Hayashi did not get the rest she wanted.

Instead her stupid crow chose the worst possible time to interrupt before her perfect evening could even start. Hayashi had just arrived at the Wisteria Mansion, it had lots of wisteria flowers mind you, and she was being greeted by a cute old lady when the blasted crow just had to interrupt and inform her that Sanemi wanted her home. By the end of the night.

Damn, and she had wanted to live another day. Hayashi figured that Sanemi's crow had found her sleeping on a mission again, probably when she was in the clearing after she had beaten up the Loud Boar Head. Or when she fell asleep under that tree. Or in the middle of the road. Or that one time she was at a restaurant and fell asleep while eating food. It didn't really matter, Sanemi wanted her home. And he wanted her home, now.

So she said a quick goodbye, and left, much to the confusion of Inosuke, Tanjiro and Zenitsu.

"My master will unleash hell if I'm not back by the end of the night and I'd rather live to see tomorrow, even if it's bothersome. Bye, don't die I guess." She ran off, and left the three wondering how the lazy girl got all that energy to run so fast.

'Her master must be so scary if she gets that motivated to go home'

Tanjiro thought to himself as he watched Hayashi's receding figure.

'What in interesting person she is, even if she claimed to not care at all I could still smell the worry coming off of her like blood. She must be a really nice person deep down.'

Hayashi gasped for breath, she hadn't run that fast for ages. Even if she'd mastered total concentration breathing, constant, it still took a lot out of the lazy girl to run almost a full marathon in a couple of hours. Not to mention she didn't get any breaks because of the looming threat of Angry Guy.

Speaking of which, Hayashi had arrived just in time. It was three minutes after midnight. Three minutes late, even after all that effort she put into not being late. Maybe Sanemi wouldn't notice if she snuck in through a window.

Hayashi took off her shoes and slowed her breathing so that only the faintest breath could be heard. She tiptoes across the yard, avoiding all the traps that Sanemi had set if she ever decided to sneak in. She knew the trap placements by heart now, and Sanemi never bothered to change them so they proved easy to dodge.

Once she reached her window, Hayashi peeked in and searched her room for the usual places Sanemi would hide in. There seemed to be none, so she carefully crawled in and placed her shoes on one side of the bedroom. Hayashi was in the middle of quietly laying down her futon to pretend to be sleeping when the door banged open. She inched around and was met with an irritated face.

"..."

"..."

"Uhm... Good morning Shinazugawa-san?" Hayashi hoped that she wouldn't face the wrath of Sanemi, but her hope deemed useless.

"DON'T YOU 'GOOD MORNING' ME YOU BRAT! I TOLD YOU TO BE HOME BY THE END OF THE DAY!" Hayashi let out a terrified squeak and went to apologizing right away.

"I'm sorry Shinazugawa-san! I shouldn't have fallen asleep, but in my defense beating up that boar head was super tiring!" Sanemi fell quiet, and Hayashi stole a glance at him.

"Did you fall asleep on your mission again?"

Realizing that she wasn't originally going to be scolded, and have given herself away by apologizing for the wrong thing, Hayashi widened her eyes. "Oops."

"Dammit Hayashi! How many times do I have to tell you to stop doing that!" Sanemi let out a frustrated sigh and then added on, "It's dangerous you airhead, what if a demon attacks you?"

Hayashi looked up at him with wide eyes, she had been expecting a lecture of some sorts along with double or maybe even triple the amount of training. This was new. Sanemi was not only showing that he cared for her, which was quite rare, but he didn't punish her. Her eyes started to tear up.

"SANEMI!" She cried while she hugged Sanemi, which took him off guard, "I'M SORRY, I SHOULDN'T HAVE FALLEN ASLEEP, I MADE YOU WORRIED!"

"I- Get off me! You're making a mess on my uniform!" Hayashi still clung to him like a koala while Sanemi desperately tried not to show any emotion himself.

"ARGHHH!" Sanemi finally peeled Hayashi off of his leg and placed back on the floor where she sat like a lost puppy. The tears had stopped, for now, and the entirety of Sanemi's left pant leg was a mess of tears and whatever else Hayashi had rubbed off on it. He looked down on it in mild disgust, annoyed that he needed to wash them again after they had just been washed.

"Look at the mess you made on my pants you brat! Now I'm going to have to clean them..." Sanemi grumbled on with his string of insult and complaints, most of which Hayashi tuned out indifferently.

She was too busy thinking about what she wanted to eat next, and how much time she would have between her next mission. Did she smell fresh rice in the house? Or was that just her imagination. Sanemi never cooked, so maybe a kakushi or something came over to make food. But that rarely ever happened. Oh but Hayashi wish it happened. Stale rice balls were nothing compared to the fluffy, moist, beautiful thing that was rice and she cra-

"ARE YOU EVEN LISTENING?!" Sanemi's voice cut off Hayashi's train of thoughts and she looked up at him, confused.

"Huh?"

"DON'T YOU 'HUH' ME, YOUR TRAINING STARTS AT 6 THIS MORNING AND THAT'S FINAL!" Sanemi stormed out of Hayashi's room and slammed the door, leaving a very confused and bewildered girl to try and figure out what he had been talking about.

It was 5 minutes before 6 in the morning. Sanemi was walking to the dojo connected to the Wind mansion. His crow had interrogated Hayashi's and had been given the information that she was granted a break. It was a perfect opportunity to train her and hopefully polish some of her wind forms. But, when he was trying to explain that to Hayashi she didn't even pretend to listen. She was probably in her room sleeping or she had run away again. What an airhead. He silently padded though the mansion to the dojo.

Sanemi thought that Hayashi was a good student, brilliant even. She had taken up total concentration:constant in a matter of weeks and learned all of the wind breathing forms in less than three months. He remembered his shock when the girl followed him home when he had found her in a ditch.

If she only put in a little more effort and care into everything that she did she would already have been Hashira. Sanemi hated seeing all of that talent go to waste. Talent that he never had. But he could see that she was trying her best to be motivated. Yet something held her back, the desire to be left behind was too great in her. He wanted to fix that, Sanemi didn't want to see her suffer, as much as he pretended to be indifferent.

He opened the dojo door with a huff, and jumped back in surprise to see her sleeping soundly on the floor. All of the training equipment was out and looked like it had been used. The dust in the air was disturbed and floating around in the morning sun. Sanemi walked over to where Hayashi was passed out and took the wooden training sword from her hand. He noticed a number of blisters on her hand. Hayashi's crow flew up to greet him and landed clumsily on his shoulder.

"CAW! MASTER HAS BEEN TRAINING SINCE DARK! CAW" it yelled in his ear. Her crow was not to smartest of crows, but at least it knew how to communicate.

Unwillingly Sanemi felt the corners of his lips being pulled up slightly. Hayashi didn't even know what he had said the night before, yet she had still come and practiced to impress him.

"I'm going soft because of you brat."

He let her sleep for the rest of the day.