Bley vibes?” insisted Kagami. “Explain your rationale, Marinette.”

“It’s vibes,” said Marinette, throwing a hand back. “It’s not rational, it just… makes sense, you know? Why, do you want to have Prince vibes?”

“No!” said Kagami, hotly. She seemed genuinely worked up. “I just don’t think you’re making any sense! At all!”

There was a moment of peace, before Juleka raised her hand and said, “If’n it helps, um… I d’n know what she’s talk’n about, either.”

“Good. Thank you.”

“But I agree about Hiromi.”

Somehow, this didn’t seem to bother Kagami, who went into a slightly satisfied smile rather than protest again. “Good.”

Marinette picked up her burrito again. “I think,” she said, “our band will have The Bad Plus vibes. And Vels Trio vibes. And Akoustic Band vibes, too.”

“Those also sound nothing alike!” —

— and so went the lunch, until they were already too late for their next class.

#3

Juleka was spotted on campus with an unfamiliar boy early in the semester. A tall and lanky boy with turquoise tips dyed into his messy hair, and a guitar case on his back. This raised a somewhat-apparent curiosity in Kagami, and a much more obvious interest in Marinette.

That was why Marinette and Kagami waited inside the lobby for Juleka and the boy to come inside. They were going to pry about this mysterious guy. Or at least, Marinette was going to.

“Hey, Juleka!” said Marinette, when the glass doors parted. “You got a boyfriend? Congratulations!”

Juleka’s reaction could be indicative of several things. She blushed extremely red, stopped walking, and pressed in on her temples with one hand. “Agh!” she said, just a little louder than was customary for her.

“These your friends, Jules?” said the boy-maybe-friend. He smiled softly, having stopped right next to her. “You want me to explain?”

“Ugh, no,” said Juleka, and let go of her temples. “Please talk to my girl friends as little as possible.” She sighed and stepped ahead and went on, “Hey. Um. This’s my brother, Luka.”

“Brother?” said Kagami, raising her eyebrows.

Luka chuckled as he moved forward with his hand out. “Nothing wrong with having a brother, is there? Enchanté — what’s your name?”

“Kagami,” said Kagami and took the hand. “I play in a trio with Juleka.”

“We’ve barely played yet,” said Marinette. “Hey! I’m Marinette, and I play drums in that trio.”

When Luka turned towards her, she almost seemed to stop. His smile changed slightly and he said, “Enchanté,” in a tone that was more — severe — than when he spoke to Kagami. “Marinette… what a beautiful name.”

Marinette turned slightly pink at that. “Um… er…”

“Luka. Stop that,” said Juleka. But it didn’t seem to help.

“Your heartsong… it’s a symphony of voices singing in transcendent harmony,” said Luka. He took Marinette’s hand and kissed it. “It’s beautiful. I’d love to hear it again.”

“That doesn’t make sense,” said Kagami.

“No shit,” said Juleka.

Luka gave Kagami a perplexed look. “What do you mean?”

“A symphony is instrumental,” said Kagami. “You can’t have a symphony with just voices, you need an orchestra. Voices weren’t even allowed in symphonies until Beethoven’s Ninth. You are describing a choral work, and you aren’t even describing it well.”

“Well —”

“Furthermore,” Kagami continued, folding her arms, “‘heartsongs’ don’t exist. You’re trying to flirt and you’re doing it badly. Marinette’s ‘heartsong’, if such a thing were to exist, would be atonal and messy and violently percussive.”

Again, Luka chuckled. But it was a more subdued chuckle this time. “I guess you don’t trust me, then?” he half-asked, half-said.

“No,” said Juleka, and pulled him back. “You’re untrustworthy. Go away 'n stop flirting w’ my friends.”

He ran his hand through his hair, throwing it back. “I was just trying to get to know people,” he said. “But okay. I’ll leave. It was very nice to meet you, Marinette, Kagami.” And he turned on his heel and walked away.

Juleka sighed as he disappeared down the hallway, arms folded like against the cold. She kicked lightly at the floor; Kagami sent her a sympathetic glance.

“Brothers,” Juleka commented eventually. “Ugh.”

“Is he a student here?” said Kagami.

“Yh. Second year. Guitar.”

“I see. And now he’s looking for a first-year girlfriend.”

Juleka shrugged. “I d’no. He flirts alla time. Last week he did the heartsong bit in the groc’ry store.”

“Ah,” said Kagami.

“He’s pretty hot,” said Marinette, and the other two turned to look at her in surprise. “Wow.”

“Don’t tell me that actually worked on you,” said Kagami.

“What? He looks almost as good as Juleka,” said Marinette.

“W-w-what?” stammered Juleka, eyes wider than barn doors.

Marinette didn’t seem to notice much of the reaction. “Just saying it as I see it. Kagami, you agree, right?”

Kagami’s reaction was, very briefly, to look like she was about to be run over. Then she furrowed every piece of her face and said, “I refuse to comment on any part of what you just said.”

“Aw, why not? Did his heart thingy bother you that m—”

“I think,” interrupted Juleka, with an intensity that seemed born out of absolute necessity, “we should move on and get to class.” She seemed unable to look at Marinette.

“Yes,” said Kagami.

Coincidentally, the clock in the hallway turned to ten minutes past just then. It was time to get to class. So Kagami grabbed Marinette firmly by the arm and pulled her along, and Juleka followed. And Luka… well, he stopped being an issue for about three days. Give or take.

#4

Their practice sessions soon became frequent enough that they needed to request a permanent spot in a practice room, three times a week. They found one with a grand piano and a drumset, plus enough extra space for a double bass, just like the one they first practised in — but unfortunately, the drumset lacked proper cymbals, and the piano was somewhat out of tune. Not all the keys, but a handful of them, like A5 and G#7 and, annoyingly, C4.

The former problem was fine for Marinette, who could just bring in her own cymbals. The latter was specifically a big issue for Kagami.

“I think it sounds like we’re in a saloon,” said Marinette, while mounting her crash. “It’s pretty cool.”

“It sounds like a cat is dying,” complained Kagami.

“Um,” said Juleka. “I could play outta tune too?”

“No. I would be driven mad.”

Marinette started to unscrew the cracked ride, though not without tapping a noise out of it first. Said noise seemed to displease her, in that she wrinkled her nose as it rang out. “What’s so wrong about a few wonky notes? It’s still music.”

“It’s wrong music,” countered Kagami, and played an expansive Cmaj6 chord which avoided the offending notes. “You wouldn’t play a concert with a piano as badly tuned as this.”

Juleka raised her hand. “We, um, we’re not play’n a concert…”

“Yet,” said Marinette and winked.

“That doesn’t matter,” said Kagami. She shifted the chord into Eaug7b9, then Fmaj9, then landed it on a soft Dbmaj7b5. This last one involved C4 as a middle note, and she wrinkled her nose at it. “I can’t sound good like this.”

“Really? I think you sound good all the time,” said Marinette. She finished putting the ride in place and tapped the bell, then nodded in appreciation before going to work on the hi-hat.

Kagami glared at her for a moment. But it hadn’t sounded like a joke. “... I could still sound better, though.”

“Why don’t you just avoid the notes that are wrong? That C and A and that one F, too. It’s a bit annoying but if you hate the sound so much, maybe you’ll manage better.”

“F?” said Kagami, blinking. Then she tested an F2-F3 octave, and immediately winced. “How did you hear that?”

“Intuition,” said Marinette. “Anyway, the bottom F is just a little bit too low. It’s barely noticeable. I wouldn’t bother with it, really. I sure don’t mind if you’re a little out of tune, and I’m sure Juleka doesn’t, either.”

“Nh,” said Juleka, apparently in agreement because she also nodded shortly after.

“It’s just…” Marinette tapped her finger on the smallest tom, and winced. “Ew. Okay, I gotta tune this one.”

While Marinette went for her drum tuning key, Kagami found time to get frustrated again. “Marinette. You’re chiding me for worrying about tuning, but you want to tune your drums?”

“No?” said Marinette, paying far more attention to the drum than Kagami. She kept tuning all the way through the conversation, tapping and twisting. “I’m not chiding you. I just don’t think it matters all that much. It’s just music.”

“There’s no ‘just’ about music.”

“Sure there is.”

“Um,” said Juleka, raising her hand. “D’we gotta fight?”

“I just want to know how it doesn’t matter for me, a tonal instrument, to be in tune, but it matters for the drums!” complained Kagami.

“I jus’ think —”

Marinette stomped on the kick pedal, sudden and hard. Juleka almost jolted severely enough to drop her bass, but just barely held on to it. “How the drums sound is super important! I can’t play with a snare that’s out of tune! It throws off my whole game, okay?”

Kagami had already narrowed her eyes at the kick drum; at the end of Marinette’s little speech, her whole face was scrunched. “I think I’d rather listen to a badly tuned piano than ever hear you speak again, Marinette,” she said.

“Sure. Just give me a moment and I’ll have the snare ready.”

The other two watched as Marinette tuned both the batter and the resonant head, a process that happened surprisingly fast.

“Maybe ‘ll get a piano tun’r in if’n we ask,” said Juleka.

“And a gag for Marinette,” sighed Kagami.

Juleka went incredibly pink and tried to hide behind her bass. “Um.”

They soon got to actual practice. Within the hour, even Kagami had almost forgotten that the piano was out of key. Within the week, a piano technician had shown up to remove the issue completely.

It took far longer than that for Juleka to stop imagining Marinette in a gag.

#5

They all knew why they started eating lunch together. They got to know each other on the first day; they were in the same band and the same classes; of course they’d sit at the same table during lunch, at least some of the time.

What they didn’t really know was why they kept sitting together all the time. Marinette seemed to catch people’s eye and had an easy time making friends, but she still kept coming back to sit in the corner with the two girls whose social circle largely consisted of their trio and, to Juleka's consternation, Luka.

(Juleka also had some other acquaintances, because this being a music school it was very hard to find enough bass players, and so she had at least been spoken to by some other students. Even so, she considered them outside her social circle unless they actively intruded on her personal space.)

(Kagami did have one other acquaintance at campus, but that was her piano teacher.)

Maybe Marinette didn't think about why they sat together at all. It was a little hard to tell with her, because she seemed to share a lot of thoughts during lunch, but generally disconnected and disparate things. In a way that — to Kagami — evoked a twelve-tone piece written by somebody that didn't know the twelve notes were supposed to come in specific orders.

For example, when Marinette sat down at the table a little late and went, "Is there anything hotter than a hard case guitar bag?"

Juleka choked on her food in response, and her face reddened hard. Kagami cleared her throat and said, "Juleka asked us not to talk about her brother in her presence."

"What? Luka? No, he's a soft case guy. I'm talking about Nino."

"Nino?" said Kagami. "Wait… the guy who's always wearing a baseball cap and headphones?"

"Isn't he handsome? I bet he's great at playing." Marinette pointed towards the corner of the room, where Nino was seated at a round table with two other people, none of whom any of them recognised. The aforementioned hard guitar case was standing behind him, leant up against the wall.

"Um," said Juleka, less red now, "he's… 's not a guitarist."

"Oh."

"He asked me to play w' him for a thingy. He, um… he does 'lectronics."

"Then why does he have a guitar case?" asked Kagami.

As they watched, a tall brunette walked up to Nino's table. Nino raised his arm in apparent greeting, then lifted up the guitar and handed it over to the girl, who took hold of it with one hand and did a fingergun with the other. There was no other conversation; she just left immediately afterwards.

"Who was that?" said Kagami.

"Vivica," said Juleka. "Sec'n year."

"Wow," said Marinette airily. "She's hot."

Kagami put her lunchbox down hard enough to make a loud knock. "Do you seriously have another crush? Just from a guitar case?"

"Crush? I'm just saying she's hot."

"And Nino."

"Well, he is! And Luka too, before you ask!" Juleka choked on her lunch again, her eyes visibly watering.

Sighing, Kagami picked up her lunchbox again. "I can't believe how easily you fall for people."

"I haven't fallen for anyone. I just know what hot looks like. You're hot too, you know."

This time, Kagami's lunchbox fell to the table without her hands following suit. "W-what?"

Marinette clapped her hand over her mouth. "Mmf," she said, and then removing her hand, "I, I need to be somewhere else." Then she got to her feet and ran off, leaving her lunch and her bag behind.

"… What?" said Kagami, looking towards Juleka.

"Enh," said Juleka, shrugging.

"Why did she run away?"

Juleka shrugged again. She had just regained the spoons to get back to her lunch, and wasn't about to let her sandwiches go uneaten.

"Okay," said Kagami. They'd only been friends — were they even friends? — for five weeks by now. There were plenty of things they didn't know about each other yet. Maybe Marinette made sense to herself, even though she didn't to them right now. "Fine."

"'gami?"

"Yes?" said Kagami, sighing into her bento.

"How d'you feel 'bout the band?"

Kagami pondered her answer. At this point she was decently certain that the three of them were the best musicians of their year; she was also reasonably sure that she was the best pianist in the entire school, given her piano teacher's reactions to her playing. It was possible that the man had swallowed at least three flies as she improvised her jazz rendition of Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata (the third movement), and that was a piece she could normally play with her eyes closed. If she were to guess, Juleka and Marinette were in the same category as her, hard-working talents with a lot to prove. Or at least that was true for Juleka; she couldn't yet tell if Marinette was a hard worker or just born with an innate ear that would have been better served in the hands — or, she supposed, on the side of the head — of someone more willing to use it.

"'cos," said Juleka, when Kagami's answer was too long coming, "I think we sh'd try to get t' know each other better. Right?"

"Really?"

"Yeah. 'cos you 'n 'nette fight alla time 'n if we… did stuff t'gether outside school…"

A piece clicked in Kagami's head. "You're right," she said, nodding slowly. "We should."

"Good!" said Juleka, brightening. "I —"

"We should do a karaoke competition," said Kagami.

Juleka's entire expression fell like a blancmange off a high shelf. "Er…"

"This Friday. At 20:00. Shibuya Karaoke."

"But —"

"It's not in Shibuya. It's on Rue de la Gaité," said Kagami.

There was a fire in her eyes now that was impossible to overlook, and Juleka decided against telling her about the three big problems she could see with this plan. So instead she just said, "'kay."

Lunch ended five minutes later.

#6

"I hope you are both ready," said Kagami, who had dressed up nice for the occasion.

"Er, I think so?" said Marinette, who hadn't.

"Nh," said Juleka, who wasn't ready.

"Whoever wins tonight becomes the band leader," Kagami continued.

Juleka sighed. What she had hoped would be a relaxing time out with no specific expectations on anyone's ability to enunciate clearly and articulately, had instead become a gauntlet — collectively, Juleka's first and second big problem. The only upside was that Marinette had actually been available, which was Juleka's third big problem; however, from a different perspective, Marinette's presence was what enabled the other two big problems to still be problems, so that was all a wash.

"Sure," said Marinette. Then, "But why do we need a band leader?" And finally, as Kagami opened her mouth, "I think we're just fine as we are, aren't we?"

"No," said Kagami, folding her arms. "We need direction. We need order."

"Well, um, I can't give any of those. So I probably shouldn't be in the running."

"Correct. But it would be unfair not to give you a chance."

Marinette rolled her eyes. "Right, okay. I just won't try, then."

"No. You have to try your very best, or it won't be an acceptable victory," said Kagami, with an intensity that seemed a few steps beyond her usual.

"Can you even sing, though?"

"Of course. I have taken lessons."

"Really? I haven't," said Marinette, which steeled a frown onto Kagami's lips. It didn't seem to be intended as a slight, though. "Wait, Juleka, can you sing? You're so quiet when we play."

Juleka shook her head with all the vigour she had, which in fairness wasn't a lot.

"Okay," said Marinette and smiled at her. Then she tried, with some success, to do the same at Kagami, though Kagami didn’t seem to appreciate the effort.

"We will also do scoring differently," Kagami said. "After every round, we will put ourselves in a ranked list from first to third place. The winner gets extra points and the loser, in third, is docked points."

This was a vision of hell itself to Juleka, so she was happy to hear Marinette say, "Isn't that a bit pointlessly antagonistic?"

She was less happy to hear Kagami say, "It is necessary to ensure that we also make the decision based on our own judgement, not the whims of a machine."

Finally, she was least of all happy that Marinette gave up on protesting further. "Alright," said Marinette. "Can we do something fun afterwards?"

"No."

They got into their little karaoke room and when Marinette asked what they should be singing, Kagami said everyone should pick two each. Which led to a small argument when Marinette picked Sia's Chandelier and Kagami insisted no one else knew it, and Juleka was too embarrassed to admit she did.

The final lineup became: Juleka suggested Earth Wind & Fire's September and Daft Punk's Get Lucky, Marinette suggested Queen's Don't Stop Me Now and Journey's Don't Stop Believin' out of an abundance of caution, and Kagami suggested Prince's Purple Rain and Edith Piaf's La Vie en Rose. They started with September all at once, and while they all got scores from the machine they found it very hard to score each other, which Marinette and Juleka were fine with but Kagami was not.

"We have to sing separately," she insisted.

"That means we'll be here twice as long," said Marinette.

"Thrice," said Juleka.

"Really? That’s not too bad, then," said Marinette.

Kagami answered her with a nasty glare. "How on Earth did you get so good at drums when you can't even count to two?"

"Practice!"

"Ugh," said Juleka.

When they got started on Don’t Stop Me Now, one at a time, Kagami insisted on starting. She sang well and got a good score, though she clearly wasn't used to the style and ended up cracking her voice on the last chorus. As she sat down with an embarrassed red on her face, Marinette took the microphone and set off on a high-energy rendition of the same, with the confidence of someone who had sang it dozens of times. She got fewer points from the computer than Kagami, because she improvised more, but even Kagami had to admit it was the better performance as she transferred the scores into her spreadsheet.

Then Juleka took the stage.

She started out insecure, like she was trying to copy Freddie Mercury without being sure she could do it. But her voice was clear underneath and her intonation was spot on, and once she got past the initial wobbles she also had excellent pitch control.

When she hit the first chorus, she had closed her eyes, and the other two were unable to close their mouths. Juleka was stellar. Her tone, her attack, the way she let her voice tear a little at the edges without ever losing control of it: the others were mesmerised.

Until she finished the last, lah-da-dah line, and the room would have been quiet if not for the dinging from the karaoke machine.

"Fuck," said Marinette.

And then she ran out of the room and didn't return.

#7

While Marinette was very good at falling in love with people, other people were also very good at falling in love with her. She never started a relationship with anyone, but she was frequently asked on dates, like there was some kind of competition going as to who could woo her first.

It was mostly boys. But Juleka, who knew how to find her people, also knew that there were girls who fancied the drummer. Which was fair enough, at least to Juleka. She was still struggling with occasional nightly dreams of 'accidentally' walking in on Marinette in the shower. Still, she felt she had a better understanding of all of Marinette’s shortcomings than everyone else.

For one thing, she was a drummer. For another, she was unable to commit to anything except music; she seemed to actively avoid connections that were proposed to her, and instead preferred to point her nozzle at impossible targets.

And for a third thing, she was A Drummer. There was no curing that. Not even cutting one of their arms off could stop a true A Drummer.

The most persistent attempter at trying to get with Marinette was, annoyingly, Luka. And Juleka knew she couldn’t survive those encounters without her head doing things she really didn't want it to, so she always left when he showed up to try his luck.

Such as today, when he unexpectedly exited an elevator and Juleka literally pushed him out of the way to get into the elevator, showed him the finger, and then pushed the close door button before the others could follow her.

"I don't think she likes you very much," commented Marinette.

"She's just having a bad day," he said, winking. "But you, mon amie, never fail to make my day better."

Kagami, who liked Luka's flirting about as much as she liked ear infections, folded her arms at him. "You can’t be serious."

"Marinette," said Luka, "your heartsong is even more captivating than usual. It rings with chimes from heaven, and —"

"If it's from heaven, it's not her heartsong."

"— and bells from the rooftops."

"That also isn't in her heart. Go away, Luka."

He fixed her with a smile. "Does the pianist want me to describe her inner symphony too?"

"No."

"Aw, come on! " said Marinette. "You gotta let him try. He has such a way with words!"

"That is one way of putting it, yes."

"Your inner song… is a C sharp minor chord," he said. Kagami looked no less suspicious. "The C rings out on top, showing your true unreleased potential."

"C sharp minor doesn’t have a C in it. You’re thinking of C sharp minor major seventh, and only an insane person would place the C anywhere except on top."

Marinette said, "Actually, she's kind of right."

"That's what I meant, yes," said Luka. "A C sharp minor with an added note. But I can also hear a dissonance within you —"

"A C sharp minor with a major seventh is already dissonant. You need to brush up on your musical terminology, or you will fall at every hurdle. Now leave us alone."

He watched her with something that might have been amusement. His smile, at least, was sly enough for that. "Okay. I will. You're a challenging piece to play, Kagami," he said.

"Too challenging for you." She grabbed Marinette’s wrist and started pulling her away, towards the stairs, which Luka didn't protest — or Marinette either, for that matter.

Not until after they were within the stairwell and out of earshot, at least. There, Marinette piped up to say, "Why do you have to be so mean to him?"

"He's a player."

"A… guitar player?"

Kagami sighed, stopped at a landing. "No. He's just trying to get an easy date. You must avoid him."

Marinette came up alongside her, raised the nearest eyebrow. "He says nice things, though? I think he's cool."

"And attractive, no doubt," said Kagami, with a mental eyeroll.

"Well, yes, objectively, but… I just wanted to hear about the song. If I'm also a challenging piece to play."

"You are not. You are the easiest piece to play I've ever met. Anyone could sightread you," said Kagami, rolling her eyes.

Marinette stood silent for a moment. Then her face hardened into a frown. "Thanks so much for that," she said, ripped her hand free, and stomped up the stairs.

"Marinette?"

There was no answer. Kagami was left staring at empty steps, with only the echo of Marinette’s heavy-hitting shoes for company. And she wondered if maybe she had played herself.

#8

Marinette was always the last to arrive for practice. This led to Juleka and Kagami often having unscheduled talks about nothing much, or more accurately, Kagami having those talks.

Kagami was particularly energised one day. She wasn’t always quick to initiate conversation, but on that day she could barely contain herself as she sat down at the piano and double-checked that Marinette wasn’t there: "What's wrong with her?"

Juleka looked up in clear horror. "Hnh?"

"She ran away from karaoke. Last week she ran away from me on the stairs. Yesterday she walked into the bathroom while I was washing my hands, and when I said hello she turned and walked out."

"Oh. Marint," said Juleka, with something that might have been relief.

"Yes. What is wrong with her?"

Juleka let the question hang in the air as she pulled the upright bass upright. She was reasonably certain Kagami was also one of her people, but she didn't want to jump into conclusions about why Kagami was asking.

Once she had her instrument in position, though, she asked: "Wh'd she look like?"

"… What?"

"Yes'rday."

"Oh," said Kagami, who hadn't really thought about it yet. "I suppose… scared?"

'Scared' was also a good descriptor of Marinette many other times. Even though she made friends easily, she didn't always seem to know what to do with those friends. And she was casually confident about anything to do with music, but outside of music she seemed way more anxious.

"I guess she's jus' weird," said Juleka.

"But why?"

"Unno." She put her hand to the strings. "Sh'd we play a bit?"

Kagami frowned, but it was a weak and not-very-committed frown. "Play what?"

Juleka's reply was a shrug. Still, the meaning seemed to get through.

"Okay. Play something until she arrives. How about we flip through the Real Book again?"

"Sure," said Juleka, who had played everything in it. She had a couple vetoes, meaning about twenty of them, but she didn't want to talk about them unless they became relevant.

"Let's see," said Kagami, and flipped hers open. She grimaced. "We are not playing Fly Me to the Moon," she said.

"Mh," said Juleka, overjoyed.

Kagami kept on flipping for a bit. This was apparently an idle action. Because she returned to the previous topic about halfway through the volume and said, "We still haven't found a bandleader."

"Mh." Juleka was less overjoyed now.

"It's her fault."

"Mh."

"Why can't she just be normal?"

Juleka didn't say anything. She felt no one in the group was normal. That wasn't a criticism, just an observation.

Another observation she had was that if Kagami was asking like this, she was definitely one of Juleka's people. Even if she didn't know. And even if Marinette would never reciprocate.

"Why is she even late today?" continued Kagami. "She doesn't have class. Her drum lessons are tomorrow."

"I saw her in the classroom," said Juleka. "B'fore I came here."

"Why was she in the classroom? Class ended two hours ago."

Juleka shrugged again. It was only a glimpse, and Marinette had been sitting there all by herself, face in some book. "Unno."

"Okay. I see," said Kagami, flipping again. "Maybe some extra studying, then. She needs it, badly. Hm… At Last…"

Just as she said the title, the door clicked open. Marinette stepped in, slightly out of breath. "H-hey," she said.

"Where have you been?" demanded Kagami. "You're twenty minutes late!"

Marinette didn't seem very bothered by this. "Sorry. I got held up."

"With what?"

"I overslept."

Juleka glanced at the clock on the wall. It showed 14:50.

"You overslept? We were in the same class two hours ago! You were awake!"

"I fell asleep again," said Marinette, like it was a defence. She sat down and unzipped her bag of sticks, and pulled out two regular wooden ones — though they were mismatched, one significantly bigger than the other. "Should we get playing?"

It took a couple moments for Juleka to realise that she must have seen Marinette asleep on that book in the classroom; she had internalised it as just really deep studying. It took a couple moments more than that to start to imagine all the things she could have done to a sleeping Marinette, and then a couple moments more to realise that she was having intrusive thoughts again. She stuck her tongue out and tried to excise them.

"We should have 'gotten playing'," Kagami stuck the words into place like in a pillory she was aiming to pelt with tomatoes, "half an hour ago!"

"Yeah. Sorry," said Marinette, and Juleka had excised the thoughts to a sufficient degree that when she looked at Marinette she only blushed a little bit. "But the longer we argue about that, the less time we have to play, so what are we playing? It's your turn today, right, Kaggy?"

Kagami pinched the bridge of her nose. "It is. Please don't call me that. And please shut up for half a minute so I can calm down."

Marinette blinked. "Oh. Right. Okay. Yeah, I'll shut up. Just half a minute?"

"Yes."

"Gotcha. I'll be quiet as a mouse."

Juleka could tell that Kagami was doing breathing exercises of some kind. That was maybe a bad sign, but at least she was keeping calm. An unquestionably good sign was that even after half a minute had passed (Juleka was looking at her watch), Marinette didn't say anything — maybe she felt bad about being late, or something like that.

It was in fact a whole 58 seconds before Marinette said, "Okay. It's been sixty seconds," with the entire sixty seconds having passed as she gave that count. "Are you okay, Gami?"

"Don't call me that either," said Kagami, though she sighed. "But yes. And today I want us to play The Black Page."

"The Zappa joint?" said Marinette. "Don't we need a full orchestra for that?"

"I've taken the liberty of writing an adaptation for our trio. All we need is a bass player, a pianist… and a drummer who can follow notation."

Marinette's hand went up. "I think I'll just improvise."

Kagami stood up, grabbed a manila off the piano, and grinned triumphantly. "No, you will not. Because every strike of a drum perfectly matches an instrumental note." She dropped a large stack of paper onto the floor tom, held together with a paperclip that seemed like it might break if a single sheet more was added. It resounded through the room, as Kagami moved on and handed a similarly thick stack to Juleka. "This time, Marinette, you will have to learn how to read notation."

"But… I don't know how," said Marinette. She pulled out her phone and started flipping around on it. "If I find a recording instead, and just learn it by memory…"

"No. You are not allowed."

"I can help," offered Juleka. She gulped. "I know some drum stuff."

"We will be performing this for my term exam," said Kagami. "Two months from now. I expect all of us to have it perfectly together by then."

Marinette let out a strangled wail, fainted, and concussed herself on the crash bell.

#9

Kagami loved playing with people. She was therefore very annoyed that nobody wanted to play with her.

That wasn't true, of course. Juleka and Marinette wanted to play with her. She had also been asked to play with a second group for a performance after her piano teacher recommended her, as their pianist had fallen ill the same day. The performance went well, she thought, especially given how she had learnt everything on the fly — she couldn't add as much flourish as she wanted to — although if she were to be honest, the group had stunk. They were a guitarist, a drummer, and a bass player, and the drummer and bass player would have needed a stepladder to reach Marinette and Juleka's heels. Which was a very frustrating thing to think about, if she were to be honest.

Then again, it was more frustrating that she was unquestionably the best piano player at the entire university, and yet no one wanted to ask her to play with them.

"Y're scaring the hoes," was Juleka's advice when asked at lunch.

"Scaring the hose? What hose?"

Juleka shrugged and did not elaborate. Instead she went back to her lunchbox and stabbed a potato with her fork.

"Juleka. I asked you a question," said Kagami.

At that point, Juleka was saved by the bell that was Luka walking up. Kagami rolled her eyes once she noticed, and firmly didn't look at him.

"Hey, sis," he said. "Do you still have the pick you borrowed?"

Juleka shook her head. "Mgh," she said, because there was potato in the way of saying actual words, or possibly just because she was Juleka.

"I really need it back. It's my lucky pick, and I've got a concert tomorrow night…"

"You lend your lucky pick out to people?" said Kagami, unable to curb her sudden curiosity.

He looked at her like she had asked him to explain heartsongs again. "Er… yes? I want my sister to have some luck, too."

"Luck can't be shared," said Kagami. She then decided to skip the formalities and went straight to the point: "Luck isn't real, either. Play with a different pick."

"K'gami, y're scaring the hoes," said Juleka.

"What hose?"

"Luka…"

This time Luka looked like he had been asked to explain heartsongs, but at gunpoint. "Er. Well. You see, 'scaring the hoes' is a slang term, and it means, well, you're kind of scary."

"What?"

"I don't think you're scary!" he added. "I'm not scared. But you know, you can be a little… difficult? It sounds like you have a grudge against people when you talk to them."

She furrowed her brows at him. "No I don't. I have a grudge against you, because you're playing with Marinette's heart."

There was a moment of pause, then. One that felt very judgemental.

"All I'm saying is, your heart song is a little dissonant," said Luka eventually, with a shrug to cap it off.

"He means y're standoffish 'n' come off sharp," added Juleka. "'n' it's scaring the hoes."

"Who is the hose?" said Kagami, utterly baffled right now; she didn't want to say anything about the other part, because that was something she needed to process before she — and she knew herself well enough to guess this is how it would go — got angry about it.

"The hoes," said Luka. "Like, 'the girls' but a bit… rude."

Kagami turned to Juleka. "… Do I scare you?"

"Nh." Juleka shook her head. "I'm not a ho."

"You're… not a girl?"

"Nnh," said Juleka, and her expression twisted for a bit. Her mouth opened and closed a couple times, and then she ended in a frown and looked at Luka.

His response was so immediate, it was clear he'd been waiting for the prompting this time. "She's a girl. She just doesn't get scared easily."

Juleka nodded, then pulled up her left sleeve. There was a tattoo of some horrible clown monster on it.

"Oh," said Kagami.

"Yeah," said Juleka.

"Anyway, Kagami, you’re cool. Just stop scaring the hoes, all right?" said Luka.

"Stop saying that!"

He gave her a two-fingered salute, smirked, then walked away without another word. Kagami, having completely forgotten that she did come off sharp and as having a grudge sometimes, showed his back the middle finger.

"Hoes," said Juleka.

"What?" said Kagami, who hadn't heard clearly.

"Nh," said Juleka.

And that was that, until the next day.

#10

While the three of them had highly variable success when it came to friends, their instrumental teachers all praised them into the high heavens and quickly put them into the teachers' official surreptitious, never-to-be-mentioned, don't-let-the-students-know books of favourites.

It was mainly because they were good at their instruments, sure. Juleka's teacher crowed constantly about her elegant bass lines; Kagami's teacher was reasonably certain she was training the best pianist she had ever seen, including in the mirror; and Marinette’s teacher had taken to messaging her whenever he wanted to take a nap but needed to wake up in exactly twenty-four minutes. (This last thing was enough to raise red flags for his colleagues, but ultimately it was just too weird of an edge case to care about beyond the requisite raised eyebrows in the break room.)

Regardless — Juleka, Kagami, and Marinette became the core of a group who would perform at the end-of-semester schoolwide christmas ceremony. Because this was a jazz academy, the focus would be more on jazz than christmas, but there would nonetheless be one christmas song in there along with all the jazz. Jazzed up, of course.

It quickly turned out that this christmas song would feature Marinette's worst enemy, though.

"I hate notation," she groaned, face down on the snare.

"Tough luck," said Kagami.

"Hoes," said Juleka.

"You have to learn how to practise music like a professional," Kagami continued, either ignoring or just not having registered Juleka's comment.

"House?" said Marinette. Juleka shrugged.

They wouldn't be alone in the band, either. Vivica the guitarist was there, and a percussionist named Ivan. There was also a horn section featuring the sax, trombone, and cornet players that the teachers had the most faith in, made up of seven people; the whole group of performers would round out to twelve people. Everyone, it seemed, could sightread. Or at the very least, everyone was perusing their sheets and playing quietly along while they waited for active direction from the teachers.

One of the teachers — presumably a guitar teacher, because he had a still-smoking cigarette clasped between his index and middle fingers — stepped up to the centre of the room soon after Marinette's question about living quarters. He clapped his hands loudly and immediately said "Quiet! Speacher teaking, I mean teacher speaking."

Everyone quickly settled down, by the standards of a music academy, which meant it took about twenty seconds. Also, the teacher kept speaking the whole time, which meant only Kagami was able to catch everything.

"This is going to be a very important performance for all of you. It will not count directly towards any evaluation, but your behaviour in this setting will tell us a lot about your ability to cooperate and perform in a group context. We know you're all very skilled musicians," his eye flitted towards Kagami, "so we're sure the concert will be amazing. But keep in mind that we're also analysing your other abilities."

There was a vague smattering of 'Yes, sir's from the musicians. Even Marinette sat up a little taller.

"Today, I think we should start with the arrangement of Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire. It's the one that requires the most practice."

Marinette groaned and suddenly didn't sit tall at all.

"Is there a problem, Miss Dupain-Cheng?"

"No! Nono, I'm fine. Just tired and… brainy. Not brainy. Bad brainy."

He wrinkled his nose, then swept his eyes over the group at large. "Does everyone have their sheet music?" Again, a scatter of 'Yes'. "Right. The lot of you, I want you to spend this next hour practising together, but before you start… are there any parts you're uncertain about?"

Marinette's hand almost went up, but it fell down again before the teacher could see her. There was a vague murmur from the rest that largely sounded like, 'All good,' or just grunts that could be reasonably assumed to be affirmative. Kagami grinned with satisfaction. Juleka sighed.

"Good. Then I'll direct you… start on page one, the first bar. That's a short piano-and-saxophone intro before the whole group comes in between bars ten and twelve. Everyone got that? Then we'll start in one, two, three, four…"

It took until the thirteenth bar before he stopped everyone. "All right, all right, stop! Stop! Vivica, you stop too! Marinette, what the hell was that?"

Marinette looked down at her lap. "Drumming, sir."

"It wasn't the right drumming. Follow the notes on the page, please. Kagami, Jermaine, well done on the intro, try to play it a bit more fluid next time. Okay? Yes, Kagami?"

"Marinette can't read notation," said Kagami, lowering her hand. "She hasn't learned." There was a not-at-all-insignificant undertone of mirth to her voice.

"… What? How can she not know notation?"

"I have also asked her that very same question."

"It's a requirement for enrolling in this academy in the first place! A part of the entrance exam!"

This time, Marinette genuinely did raise her hand, and fast and high too. "M Degrassi thought I was so good he waived it. I have perfect pitch and perfect time."

"… What? Nonsense. You can’t just… Étienne, when I get my hands on you…"

"'m teaching her," said Juleka. She did nothing with her hands.

"Then teach her fast, Juleka. It's only a month and a half until the performance. Ivan, can you handle the drums today? Including sightreading?"

Ivan nodded and also made a sound that was the vocal equivalent of nodding. He stepped out and moved towards the drumset, and Marinette looked absolutely wretched as she hesitated her way out of the drum chair and got to her feet.

"I can… percuss?" said Marinette, strangled.

"If you can't read notation for drums, I don’t trust anything you'd do with a percussion set," said the teacher. "All of you, places. Let's take this again from the top. One, two, three, four…"

This time they made it to bar two before Marinette said, "This isn't the right tempo."

"Please be quiet, Marinette."

"You're supposed to be going 89 beats per minute. This is 101.3 beats per minute."

"If you don't quiet down, I will throw you out. Making up numbers won't make you any less of a distraction."

"I'm not making them up! You —"

"Quiet! Leave now, or you'll be barred from performing altogether!"

Marinette's mouth fell halfway open. She glanced around the room and saw that except for her bandmates, everyone else was glaring at her.

"… Okay," she croaked. And she picked up her bag of sticks and walked outside, just a little too quickly to feel natural.

"Hoes," said Juleka, giving Kagami a pointed look.

They all went back to practising. But Kagami did pull out her metronome before their next try, to make sure she wouldn't be going too fast.

#11

"Ivan is so stupid," said Marinette.

"He's not," murmured Juleka.

They were, technically, supposed to be practising notation. Meaning: Marinette was supposed to be practising, and Juleka was supposed to be teaching her. But it was obviously difficult for Marinette to stay on topic.

"He's a way worse drummer than me."

"Mhm," said Juleka, who couldn't disagree.

Then again, Marinette was quite possibly a once-in-a-lifetime drumming prodigy, and Ivan had still passed the entrance exam and was very good. It was a bit like comparing an Olympian swimmer to a swordfish; both were very good at what they were doing, but the swordfish was just made for being in the water in the way an Olympian never could be.

Plus, just like a swordfish, Marinette right now seemed like she might stab someone.

"His time's all off. And his fills are stupid. I hate him."

"You don't," said Juleka.

Marinette didn't reply. She just frowned at the page in front of her.

"Y're jus' upset 'cos the teacher was rude. Plus y're jealous 'cos he can read sheet music 'n you can't."

"No. He's stupid and bad."

Juleka raised her eyebrows. Eventually, Marinette looked at her, and then groaned and let her head fall to the desk.

"I guess…"

"Y'know how t' fix that?"

"No."

"Learn how to read sheet music."

"No. I can learn anything just by listening."

"Y' can't. Y'gotta have something t' lis'n to."

Marinette groaned again. "Then just record it! Music is impro anyway. All I need is to know the tempo and time signatures and I'm golden."

"What'f time sign't' changes?" said Juleka, who — as a lesbian — was getting very bored of playing the straight man.

"Then… tell me when it changes, I guess?"

"Sheet music does that."

"But I can’t read it!"

"Then learn."

Marinette groaned a third time and rolled her forehead against the desk.

That was the point at which Juleka had had enough, something that came as suddenly to her as it did to Marinette. She clutched Marinette by the shoulders and wrenched her off the desk, glared her directly in the eyes, and said: "Y're jus' making ev'rythin' difficult for ev'ryone! Kagami wants you t' learn 'n so do the teachers 'n ev'ryone else! So pick up th' slack 'n learn to read or I — or," she was honestly too deep into it now to even hear what she was saying, let alone plan it beforehand, and that had to be true because otherwise she had no explanation for what she said next which was, "or I'll spank you!"

She realised. But it was too late. Marinette’s eyes were already going wide, and now she was going to run away because what a freaky and weird thing to say and Juleka was actively having to fight off nasty nasty thoughts and this was never going to —

"— yes, um, of course, yes," said Marinette. And her cheeks were pink and her voice was shaky. "What-whatever you say."

And somehow, she went back to looking at the page. She pointed at a symbol and said, "What does this mean?"

Juleka, too baffled to analyse what just happened and too mortified to address anything else, looked at where the finger was pointing. "Er… um… rest."

"And… this?"

"Also rest."

"Why do they look different? Um?"

"They — 'cos they are dif'rent lengths, so you… rest for… one's half, one's quarter…"

"O-okay," said Marinette. She pointed at something else. "So… quarter note?"

Juleka swallowed. She really needed a rest herself right now, and maybe a bar. "Nh. N… I don’t know…"

"Juleka," said Marinette. Juleka looked, and saw that Marinette’s eyes were fixed directly on her. "Please… command me. I, um, it helps me focus when you, when…"

As Marinette spoke, her eyes just went wider and wider, until she finally trailed off into nothing and her face glowed like a red light except more pink. Her lips contracted as though she'd eaten a lemon.

"F-fuck," she said, and then she scrambled to her feet and ran out the door.

"… Okay," said Juleka, but only after Marinette had already been out of the room for several centuries. Her voice felt strangled in her throat even then. 'Command'… Marinette?

Then she put her head into her hands and tried to scrub away every piece of her shameful imagination, shaving it away one groan at a time. It didn't work.

#12

If Marinette had been weird before, it was nothing compared to what she was after. She would show up late for practice and not even try to offer any excuses; she would stare off at nothing in class and then suddenly jolt and yelp.

Juleka struggled to interpret it, but Kagami was reasonably certain that Marinette was just in the grips of one of her crushes. Perhaps multiple. The two of them often sat next to each other in class, and more than a few times the drummer had mumbled things under her breath that sounded like reveries about things she should not be doing on school property.

The idea of that was frustrating, annoying, and also a few other vaguely synonymous things, for reasons that Kagami couldn't entirely explain to herself. But she was nothing if not a trooper, so she kept quiet about it, at least so long as she wasn’t with Juleka.

Today, though, she was with Marinette. In a study room. And Marinette was not at all following along with the online lecture they were supposed to be watching together. (Juleka hadn't wanted to join them, for reasons she emphatically didn't expand on.)

"Marinette," said Kagami, and Marinette almost flew out of her seat. "Pay attention."

"I — yes," murmured Marinette.

It was a lecture on chord construction for their composition class. Right now they were on polychords, and the teacher was making a point that from a certain perspective, any chord with more than three notes could be considered a polychord. A C major seventh was a polychord of an E minor over a C major. She demonstrated this on a piano just out of view. Then she played a very different polychord and asked them to identify it by ear.

Kagami glimpsed down at Marinette's notes. It was an absolute mess, filled with doodles and scribbles all over the margins, but Marinette was just lifting her pen off the page and right there she'd written 'F# / Em7'. Vaguely impressed by her progress in at least some kind of notation, Kagami nodded and pressed the raise hand button.

"Yes? Kagami, Marinette?" said the teacher, after some fiddling with whatever technological issue she was having on her end.

"Marinette has the answer," said Kagami.

"What?" said Marinette. "How do you — did you look at my notes?"

"I did," said Kagami, looking at the teacher through the screen. "Give the answer."

But Marinette just slammed her arms over her notes, loud enough that it was picked up by the microphone and therefore blew the two of them up full screen. "Don't look at my notes!" she wailed, scrunching the papers together. Baffled, Kagami looked aside and saw that Marinette was wide-eyed, red-faced, and hunched over so as to hide as much as possible of the writing as possible.

"… What?" said Kagami.

"My notes! They're mine! They're secret!"

Just for a moment, Kagami let her eyes droop to what little was still visible. There were flowers and also, unexpectedly, guitars on the page, intertwined in a complete mess. And there were two large hearts with names written inside them. Probably. All she had a chance to see in one was 'ka', presumably 'Luka', and in the other there was also a 'ka'. But the writing had too much flourish to it to be legible beyond that. Even so, her stomach knotted up uncomfortably at the sight.

"Marinette, answer the question," she managed.

"No! Stop looking at my notes!" said Marinette, finally catching enough of them inside her arms to lift them off the table. She turned and ran, leaving her pencil case and drumstick bag behind as she escaped through the door.

"… What?"

"Kagami? Do you have an answer to the question or not?" asked the teacher.

"I… don't have it," Kagami said. "Marinette brought it with her."

"I'd appreciate it if less class time was wasted," the teacher replied drily. "Adrien? Your hand's up. Do you know?"

"It was a major, augmented fifth? And then another chord. Diminished?"

"Not quite. It was actually an F sharp major over an E minor seventh. Now, polychords are difficult, so it's fine not to get them straight away. I just wanted to demonstrate so you'd get an idea."

Kagami nodded at the screen. She wasn't sure why. Glancing over her shoulder, she saw that one crumpled piece of paper had fallen out of Marinette's grasp on the way out, and now lay forlorn just inside the half-open door. For a moment she wanted to reach out and grasp it, to see what on Earth had gotten Marinette so riled up about the idea of someone seeing her notes, but then the computer pinged.

There was a direct message in chat, from Juleka. 'hoes', it said, and nothing else.

And Kagami decided to let the paper lie.

#13

Kagami tried her best not to 'scare the hoes' for a while. This unfortunately required her to be in Luka's proximity, because he was better at explaining it. Luka was also sometimes proximate to other people, which either didn't matter or actively made things worse.

Nino was okay, though. Even though she struggled to understand what he was saying most of the time.

"Yeah," he said one of those times.

She frowned at him. "I asked who your favourite musicians are."

"Yeah," he repeated. "Don't know. I'm into most things."

"Got any examples?" said Luka, who sounded like he was thoroughly amused.

"Don't know. Rad stuff. Noname and Cory Henry. Sevish. James Blake, Flying Lotus…" Luka raised his fist and the two of them traded knuckles. "I like stuff you can dance to, I guess."

"You can dance to Sevish?" said Luka.

"'course. I can dance to all kinds of joints."

"Hudson Mohawke. Cbat."

"Word." Nino raised his fist this time, and Luka bumped it with a grin.

Kagami honestly couldn't stop staring. It was a bit like watching a car crash where the drivers weren't hurt and just went out of the car to shake hands and share a bottle of wine in the wreckage. "None of what you just said made any sense," she muttered, but not too aggressively. Just in case.

"Yeah," said Nino and put his arms behind his head.

"Language is more than words," said Luka.

"That also doesn't make any sense."

From the way Luka was looking at her, she was decently certain that he was mocking her, or at least having a lot of fun at her expense. "Come on, Kagami," he said. "Don't be like that. We're just chatting."

She frowned and folded her arms. "You're being incomprehensible."

"Just like your heartsong," said Luka, still grinning.

Kagami could have said a lot of things at that point. She could have told him that a C sharp minor major seventh chord was one of the easiest chords in the universe, and that dissonance was not the same as incomprehensibility. She could have kept insisting that heartsongs were fake. She could even have told him to kindly go jump out the window.

But the only words that wanted to come out of her mouth were apparently, "Stay away from her."

"Who?" said Nino.

Luka knew, of course. But he just said, "It's just an in-joke. Don't worry about it, Neens."

Which — thank goodness. Kagami had not been planning to talk about that topic anyway, so she let it pass as the lie it was.

Until Nino looked past her and raised his hand and said, "Hey, Marinette! Over here!"

Kagami's heart very nearly stopped. She turned around and sure enough, Marinette was there, walking closer — although maybe the word 'walking' was a little generous, considering her legs were stiff as metronome arms and swung the same way, too. She was staring straight ahead as though not at anyone but instead at some unseen ineffable aspect of the mechanics of the universe.

"Hey, Mars," said Luka. Kagami wanted to slap him.

Marinette came all the way over before she said anything, and then waited just a bit longer, and from the pinkness of her cheeks and the clunky way she glanced between the two boys, Kagami was reasonably certain the awkward hesitation was because of a crush. Two crushes, probably, because Marinette had talked before about both Nino and Luka being hot. Frustrated, Kagami folded her arms and looked away.

"Er, um," said Marinette, and then she said it again, and then, eloquently, "I, um, N-N-Nino, dododo you have thethe… book thingymabobcat um?"

"Sure do, dude," said Nino. He made for his backpack and dug his hands into it; it looked more full than a crowded train.

"O-okay, um," said Marinette. "Goo-goo-good."

"The Goo Goo Dolls are also pretty good," said Luka, to which Nino grunted a half-audible agreement. "Hey, Marinette? Wanna go out this weekend? I'll take you to a fancy restaurant and serenade you with my acoustic."

"No."

Luka didn't seem disappointed by this. He just rolled his eyes, after which they landed on Kagami. And then he winked.

"What?" demanded Kagami.

"Nothing, nothing," said Luka, almost sing-song. In the meantime, Nino pulled out his book, which he handed carelessly over to Marinette with a kind of vague smile on his lips.

"There you go," he said.

Kagami briefly scanned the volume. It was a thick and battered copy of a book called 'Advanced Notation Techniques: Practices and Habits', and there were four authors listed on the cover. This had to be far beyond Marinette's comprehension. "Er. Marinette?"

"Nosorrydon'thavetimegottagobye!" said Marinette — well, she kind of screamed it — and then she ran off, clutching the book to her front.

Helplessly, Kagami turned to Luka, who was actively suppressing some kind of giggle. "Did I scare the hoes?"

"No, I think the hoes scared themselves this time," he said, and then broke into a fit of laughter that had him keeling over. "Oh man. Oh man."

"Isn't that a bit rude?" said Nino, lifting an eyebrow.

"It's a metaphor," said Kagami, still frowning at Luka. "Hoes means girls."

"Okay, that's not a metaphor, and it's still uncool, yeah?"

Maybe it was. But Kagami was too annoyed with Luka's behaviour to really consider what Nino was saying. "Whatever. I'm going too. Don't follow me."

Nino shrugged, while Luka just kept on laughing. "Sure, dude. See you later."

She turned on her heel and walked away, towards the stairs down. Her head was tumbling with Marinette. The way Marinette kept running away. The way Marinette had everyone's heads turning. The way Marinette refused to stay for class but she borrowed books that were way outside her skill level. The way Marinette was a world class drummer with the brain and attention span of someone who shouldn't be. The way Marinette was so incredibly annoying. The way Marinette smiled. The way Marinette cheered and complimented people after every song during practice. The way Marinette…

… fuck.

#14

Juleka found herself thinking about Marinette even when Marinette wasn't there. Maybe in the same way she'd think about a raging fire in a distant building. Or maybe that was mean — Marinette wasn't as destructive as a fire — but she was about as spectacular. And hot.

As a long-time connoisseur of women, Juleka had her physical preferences. Marinette filled some of those, for example the powerful muscles she'd gained from playing so much drums. But really, her main strengths were just her exuberance and her drive. And maybe her tank tops and occasional short shorts, but if Juleka thought too much about those she would have to to gouge her mind's eye out. Exuberance and drive were the important parts.

Neither of those were on display when Marinette grabbed her by the arm and pulled her aside into a practice room one time before their second class of the day, out of Kagami's reach. In fact, Marinette was pinker than a hibiscus and about as capable of speech.

"Er," she said, which might not be a thing hibiscuses could say, but giving someone a hibiscus at least meant something.

"Um?" said Juleka, and realised she didn't really have a leg to stand on in the conveying-things-with-words department.

"L-love," said Marinette.

Certain she'd heard wrong, Juleka found herself grabbing Marinette by the straps of her tank top. "What?" she screamed. "What'd y'say?"

"I, I," said Marinette, wild-eyed.

"What?"

"I… I'm in love with Kagami!" said Marinette, loud — and then quiet, "H-help?"

Juleka let go. It was a reflex, nothing more. Her heart was beating like a drum. "… What?"

"I've fallen in love with Kagami and… and… and you're a lesbian, so you know what girls like, right?"

"Well… um…" started Juleka, about to answer the second half with something like 'you're a girl, aren't you?' until the first half caught up with her. "Wait… how d'you know I'm…"

Marinette's eyes went wider than any eyes Juleka had seen in her life. "I — um — I —" she started.

Then she ran away and just as she passed through the door to the outside, she screamed a very loud, "Fuck!"

#15

It was maybe not surprising that Kagami and Juleka were more at peace when it was just the two of them, but it was still a type of surprise to them. After all, they hadn't really considered each other as specifically interesting people (outside of music); instead, they'd fallen into place beside each other. Marinette was the social glue, even though she tended to attach the wrong pieces to each other and generally leave a huge sticky mess everywhere she went. Just Juleka and Kagami… they could relax more, and be quiet. And when they talked it was less explosive.

"Your brother is… acceptable," said Kagami one time they were waiting in a classroom together.

"—," said Juleka.

"I dislike him but he's not bad."

Juleka nodded. "Mh. Sounds good. Yep. Great."

"Yes."

They were about twenty minutes early, because their instrument lessons had been cancelled for the day — and Kagami had received the news along with the message, 'you don't need lessons either way, just keep practising.' This had, naturally, killed her desire to practise. So until Juleka arrived, she'd instead sat in the classroom with headphones on and criticised Glenn Gould's Goldberg variations. It was always useful practice to figure out the mistakes of the world's top performers; that way she could avoid making them herself. After all, she needed to become the best jazz pianist in all of history, or she would never amount to anything.

"Wh' class," said Juleka.

"The one we're about to have? Music history."

"Oh," said Juleka, in the tone that meant 'Oh, good, I was right'.

"Last time we learnt about hot jazz."

"Nh."

Kagami liked Juleka. She was helpful and a great bass player, and her struggles to speak meant she could also be an excellent silent companion. Despite Kagami's frustrating realisation that she had feelings for the loudest and most obnoxious person in class, if not all of Paris, she generally preferred less noise. Sound should be used for music, not other things.

That said, Juleka seemed a little out of sorts today. It was the subtle things: the movement of her eyes and the twitching of her fingers. And earlier she used a lot of words to say 'okay' where none of the words actually meant 'okay'.

"Are you alright?" Kagami asked, pressing her thumbs together atop the desk. "You seem nervous."

"—," said Juleka. Her eyes met Kagami's and then, immediately, fell away and to the side. "'m thinking."

"Oh. Good. Thinking is wise."

"Ys."

Juleka was also beautiful. This was something Kagami had resigned herself to analysing from a distance. She'd thought about it ever since Marinette declared that Juleka was 'hotter than Luka', which she agreed with, but that was just a fact of the universe. It wasn't a profound observation. It just hadn't occurred to Kagami to consider anything beyond that, like… telling Juleka how she felt. What was the point of that? 'I find you to be very good-looking. Unfortunately, I am currently infatuated with an idiot. Let's keep playing in the same band in spite of this conversation, which will surely not lead to horror and dissolution.' No, better to just let Juleka be beautiful and wait for her obstreperously burdensome feelings for Marinette to pass, too. That way they could just continue being good at music together. Music and emotions seldom mixed well.

She was just about to open her mouth to ask Juleka if there was anything she could do to help, but at that point she heard a very loud whisper from outside the classroom. "Kagami! Kagami! I need you!" it said. Kagami knew the voice all too well, and so did Juleka, and so they both turned towards the doorway, where they saw Marinette's head and also Marinette's hand, both leaning in from the side.

"Eep," said Juleka.

"What?" said Kagami.

Marinette waved smally but insistently, then rested her hand on the jamb. "Come!" she wheedled. "Now!"

Something with the notation thing? Marinette knew about as much about tact as a frightened horse and while a normal person probably wouldn't ask for help like this, Marinette was… Marinette. A twenty-hour free jazz — or maybe just hot jazz — full quartet improvisation session in the shape of a person. Juleka 'eep'ed again as Kagami, perhaps inadvisably, pushed herself out of her seat and walked across to the doorway.

As soon as Kagami was through the doorway, Marinette grabbed her by the wrist and pulled her aside into the nearest practice room. There was a pianist there, practising scales. Marinette grabbed him by the shoulders and carried him, somehow just by the shoulders, out of the room, and then she shut the door and shot a wild look at Kagami.

"What's wrong?" said Kagami, and then because Marinette seemed particularly unsettled today, "What set of complex variables has gone wrong?"

"Nothing," said Marinette. She stepped closer, enough that Kagami could have reached out and grabbed the back of her head and then either headbutted or kissed her. She was visibly sweating.

"Something is wrong."

"Yes. Two thi— one thing." The correction came on a strained inhale, and Marinette folded her hands like she was holding an insect inside it. "I… have to tell you something."

Kagami curled her eyebrows. "Is this about the Black Page performance?"

"Nes! I mean no! I —" started Marinette, and then she squeezed her hands tighter and breathed in, then out. "I'minlovewithJuleka. Help."

"… Help?" said Kagami. It was the only part of what Marinette said that wasn't baffling.

"I need help on, on, on how to get with her," said Marinette. "Advice. You're s-smart. And hot. I mean you're shit hot at knowing stuff — fuck!"

It took until Marinette was already out the door for Kagami to realise the conversation was over. Gaping, she stuck her head outside the door to see, but Marinette was already gone. The only person outside the door was the piano player, who adjusted his glasses carefully and frowned at her.

"Can I get my room back now?" he said.

"… Yes," said Kagami, and stepped into the hallway.

Marinette was in love with Juleka, and planning to act on it. That thought rambled in Kagami's brain as she walked back towards the classroom, though her feet felt like they were stuck in a ridiculous amount of gum with each step she took. Marinette, her current infatuation, was in love with Juleka, her favourite person to spend time alone with. Her bandmates might soon start dating each other. Marinette… had a thing for Juleka. Did Juleka even like Marinette back? Did she like Kagami? Wouldn't this tear a rift into their already fragile band? Two members of the band, none of whom were Kagami, might soon start dating. Unless Marinette kept on being terrible at communicating, which — would hopefully be the end of it.

She slumped back into the classroom but managed to right herself before she found her seat. And she didn't look at Juleka.

"Did she t'll you sh' likes you?" said Juleka. It didn't sound like a joke, but obviously it was one.

"No," Kagami replied.

Marinette never turned up for that class.

#16

Practice felt weird lately. Probably to all of them, but each of them could only sense their own discomfort in the moment, and everything else was just guesswork. Kagami knew she had feelings for Marinette, which was incredibly annoying when Marinette was so incredibly annoying. She also knew she had feelings for Juleka, but those were bearable and less confusing. Juleka knew she had feelings for Marinette, because she couldn't scrub the images out of her brain. Marinette — who could possibly know what was going on inside Marinette's head? Even she probably didn't know.

Even so, Marinette was playing as well as ever. Juleka had gone from being frustrated that the metronome was perfectly in time with Marinette's playing, to not bothering to start the metronome, to using it again just because she wanted to be impressed. Because being impressed with Marinette for her musical talent was a distraction from all the imaginings of herself whipping Marinette and Marinette crying for more. Although a rhythmic crack of the whip — no, no, no.

They were all playing about as well as ever, actually. Music, at least to Juleka, allowed her to cut herself away from what was inside her brain. Instead she let her fingers speak and her soul roar with every strike of a string, and then her brain would just vibrate until the song was over and she had to open her eyes and see her bandmates again. And that was where all the trouble started, because Marinette had feelings for Kagami and that also meant Kagami turned up in Juleka's imagination, and she found herself idly plucking the strings between songs to avoid that happening.

It was a lot worse when they were practising notation together. Marinette had improved, but Juleka didn't have a bass to play. Just increasingly crumpled sheets of paper to clutch.

"All right," said Marinette, once they were through a practice rendition of All the Things You Are. She sounded less bouncy than her usual, except her eyes, which couldn't seem to find a spot to land. "Good stuff, girls. I think we, um, nailed that one."

"You sang the melody wrong," commented Kagami. She put her finger on her own Real Book. "You sang an E flat over the B minor seventh in the middle. That should be an E natural."

"It — it should?" said Marinette, frantically looking down at the floor. "That… oh, that's not a flat sign, is it…"

"No. It's a natural — hang on." Kagami slapped her fingers against the keys, briefly sending out a shock of notes. "You were reading notation?"

Marinette visibly swallowed. "I… have a Real Book too now. I haven't played this song before."

"You haven't — what?" said Kagami. "When did you — what?"

Juleka couldn't help but agree. She had been too busy setting up the microphone when Marinette was talking about tempo, and also not looking at Marinette the rest of the time, so she hadn't noticed it — but now she could see it, the open book at Marinette's feet. It was somehow already shabby and torn, perhaps because Marinette currently had her shoe in it.

"I'm learning notation, right? So I have to… learn by doing," said Marinette, somewhat defiantly but also very weakly. "Why did they make the natural look so similar to the flat…"

"So you mean to tell us… you were sight reading the whole thing while we were playing?"

"… Yeah…"

"Even though you also did a drum solo."

"Well, I wasn't reading anything for that one. Just… counting. Sorry."

Kagami frowned. It wasn't a very enthusiastic frown. "Don't be sorry. It's good you're learning, I just didn't think you'd learn so quickly." She turned to Juleka right after saying that and didn't frown anymore. "Has she also been learning drum notation?"

"Well," said Juleka. She dared a darting glance at Marinette, and immediately regretted it. "Um. 'nly been teach'ng her drum notation…"

"Huh," said Kagami. It was very hard to read her tone. It was somewhat approving, but that was contradicted just a little bit by her face. "It sounds like your lessons have been paying off."

Juleka only dared to answer with a nod.

"That's splendid for you. And you, Marinette." And then through half-gritted teeth: "I'm happy for you."

"Um!" said Marinette. Very loudly. Juleka and Kagami both jolted and turned towards her. "I have a thing! A thingy thing!" Before either of them had a chance to ask why, she pinkened noticeably and kept going, "I wanna do a thing for my term exam. Like, like Kagami's thing, but different."

Curiosity overtook Juleka, despite her vocal cords. "What thing?"

"A song! Not a thingy! Or shnozzle! I wanna play Chet Baker on my term exam!"

"What song?" asked Kagami.

"It's…" started Marinette. She basically lost her voice completely by the end of that single word. She looked down, breathed in, then pulled two sheets of paper out of her drumstick bag. Clasping them tightly, she breathed in again and tried to look at Kagami, but then she looked down again and started folding the sheets into paper planes. As Juleka and Kagami exchanged baffled glances, Marinette threw a plane at each of them and then put her forehead on the snare drum.

Kagami was the first to unfold the plane. "I Fall In Love Too Easily," she read, as Juleka tried to wrangle her plane flat. With a glance at Juleka, then to Marinette, she added: "Very subtle."

"I wanna sing too," said Marinette. "The lyrics're different."

"Okay."

"And… I wanna have Luka play with us."

"Hah!" said Kagami. Juleka, for her part, recoiled and stuck her tongue out. Kagami continued, "I am not sharing the spotlight with a guitar."

Still with her head on the snare, Marinette replied, "'snot guitar. He's percussing." The words buzzed through the drumskin like an army of bees; Juleka shuddered nonetheless at the idea of playing together with Luka.

"I think —" started Kagami.

But Marinette stomped her foot on the bass drum, not harshly, more like a soft thump against nothing. "Please?" she buzzed, pathetically.

Kagami looked towards Juleka, evidently without much hope. Juleka answered the look in kind.

"… Okay," said Kagami.

"Thank you," said Marinette.

Juleka had to wonder: did Kagami know now? Did Marinette tell her that day before class, when she pulled Kagami aside? Did Kagami just lie afterwards? But Juleka had her answer as soon as she asked those questions, because she knew what girls pining looked like. This was a classic case of two people who wanted each other — well, two people who wanted each other and one third wheel who wanted at least one of them — not that that mattered — anyway, this was obviously not the result of two people who had already talked it over. Marinette didn't seem snubbed at all, and Kagami didn't seem girlfriended. Juleka sighed in relief, and then felt bad about the relief part.

Then she looked down at the sheet. It wasn't just I Fall In Love Too Easily. It was also reharmonised with multiple polychords, which Juleka found tiring because she would usually only get to play a single note during them anyway, but maybe Kagami would like them.

Maybe Kagami would also like it because she'd figure out it was a stunt for her sake at some point. Anything was possible.

Juleka regretted her earlier sigh. Not because she felt bad about it, but… because she kind of didn't want Marinette and Kagami to get together. But as with all things… she wouldn't be able to protest loud enough.

She flipped to the next page (that wasn't Fly Me To the Moon) and said, "N'xt song?" And the other two looked at her for a moment, and nodded. And then practice went back to being not quite as normal.

#17

"Now, Marinette," said the probably-guitar teacher. It was just over five weeks out from the big Christmas performance, and about three weeks out from term exams, and they were sat in the large practice room with wooden beams bisecting the floor. All the others who would be playing were also there, of course, and Kagami was watching with rapt attention. "Are you properly prepared today, or do I have to give Ivan the drumsticks again?"

Marinette was obviously uncomfortable with this type of attention. Kagami kind of wanted to push on her and also, kind of not; she scraped her fingernails quietly across the piano keys. But she knew that if she did push she would be scaring the hoes. Even though Nino was right that it was rude to call someone a ho. But even so.

"I think I can do it today, sir," said Marinette. She wasn't even sitting down at the drums; she was standing upright beside them. "I can read notation better."

Kagami couldn't help herself. "Meaning she can read it at all."

"Hoes," murmured Juleka.

"That's rude and unfair," said Kagami.

"Shush, you two. Marinette, have you looked at the sheet music in advance this time?"

"Yes, sir."

"Then let's give it a try. Kagami, Jermaine, you're in the lead now."

Scrunching up her hands, Kagami nodded to the teacher, then shot a glare at Marinette and Juleka. Neither of them noticed, but that was perfectly okay. She was just expressing frustration at… something. She knew what the something was, but she didn't want to admit it in case it would somehow show on her face or in her eyes.

"Marinette? Count us in," she said instead, placing her fingers at the ready. C sharp minor seventh add six. She was prepared.

The beat was tidy. She let it flow through her body as she played the first chord, tried to channel the tempo through her fingers. It worked, at least as far as she could tell, although she was sure Marinette could have nitpicked it as being slightly off. Jermaine's saxophone lay lush on top, and he had decided on playing rubato this time, so it wasn't like they needed to stick a hundred per cent to 89. Marinette would catch them up, anyway.

Then the whole band came in. Kagami hadn't read the sheet Marinette was playing from so she didn't know if the drumming was on the mark, but the teacher at least wasn't protesting. The teacher was actually smoking, which Kagami believed was probably illegal, but she also knew guitarists rarely cared about the law so she kept quiet and focused on playing. Marinette had her nose stuck to her music stand the whole time; everyone else seemed more relaxed. The air felt thick with expectation, though. And Ivan was eyeing the drumset, or possibly Marinette, or possibly the drummer's chair, regularly throughout the performance.

The last chord rang out in a quiet mezzopiano. Everyone breathed out, then looked towards the teacher, and the teacher stuck his cigarette into the wooden beam he'd been leaning on. He didn't get to open his mouth, however, before there was a noise from the drumset. Specifically, a kick and crash at the same time.

"Sorry!" shouted Marinette, loud enough to be heard over the fading din. "I messed up. I suck. Sorry."

"Y' didn't," murmured Juleka, and the only reason Kagami heard her was because there was only one person — Vivica — between them.

"Messed up? How?" said the teacher. "You played the notes right. Mostly."

"But I wobbled on the tempo! I was down to 82 during the bridge. I should have practised more. And then I had to speed up to catch us back up so the whole thing wouldn't last too long and that just destabilised it. I'll do better next time. Sorry."

The teacher blinked, then lifted the cigarette to his mouth. He tried to smoke it, but it was extinguished, so he ended up just sucking on a smouldering cotton stick and grimacing from it. "I'll be honest, Marinette, I don't think anyone noticed."

"I did," said Ivan, raising his hand.

"I don't think anyone who isn't a drummer noticed," sighed the teacher. "Try to brush up some more on the bridge before next practice, though, because you looked uncomfortable while playing. Jermaine, be a little less rubato on the intro. Vivica, I don't want to hear any fills during the trumpet solo, that's Max's place to shine. Stick to the chords. Other than that, good work, everyone. You're a bit stiff and there are still some smaller details, but that'll go away with more practice. Let's take it one more time from the top, and I'll call for a repeat from the bridge if I think it's necessary. But I think this one's going to be a banger."

The last choice of words elicited two groans from the horn section, but other than that people flipped back to the first page and prepared for another round.

Kagami did the same, though she dared a look Marinettewards. To her horror, she saw that Marinette was staring straight at her with eyes that could have been called 'puppydog' if they weren't so pathetic and pleading.

"What?" snapped Kagami, though she didn't mean to snap.

"Hoes," said Juleka. Kagami closed her mouth, because she knew she didn't have a leg to stand on when it came to rudeness right now.

"I don't think we're allowed to use that when there isn't a fire," said Vivica.

"Shut up," said the teacher. "Kagami, Jermaine. From the top. Marinette, count them in."

Kagami stared at Marinette as the drummer raised her sticks and clashed them together. One, two, three, four, she counted — but Kagami found herself wishing Marinette would stop at just two.

#18

It was one week before term exams. Slightly less, in fact. And Juleka sat opposite Kagami in the lunch area with her arms folded. "C'mon," she said.

"We don't have time for social events," said Kagami. She didn't have her arms folded. Instead she had her fingers steepled, and looked incredibly calm. "We need to practice."

"Not tw'n'-f'r sev'n," said Juleka.

"Practicing all hours of day except sleep and classes is not twenty-four seven," replied Kagami. "And we don't have practice on weekends."

Juleka had decided to reintroduce the idea of a social gathering for their little group. This time she had frontloaded her intentions to avoid misunderstandings like last time, but Kagami didn't seem receptive at all. Particularly not to the idea of a video game night.

"'swhy we gotta do Saturday," Juleka insisted.

"No. On Saturdays I practise at home."

"Yer th' best pianist in school! Y' don' need practice!"

Kagami raised an eyebrow. "I'm not yet the best pianist in the world. I can't rest until I have outperformed everyone. Even Hiromi."

"But —"

"Hey, guys," said Marinette suddenly. She plopped down beside them — or to be more specific, one chair away from Juleka, where she also ended up sitting awkwardly on the side of the chair — and breathed out, and then didn't look at either of them. "What are you talking about?"

"Well." Kagami had been as quiet as Juleka while Marinette took her seat, but now she unsteepled her fingers and instead folded her hands on the table. "Juleka wants us to have a frivolous game night at her home this weekend."

Marinette's eyes flickered aside to Juleka. "R-really? That's… cool. What time?"

Juleka then had the baffling experience of watching Kagami's face morph into complete subservience. "… Yes, Juleka. What time?"

And that was how Juleka ended up with two girls in her room, on her bed, with trembling controllers in their hands, but — perhaps luckily — fully dressed. It was at least lucky for Juleka's composure, which was already frayed from Kagami's full-body engagement in the gameplay and from Marinette's apparent god-given talent at fighting games. Neither Juleka or Kagami could touch her, meaning dominate her, meaning beat, meaning win over her.

It was nice, though. Because Kagami wasn't needling Marinette, and Marinette wasn't being annoying about things. They were just hanging out in a way they hadn't really before — they weren't even discussing music. And Juleka loved music talk, she just… kind of wanted to know Marinette outside of her A Drummer-ness. And Kagami outside her A Pianist-ness.

Which went well enough. Marinette was still obviously A Drummer. Kagami still had her hangups. But they felt different when they were all holding the same thing and sitting in the same bed, and the river around the boat rocked them gently with every passing motorised vessel. And they had non-cafeteria food with them.

"This boat would be a good place to hold a concert," said Kagami, and somewhat ruined the mood. "On the deck."

"Ys," said Juleka.

"It's probably a lovely place to be in the summer," said Marinette. "Just for hanging out, I mean. Concerts too." She seemed more fired up tonight than her usual as of late, maybe because she had video games to distract herself.

"Ys," said Juleka, more enthusiastic this time.

"I suppose," sighed Kagami, letting herself fall back against the wall behind the bed. "We should really be practising, though. It's only three days before my term exam, and four days before you two's." The pianists and guitarists and singers were supposed to go first, with backup instruments slotted for the second day, and a third day in case there were delays.

"Too much practice drives you crazy," said Marinette. "General you. Not you specifically. You, um, you're not crazy."

Kagami frowned, but didn't respond. Her eyes were fastened on the TV screen.

"But on the topic of the band…" Marinette's voice was lower now, softer too. She also stared straight ahead at the TV. "Kagami, you wanted a competition for band leader, right?"

"Oh," said Kagami, looking at Marinette's back. "Yes. I did. I forgot about that after you ran away and abandoned us." Thank God, thought Juleka.

"S-sorry. But, but, I have an idea. I think… J-Juleka should be band leader. She's good at teaching and commanding and stuff. And, and you're also good at commanding, Ka-Kagami, but I think maybe Juleka… is better. And I'm terrible at it, so…"

"You are, yes," said Kagami, while Juleka reeled from the suggestion. Kagami looked to Juleka, and Juleka felt her heart run faster. "Are you fine with being band leader?"

Swallowing, Juleka said, "I can't… m' voice…"

"That doesn't matter. I can understand you either way. And Marinette seems willing to try and listen."

"But…"

… would it be a bad thing, though? She could tell the others to shut up and they might listen. Or she could tell them to have social gatherings and not practise 24/7. And maybe, just maybe, she could learn to be a bit more assertive.

Maybe she could tell Marinette to stop pursuing Kagami and instead pursue her — no, bad idea, bad idea. But even so…

"I have one demand of you before that, though," Kagami continued. "I need you to play a solo for Giant Steps on my exam performance."

"… Okay," said Juleka, or rather she swallowed the word, but it at least got out. "Sure." It wasn't that she was categorically opposed to doing solos, she just didn't like the spotlight. But if she was going to be band leader anyway… maybe?

"Good. Then you are our band leader. Leader of our band."

"And, um," said Marinette. She was still staring at the TV, but she was visibly blushing even against the pale blue of the pause screen. "You can both command me. I need to be told what to do, I think. It's nice to be told what to do. I need — god — sorry, I'll shut up." She dropped the controller into her lap and buried her face in her hands.

Juleka very much wanted to do the same thing, for the mental image that had just reemerged from her subconscious. But at that point, the door opened and Luka leaned inside — at first he looked normal, but then his expression morphed into a shit-eating grin.

"Sorry to disturb," he said. "Juleka. Mon cheries."

"Shut up," said Juleka.

"Do you know where the cinnamon is? I need to make a terrible joke," said Luka, unperturbed.

"What?"

"For my boyfriend."

As he said that, Nino — of all people — leant after him and placed a kiss on his cheek. "Word," said Nino.

Juleka, at this point very red herself, threw a plushie at the two of them. "Top of fridge! Blue tin! Get out!"

Luka's grin ate further shit. "Okay, sis. I'll leave you and your girlfriends alone."

"Ugh!"

"But your heartsongs all sound pretty messy right now," he said and winked, and then he put his arm around Nino's waist and pulled the both of them out of the room. The second plushy hit the door just as it closed.

"I thought he was only after Marinette," said Kagami. "Strange."

"No! He doesn't want me! No!" protested Marinette.

"He flirts w' ev'ryone," mumbled Juleka.

"Yes!" said Marinette. Her face was still deep inside her palms, and now the rest of her seemed to be curling up into a cannonball. "Ugh!"

Juleka stared at Marinette for a moment. Then she looked to Kagami. And then she realised it was her time to make calls.

"I th'nk… more gaming," she managed.

They played some more, and ate some more snacks, and Marinette reverted to regular human form. They spent the next two days practising Giant Steps and The Black Page, and I Fall In Love Too Easily but conspicuously without singing or lyrics, and then they had exams.

#19

Exams were on. Kagami breezed through hers and the examinators didn't even need to deliberate before giving her a grade, they just called her in to say she got a perfect score and — frustratingly — to be compared to The Bad Plus. She'd expected the perfect score, because she knew she was far above the required level, but it was still satisfying to have it confirmed and to have it reflected in her grade.

Then came the next day, and Juleka's exam went about the same. She played excellently and even decided to repeat her bass solo success for when they played Giant Steps during her exam, and she got called in to be given a perfect score and to be asked to perform on a CD. This annoyed Kagami, who hadn't been asked the same, but she was happy to hear that Juleka turned them down.

Then, finally, was Marinette's exam. The last one to matter. They breezed through The Black Page and Giant Steps, the two songs that all three of them had on their exam tracklists, and then Marinette had an eight minute solo that had everyone gaping. Except Kagami, who kept her appreciation to a simple nod.

The last song was the brand new one. I Fall In Love Too Easily, which Marinette said she had reharmonised herself, with the aid of an unspecified helper that Kagami strongly suspected was Luka. Why else would he be there, if they didn't even want to date each other?

"My last song," was all Marinette said before counting in. Once the intro was through, she burst into singing — her voice was excellent as always, especially now that it wasn't trying to replicate the saxophone jumps of John Coltrane and instead lay in a normal human register with normal human vocal lines.

And she kept singing well for a while, until suddenly, she forgot the lyrics for the verse. "I fall in love too terribly hard for love to ever last," she said, and then she made a choking sound and stopped singing completely. Her drumming kept on going — as steady as always, though with fewer fills than normal — but it was obvious from her face, and the way she had replaced her singing with a lot of sweating, that she wasn't giving her best performance.

She did catch up again for the last chorus. Her voice grew in strength and frayed slightly, like she was making an effort to be as emotional as possible to make up for the verses she missed. When she did so, the mood of the room changed immediately — the audience was responding to her rallying cry. "I fall in love too terribly hard," she sang, and then puzzlingly, "but I still want love to last." They ended with the ambitious polychord A flat minor over B minor over C major, which Kagami needed to arpeggiate.

And then the audience applauded, perhaps a little sympathetically, but Marinette had still made a stellar performance outside of her slipup. It only took a minute for the teachers to call her in, a minute Marinette spent staring at a corner while Luka rubbed her back and whispered probably-reassurances into her ear, and that Kagami spent fuming with annoyance because she wanted to be the one to reassure Marinette.

When Marinette got out again she was extremely red, and she pulled Luka aside right outside the deliberation room to whisper something in his ear before running away.

"I thought she didn't like you," said Kagami when he walked up to her and Juleka.

"She doesn't," he said. He didn't even grin, he just sighed with a smile. "Anyway, she got top marks, and the teachers wanted you to perform I Fall In Love Too Easily as an extra number at the year-end party. After the big one. Yeah?"

"What?" said Kagami, looking aside at Juleka, who seemed as confused as her.

He grinned this time. "Yeah. I gotta annoy you on stage one more time, I'm afraid."

Juleka walked up while Kagami was sputtering and kicked him gently in the shin. "I hate you," she told him.

"But why?" Kagami managed, too exasperated to fold her arms, so she just grabbed her upper arms very tightly instead. She was pretty sure she was incredibly irritated that she didn't get to talk to her infatuation after that exam performance, and she was certain that — if that were the case — it was partly because she wanted to ask Marinette why only the final lyric was changed. She also wanted to ask Marinette other things, but they were less relevant in the here and now.

"'cos he sucks," said Juleka.

"I meant —"

"Because they thought it was a pretty nifty arrangement," said Luka and shrugged. He looked over his shoulder, as though scanning for someone, but he didn't find them. "Anyway, Kagami? Jules? I think I gotta tell you something. In private."

Kagami frowned. "I don't want you either."

"No, I mean — it's about Marinette," he said, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Let's find a practice room. They should be empty now there's exams happening. Okay? I won't do anything to you."

"… Right," said Kagami, gripping her arms tighter because she didn't believe him. But she supposed she didn't not believe him hard enough to refuse the suggestion.

He pulled them aside to a practice room. Inside was a piano player, the same one from a few weeks back — he took one look at Kagami, groaned, and walked outside with a grumbling "I want the room back as soon as you're done, harlots. And he-lot."

Luka sat down on the piano chair. Juleka and Kagami leaned up against the walls, which were just a little too puffy with all the insulation. "Speak," said Juleka.

"Okay. So," said Luka. He leaned an elbow on the piano, then leaned the side of his head on the hand. "That song's a love song."

"Duh," said Juleka, whose bravery must have returned with the lack of open spaces to swallow her words.

"I meant a love song to someone. She sang it for someone special, or she wanted to."

Kagami rolled her eyes. They'd come back to that again — had Marinette just asked anyone for help? "Juleka," she said.

"What?" said Juleka, staring wide-eyed at Kagami. "N-no, it — she — 's you!"

"What?"

"You're both right, and so very wrong," said Luka. He chuckled, but it wasn't a very brave chuckle. It sounded like something bobbing in water. "She's in love with you. Like, you two together. At once. So she sang a love song for both of you. She failed to sing a love song for both of you."

"… What?" said both of them, simultaneously. Kagami threw a look at Juleka, who seemed completely stunned. For her own part, she was burning in every part of her face. Her hands had somehow let go of her arms and were instead hanging down like claws at her sides. "You're joking," she continued.

"She told me she informed both of you about the other one. I told her that wasn't good enough and she'd never get anywhere with that, because both of you are seriously awkward. No offence, of course. I like both of you."

Kagami, who was too bemused to even register offence right now, said "Okay."

"She planned the lyrics to namedrop you and call out some things she likes about you. But she messed up at the original chorus and sang the original line, and then she forgot everything after that, I think."

There was a throat clearing sound from Juleka. "Er. Why'd she?"

"She likes drama, I guess?"

"Oh."

"Anyway, I'm not supposed to tell you any of this and she'll behead me with a cymbal if she hears I told you this. I'm only telling you because if you play the song again at the christmas fest, and she decides to try making it a confession song — at a party where the whole school and also city government officials are invited — I think it's best if you're prepared so the whole performance doesn't get ruined and turn into a drum solo."

"Indeed. Yes." To add to the redundancy, Kagami also nodded. "I understand."

"Also, I guess I wanted to let you know because —"

Kagami raised her hand.

"— yes?"

"Is that why the song ended on a triple polychord?"

"Honestly, I have no idea. She just wanted it. I think it sounds nice."

Not that it didn't. But there was something just a bit too serendipitous about writing it down as a triple polychord. Kagami glanced at Juleka and saw in her eyes the same conclusion she'd reached: that was also part of it.

"'m fine with it," said Juleka. Kagami felt her eyes bulge, but Juleka added, "Whole band dating."

"What?" — that was what Kagami wanted to say. But she knew deep down that she'd considered it herself and found it not at all distasteful. Instead she said, "Oh."

"Do what you want," said Luka. "Just don't tell Marinette I said anything. I don't want to die. If she sings the lyrics she wanted at the Christmas concert, act surprised but play like pros. And if she doesn't, maybe find a different way to let her know you figured it out."

Kagami nodded again. She didn't add words this time. But Juleka piped in with a quiet, "Th'nks, Luke."

"Yeah," he said and got to his feet. Then he walked out the door with a final sigh and a "Bye, you two. Good luck. See you tonight, Jules."

What else was there to do but stare? Both of them stared — at Luka as he disappeared, at the door as it closed, at nothing once they were alone. Probably neither of them had expected this, but Kagami definitely hadn't. And she kind of wanted to strangle Marinette for being annoying, but… in a sense, she was also just relieved to know her feelings weren't unrequited. At least somewhat.

Something picked at her elbow. It took her a couple of moments to realise that there was only one something in the room, and that was Juleka.

"Let's date," said Juleka.

"… Okay," said Kagami. "Sure. Yes."

"Let's also kiss."

"Yes."

They did so. Then Juleka, band leader, said they should reveal to Marinette they were dating after the semester-end performance. That way they could invite her to date them too, and whether or not she'd sang a confession to them at that point didn't matter. They could ask her anyhow. Kagami agreed — though she couldn't help but feel like she'd just been outmanoeuvred by her bandmates in some way.

On the other hand, though… it was nice sometimes to lose control over things.

Juleka's tongue was down her throat five seconds later, and the pianist outside never ended up getting back in that day.

#20

Marinette sighed. They'd gotten through Chestnuts and all the other songs, and now there was just one song left. Her song. Her exam performance she'd botched. Her love confession, or confessions, which she'd absolutely ruined.

She didn't know if she'd manage today. She hoped she could. She exchanged a glance with Luka, who smiled gently at her, and felt a little stronger for it.

Then she looked to Kagami, and then Juleka, and even though they both smiled she felt less strong for doing that. It was partly because of nerves, but also partly because of the way they smiled. She might have called it 'predatory' if she saw that look on a shark or, hell, even on a goat in a field somewhere.

But it was do or die now, anyway. She'd either do a good performance, or she'd flub it, and that was all. It would be over afterwards regardless.

She counted one, two, and then one, two, three.