Chapter 15: Live Music, Mild Chaos

Yuna's POV

Sunset poured through my curtains, warming the side of my face as I lay sprawled on my bed, staring at my phone screen.

My heart was still racing, my fingers hovering over the email I had just read for the sixth time.

They loved it.

Ryo Ishikawa and his producer actually loved my song.

The same song Kai unknowingly helped me write.

I buried my face into my pillow, half-smothering the squeal threatening to escape.

After all the stress, the late nights, the countless rewrites—I finally did it.

Before I could fully process the rush of emotions, my phone buzzed again. I nearly dropped it.

Manager

I sat up so fast my blanket slid off my shoulders. Taking a deep breath, I answered.

"Hello?"

"Yuna," my manager's familiar voice greeted, sounding pleased.

"Mia just updated me. Ryo and his team are really happy with your song. I just wanted to say congrats again."

A giddy smile tugged at my lips. "Thank you."

"I knew you could pull it off," they said.

"We'll set a meeting soon to go over the next steps, but for now, enjoy this win."

I nodded, even though they couldn't see me.

"Got it."

"Oh, and Mia mentioned you have some plans tonight?"

I sighed. "Yeah, there's a school band performance. I still have to attend."

"Ah," they said, amused. "Well, have fun. You earned it."

We said our goodbyes, and I flopped back onto the bed, staring at the ceiling.

Kai had no idea. He probably didn't even remember how he had helped—just casually throwing out ideas while pretending he wasn't invested. If I told him, would he be surprised? Would he care?

Not that it mattered. I wasn't planning on telling him anytime soon.

A knock downstairs snapped me out of my thoughts.

Aunt Rosa's voice followed. "Yuna, Kai's here!"

I bolted upright. Already?!

Scrambling to my feet, I grabbed my jacket and shoved my phone into my bag.

Kai had no clue I was a songwriter. And for now, I planned to keep it that way.

-----

The school's mini-gym was already buzzing with life by the time we arrived. Students crowded the entrance, some chatting excitedly, others checking their phones like they had somewhere better to be.

The air smelled faintly of sweat, cheap cologne, and the suspiciously artificial cheese from the cafeteria nachos someone was trying to sell near the door.

And somehow, I had managed to drag Erika into this mess.

She stood beside me, arms crossed, eyebrows raised in sheer, unfiltered skepticism.

"You expect this to go well?"

I shrugged, adjusting my bag over my shoulder. "Maybe?"

Kai, standing on my other side, exhaled like he was already regretting every decision that led him here.

"That's reassuring."

I grinned. "See? Kai gets it."

"I do get it," he said. "And that's exactly why I'm concerned."

Erika scoffed, glancing around. "I still don't know why you let Leo force you into this."

"Correction," I said. "Us. He forced us into this."

Kai frowned. "Leo forced you to come?"

"Oh, you have no idea," Erika muttered.

Before I could explain, the speakers let out a deafening microphone screech, making everyone in the gym flinch. Erika shot me a look so deadpan it could have been framed in a museum.

"See?" she said. "This is already a bad idea."

And then, as if he had some supernatural ability to appear at the exact moment he was being talked about, Leo came jogging toward us, all bright smiles and boundless energy, as if he wasn't the reason we were currently suffering.

"Yuna! Erika! You actually showed up!"

Erika scoffed. "As if we had a choice."

Leo grinned like that was the best compliment he'd ever received. "Hey, I told you it'd be fun."

"Define fun," Erika deadpanned.

Leo smirked. "Loud music, bad decisions, and maybe some regret by the end of the night."

Kai muttered, "Sounds about right."

I sighed. "Leo, if you get us into trouble tonight, I'm making you personally responsible for all damages—emotional and physical."

Leo threw an arm around my shoulder like I hadn't just threatened him.

"Relax, Yuna. It's just music. What's the worst that could happen?"

Erika and I exchanged a look.

We both knew better than to ask that question.

The moment the band stepped onto the stage, the crowd erupted into cheers—mostly out of blind enthusiasm, completely unaware of the chaos about to unfold.

Erika, standing beside me with her arms crossed, let out a deep sigh. "This is going to be a disaster."

"Have some faith," I replied, though even I wasn't convinced.

Leo, the desperate and stressed leader of this tragic ensemble, clapped his drumsticks together with the energy of a man who had already accepted his fate.

"Alright, guys! Let's give them a show!"

From the back of the stage, Milo, their eternally dead-inside bassist, slowly blinked. If he had any emotions left, he wasn't showing them.

Ethan, the so-called lead guitarist, adjusted his sunglasses (despite the fact that we were indoors at night) and threw a cocky grin at the audience.

"Get ready to rock."

Kai, arms crossed beside me, sighed. "This is going to hurt."

And then it began.

Ethan, in his usual overconfident disaster fashion, immediately messed up his solo, his fingers slipping on the strings. Instead of smoothly transitioning into the next chord, he played something that sounded like a cat walking across a piano.

Noah, their keyboardist, tried to cover for him—except he was on the wrong key entirely.

The song was in C major. He was playing… something that definitely wasn't C major.

Lena, the lead vocalist, soldiered on, hitting a note so high and off-key that half the audience instinctively cringed.

Milo, the only semi-competent one, kept playing, his expression unchanged. He had seen too much to be affected.

Leo, looking like a man barely holding onto his sanity, tried to keep the beat steady, but at this point, it was like trying to row a sinking boat with a spoon.

Someone in the audience started laughing. Then another. And another.

Erika turned to me. "I told you."

Leo slammed his drumsticks onto the set. "WE'RE NOT STOPPING!"

Lena flipped her hair, completely oblivious to the disaster happening around her. Ethan threw in another unnecessary guitar solo, hitting more wrong notes than should be legally allowed.

Kai winced. "I think my ears are bleeding."

"Shhh," I whispered, eyes sparkling with amusement. "This is art."

Leo, on the verge of a breakdown, screamed, "KEEP PLAYING!"

And against all odds, they did.

By the time the song finally gasped its last, wheezing note, the damage was done. The audience sat in stunned silence, processing what they had just been forced to endure.

Then, chaos.

Some people were openly laughing, unable to contain themselves. Others looked physically unwell, like they had just watched their childhood dreams shatter in real-time.

A girl near the front had her head down on the table, refusing to look up.

"This is performance art, right?" a guy near the front whispered, looking around for confirmation.

"Like, they're doing this on purpose?"

His friend, wide-eyed and shaken, whispered back, "No, dude. This is real."

Leo, the only one still fighting for his life, slammed out the final drumbeat like a man trying to summon divine intervention.

He sat there, breathing heavily, gripping his drumsticks like they were his last remaining will to live.

Silence.

Then—scattered, hesitant claps. The kind of polite clapping you do when someone's five-year-old forces you to watch their 'play' and you don't want to ruin their dreams.

Ethan, ever the optimist, pulled off his sunglasses with a dramatic flourish and ran a hand through his messy hair.

"Nailed it."

Noah, who had somehow ended up two entire keys off from the rest of the band, squinted at him.

"Did we?"

Lena, ever the main character, flipped her hair and struck a pose, as if the entire school hadn't just suffered through five minutes of unfiltered auditory trauma.

"The crowd loves us."

A pained noise escaped Kai as he stood beside me. "Do they?"

Even Milo, the eternal void of emotion, looked mildly disturbed. He stared down at his bass, as if questioning his entire existence.

Leo, visibly shaking, turned to his bandmates. "What the hell was that?"

Ethan shrugged. "Creative freedom."

Leo inhaled sharply, as if actively resisting the urge to commit murder. "That was not freedom. That was a sonic disaster. That was the exact moment my ancestors disowned me."

Noah coughed into his hand. "At least no one threw anything?"

Thud.

A crumpled-up flyer hit the stage.

Leo's soul physically left his body.

I clapped him on the back as we passed by, offering the most comforting words I could think of.

"Hey. At least it's over."

Leo stared blankly into the distance, completely dead inside. "I'm never recovering from this."

From the back of the crowd, someone muttered, "Did she say the crowd loves them?"

Another voice responded, "We should check on her. That's some serious delusion."

And just when we thought it couldn't get worse—

"ENCORE!"

Leo visibly flinched.

Leo wasn't saying anything. He wasn't crying, wasn't shouting, wasn't even moving. He just sat there behind his drum set, gripping his sticks so tightly his knuckles turned white.

His eyes, usually burning with overdramatic passion, were blank. Hollow.

The audience had already moved on—laughing, whispering, walking off to get snacks like they hadn't just witnessed a slow-motion car crash.

A few were still snickering, shaking their heads, exchanging amused looks. The worst part? No one was even surprised.

I glanced at the others. Ethan was furiously retuning his guitar like that had been the problem. Noah looked lost, like he was still trying to process how it all went wrong (as if he hadn't been mashing random keys the whole time).

Lena, for once, wasn't talking about her "future as a pop star."

She just stood there, gripping the mic, staring at the floor.

Then there was Milo.

Milo, who never cared about anything. Milo, who was always just there, quietly judging everything from the shadows. But right now? Even Milo looked wrecked. His bass hung limp at his side, and for the first time ever, he didn't look like he was above all this. He just looked tired.

I exhaled.

I didn't want to care. This wasn't my problem. It wasn't my band. It wasn't my dream.

But watching Leo—Leo, who never gave up, who talked about this band like it was his life's mission—just sit there in stunned silence, like a part of him had died on stage…

I couldn't just stand here anymore.

I looked at Kai, who was still watching the stage, hands shoved in his pockets, a flicker of sympathy in his usually unreadable face. He didn't know what I was thinking. No one did.

But I knew one thing for sure.

I wasn't going to let this end like this.

To be continued.