The White Palm.
I am sitting beside her. She is reading. I steal quick glances at her, being careful to not be too obvious, but never getting a really good look at her. Once in a while I notice her glancing at me. I see that she just started Chapter 28. She shifts her crossed legs a few times. I watch her foot move slowly through the air. Black shoes that look like slippers. At one point, she moves her foot just enough to reveal her black ankle-height socks and her whiter-than-the-page leg. I smile at the contrast. She flips a few pages. I finally turn to look at her face directly and deliberately, but find that it is obscured by tumbles of brown hair. I watch her hold the book with one hand; the white flesh of her palm resting against a scribbled page.