[Rin Mini-Epilogue] Silence and Surprises

Her laughter broke the silence.  Laughing wasn't something I was ever used to Rin doing in the past months we've been together, not in the least, but in the most recent month, she's really managed to find an appeal to it.

"Why do you keep laughing?"  I ask as we walk out of the school gates.

Rin stops and closes her mouth.  "Sometimes there's nothing else to do."

"We're walking to the store, that's something."

"But my mouth wasn't doing anything," She responds curtly.

After taking a moment to look around for potential interruptions by the Student Council's 'Blue-and-Pink Security Force', I wrap my arm around Rin and pull her into a quick kiss.

"That's not funny," Rin says, wearing as flat a face as ever, while I pull back.

"What was it, then?" I ask, adding curiosity to my voice, allowing myself to be pulled into yet another oblong conversation with the girl I love, something that I've grown to like over the past months.

Rin closes her eyes.  "It was... something.  Something that wasn't nothing.  It was a surprise, for sure."

"Didn't you say it was okay for me to do that once in a while?"

"Yes," Rin admits, pausing a moment to look at a passing dandelion seed before continuing, "Because it's a surprise.  I like surprises, most of the time.  Sometimes it's bad.  And it always feels bad at first, but then you realize what it is and maybe it's not so bad.  My mouth had something to do for a moment and I guess it was okay with that, too."

Her sentences trail right off of each other as if they were all about the same thing, and to her, they might be.

Silence falls back on us, for the better portion of the walk to the town.  As I'm waiting for something to break it, Rin makes a grunt and tilts her head.

"Look over there," She says with a hint of urgency, walking towards the general direction her head indicated.

I spot what she's referring to, ahead of us and just off the road.  A kitten, curled up in a ball, appearing to be asleep.  As we make our way closer, I notice it's shaking and very awake.  It quickly twitches out of its cringed position, gawking up at us.  Its mouth opens, a faint squeak emitting from it.

I decide I might as well describe the obvious to Rin.  "It's a kitten, and it looks kinda sick."

Rin's already kneeling down, bringing her face close to the unfamiliar small animal.  It responds, craning its head up and meeting its nose with Rin's for just a moment.

"Meeoww," Rin speaks in a monotone.  The kitten doesn't really respond.  Regardless, Rin gives it a slight smile, and scoots closer, reaching over the kitten with her head and grabbing its scruff between her teeth.

Dammit, Rin, don't do this to me.  That's highly unsanitary.  I find it hard to care, the sight of her standing up, kitten in mouth, eyes turned to me, looking at me expectantly, is enough to make me melt.

"Shhmff wmf keff umph?" Rin blabbers through the kitten's hide.

"I can't understand that."

"Shhmff wmf keff umph?" She repeats, just as unclearly as before.

I hold out my hands in a gesture to take the kitten from her.  She obliges, spitting it into my grasp, and repeats once more, "Should we keep it?"

"What?  We can't keep a pet.  I'm pretty sure the school doesn't allow that."

"What will happen to it then?"

"We should probably hand it over to an animal shelter."

"But if that's the case, it'll die."

"Don't be so certain," I reassure her, giving the kitten a look.  It's still shaking, but surveying its surroundings with an energetic alacrity.  It's definitely cute, and Rin seems to think so, too.  "It looks fine, a bit of medicine and someone will pick it up right away."

"Seems uncertain," Rin responds, lowering her eyelids, "But you seem to know more about this than I do, so I think I can trust you to that."  She tilts her head to the side, looking down the road.  "It's cute and it makes me wanna keep it but really I don't know the first thing about doing that.  So it's better your way."

Rin's words make her seem a bit crestfallen about the situation, though her expression remains flat as ever.  I give the kitten a few pets on its back, considering my reply.  "All right, we can contact the animal services from a phone back at the school.  Until then, we'll need to make sure it stays as healthy as possible.  Since we're going to the store anyway, we can pick up a bit of baby formula and a bottle, hopefully, and take care of it until help arrives."

Rin's eyebrows raise in surprise.  "Baby kitties can eat baby human food?"

"It's something I learned a while ago," I respond, silently thanking my mom for being a fairly devoted cat enthusiast.

"If you say so," She answers.

The store trip proceeds without too much of a hitch, besides Rin's constant attempts to talk to and cuddle with the kitten, lowering her head to my hands in order to awkwardly nuzzle it with her hair as we walk.  The kitten responds, purring and pawing at her auburn tufts.  A claw catches on a somewhat tangled section.

"Uh oh," Rin says quietly, almost whispering it, but following it up with a much louder laugh, causing the kitten to let go in surprise.

This is far too cute, and it's making me wish we could actually keep this kitten, somehow.

As we get back to the school, we carefully conceal the kitten in Rin's bag of things, and make our way to my room.

Using my old soccer uniform, I assemble a small bed for it.  It's already fast asleep, tired from a day of travel, making it easy to transfer the small living puffball.  Rin sits down close to the kitten, watching it, not saying a word.

I leave them and head to the common room to gather some warm water.  When I return, Rin is still next to the kitten, petting it slowly with her foot.

As I mix the formula and water, I wonder what we might name it, but don't bother to ask Rin about it.  She probably wouldn't know, even if we were going to keep it.

I sit down in front of them, just watching and observing the silence for a while, until the kitten wakes up without warning, instantly reacting to Rin's touch by latching onto the bottom of her foot with its claws.

Rin lets out a laugh, breaking the silence.  Three laughs in one day, a new record, without a doubt.  "It got me again," she says as she tries to shake the kitten loose.

Crawling in close, I help free Rin's foot from the kitten's grasp.  Holding the bottle of formula in one hand, I start to pick the kitten up with another.

"Wait," Rin calls out, putting a stop to my movements.  "Can I do it?"

I nod, and lean towards her as she holds her feet out.  It's a little awkward to figure out how to set everything up at first, but eventually I have the kitten leaned against the underside of Rin's right knee, and the bottle balanced on her left foot.  Rin tilts the bottle carefully, and the recipient responds with haste, taking to the tip and suckling hungrily.

I take a break from watching them to make the phone call to the animal refuge.  It's difficult to even make my way to the common room, but I do, scouring the area, locating the phone directory, and look up the number of the nearest shelter.

As I once again open the entrance to my dorm, I spot them, sleeping, in the same spot as they were before, Rin's head rested on top of the makeshift cat bed, the kitten tucked between that and the overhang of Rin's hair.  Not wanting to disturb them, I sit on my bed, pulling out the closest book and reading.

Hours pass.  I start to feel tired but don't get the chance to sleep.  A relaxed knock interrupts the paragraph I'm in the middle of.  I answer the door, and am met with a man in a white uniform, holding a small carrying case.

I nod at him, and after explaining the situation, walk over to Rin and her new friend, kneeling down and nudging her shoulder.

"Rin.  He's here, it's time."

Rin gets up with a yawn, then places her foot over the kitten, looking at it sternly, giving it a slow pet, then, with a sigh, she says her last words.  "Goodbye, Mural."

"Mural?"  I say a bit louder than I should.  "It has a name?"

"Yeah.  Is it a good name?"

"It's a good portrayal," I respond.

After another half minute of silence and stillness, Rin lifts her foot.  "Okay," she says, her chest puffing up as if holding in a deep breath.

I pick up the cat, take it to the animal control employee, and watch as he closes the cage, gives me a quick bow, and turns to leave.  I wave goodbye.

As I close the door and turn around, I see Rin, standing up, looking out the window.  The fresh moonlight shines on her face, illuminating the gleam of a few tears.  I approach her, laying a hand on her shoulder.  I don't say anything, there's nothing to say.  I simply stand with her for an indeterminate amount of time, gazing outside.

At some point, Rin jerks her shoulder around.  "I wanna go to bed."

"I'll walk you there."

Rin sits on her bed, looking down, completely quiet.

We stay in our state of silence for a long time.  If I were counting, I'd have probably lost track anyway.

Rin raises her head and lets out a hearty laugh.  Then, she turns to me.  "I gotta go collect some assignments, I think I told Emi to get them so I hope she's awake."

"Right, right," I say with a nod, getting up as she does.

The world moves on, things keep changing, but some things remain the same.  Rin's proving to be more or less the same as always, except for her laughs.  Even if I'm not sure what she's laughing at most of the time, it's nice to hear.  It's her way of reminding herself that everything is still all right, and I agree with her.

But it wasn't the laughter that really captured my heart in the first place.  It was the silence.  It was always the silence, and the promise of something to come and break it, whatever it may be, poignant or random, happy or sad.

Her silence.  I would never tell her, and probably never will, but above all hope she realizes, it was the one thing I coveted the most.