It's Free if it Takes Over Thirty Minutes

Chapter 7

Haru woke up Monday to get ready for class and still felt like shit. His stomach still ached at a weird emptiness that festered. He could cross getting more sleep off of his list of possible solutions. He slept a good thirteen hours of sleep that night, and still couldn't function properly. He thought maybe it was something he had eaten recently that made him feel sick. He thought it'd wear off soon, and he would just continue with his normal routines.

Class was rough, but not unbearable. Work was a little tougher.

"Hey, work the phones today, rotten fish, we're short on staff today," Haru's boss called to him.

Haru nodded and answered all the phone calls for the day.

"Sekai Seikō no piza. What can I get for you?"

He listened to what felt like a thousand orders between prepping ingredients and sauces. Some customers were easier to deal with that others, and talking drained Haru like streaming videos would your phone's battery life. By the end of his three hour shift, he was almost completely out of it.

He got to the pool afterwards and hoped he could shake it off. Nope. He took it easy, not pushing himself too hard. After an hour and a half, he decided to stop; that the cold water might just make him sicker. He consulted his coaches about the problem and they advised him to take it easy like he had been. One told him to go see a doctor, but when would Haru have time for that?

Haru got home that night around nine at night, worked a bit on his school assignments and then decided to sleep. He was too tired to even check his phone messages or missed calls. The only problem was that when he was in bed and the lights were off, his roommate nowhere to be found, and he couldn't keep his eyes closed. No matter how much he wanted to sleep, he could only curl up and try to ignore the sickness in his gut. It got so bad, he could hear pounding in his head. So, he eventually did check his phone.

Haru expected that the three missed emails on his phone to be from Makoto. He couldn't have been more wrong. He had an email forwarded from his boss about the work schedule the rest of the week, and two from Rin. Rin's number was one Haru hadn't seen in a long time. The first text was just a simple "hello" but the second one came as a slight surprise.

Are you okay? You left the unusually early.

Haru replied, the time on his phone reading 11:24.

I'm fine.

Getting his mind off forcing himself to sleep eased his pain slightly. Although he didn't think he would get a reply so he put the phone down and rolled over, trying to sleep again. That was, until his phone beside his bed started to rumble, shaking his room like an earthquake. Quickly checking his phone, Rin had replied.

Alright. Let me know if something's wrong though.

Haru couldn't bring himself to reply, and eventually slept.

The rest of the week went by the same, Haru eventually sleeping. The second day he was sleep deprived, the third he was unable to focus. On the fourth night he woke up from the eventual sleep in cold sweat. His head hurt, his stomach ached, and he was falling apart.

It was Friday, and Haru had made it through his first class of the day. Barely. He was in his Statistics class when he couldn't take it much more. He told his professor that he felt ill and needed to leave. Only one head peered up as Haru left the classroom, one with a maroon shade of hair.

Dizzy, Haru took a few steps, after shutting the classroom door, in the hallway. He wasn't quite sure what the colors of the walls were, or the floor, or the ceiling. At the moment, they all looked the same. Was he walking on the ceiling or the floor? Was that a door or just a window? Well, it didn't matter too much when they all faded to black.

The walls were white, the same as the ceiling, but the floors were blue. Haru could tell the much when color started to fade back from black. He looked around and saw the needle in his arm. He looked even more and saw a figure in a black coat sitting in a chair across the room. Haru moaned himself awake, gaining the attention of the man in the coat.

"Haru, are you awake? How are you feeling?"

"Fine?" Haru still couldn't make out who it was.

"You are a fucking idiot."

"What's going on?" the person got closer and soon clearer. "Rin?"

"You left class early, and passed out in the hall. An upperclassman found you and told our professor. When I heard, I called an ambulance."

"Oh."

"Fuck, Haru, that's all you have to say? Oh?"

When Haru didn't answer, Rin sighed, "Haru, be honest. How long have you not been feeling well? You were acting strange on Monday. Please tell me you haven't been feeling sick all week!"

"Maybe," Haru replied, avoiding eye contact.

"Haru you fucking liar. God. Why didn't you tell me then?"

"Why do you care?"

"Because I'm your friend?!"

Haru mumbled to himself, "Then why'd you ignore us?"

That's when the nurse walked in the room. "Mr. Nanase? I'd like to ask you a few questions. Would that be alright? I'll have to ask your friend to leave."

Taking the hint, with one last look at Haru, Rin left without a word.

"Mr. Nanase, from the tests our doctors have performed, it seems there is nothing wrong with your condition. We suspect you fainted do to exhaustion and lack of sleep. On Average, how much a sleep have you gotten the past few days?"

"Not sure."

"Have you been having any trouble sleeping lately?"

"Yes."

"Any particular reason you know of? Medications that may keep you awake at all?"

"No."

"Nothing you can think of?"

"My stomach hurt."

"Did it physically hurt? As in pain or discomfort?

"More like an empty hole in my gut."

"Could it have been anxiety?"

Haru shrugged his shoulders.

"Has anything in your life recently been able to impact you in such a way?"

"Not that I can think of."

"What about your school life? Work life? Social life?"

"All the same."

"Please take some time to consider. How is college life? Have you been home sick? Anything new with friends or family that may have given you a shock?"

After some thought, Haru remembered Rin. "I reconnected with an old friend."

"Define reconnect."

"We hadn't talked in a year."

"Were you close before that?"

"Fairly,"

"Why did you stop talking?"

"He didn't reply,"

"Could you be feeling anger or confusion towards him now due to this?"

"I don't know."

"Well, Mr. Nanase. What we're going to do is prescribe a weak antidepressant and hope it helps with your condition. You seem fine now, and if you're feeling so to, we'll have you discharged in the next hour."

Haru nodded got comfortable in his bed again. He stared at the wall for a good couple of minutes thinking. Pulling out his phone, he notices someone from the corner of his eye. Rin had re-entered the room.

"Rin? I thought you left."

"I was going to, but I got a coffee and thought I'd say goodbye first. Then I caught the nurse and she told me you were being discharged. I knew you didn't have any money on you, so I'm here to offer you a ride."

"Okay," Haru smiled.