Surprisingly, I get a good night's sleep. I can tell. My head feels like cotton. It's almost noon already. Sleeping late is fine, since it's a Sunday and there are no classes.

Oh, the festival...As my senses return to me, I can hear the sound of people outside, the general hustle-and-bustle crowd song. What to do...

There will be a few exams in the coming week, but nothing that I'm not already prepared for. With no urgent academic obligations, I can spend the day however I like. I toss down a few pills of the latest experimental medication and exit into the hallway with my crutch, deciding to find something to eat.

I make it as far as the dorm steps before pausing, watching people go by.

There are some young families with the perturbed parents trying to keep up with their over enthusiastic offspring...a few students of our own accompanied by their parents...and a lot of stragglers here for no reason I can imagine. I guess it's the promise of cheap, low quality food.

The carillon bursts into life and the principal's squeaky voice announces the opening of the festival over the PA system. Everyone claps, though rather unenthusiastically.

An impatient tapping sound comes from behind me and I step down and out, quickly realizing that I am still blocking the entrance. Two guys file out past me, talking amongst themselves.

Hm...what have I come here to do?

I guess I can start by taking a tour around the grounds to see what the festival is like. I can try to find Hanako and Lilly, see if Shizune and Misha have taken the time to explore what they've helped manage. Maybe Emi's running on the track, or talking with some friends. And Rin-

Oh crap, Rin!

I hop down to where the mural is. It isn't very far.

A few people are studying the art on the wall, while the artist herself is lounging on the sidelines, leaning against the wall. She looks bored, and rather under the weather. I walk up to her, attracting her attention.

"Good morning." She blinks.

"Hello."

"How's it going?"

"Nowhere. I'm stuck."

"Stuck?"

She frowns, dissatisfied. "I mean I can't walk stuck. I think my legs are out of order because of yesterday."

"Can you put them back in order?" I ask, half-teasing.

"I tried, but they wouldn't cooperate."

"Does it hurt?"

"It's hard to say. Maybe." I sit down somewhat in front of her, setting the crutch on the ground below me and raising my injured leg on it. It's a familiar cycle.

"Welcome to the club." I mutter, under my breath. Well, not really, since my leg doesn't hurt. I guess that makes her President?

"Teacher's friends came by." She doesn't seem particularly excited. "Then they headed into town for lunch and asked me to go. It was a good thing my legs hurt so much."

"Hm." I study the completed mural myself. It's extremely abstract, disfigured human body parts jumping out at me. It looks nice, and seems to form some kind of whole, but I couldn't say what.

"But now you're stuck there? Do you need help?" I ask. She shakes her head, her rust-red hair flying everywhere.

"I'll just wait until I can walk again. It should be either sooner or later, if you think about it for a while. Teacher was happy that I finished the mural."

"He should be." I say, as I consider Rin's long nights out.

"But I wonder if it's finished after all." I consider the mural.

"I think that's something only you can answer."

"I thought yesterday that I had done everything, but now I'm not sure any more. I should paint more details. Maybe. Probably. It's hard to decide."

"It looks good." The wall is so wide that I have to turn my neck from side to side to see the entire painting. The figures are rough looking, as if thoughtlessly placed and rudimentarily painted, but a great deal of thought and care has gone into each and every one of them.

I don't even know what kind of feeling I get from it. It seems to just exist, floating, much like the artist herself.

"What is this about?" I ask, idly, hoping that her answer will clear it up for me.

"It's not about anything at all. That's what I wanted to paint, so I did."

Erk.

"...That was a small lie. I said it anyways because I would kind of like it to be true. Teacher wanted me to do this, but I didn't have any ideas. I tried to have some, but nothing happened. So now this is a painting without any ideas."

"But...what are you painting, then?" I ask, completely confused.

She turns to me for the first time, her murky green eyes staring emptily at me.

"No idea. Come to think of it, I think I'll call this 'No idea.'" I consider this carefully.

"But you still have to think about it. Every stroke is intentional, unless you accidentally threw paint onto the wall and took shape."

"I've done that before. Splashed paint everywhere. It was messy." Rin says, veering off the cliff into nothingness.

"That's not the point." I reply.

"Words have points? I always thought they were circles, myself." I blink, opening my mouth to respond, then give up.

I guess this will always be the mysterious mural. Painted with no idea. Hm...

"Well, you can't call it 'No idea.'" She looks at me oddly. "Well, I guess you could, but there WAS an idea behind this. What makes this a mural and not a painting?"

"It's a mural." Rin responds, matter-of-factly.

"I see." I deadpan. "But then the idea of painting this in the first place was to be a mural, right? So therefore, no matter how general, you did have an idea!"

"I get it." Rin says, as I cheer internally. "I wanted to paint a mural at its maximum muralness, paint a mural to be a mural and nothing but a mural. It expresses itself, then; this mural expresses its muralness with its muralness."

Never mind, then.

I sigh. "That's basically it, yes." I slide my crutch back towards myself, grabbing it. "It was nice seeing you, Rin. See you soon."

She shrugs, in a very thorough manner. It seems that she expresses all her sentiment towards me with that one shrug; or perhaps she expresses nothing at all.

Rin expresses Rin.

It occurs to me that she can't exactly move right now. I almost offer her my crutch but stop, realizing how stupid that is.

"I'll see you around. Hopefully your legs unstick themselves." I say, before turning around.

"They will. They always will." Her voice floats after me as I make my way into the festival itself.