Rin was the first house on the stop. They noticed her mom and she had a horrified look on her face. She told the other 2 to head home right away. They did as they were told. Rin's mom asked why she didn't answer her phone? Rin gazed down at her phone and realized she had kept it in "silent mode" from when she was asleep, she liked sleep, she never wanted to be disturbed during her slumber. Her mother brought her inside by holding her shoulder, it was weird. Rin started to get a fuzzy feeling in her stomach and started to feel lightheaded. She was remembering the last time her mom held her like this, was when she found out her dad died. She sat down and her mom asked her if she had heard from the school of what had happened. She said "of course, they told us there was mercury spill"
Her mom shook her head and stated that over the weekend that her home room teacher Sensei Ichikawa was found dead at his house. This "hit" Rin hard, he was more like a parent than a teacher. Rin unlatched herself from her Mother's grasp and slowly walked upstairs, her mom didn't know what to do. She let Rin go to her room..She thought better to give her space. I'll see how she is doing later.
As Rin slowly crawled into bed, she sat in the corner by the wall. Sitting next to this wall always brought her comfort. It was from this corner that her dad would read her stories about far off places. She started to cry, she felt like it had been forever since she cried. The tears would not stop. She seemed to cry for hours. Finally Rin grew tired and fell asleep holding one of her dad's old stories. When she woke the next day, it wasn't her alarm that had woken her up, but another dream that she couldn't remember, but couldn't shake the sick feeling that it brought. Rin looked at her watch and realized it was 1300, she slept passed NOON! She could not believe it. She jumped out of bed expecting to be late for school and her mom furious and went downstairs to see her mother at the table having a light lunch. Some salad and fruit. Her mother just looked at her and pushed a plate in front of Rin. She sat down and tried to eat but could only take a couple bites. She finally mustered the strength to stand up again and slowly walked to her room. Her mother did not speak to her, she just let her go. This upset Rin but made her calm as well. She didn't want to think bout Sensei Ichikawa for a little while. That didn't last long though, she wanted to know what had happened to him.