We end on a G. I’m pretty sure it’s a G. I’ve been looking a little into music theory, it’s surprisingly easy to catch. Easier than playing at least. We’re on the third fret on the E string, or at least I am. I think I’m playing it right. Yeah, it’s a G.   Both Hanako and Ken have their days-off today, so it’s just Ritsu and me in the music room. It’s been a few weeks since Ken and Hanako joined, and what once was spontaneous has now become routine. Hanako and Ken only show up at Tuesdays and Thursdays, which leaves Ritsu and me with three days with just the two of us. At first, we were practicing on Saturdays as well, but it wasn’t really needed, so we dropped it. Or rather, I dropped it. Ritsu seemingly spends all her free time up here.   R: Hey, Hisao! Ritsu looks really fired up, but she looks like that all the time so I don’t really read much into it. Still, I give her my attention. Anything else would have been pretty stupid. R: Let’s get locked inside the school tonight! What? H: Why? You don’t spend enough time here already? R: Don’t you think it would be sort of magical, seeing the school as it sleeps? H. I can’t really say I see the appeal. R: C’mon, I even brought… By the sound of it seems like she has fucked up something. R: …one sleeping bag for myself…   Suddenly, the sound of steps can be heard ringing through the corridor. R: Quick, hide! I stutter out some form of protest, but from the moment she grabs my hand, I know I’m fighting a losing battle. She pulls me into the dusty storage room, the door closes just mere seconds before the main door to the music room is opened. There’s no way the inspector guy didn’t hear us. No way. Still, we are clinging to the walls, trying to be as silent as humanly possible.   The steps come to an abrupt end right outside of the door. He heard us, there’s no way that he didn’t hear us. And still, he’s just standing outside there. I can feel a drop of sweat forming on my forehead. It’s slowly making its way across my face; I can feel as it’s cooling down from the initial body temperature. Is this some kind of torture? I shoot a glance over at Ritsu, she seems to be taking the suspense in a completely different way, and a wild grin is plastered across her face. She seems to find thrill in knowing we’ll soon being caught, while I can only think of what it’s going to lead to. I’m not sure which one of us has the better approach.   The rattling of steel can be heard from the other side of the door, then a key is inserted and turned around in the lock. Wait. He totally knows we’re in here. He heard us.   But locking us up here was the perfect punishment. If there’s any complaints raised, he can claim he didn’t knew. And if we bring any attention to ourselves we’ll have to explain why we were hiding in the first place. The steps have already vanished out of the room before I even make up my mind about whether I should try to get his attention so he’ll let us out or not. Ritsu seems to have her face frozen in a flabbergasted expression, but the statue-like expression break into a sheepish grin after a few seconds. R: ehehe R: Seems like we’re stuck here. H: Why did I even agree with you to hide? R: You didn’t really, I just pulled you over here. R: “can you ever forgive me?” H: What’s with the English? I thought you were a nationalist or something. R: Nah, English sound cool, I’m just afraid it’ll lose the magic if I ever learn it. R: And I’m not a nationalist, what the hell?   Ritsu flicks the light switch, and the realization that the storage room not exactly has gotten less crammed since our last visit hits the both of us simultaneously. H: There’s seriously not even enough space to sleep in here, except for in the chair. R: Guess we’ll be rock and rolling all night then. I can’t help but being influenced by her positivity in this admittedly rather silly scenario. R: Might as well make the best out of it since we’re trapped here, you know. H: You didn’t plan this, did you? R: Nah, it’s like I said we were gonna check out the school at night together. H: Well that almost sounds romantic. Ritsu suddenly gets very flustered, her whole face flushing a deep shade of red. It catches me a little off guard; I didn’t mean anything with it. Her answer comes from behind the hands she has brought up to her face in an unsuccessful attempt to conceal her blush. R: I didn’t mean it like that! R: idiot. H: You’re overreacting. Ritsu just goes silent for a few seconds, before she once again speaks.   R: What are you gonna do after graduation? Sometimes I just can’t follow Ritsu’s thought process. Guess I’ll never know unless I ask. H: What’s with that all out of sudden? R: Partly because I want to get away from the last topic and partly because I want to talk about what I want to do after graduation. H: That’s not how you socialize. R: It has worked fine so far. I just let out a sigh, I don’t really have any other comment.   I don’t have any exact plan for what I’m doing after high school is over, I want to go to university, but I don’t know anything beyond that. Frankly I didn’t think Ritsu would have planned anything either, but it seems like she has, unless she wants to brag about her laziness for some reason. R: Aren’t you gonna ask? H: Sure, what are you planning? R: I’m gonna be a rock star. H: Sure you are. R: I’m serious, don’t you think I can do it? H: It’s not easy. R: Nothing is easy, I want to be a rock star. H: It’s seriously a lot of hard work. R: As opposed to becoming a doctor or whatever? R: Did you know that before I came here I could barely keep a rhythm, I’d rush through the songs and I’m honestly impressed that anyone managed to play with me. R: Back then I played in an all-girl band, so it was okay because the most important thing was that we were cute. R: But we’d always get comments on it, and now when I don’t have the others to pull me into stardom, I have to work on it. R: So I got a thing that plays a steady beat, metro- something. R: and now I’m always listening to it when I’m by myself, even when I’m sleeping. R: I think it has helped. R: You telling me I can’t make it will just fuel me further, too many have told me that I can’t make it by now for me to not pull it off. She takes a short breathing pause, I’m wondering why she feels like defending herself this intensely to me. R: And I already practice pretty much at any free time I have, don’t you think that’s hard work, especially with this fucked up thing. She limply throws her right hand into the air for emphasis. I’m left speechless, I don’t know what to answer, she seems so passionate about this, but then again picking something that farfetched as your only career path seems like a really bad idea.