The New House

Eight Months Later

We pick the story up eight months later as Haruo, River and family move into their new home in Riverview.

The new house was substantially more ornate than the other one and it had several garages. After selling several of their cars, they were able to downsize to the point where they were able to utilize the garage's parking spots. Haruo did enjoy the two Minus One Kelvin fridges in the kitchen. As a Level 10 5-Star Chef, he was able to whip up most dishes with relative ease.

Alanna was amazed at the house and how it looked as she walked in the door of the home.

There were quite a few nice new things about the new home that would make the family feel comfortable: the kitchen with the double Minus One Kelvin fridges, the wall-size TV, the wonderfully ornate dining room with the panelled walls.

Spending the money to be able to afford a nice house like this was worth it, Haruo thought to himself.Seeing the look on River's face is worth all the money in the world. Of course, the first thing that River gravitated towards was the easel and with her job as a painter, it was the logical thing for her to do.

River's step-sister headed downstairs to the ice-rink to spend some time on the couch reading.

...while River concentrated on producing more paintings to sell. She was now making over §20,000 per commissioned painting and it was a far cry from the days when they were newly married and struggling to get by. They had enough money that they were making a comfortable living.

Haruo, after seeing that his family was settling in, headed up to the Aleister's Apothecary Shop to see if there were any items that he consign that would be profitable.

He was rather hungry so rather than going home, he headed off to the diner to grab a bite to eat.

The Chikamori family and Satoshi had grown estranged since Molly was not happy with the move out of Sunset Valley to Riverview, but that really couldn't be helped. When one ends up being married, you support your spouse with your heart and soul, 110%.

For the Chikamori family it meant that even though they weren't together as an extended family, it certainly meant that life would still go on regardless of the situation that they found themselves in. Satoshi threw in his lot with his wife and hopefully the two of them would make it. Haruo and River had threw their lot in as far as taking care of Aidan (Satoshi's son and Haruo's cousin) and raising him so that he would have a chance. Molly didn't like the situation, but she knew for a fact that if she had to deal with Aidan, he'd probably have been taken by now and there was no way in hel that Haruo would let that happen to his family, nor would Yasunobu be happy about that situation either.