Status: thank you.
The Sanctuary Beyond the Undergrowth
twelve
“What’s your name?”
He looked up from his little book and stared at me through wavy, overgrown bangs. I stood with my back tall, trying to not appear intimidated by him, but his eyes were too pale and pierced right through my flesh.
“Why?”
“Well,” I began softly. “I don’t know it.”
He stared at me for another while. His eyes ran over each freckle on my face, the way my nose pointed nearly straight up into the air, the way my lips were barely there and a dark color. And then he patted the spot beside him on the bench. “Sit.”
I sat.
He set his book down and sighed with great burden. “Why do you talk to me?”
My gaze shifted from his wide eyes to his curved fingernails. They were neat, cut short, and tidy. His white t-shirt hung off his gaunt form; those spider legs of his were tucked away into those familiar boots [the ones I studied on our first meeting]; he had bad posture; and his hands always shivered some. Sometimes when I told him about my day—I knew he didn’t care about the tales of a young girl in school—his posture would become worst. His eyes would study mine, lips downturned in concentration. When I said something an annoying girl did, he’d laugh. When I told him about a bad grade I received in my hardest class, he’d exhale heavily. When I told him he was pretty much the only friend I had [which I did often], because I distanced myself from the others, he’d mutter, “I wish you wouldn’t do that.”
And so maybe that was why I talked to him.
He looked up from his little book and stared at me through wavy, overgrown bangs. I stood with my back tall, trying to not appear intimidated by him, but his eyes were too pale and pierced right through my flesh.
“Why?”
“Well,” I began softly. “I don’t know it.”
He stared at me for another while. His eyes ran over each freckle on my face, the way my nose pointed nearly straight up into the air, the way my lips were barely there and a dark color. And then he patted the spot beside him on the bench. “Sit.”
I sat.
He set his book down and sighed with great burden. “Why do you talk to me?”
My gaze shifted from his wide eyes to his curved fingernails. They were neat, cut short, and tidy. His white t-shirt hung off his gaunt form; those spider legs of his were tucked away into those familiar boots [the ones I studied on our first meeting]; he had bad posture; and his hands always shivered some. Sometimes when I told him about my day—I knew he didn’t care about the tales of a young girl in school—his posture would become worst. His eyes would study mine, lips downturned in concentration. When I said something an annoying girl did, he’d laugh. When I told him about a bad grade I received in my hardest class, he’d exhale heavily. When I told him he was pretty much the only friend I had [which I did often], because I distanced myself from the others, he’d mutter, “I wish you wouldn’t do that.”
And so maybe that was why I talked to him.