Welcome to Gaia! ::

It actually wasn't that hot, and the sun wasn't up that high, and so Luka had finally allowed her to leave the apartment to sit underneath a shady tree at a tiny local park that had a reputation for being completely empty. And it had been, for a while: No one passed her on the bike path, no one passed her on the hiking trail, the swingset and sand box across the pair of intertwining walkways remained steadfastly empty. Magdelen, deprived of her normal hobby of barely-legal people watching, had pulled out a book and begun to read.

Probably, she thought, it had been something of her appearance that had scared people off; it wasn't often you saw a young girl all wrapped up like a mummy all the way down to individual fingers. Plus, she'd been pretty sick lately so her hair was all shaggy from lack of care. Maybe she looked like a homeless kid, or something.

Whatever, decided Magdelen. She didn't need people anyway.

This did not stop her from looking up when she heard voices. There was a little brown bear boy-type child at the playground, and what looked to be his parent coming out of the trees. She set her book aside and sat, white eyes drinking in the scene before her with an almost eerie concentration. Standing so she could cross to the very edge of the playground's mulch, she held the book as a lame excuse for being so close that she could hear snippets of the family's conversation.

Her bangs were too long, but with her head down like she was reading, it was easy to see through the white strands of hair. There wasn't much to recommend the family, really: small, it seemed, with just the father and the child. But still, you could only go so long just watching old movies and moping about losing your spot in the school drama before you just wanted to watch some kind of normal family.

Well, maybe a normal person would just want to go shopping or something. Whatever. She crossed the rest of the distance and settled herself on a swing two places over from the bear kid and his dad, set down her olive-green canvas bag. The swing creaked loudly as she pushed herself back and forth with her toes; her attention was much more obviously focused on something other than the book she still held in her lap.

Mommy? Why did the bear kid - Kodi was his name, she'd remember that - call a man Mommy? It struck her as a little odd, and she picked her head up to give them a slightly concerned look. Her face was completely empty of embarrassment, which would certainly be taken amiss; most people did not wander around staring at other people like stalkers.

Clearly, Magdelen did.

"Hello," she said, once the boy had greeted her. "I'm Magdelen." It was fairly certain she'd never see him again - no connections, or lack of them, to worry about. "You're Kodi. Is that short for something?"