62

"Hey, you okay?" Pebble snapped me out of my reverie. We were at climbing- they'd finally return from their robotics competition yesterday.

To be honest, no. I wasn't okay. But I didn't want to make a big deal about anything. Not really.

"Just thinking," I threw out there. If they didn't want to know, they wouldn't ask. But if they did want to know...

"About..."

I looked at the clock. 8:00 pm.

"Do you wanna go get water? I'll tell you on the way," I nodded my head towards the training room.

"Sure," They shrugged.

Pebble told Coach where we were going- she didn't really care.

"So? Whatcha thinkin' about?"

Somebody yelled out in frustration, falling and hitting the mats. He laughed as he got up.

"I went to this grand opening for a mural that was redone over at Williams Park-,"

"I don't know where that is."

"Uh, it's downtown. First City Park of St.Pete. But anyway it was a little memorial of a homeless lady who feeds the birds. It was cool and all, but I was kinda zoning out when one woman started talking about her dogs. Thats when we heard the yelling."

"Yelling?" They held the training room door open for me. I waited for them before I continued walking.

"Yeah, I mean it's downtown. A lot of people are out of it. Sometimes it can get dangerous. But I was in a large group of people. I just kinda stood closer to Cosi-,"

"Cosi was there?"

"Yeah, and so was my mom. When the yelling got closer she picked her up."

"Who was yelling?" we got to the water fountains. I went first. The training room water is always the coldest.

"I didn't know at first, and I only got a glance. Usually it's habit to just keep ignoring them, don't look, don't make eye contact, but suddenly he was right behind me, and everyone looked back for a second." I paused.

"He was an old man, in a wheelchair. Looked homeless. It wasn't angry yelling, Peb, he was heartbroken and- and when I understood what he was saying..."

"What was he saying?" They urged me on.

"He said, 'My sister, my sister died, my sister died on 34th. my sister died on 34th and the police don't give a fuck!' but it sounded more like ma thiher da ohn durhe do thee ahna folee doh gi ah Foh! which is why it took me forever to figure out what he was saying. I don't even think most people were trying to understand. Luckily, another woman and a man spoke to him. They left him alone though. he wheeled his way past me, to the front, wailing one more time before stopping and wheeling away.

"I wish I could've done something, pebble, I wish I did anything besides ignore him and cry. I wish I could do something. But I didn't. I just looked forward and watched a lady talk about her dog while several city council matters nodded their heads and ignored with me, and I just clapped when everyone else clapped."

I stopped, blinking back tears, scoffing at how easy it was to do so. Was I really just as careless? Was it so hard to empathize with another human being? Was it so easy to justify my apathy?

"Whoa," Pebble reacted pretty appropriately.

"Yeah."

He started walking towards the door. I followed.

"Charlie! Pebble! What are y'all doing?" Coach yelled at us when we left the training room.

"Your mother," I mumbled. Pebble laughed.

"We were getting water," They supplied, appeasing our Coach.

"Yeah? Get on the wall! we've got thirty minutes left! Climb something!"

"Yes ma'am!" I saluted, turning the corner. I didn't think about the man for awhile after that.