Chapter 13 - Crescendo Under Pressure

Four days out from Professor Hendra's deadline, Basement Studio Number Three had fully transformed into a steam kettle ready to blow at any moment. Rehearsal sessions that had once only eaten up a couple of hours each night now stretched well past midnight. The desk in the corner of the studio had disappeared under a pile of paper coffee cups, score sheets scrawled over in red and black ink, and loops of cable left tangled wherever they'd landed. Even the air in the room had started to smell faintly of instant coffee and warm electronics, the particular scent of two people running on too little sleep.

But unlike the days before, the tension filling the room tonight wasn't about who was right in some musical argument anymore. Ever since they'd successfully fused the transition section three days ago, the dynamic between them had shifted into something far more productive—though that didn't necessarily mean calmer.

"The tempo on the ending section still isn't solid enough," Michi murmured, her fingers pausing over the keys as she studied the digital metronome on screen. "If we play it this fast in front of other people tomorrow, I'm worried the rhythm's going to sound sloppy instead of bold."

"That's exactly what makes it interesting." Rimba leaned his guitar against the wall and stepped closer to look at the same screen. "Besides, since when did you suddenly start caring what other people think? You're usually the one who couldn't care less about that."

Michi went quiet for a moment, twisting the sleeve of her cardigan between her fingers. The worry wasn't really about tempo at all, if she was honest with herself. Tomorrow, for the first time, she'd have to play a part full of wild, untamed rhythm in front of Bara, Jefri, and Satria—Rimba's bandmates, whose names she only knew from offhand stories he'd mentioned in passing. As someone who'd spent her whole life keeping every other side of herself hidden from anyone in the campus circle, the idea of showing up "bold" in front of complete strangers felt like walking across a sheet of thin glass.

"I just don't want to let this project down by getting too nervous in front of your friends," Michi finally said, choosing the safer reason to say out loud.

Rimba studied her for a long moment, as if weighing something in his head. "They're not judges, Michi. They're just going to listen, give some feedback, and then we keep rehearsing. There's nothing to be scared of."

"Easy for you to say. You've known them for years." Michi let out a breath, trying to refocus on the metronome screen. "I'm just... not used to performing something unfinished in front of people I don't know yet. At the conservatory, at least, everyone already knows exactly what I'm supposed to sound like."

"Then let's not call tomorrow a performance." Rimba pulled up a chair and sat down beside her, close enough for the distance to feel like support rather than pressure. "Just treat it like a normal rehearsal that happens to have a couple of extra people in the room. If it comes out wrong, it comes out wrong. Trust me, they're plenty used to hearing me play like garbage back in high school."

Michi turned to look at him, one eyebrow raised. "You? Playing garbage? That's hard to picture."

Rimba smirked, sliding back for a moment into the version of himself that liked to tease. "Oh, you haven't heard the story about the time I hit the wrong chord in front of a whole school concert audience and just kept going, pretending it was part of an improvised solo. Ask Bara tomorrow—he still brings it up every single chance he gets."

For the first time that night, a small laugh slipped past Michi's lips, easing a little of the tension that had been sitting heavy on her chest since that afternoon. They dove back into rehearsal, this time with a lighter rhythm—not because the pressure had actually let up, but because the two of them had started finding ways to hold each other steady through it, instead of just testing each other's limits.

As midnight approached, once they finally managed to run through one complete pass of the arrangement without any real mistakes, Michi let herself sink back against her chair, letting out a breath that mixed relief with exhaustion.

"What time are we meeting Bara and the others tomorrow?" Michi asked, starting to gather the score sheets back into her folder.

"Seven in the evening, at Studio Rongga." Rimba coiled up his guitar cable, glancing at her briefly. "Don't worry. I'll be there, right beside you, in case you suddenly need an excuse to bolt."

Michi smiled faintly, though somewhere in her chest, a worry that had nothing to do with tempo or pitch—the worry of just how close her secret world was about to stand next to Rimba's wide-open one, tomorrow night—still hadn't fully quieted down.

She lay awake a while longer than usual that night, staring at the ceiling of her room, running through every possible way tomorrow could go wrong. What if one of them recognized the way she held a drumstick, even without seeing her behind a kit? What if Bara mentioned some detail about a Midnight Frequency show that only a drummer would know how to react to? She'd spent years perfecting the art of keeping two lives from ever touching, and now, for the sake of a project she'd never asked for, she was about to walk them within a few feet of each other on purpose.

It wasn't the tempo that scared her, in the end. It was the thought of finally standing in a room where both versions of herself—the polished pianist and the reckless drummer—might, for one careless second, forget to stay separate. And somewhere underneath that fear sat a smaller, quieter one she refused to look at directly: that maybe, after everything, she didn't actually want to keep them apart anymore.