"Maybe in a few days.  We don't need to plan it now."

"Alright.  Like I said, you be as well as you can."  Hug?

Hug.  "Yeah.  Love you."

"Love you more."  Squeeze, unhug.  "Thank you both for having me over, and for taking care of my boy.  I'm sure you don't need to hear that it means a lot to me."

"I'll do my best."

"Thank you.  See you in a few days!"  And she's off.

"Bye."

Shirt off as soon as she's gone.

Hm?  Right yes shirt.

.........And a cupcake.

Was he not eating cupcakes because of his mom - none of Haru's business.

Couch once the cupcake is eaten? And blog comments till he can resume Les Mis.

Yeah, couch.  And podcast, for him, except that there's only ten minutes left in the episode and he doesn't feel like starting another one.  Maybe back to music.  What does he feel like....  Kelly Clarkson, sure.

Half an hour later Haru's shoulder's getting wet again.

"...anything I can help with over there?"

Sniffle.  Headphones off.

"Do you think my mom got in a car crash?"

"...no, I doubt it very much."

"There's deer and stuff.  She has really bad luck with deer, I think it's something about her car."

"I can't guarantee otherwise but I don't think the odds are any higher today than they would be if you weren't scared. You can text her asking for a confirmation that she's home safe when she gets there."

"I thought about that but I don't want to distract her with a notification because what if that makes her crash and otherwise she would have been fine and it's all my fault."

"Yeah, fair enough. Does her phone alert to emails?"

"I don't know.  Maybe.  If they don't I don't know whether she'll see it tonight."

"Okay. You could set a timer for when you'd expect her to get home, add like half an hour in case she stops for errands, and then text her when it goes off, if that would help."

"Okay."  Maps app, how long do think it takes to get from this part of town to back home.  And it's been, what, maybe half an hour since she left?  Timer.

And then there's really nothing to do but re-headphones and go back to vividly imaging antlers through windshields.  And dwelling on the fact that he sent her off with barely an 'I love you', after spending a long time being wildly and, to be frank, baselessly mistrustful of her.  And before that failing to talk to her for a really long time.  Would he be able to cope, not only with the death of his mother, but with having that as their last conversation?  He barely said anything, and pretty much everything he did was about him.  It doesn't really help that he's listening to the music she used to put on for him when he was little, but it also maybe wouldn't help to not do that.

With forty minutes left on his timer, she sends a "Home safe!" of her own accord.  Maybe he will sob harder into Haru's shoulder about this.

"...what is it now?"

Phone?  Phone.  Haru look at his phone.  ...Also he should respond in some way.  Purple heart react.

...pat pat. "So, that's good then, right?"

"Yeah."