“It moves too fast.”

Reyhaan set his pen down and tapped twice on the lyric sheet. “Second verse. It just... slips through. Like it’s gone before it even lands.”

An unfinished ambient loop Ilan had been testing played low in the background. Afternoon sun filtered through the high windows, spilling long rectangles of warmth across the soundproofed walls. Most of the overhead lights were still off. Only one pendant above the main console glowed amber. The room smelled faintly of cedar polish and old vinyl.

Silas, cross-legged with his guitar propped against his knee, glanced over. “So what – slow it down?”

Reyhaan nodded.

The others were scattered across the studio like the music had poured them into place. Ilan was quietly noting timings in a battered notebook near the window, Jay half-curled on the carpet with a leaking iced coffee cup beside him, and Lucian sat in his usual spot – hood up, one leg stretched over a speaker case, laptop balanced precariously. The air held its usual mix of warm amp dust, overworked ventilation, and some mysterious herbal tea someone had brewed and abandoned hours ago.

“We could strip the bridge before it,” Ilan offered. “Or let the second verse open quieter. Like… just voice and a texture pad.”

“No textures,” Jay said immediately, from the floor. “The last track had four and a half textures and zero groove.”

Lucian didn’t look up. “You are the half texture.”

Jay chucked a crumpled napkin in his direction. It bounced off a cymbal with a soft clang.

“Okay, but seriously,” Jay sat up and scratched his head, “what’s the line we’re keeping? The chorus is fine now. It just needs one line that stops you.”

Reyhaan reached for the lyric page again, rewrote the middle line, slower this time. He circled it once.

“You stayed like silence might mean something.”

That pulled a pause. Silas let his fingers rest across the strings. Lucian looked up. Even Ilan, who had been testing chord timings, stopped mid-strum.

“That’s the line,” Ilan said softly.

Reyhaan hadn’t meant it as a thesis. But it landed like one.

Maybe silence could mean something – if it stayed. If it chose to stay.

Lucian leaned back as he shut his laptop. “You know what would carry that?” His gaze landed on Reyhaan. “The ocean track. From yesterday. The one you made me sit through at your place while you ignored your tea.”

Reyhaan blinked. He didn’t reply, but Lucian had already stood up and was crossing the room.

“You recorded it, yeah?”

Reyhaan hesitated, then reached into his bag and handed over his phone.

Lucian already knew where to go, like he’d done this a thousand times. The room dimmed slightly as he connected the speaker. Then –

A long, slow inhale of a sound. Waves – not literal ones, but textured, layered. A slow rising breath of sound, glassy and distant. Underneath, something hummed – not quite melody, not quite drone – like a memory that had chosen not to speak.

Nobody said anything for a while.

It didn’t demand attention. It just existed – like breath, or memory. Like the sea when you’re too tired to name the waves.

“… Okay,” Silas said first. “That’s – not bad.”

“What even is that low-end thing?” Jay asked. “Is it... water?”

Lucian raised an eyebrow at Reyhaan. “Ask the artist. He made it after –”

Reyhaan cut in. “After you renamed all my files ‘Moody Bitch Hour,’ yes.”

Jay snorted. Ilan covered a laugh.

“One hour?” Silas murmured. “He’s being generous.”

Lucian raised both hands. “I was helping.”

Silas smiled, adjusting his tuning slightly. “Let’s lay it under the verse. Just the first loop.”

“And maybe fade it in again before the last chorus,” Ilan added.

Reyhaan took the phone back and set it beside his lyric notebook. But he didn’t press pause.

Jay flopped back against a stray pillow. “Can we not call it Melt Between Hours again? Sounds like someone got dumped in a humid subway station.”

Reyhaan let a soft breath escape. “We’re calling it Distance Doesn’t Echo.”

The room returned to its quiet frequency: layered voices, scrawls of lyric fragments, the shuffle of chairs. It felt like home – except this time, no one was rushing toward something. They were listening. Letting things build.

Lucian tapped a faint beat against his thigh. Silas added a few chords, then looked up. “Try layering something sharper. Something that cuts through the stillness without breaking it.”

Reyhaan’s suggestions came slower than they once had – but they were deliberate now, less scattered. When his voice caught on a phrase, Ilan filled it in without breaking rhythm. Lucian adjusted a filter when Reyhaan pointed with a half-lazy flick of his fingers instead of speaking. There was no awkwardness in it. No gap.

During a break, as Jay and Silas argued over whether a sound was a synth or a “really offended bird,” Reyhaan stepped back toward his phone. It had lit up earlier, but he hadn’t checked.

Aria’s name sat at the top.

[1:03 P.M.]

Aria: Did you eat today? Just wondering.

Also, that sandwich you brought last time? Where was it from? I think it’s become my new favorite.

[1:10 P.M.]

Aria: Oh. Also…

The track last night – felt like it knew how to drift and stay. That makes no sense. Sorry – maybe it’s just one of those feelings that only makes sense when you’re not trying to explain it.

[2:30 P.M.]

Aria: I hope you're eating real food and not just those sesame snacks again.

He smiled – softly, the kind that stayed longer in the eyes than on the mouth.

He typed back:

“Studio day. Had real lunch, can confirm. Will tell you about the sandwich source later. And your words always make sense. Will talk when I’m free.”

He opened Ayaan’s message next. Photos of a nearly-complete workspace – fresh floors, neatly lined rigs, a caption: Studio’s done. Finally. All cleared. Should be around by the end of the month. Also, thanks for sending Kian. That guy’s got some wild ideas. Could be genius. Or chaos.

Reyhaan shook his head, smiled again.

A moment passed. His chest felt warm, and oddly still.

Drift and stay.

Like how this day felt. Like how her words always sounded – quiet, but shaped into something worth keeping. Like silence, if you knew how to listen to it.

His fingers paused, then drifted – to the mail app. A notification from the sound design competition – the one Kian had convinced him to submit to.

He’d won.

No fanfare. No nerves. Just… won.

Reyhaan took a screenshot, sent it to the group chat with Aria, Maya, and Kian.

Reyhaan: Kian promised to give a dramatic speech in my place if I won. And cry a little. I expect video proof. Certificate demands a bow.

Then he slid the phone back into his pocket.

Lucian was looping the ocean track now – layering it under Ilan’s riff. Jay tapped out a new rhythm on a box of backup strings, while Silas marked quiet beats on his page.

The studio buzzed, but gently. No urgency. Just movement. Like everything was finally unfolding at its own speed.

Reyhaan looked down at the lyric page again.

That line.

The one they’d kept.

You stayed like silence might mean something.

He folded the page and slid it into his notebook. He let it rest on his knee, thumb tracing the folded edge of the page.

He let the stillness stay a moment longer.

And stayed with it – like a sound that didn’t fade. Only settled. Stayed.

The corridor outside the studio was quiet, almost too pristine – all clean white panels and soft track lighting overhead. The kind of silence that felt designed. The type that hummed beneath the surface.

Reyhaan’s boots made almost no sound on the flooring, but he could feel each step. His body slightly unspooling after hours in the studio – ears still carrying the last note Ilan had hummed, or maybe just the echo of the ocean track.

It drifted with him now – not music, exactly. More like a residue.

He thumbed his phone open. Typed: When do you get here exactly?

A beat. Then sent it to Ayaan.

He rubbed the back of his neck as he walked into the elevator. The doors glided shut behind him with a soft chime. One hand tucked the phone back into his coat pocket; the other held his keys loosely.

Descent.

The floors blinked past: rehearsal rooms, office spaces, a few unfamiliar recording suites under construction. Each lit level passed like a cut in a film.

B1.

B2.

B3.

The elevator stopped with a hush and opened into cool, unmoving air.

The underground lot was quiet. Dimly lit. Still.

He stepped out. Concrete underfoot. The space smelled of car wax, cement, and something faintly floral – like someone had passed through recently, perfume still hanging in the air.

He began walking. The keys cool in his hand.

Soft LED strips ran along the ceiling in quiet intervals, casting long shadows between parked cars and support pillars.

To his right: the matte-black van Silas preferred, its windows tinted nearly opaque, the VYER crest discreetly etched on the back. A few rows down, Jay’s sleek electric bike – surprisingly spotless despite his habit of bumping into things. To the left, Reyhaan’s own car – understated, low-slung – parked near the far pillar where the overhead motion sensor flickered once, then settled into a dull, steady glow.

Then –

A small clink. Followed by a faint roll.

Subtle, but unmistakable. Like glass hitting concrete.

His pulse hitched.

The hairs along his arms rose – not from fear, exactly. More like his body noticed something before his mind did.

Reyhaan stilled.

The sound hadn’t come from near the elevator – but from deeper in the lot, just past where the light didn’t quite reach. Near the storage units. Or the far wall.

A breeze touched the side of his face. Cold. Out of place.

There shouldn’t be air movement down here.

He turned his head slightly. Waited.

Just shadows. The soft hum of lights overhead.

He took a slow step, then another. Keys quiet in his grip.

A glint –

Only the van’s mirror.

But something had changed.

Then –

The elevator behind him dinged.

Louder than before, somehow.

Doors sliding open. Voices. The sharp roll of suitcase wheels and bursts of laughter. Two label interns and someone from logistics, arms full of camera gear, heading toward their car.

The interruption splintered the quiet. Reyhaan stepped back from the pillar, straightening his shoulders – like it mattered who saw.

As they passed, one of the interns gave him a half-smile. “Long day?”

He nodded. “Little bit.”

He turned and continued toward his car, slipping into the shadows beneath the pillar. He didn’t glance back. Didn’t look again at the bike racks.

But his shoulder blades were tight.

It wasn’t the sound alone.

It was that odd weight at the back of his neck. That sense that the space wasn’t just being used – it was being watched.

He clicked open the door, slid in, and shut it with care. The engine hummed quietly to life.

But for a few seconds longer, he sat there – unmoving. Eyes on the rearview mirror.

There was nothing.

Just the elevator, closing again.

Still, something clung to the edge of his thoughts.

A beat too long.

A silence that hadn’t quite ended when it should have.