"100 yen please"

Hotaru lazily shuffled her hand into her pocket, scrounging up a handful of coins, listlessly allowing them to flow out of her palm as she rotated her hand to the left, snatching up the bottle of water and tearing off the cap and taking in a mouthful of water. Hotaru nodded slightly to the clerk and turned to exit. 

In that moment, the heaviness of tiredness began to take hold on Hotaru, as she sat herself on the curb of the store, holding her head, seeking to drown out the sounds of nearby people, and not collapse of exhaustion on the streets. Each shutter of her eyes was permeated by images of her recurrent dreams, with a low groan of exhaustion sonorating from her. In spite of her eyelids falling as if of leaden construction, Hotaru took another sip of her water, as she struggled to get energy up. If only a few more hours of rest could have been kind enough to stick with her in that night.

"Ugh, better get myself up, lest I end up another headline in the paper", Hotaru mused to herself, as she jerked herself up suddenly. The young men near to her were loudly chattering, their bawdy laughter pounding into Hotaru's already throbbing brain, increasing the spinning of her tired vertigo. While she had worked on drowning out this chatter, it also meant she didn't hear the clacking of an object on concrete, and with her quick, effortless motion, she couldn't help but hit into a young woman behind her. Hard.

One of the delinquents watching let out a hearty laugh as the two girls collided, with the others watching with grins obscured behind their hands. Hotaru reeled back, shaking herself back to reality as her eyes focused on the target of her collision. Eyes widening as she saw the white cane in her hand, and the familiar face. 

"Ah! Haruko! I'm so sorry!" she stammered out, unsure of what to say or do. It was unlikely that she was hurt at all; any one in Judo could no doubt take a harder blow than anything little Hotaru could deal out, but Hotaru couldn't help but feel bad for running into her so carelessly.