The thing about getting used to something is, once it changes, you realize how badly you relied on it in the first place.
For months, I saw her only on trains — that narrow window between sunrise and school, sealed off by cheap earbuds and coffee-stained uniforms.
Now?
She exists everywhere.
In hallways.
In the courtyard.
In the music room.
In places where I'm not used to seeing her — smiling like she owns the space.
It's mildly terrifying.
---
She joined the music club.
And by "joined," I mean she walked in one afternoon, poked around, threatened to break a ukulele, then sat in the back and refused to participate until someone played a Mitski song.
By the second meeting, she was sitting cross-legged with a cheap keyboard on her lap, pretending not to know how to use it.
By the third?
She was laughing with second-years and writing lyrics into a star-covered notebook like she wasn't a flight risk.
---
She passed me a slip of paper in class one day.
I expected a drawing. Or a sarcastic haiku about my bad posture.
Instead: lyrics.
Messy handwriting. Too many metaphors. A coffee stain on the edge.
> "It's about... y'know. Stuff."
That was all she said.
Then she leaned back in her seat and chewed on the end of her pencil like she hadn't just dropped emotional TNT in my lap.
---
The lyrics weren't even subtle.
There was a whole verse about a boy with "silent hands" and "weather in his eyes" — which is either deeply poetic or a weird way to say I need sleep and eye drops.
I didn't ask.
She didn't explain.
---
After school, I walked by the music room.
Not on purpose.
Definitely not.
Totally not timing my route to pass it exactly when I thought she'd still be there.
Inside, she was laughing with a girl who played guitar upside down.
Like, literally upside down. I don't know. Art kids are strange.
Hikari leaned over the keyboard and tapped something out — a few notes, then a frown.
She didn't see me.
Which felt... weird.
Not bad.
Not good.
Just different.
---
That night, I opened my sketchbook.
Drew her without realizing it.
Again.
Not the usual: not her with messy hair or headphone wires in knots.
Just her sitting in that music room, smiling like the piano wasn't a battlefield.
---
She texted me around 10 p.m.
> [Hikari]: if i wrote a song abt u would you sue me
[Me]: probably
[Hikari]: u wouldn't
[Hikari]: you'd cry
[Me]: inaccurate. i'd leak it anonymously and deny involvement
[Hikari]: liar
[Hikari]: i started it already btw
[Hikari]: just don't make a big deal out of it
I didn't reply.
Because I was smiling.
And apparently that makes me emotionally compromised.
---
The next morning on the train, she looked tired.
Her hair was tied sloppily.
Her jacket was on inside out.
There was pen ink on her chin.
"You look like a Tumblr post from 2012," I muttered.
She yawned. "Stayed up late. Music things."
"Ah yes, the painful suffering of the artistic elite."
She shoved a muffin at my face.
"Shut up and eat my breakfast. I wrote you into the chorus."
---
I took the muffin.
It was banana.
Not my favorite.
But still warm.
Still hers.
---
We shared earbuds.
As usual.
Except this time, I noticed how she didn't just lean against me — she stayed there. Settled in. As if the train was a place she belonged again.
---
Halfway through the ride, she said:
> "I didn't think I'd like school again."
I didn't respond right away.
Just kept staring at the window like the scenery would give me answers.
Finally, I muttered:
> "It's easier when someone's waiting at the end of the day."
She blinked up at me.
Then nodded once.
Tucked the earbud back in.
And closed her eyes.
---
I kept looking at her for a moment.
Because for the first time in weeks, she looked like she wasn't running anymore.
Like the lyrics were slowly becoming her.
Like this, all of this — the club, the music, even the awful banana muffin — was her rebuilding from the inside out.
---
And me?
Still in the same train seat, holding the same bag, listening to the same jazz playlist.
But it didn't feel lonely anymore.
Just... steady.
---
Maybe she's the one expanding.
But I'm still the stop she returns to.
And for now?
That's enough.
---