Pale moonlight streams in through the large skylight that takes up most of the ceiling of the studio, forming odd-looking shadows on the walls and floor. The lone occupant of the room is an auburn-haired woman with a paintbrush held between her toes. She is wide-awake, all of her energy focused on the job at hand. An idea struck her as she was trying to fall asleep, and she knew that she would have to act on it, or it would be gone.
 
Rin leans forward and sighs, resting the brush on the floor and staring intently at the canvas in front of her. ‘This isn’t working,’ she thinks, ‘I know I understand it, but will anyone else?’
 
She shakes her head, as if trying to expel the thoughts. ‘No. It doesn’t matter if other people get it or not. I got over that a long time ago.’ She turns her head upward and stares through the skylight at the countless stars that pockmark the blackness. It reminds her of a night over ten years ago spent gazing at the sky with her now-husband. She smiles at the thought.
 
“Mommy?”
 
The voice startles Rin out of her memories, and she whips her head around. The door to the studio is open, and standing in the entryway is a young girl clad in a long purple nightgown. Her short, mahogany-colored hair is splayed wildly about her head, and she’s clutching a pillow in both hands, hugging it against her stomach.
 
Rin looks at the girl for several seconds before saying anything. “Ayano? What are you still doing up?”
 
“I… couldn’t sleep,” Ayano replies, taking a step into the room, “I wanted to come sleep with you, but you weren’t in your bed, so I thought might be in here.”
 
“Oh, okay.” Rin turns back to the painting, and she hears Ayano walk closer, her light footsteps barely making any noise on the floor of the studio, until she’s standing just behind Rin. “I can’t sleep either. Well, I’m certainly tired enough, but I need to finish this.”
 
“You always stay up really late painting,” Ayano says, tugging on one of her mother’s loose sleeves, “Don’t you just wanna go to sleep?”
 
“Yeah,” Rin replies, sighing, “But I have to finish this first. If I don’t, I’ll feel really disappointed in myself.”
 
Ayano turns to look at the painting. “It’s pretty,” she declares. She points to a spot on the canvas covered in a sickly-looking shade of green. “What’s that color called?”
 
“Chartreuse.”
 
Ayano giggles. “Why do they all have funny names?”
 
Rin shrugs. “It’s French, I think. A lot of French words are funny.”
 
A few minutes pass in silence, Rin trying to determine if the painting is missing anything while Ayano curiously studies the strange shapes and colors that make it up.
 
“Hey, mommy?” she asks suddenly, breaking the silence.
 
“Yeah?”
 
“Can I draw something?”
 
“Sure.”
 
Rin stands up and walks over to a desk in the corner of the room. It has a series of drawers that sit low to the floor, accommodating her disability nicely. She pulls open one of the drawers and retrieves a notepad from inside, handing it to Ayano, along with a pencil from atop the desk. Ayano plops down on the couch next to the desk and begins sketching something, while Rin returns to her seat in front of the painting.
 
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After some time, Rin admits defeat and stands up, bending backward to relieve an ache in her spine. ‘I’ve gotta remember to ask Hisao to get me a new chair,’ she thinks, yawning.
 
Just as she’s about to head off to the bedroom, she notices Ayano curled up on the couch, asleep. She had been so quiet; Rin forgot she was there. Rin moves closer to her daughter, seeing the notepad lying next to her head and the pencil still clutched in one of her hands. She sits down on the couch and carefully grabs it with her foot, using the other one to flip it open. After passing several pages of her own doodles, she finds one of Ayano’s.
 
It’s a simple illustration of Rin herself. She’s sitting on a stool, holding a paintbrush in her foot and painting. A caption in huge capital letters underneath the sketch reads, ‘MY MOMMY ALWAYS WORKS REALLY HARD’. Rin smiles, and turns the page.
 
Another simple drawing, this one portraying Ayano (as noted by the arrow pointing to her saying ‘ME’). Her hair is longer, reaching past her shoulders, and she’s standing next to a man wearing a suit, with a child between them. What’s most noticeable about the drawing, however, is Ayano’s shirt. Her sleeves are tied into knots.
 
‘WHEN I GROW UP, I WANT TO BE JUST LIKE HER’
 
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