People Watching

Eroshay sat on one of the swings in the small park nearest the stables and sports fields. She had waited after school rather than going straight back to the orphanage, or as she simply knew it, home.

She was barely swinging at all, kicking gently front and back as she watched anyone who happened to go by. She wasn't smiling, but she hardly ever smiled.

She had bundled up as much as she could, gloves and all, for fear or touching anyone throughout the school day.

Shay sighed and looked at her feet, drawing odd shapes in the mulch below with the toe of her shoe.

@TiaMonrole

Shay looked up at him in surprise. She blinked, opening her mouth to speak and then closed it.

"Tia is a girl's name," Shay said. She didn't mean for it to come out as rudely as it had; maybe she was trying for a conversation starter?

After realizing she had been rude, she looked forward and swung a little higher. "Uh, I'm Shay."

Shay was shaken by his excitability. This boy was very loud and a little, scratch that, way too happy for her taste.

"I'm people watching," she said in her soft, raspy voice.

She wasn't certain why he told her not to tell anyone about his name being a girl's name. Who would she tell? How would they not already know? This request confused her, so she didn't say anything about it.

"Why is your name Tia?" she asked instead, wondering if his parents were just cruel or maybe they thought they were having a girl?

It didn't occur to her that this might upset him. Things of that nature rarely occurred to Shay.

Shay was getting tired by his quick way of speech. She didn't often speak to people, so she didn't know what most kids her age were like.

"It's like bird watching," she explained. "You watch people to see what they do in their day to day lives. That way you learn about people as a whole and know how to talk to them."

Shay's head spun with all the questions she was being asked.

"I don't know how many people I know about. I do it...because I find it more fun than talking to most people."

She pointed to a couple talking on a bench a ways from them.

"See, like watching them. You watch them, and you see this really deep moment between two people. Then, when you have a deep moment of your own, you may understand it better. People don't always act like themselves when you just walk up and talk to them."