The sound of the Rain

8. Getting used

A month later

“Did you submit your report?” Riko asked Alyia. Alyia’s eyes widened at the realization. She finished her report yesterday at night but forgot to submit it. Exhaustion caught her the same moment she finished and fell asleep like a baby.

“You still have one hour.” Riko informed her with a smile. A month ago, Alyia sat beside Riko during the entrance ceremony and since then, those two became best friends. Riko, who was originally too shy to speak with others, opened and Alyia found missing courage thanks to her new friends, too. They both together worked as one person, supporting one another and helping each other whenever the other one needed help.

“Thank you Riko.” Alyia called as she ran to the library where she could freely sit and connect her laptop without issues, quickly submitting her hard work.

“Come on, don’t you wanna skip class with me?” She overheard the conversation coming out from one of the library aisles writing the books shelves.

“Does it hurt your feelings, Hiro?” Alyia froze for a moment, hearing the name coming from the girl. This Hiro must have been her boyfriend for sure, since they seemed to be too close. Alyia quickly collected her things and tried to get out of there as fast as possible. It was still relatively early in the morning, which was the reason for the library to be almost empty, but it still surprised her to hear two students acting like this in the public place. Alyia was sure she wasn’t the only one in the library and sure others overheard them as well, but to her surprise those few people she saw around her pretended like they heard nothing. She almost ran away from the place, but the voice of the young man still echoed in her mind. His voice felt so nostalgic and familiar, but she couldn’t figure out who he was. He wasn’t from her class and no matter how hard she thought about it, his voice didn’t fit any face in her mind.

Library had free access to the college network together with the internet, but inside classes the connection was very limited and most of the time overloaded, especially during classes with full attendance. Alyia with Riko now had programming, which meant the room was going to be full. For this reason, she ran straight to the library to make sure she could submit her work through the college network.

“All well?” Riko stopped her at the entrance to the class.

“Hmm. Thanks for this one. You literally saved me.” Alyia thanked her with a wide smile.

“You should probably slow down a bit with your work. This is the fourth time you almost missed the deadline for the report.” Riko scolded her gently, taking her hand and leading her to their seats in the class.

“I know, but I need this money.” Alyia shook her head as she walked behind her friend.

“Did you think about moving to a dormitory?” Riko took the seat and Alyia right beside her.

“I told you before that I am living in my father’s apartment, so I don’t need to pay for it, but the other expenses are simply too high plus…” Alyia said, but in the end she couldn’t finish the sentence. There were still things she didn’t tell Riko. Riko knew Alyia’s mother died over half a year ago and her father lived abroad, but Alyia kept her debt a secret. Not because of the shame. It was debt left from the treatment of her mother, so she didn’t think there was something to be ashamed of. Alyia had a hard time asking for help from others, especially when it came to money. She wanted to make sure she could stand on her two feet and support herself. Sharing this kind of problem with anyone else would mean they might try to help her financially, which would make her feel uncomfortable. Also, the first time she asked for help was almost two years ago when her mother got sick, and she contacted her father. He refused her with a harsh word. Alyia knew he regretted those words. She could see that in his eyes when he looked at her during the funeral, but it was too late to fix it back then. Plus, she never blames him for that. When he offered her help after, she refused him. Alyia explained to him everything and told him that there wasn’t any grudge. There wasn’t any available treatment for her mother's sickness. She knew that, so there wasn’t any reason to blame her father for not supporting them back then. But now it was time for her to live her life and support herself.

“It’s okay. You don’t need to tell me.” From time to time, Riko tried to get those secrets from Alyia. She didn’t mean to intrude on her life, but seeing her struggle and sad, pained Riko.

“Don’t worry about me. I am used to working this way and extra pocket money now means less work during exams.” Alyia repaid her with a smile. Deep inside Alyia knew she was exhausting herself but right now she had too many things to take care of and bothering Riko with her own problems won’t do any good to her friend. Riko had enough problems of her own.

“You could come and help me with my work.” Riko suggested. Alyia knew about Riko’s manual work, but the truth was she worked fewer hours and earned almost the same as Alyia while writing, except Alyia dreamed about staying with her writing for the rest of her life, so she paid extra attention to her work.

“You just asked me to work less and now you are asking me to work with you?” Alyia asked jokingly, trying to tease her.

“That’s not what I meant. It usually takes me two or three hours a day to finish my work. Two of us can be sure to make it faster, so I would say there might be a little bonus for extra fast work. Madam is quite generous when it comes to good and swift work. Madam doesn’t feel relaxed when others stayed in her home, especially after husband’s death, so I am sure she will be extra please knowing that after one hour we can leave.” Riko provided a rational explanation which made sense, but Alyia felt reluctant about her request. When Riko took this work, she slept during the classes several times, which meant the work itself exhausted her a lot. Later it became better, so Alyia asked if she switched. Riko explained to her that the house where she worked has a huge library which they asked her to clean. For a long time, no one cared about that place. They kept only two maids in the entire house, and they already had plenty of work with other rooms and regular daily cleaning. Taking care of the library was just too much, but once Riko took care of the books and cleaned it from down to top, it became quite easy to keep it that way. The other place in that part of the house was just a piece of cake. Riko also explained to Alyia that the part of the house where she was cleaning belonged to the madam’s husband who died a few years ago, so they rarely used it.

“I guess I could handle hour or two of extra work.” Alyia thoughts about it carefully. Getting extra money would mean she could repay her debt faster and sleep soundly, focusing more on her writing career and as well on her exams. She just started college, so there was too much time left and a lot of studying.

“Really? I know you are probably tired, A-li. I can see your dark bags under your eyes, but if you really need money that much, I could arrange this for you. Later, you could just focus on your studying and get some rest. Plus, we would be together, so I make sure you at least eat properly. I can say you lost some weight in the last month. You can stay like this for much longer.” Riko again spoke to her in a motherly scolding tone, which reminded her of her mother, whom she lost. Whenever Riko spoke to her this way, she felt relieved.

“As you say, mom,” Alyia said, joking with Riko. Riko pouted at her, pretending to be angry, but she knew whenever Alyia mentioned her mother, she usually became sad, but when calling Riko's mom, she seemed happy. Riko realized quickly that what Alyia missed must have been those times when her mother took care of her. When she asked her about the day, if everything was alright and especially when making sure her daughter was eating well and staying healthy. These thoughts gave Riko courage to scold Alyia whenever she did something unhealthy, like skipping proper meals or the typical lack of sleep because of work. Riko played again words Alyia said just a moment ago about taking a break during exams and focusing just on her studies. It meant she would take a short break from work and during that time Riko created a plan to make her sleep a lot so she could regain some of her beauty which she lost thanks to the tiredness all over her face and those dark bags which she wore daily for the past few weeks. Thoughts about Alyia overworking herself became real. Making her work extra now didn’t seem like a good idea, but she would have to watch her at least, making sure she would eat. Plus, the work itself wasn’t hard anymore.

“Alright, alright. I will arrange it today and from tomorrow you should be able to come with me to my work,” Riko said, full of enthusiasm. Professor just entered the classroom, and they both turned to the board awaiting the lesson. When it came to studying, Riko was slower, and she needed to study more. Alyia seemed to understand everything right from the beginning, and dealing with programming and computers felt extremely easy for her. Riko always listened properly to the lesson, but later she had to ask Alyia to explain it. At least Alyia had patience and was latent in teaching as well. Once she explained something to Riko, she could always understand it more clearly, but today she couldn’t focus on the lesson. No matter how hard Riko tried to focus today, her thoughts kept roaming around Alyia and her problems. Whenever they came to lower the workload, Alyia’s eyes changed. She became distant out of the blue. Riko slowly realized that there had to be some sort of financial issue, but when she tried to turn the subject to it, Alyia changed it almost instantly, dodging the questions. It made Riko sad.