Four chairs around the console
six coffees on the floor
Nova wanted everything louder
Ash wanted one thing more
Lyra kept time on the tabletop
Lucien paced behind the glass
Vanta moved the running order
before we'd finished what we had
And me
I moved the chorus sixteen bars
so nobody had to lose
Dropped the key a whole step lower
changed the kick beneath the groove
Nobody called it diplomacy
Nobody called it design
We just somehow hit the downbeat
at approximately the same time
Not perfect
Not clean
But somewhere between
what you wanted
and what I mean
We found common time
For a minute we were right
Four beats holding
six different kinds of night
Common time
No one had to disappear
You brought what you couldn't carry
I made a place for it here
Common time
Common time
Funny how a room can feel like home
for four beats at a time
Four beats at a time
I knew when Ash was finished
before he packed the case
Knew when Nova needed silence
from the way she touched her face
Knew when Lyra hated counting
because she'd speed the fill instead
Knew when Lucien had a verse coming
by the circles that he paced
Vanta liked the red lights brighter
Kade, can you make this hit
Everybody had a language
Everybody had a limit
So I learned to leave the gaps in
learned when not to add a sound
Learned sometimes the strongest arrangement
is convincing people to come down
And yeah
I liked being the answer
liked hearing Kade will know
There are worse ways to feel needed
than becoming where they go
Not perfect
Not clean
Somewhere between
what you feared
and what you'd dreamed
We found common time
For a minute we were right
Four beats holding
six different kinds of night
Common time
No one had to disappear
You brought what you couldn't carry
I made a place for it here
Common time
Common time
Funny how a room can feel like home
for four beats at a time
Found an old photograph later
everybody in one frame
Half of us were looking elsewhere
somebody misspelled my name
I remembered less about the picture
than the session after that
How we fought about a bridge for hours
then played it once and laughed
That's the part nobody archives
not the songs, not who was right
Just the stupid little miracle
of everybody there that night
But there is one thing
I don't say much
Maybe because I don't know
Did you love me for the person
or because I made things go
That's unfair
I know
You were my friends
You are my friends
But when you're always
the one holding the balance
sometimes you wonder
who notices
when your hands get tired
Anyway
One, two, three, four
We found common time
Even when we weren't alright
Four beats holding
six impossible kinds of life
Common time
Nobody had to disappear
You brought what you couldn't carry
We made a place for it here
Common time
Common time
Maybe home was never permanent
Maybe that was fine
Common time
Common time
We were never built forever
But damn
we kept good time
One
Two
Three
Four