The sky was a mirror of God’s paint water. The little girl squinted her eyes so the colors would blur and so she could see the fogged vibrancy of shadow and light whisped around itself in non-shapes. Marni shut her eyes completely and rested the back of head on her pudgy little hands to provide a cushion against the uncomfortable bus seat. The group of fourth graders were being quite by the general standard of nine year olds, that is to say, they weren’t physically ripping each other apart like rabid animals. Marni had been looking forward to this trip for the last week, and had been attentively counting down the days in her grey school issued homework keeper. It wasn't that she really wanted to see the art museum; instead what she had been looking forward to was the bus ride. Marni wanted to see if people acted any differently when she was supposed to be in school; she strongly suspected that when she wasn’t watching them, people would do strange things and she was desperate to catch them in the act. She had anxiously studied the streets outside and stared down people in their cars whenever the bus stopped, all the time wondering what they were up to. Trying to figure out people was Marni’s favorite hobby; she would stalk people in stores, ask them questions in banks, and go through old receipts she would find on street corners. This trip had been her chance to view people in their “natural habitat” as it were, but so far she was disappointed. There hadn’t been anyone on the streets so far and only a few cars on the road, the passengers of which had seemed to be impervious to her squinty inspection.

Marni soon found herself completely bored, so she did what she always did when she was bored or sad or lonely or just whenever she had the time; she took out her jacket and put it over her head, then she closed her eyes very tight and pressed her palms on her eyes so she could make stars. She sometimes she would try and count them or find shapes, but usually she would just look at them and wonder how galaxy of constellations could exist right behind her eyelids. She never told anyone about her stars eyes because she thought they were the only thing that made her special.
When her mom and dad would fight with each other or her sister, Marni would hide in her closet; put a blanket over head and look at her stars. She couldn’t sing, but she would think songs really loudly in her head to block out the noises of yelling and screaming. Sometimes she would hurt her eyes from doing this too much.

The bus came to a stop, and shouting, sticky children oozed from the bus. Marni came out last, her blue jacket wrapped around her waist. The harassed teacher began to put the students into pairs so that in case one of the students got ripped into pieces by a savage wolf-man vampire monster, at least one other person would notice. The grouping was alphabetic and Marni Ezra ended up next to Holly Feller. Despite having been in the same school for the last two years Marni had never been friends with Holly because, quite frankly, nobody wanted to be friends with Marni. People always said she was ugly and weird, but Marni had asked her rag doll, Nissa, what was wrong with her, and Nissa had said she was perfect, so Marni decided to believe Nissa instead. Nissa never called her names or hit her, and she would always ask Marni how she was feeling, and comfort her after a hard day. Nissa was the greatest friend anyone could ever hope for, so Marni kept her hidden in a shoe box with all her other treasures when she was at school so nobody could take her away.
The second the teacher was finished assigning pairs Holly walked over to her friend and the two girls abandoned their respective partners to walk arm in arm into the museum. Marni didn’t mind so much being left alone, so instead of sulking Marni began look round herself for something interesting. She looked up and down the street to look for people and saw something odd. There was a scruffy black man sitting on the sidewalk across the street. Marni began to stare at him. He looked so sad, with his knees all drawn up and his hands tucked under his armpits. There were some people walking down the street, but they seemed unable to spare him smile, or even just a glance.
Mari kept on staring as her class continued to mingle in front of the museum, the man must have sensed her eyes on him and he looked up. The two looked at each other and Marni gave a big grin and waved, the man returned the gesture with a smile that instantly took ten years from his face. “Marni! We are going inside now, don’t wave to strange people, you don’t know what they could do,” the teacher said as she grabbed Marni’s shoulder and steered her into the building.
“Yes, but you don’t know what they could do either, you never know what people can do for you until you get to know them” Marni replied walking into the gloom of the art museum. The woman glared at her “Don’t you dare talk back to me, young lady. Now go catch up with the group.”
Marni walked off into the place and hung on to the back of the gang of kids like the afterthought she was. They wondered around the galleries, staring at various paintings of dead people painted by dead people years before any of them had been born. Marni yawned and thought about the man again. He was lucky, he got to sit out in the sunshine and watch people all day, all Marni got to do was get yelled at or picked on. But she kept on wondering why he had looked so sad. Maybe he got yelled at somewhere where there was nobody to help him, maybe he got picked on in secret where nobody could help him.
Half an hour later the official tour ended and the class was told to go back to the bus and get their lunches and take them to the courtyard around the back. Afterwards they could explore the rest of the galleries. When the class went back outside, Marni’s eyes instantly went to the place where the man had been sitting. He was still there, but this time he had I head down and didn’t look up at her. Marni nodded to herself, she had made up her mind. She waited until everyone had gotten their lunches and had begun to walk off to garden space behind the main museum area to sit in the shade. When they had all wondered off in that direction she quickly grabbed her lunch, and made like she was going to follow the group. When she was certain nobody was paying her any attention she slunk behind a corner and darted back. She took a deep breath and began to cross the street. The journey of ten feet seemed to take half a century, but finally Marni was standing in front of the strange scruffy man. He looked up and Marni broke into another huge smile, “Hi! My name is Marni, I got a tuna salad sandwich, baby carrots and dip and some Oreos for lunch, and do you want to split it?”
The man look surprised, and then sad. He gave her a kind, smile and gently replied, “Hey Marni. Naw, you don’t hav’ta share your food with me, you go on back now, back to class” Marni’s grin slid off her face and she looked down.
“I just thought, since you’re all alone an’ junk, and I’m all alone too, you might wanna eat lunches with me. Nobody never ever wants to be with me ‘cause they already got their own friends.”
“You seem like a good kid, you must have some friends,” came the gentle persistent reply. Despite the tone, Marni’s eyes began to water and she quickly sat down and covered her eyes with her palms again. She felt so stupid.
“Sweet heart? Do your teacher know you out here? Sweet heart? I tell you what, you give me half a that tuna sandwich an a Oreo an tell me what wrong. Ma name’s Floyd”
Marni gave a sniffle and looked up into another age defying smile. Marni felt childish for crying, but under the gaze of those kind eyes she didn’t feel as stupid as she might otherwise have. She quickly opened up her paper lunch bag and took out the contents of her lunch, which she then neatly arranged on the paper bag on the sidewalk so that each of them got an equal serving, then she handed Floyd her water bottle. “I never get thirsty during lunch, anyway there’s a fountain inside so I can get myself somthin’ to drink later if I get thirsty.”
Floyd didn’t argue and instead took water. He took a couple of big sips that emptied almost half the bottle before setting it aside. The two ate in a comfortable silence, as if they had known each other all their lives. After a few minutes Floyd looked up thoughtfully, “Marni? That a nice name, you look latino, it Spanish?”
“I don’t think so. My Papa is from Spain, but I don’t know any Spanish, I’m really dumb, an’ he gets mad ‘bout how dumb I am. I can’t even talk in Spanish even little baby sentences, even though he say even babies speak perfect Spanish all the time and instead I know how to read Hebrew, and he say that’s not good for nothing. Mamma says it’s part of her and mines religion and culture, an’ junk, but then that gets Papa get even more mad, and, um” Here she swallowed, she sort of wished she had kept the water because her throat felt so dry, “ he, he just gets mad is all.” Marni ended lamely. She could tell Floyd was looking at her again. She swallowed and looked down. She felt like all her life story was boiling up in her stomach and if Floyd were to ask her one more question it would all come up like emotional vomit. To stop him from asking her anything else she decided to ask him something that had been bothering her since she had first laid eyes on him.
“Hey, Mr. Floyd? How come you was just sitting here looking all sad and stuff and nobody even stopped?” Marni looked up at the man, who was now looking pensive, “How come they never stop?” she asked again, more quietly
“How comes you stopped when no person else did?” Floyd asked in a hushed tone, not looking at her.
“Because I know how much it hurts when they don’t stop”
“And for that, sweet heart, I’m truly sorry.”
Marni looked up at Floyd. He turned to her and the pair stared at each other, and she finally saw what it was about the man that had drawn her to him. She could hear the indignant screams of hear teacher calling for her, but she didn’t move.
She could finally see stars in his eyes.