Hob's Hill

Three

The man, rather younger than she'd previously assumed him to be, possibly around her own age of nineteen, slowly revealed the side of his face. He had a modest cropping of bark colored hair, average face shape...and giant flappy ears. Ellie fought a smile. He could tune in for radio wherever he wanted with antennae like that, she mused. His wide forehead enforced that idea, looking quite capable of housing such instruments. Then there were the eyebrows. They formed a caricature all on their own, capable of jovial dance, waggling insinuation, and dueling gestures. Currently they arched a silent question.

All this set the stage for his eyes. Her breath caught.

Stormy blue. Sunstones, was all she could think. Blue sunstones.

Sunstones most commonly were cheery orange, like a summer's day. But blue sunstones were the opposite. They were night. Mystery. Mimicking the vast depth and breathless glory of an enigmatic universe, sparkling with all the stardust of the Milky Way... He had star light in his eyes. Not careless splendor, but the curious light of someone who's never finished learning. The flickering light of a tired star, embittered with all it's endured. The light of easy awe and humor. His gaze twinkled with so much.

Fanning from them were lines. Deep set in his tan face, perhaps from working too hard, or crying too much. Worry lines. Around his mouth, in the furrow of his brow. So many creases for a boy.

And for that moment, she was lost in them. The jewel of his gaze, that captivating midnight, took her back so many years. To an erstwhile summer she spent camping at a small rock quarry with her father, before Mags was born. Of falling into her seat by a fire, under the waking stars, watching the blazing sunset of a mountain horizon swallowed by cerulean night.

The connection was instant. The both of them gawked at the other. A palpable link. Neither of them dared move, or breathe. He was studying her just as she had him. Quick flicks of scrutiny, from her brown eyes to the curve of her heart shaped face, the round of her high cheeks, and maybe the wheat blonde of her hair.

The squawk of some large predatory bird jerked them out of the moment.

An odd feeling squirmed in her gut. Ellie had the need to sit upright now. Lying prone just didn't seem right. It made her too vulnerable. She struggled to get her arms under her, to lift her head, but it was unusually heavy. And padded. She touched it, but oddly her fingers felt cottony as well. They'd also been wrapped. Processing that, she groping her crown. Wads of fabric wound around it in layers. They'd taken a cotton shirt, wrapped and tied it, and then knotted yet another shirt, an oxford, for extra measure. She only vaguely remembered falling. Had her head wound been that bad?

He sidled further into the room, looking bothered by her weakness, but hesitating to help.

Ellie realized where the shirts had come from. He was completely naked from the waist up, save the bracers holding his trouser up. And his trousers were oddly two inches too short at the ankles. She noticed this because once she glimpsed his bare chest, which was not overly muscled but athletic, she averted her gaze and noticed the trousers – and the socks. A mismatched argyll and a woolly beige, both equally stiff with dirt.

She felt him noticing her stare. A shameful blush burned her face. She scolded herself, as ogling him wouldn't help her sit up. She tried pushing once more.

"Fine?" he harped at the small girl, "Look at her. She's sort of--" Words failed him.

The girl finished his sentence with a calming tone. "Pale? That's common with bleeding."

"Right. The blood, there was a lot of that. That account for... the flopping?" He made a flip-flop gesture in Ellie's general direction.

They studied her as if she were some foreign entity. Ellie stilled, watching them watch her. There was a certain kind of detachment in their gaze now. Like zoologists observing a new species, speculating over its actions, nattering on about this and that. It sent a cold, slithering shudder down her spine.