She caught him staring and offered a warm smile, which only seemed to fuel his creative endeavor. A few stops later, as the child was about to leave, he approached her and pressed the drawing into her hands. It was a crude but endearing sketch of a woman on a crowded train, the surrounding figures little more than scribbles.
As the train continued its chaotic journey, she found herself the subject of a completely different kind of attention. A child, no more than ten years old, with a mop of unruly hair and a wide grin, stared at her with an unblinking gaze. He was drawing her - or at least, trying to - on a crumpled piece of paper, his crayon moving in bold strokes. she the molester and the crowded train best
She thanked him, touched by the gesture. The crowded train, with its usual smells of sweat and the distant tang of food, seemed a little less crowded, a little more connected, in that moment. She caught him staring and offered a warm
In that brief moment of physical contact, a world of unintended perceptions was born. He, engrossed in the headlines of the newspaper he held, didn't notice. But she, quick to react, felt a jolt of embarrassment and quickly shifted her position, trying to maximize her personal space. As the train continued its chaotic journey, she
"For you," he said, with a proud smile.