Final Riff

Chapter 12

Chapter 12

"Life fails to be perfect, but never fails to be beautiful..."

"You need to sleep..."

Haruna looked up from her guitar and watched as their drummer sat beside her on the floor with a solemn look.

"I can't..."

She whispered and played her guitar once more – practicing the riffs she wasn't supposed to play but now, she has to. Haruna felt warm hands touched her shoulders and willed her to look at Rina once more.

"You must. Haruna, you'll burn out yourself if you don't take a rest," Rina muttered. Worries were written in her face that Haruna shouldn't be providing on the already-stressed woman.

Haruna sighed and slowly let her guitar slip from her hands as Rina took it and placed it on its rack. She sat back down. Haruna didn't think of anything else and just lay her head to Rina's shoulder. The woman didn't protest and let Haruna stay that way for a few minutes.

"What do you think will happen now?" Haruna asked with fear in her voice. She didn't know she was holding her fist tightly until Rina brought her hands to her and held it with the gentleness she could muster.

"I don't know..." She answered truthfully and caressed Haruna's hands that would assume to be soothing the vocalist. It did in some degree but everything she had feared and the gravity of the situation they were all in was much bigger to be soothed with a simple gesture...well, all gestures if it came to that.

"I'm scared..." Haruna suddenly let out. Her voice was so broken she didn't even recognize it as hers. Rina's hands clenched Haruna's hands and brought her free hand to rub Haruna's arm.

"We all are..." She whispered and felt the tears coming down.

"I'm scared...to lose her," Haruna finally admitted and that brought the tears on her eyes to escape. She felt herself shake from all the emotions she felt in the past few hours. They couldn't fathom what will happen now. They were all good before Mami suddenly collapsed again. This time, it was serious and life threatening. They knew that they almost lost her that day...again.

"We won't. She'll be alright," Rina muttered bravely but the unpredictable way the disease seems to crush every hope she had but she didn't let it show as Haruna needs the support she can have from her friends. Haruna was meant to be the strong one and hold it altogether but maybe it was too much already and her body and mind couldn't cope with it any longer.

The two women stayed that way for longer than they should until the exhaustion from all the nights they've practiced and the events that happened just a day ago was finally letting their body submit in the needed rest they should have.

It was in that position that Tomomi and Eisuke found the two in the recording studio. They were meeting up with the crew and tried to talk about what they should do next because the concert was just a few days – two days and a few hours to be exact – but they couldn't find any solution to it. Haruna and Rina left in the middle of the meeting when they couldn't come up with anything. Tomomi and Eisuke stayed and tried their best but all they've thought leads to one thing only – Mami will not be in it anyway.

As the two watched the sleeping women at the room, they've decided to wake them up and persuade them to finally go home and just rest for the day even though there was a lot more work to do.

"Rina, Haruna. Wake up," Tomomi gently shook their shoulders. The two frowned but slowly they've opened their eyes to see a haggard-looking Tomomi.

"Time to go home. We should take the day to rest," She told them. Eisuke told her to do it and she couldn't argue anymore.

"But...we still have a lot of things to do," Haruna was finally waking up and found the gravity of just resting the day to be somewhat ridiculous to do.