Same Wavelength

I met Hajime on the first morning of orientation. 

The auditorium smelled faintly of floor wax and new paper. Rows of strangers sat too straight in their seats, pretending not to measure one another. I chose the third row the exact middle because it felt neutral. Not confident. Not timid. Just present.

The seat beside a tall boy with neatly combed hair was empty.

“Is this taken?” I asked.

He moved his bag immediately and smiled, as if we had already agreed to be familiar.

“Only if you’re planning to outshine me,” he said.

I laughed before deciding whether I should. The sound surprised me.

That was Hajime. Easy. Warm. People didn’t just talk to him they settled around him. By the end of the first week, he didn’t seem new anymore. He looked like someone the campus had been waiting for.

Standing next to him made introductions simpler. Conversations required less preparation. Silence felt less dangerous.

I didn’t think about that at the time.

I met Hinata three days later in the campus café.

Hajime had stepped outside to take a call. I was watching condensation gather and slide down my glass when someone spoke.

“You look like you’re thinking too loudly.”

I looked up.

She wasn’t smiling. Her expression was steady, almost observant, like she was describing the weather.

“I don’t think that’s possible,” I said.

“It is,” she replied. “Your left eyebrow tightens when you concentrate.”

I instinctively relaxed my face.

I hadn’t known that about myself.

She sat down across from me naturally, as if the seat had already been reserved.

We started with ordinary things. Classes. Dorm rooms. The humidity that refused to leave.

Then she asked, “What kind of music do you listen to when you’re alone?”

The phrasing felt intentional.

I told her, naming a band I usually avoided mentioning. It was easier to keep certain preferences private than to explain them.

She tilted her head slightly.

“I like them too,” she said. “Their second album feels more honest.”

Honest.

The word landed quietly between us.

The next afternoon, she brought up a lyric from that album.

“You said the bridge is where everything stops pretending, right?”

I paused.

I didn’t remember saying it exactly like that.

But it sounded like something I would say.

So I nodded.

Being remembered narrows the world. It reduces noise. It makes coincidence feel meaningful.

We started speaking often after that.

Sometimes in groups, where Hajime carried conversations effortlessly.

Sometimes alone, where everything slowed.

“You think in layers,” she said once.

Another time: “I don’t usually talk like this with people.”

It felt selective. Rare.

One evening outside the dorms, she said quietly,

“It feels like we’re on the same wavelength.”

Same wavelength.

The phrase lingered longer than it should have.

Hajime noticed before I did.

“You two disappear when you talk,” he teased.

I shrugged.

“It’s not like that.”

But maybe it was.

When Hinata listened, she leaned forward slightly. When I paused, she waited. When I explained something abstract, she followed without asking me to simplify.

I began noticing changes in myself.

I spoke more clearly.

I chose words faster.

I hesitated less.

It felt like growth.

There was one small moment I remember more clearly than the others.

We were sitting in the library, whispering about nothing important. I said, half-jokingly,

“I think most people only pretend to listen.”

She smiled faintly.

“They do,” she said.

“No,” I corrected, laughing. “Not pretend. They just wait for their turn to talk.”

She went quiet for a second.

Then she nodded.

“Yes,” she said. “They just wait for their turn.”

Her tone matched mine exactly.

The same pacing. The same slight emphasis.

It shouldn’t have stood out.

But for a brief second, I felt something shift not wrong, just precise.

As if I were hearing my own sentence played back to me.

I brushed it aside.

It felt good to be understood.

If I try to remember a moment when she disagreed with me, I struggle.

Perhaps there was one.

Perhaps I’ve forgotten.

At the time, it felt like harmony.

And harmony never feels dangerous.

Not in the beginning.