You were there.
Don’t you remember?
You were walking along that gray street, on that gray day. Gray raindrops pattering on the gray sidewalk. You were wearing your gray coat, looking straight ahead with an unassuming gray glare. Just another passerby, not really seeing, or searching. Just living in a routine of the dull, the mundane, and the absolute gray.
Until you saw the spark of yellow umbrella. A spark of life in the hands of a child. Her eyes of blue looking around in innocent awe. The child didn’t see the gray like you. Quite the opposite. Her eyes saw a world of endless color.
And she was enchanted by it.


She saw the green twinkle of the beggar’s eyes as she dropped a shiny copper penny in the faded maroon mug. The mug he had held from the day he lost everything.

She saw the silvery glint of the tear. The sob of a childless woman, as the young girl flashed a hopeful smile at her. Hope in the form of little white teeth.

She saw the harsh red of a freshly hit cheek, the terror as the brown package dropped onto charcoal-tinted pavement. She handed the boy the package. One less ugly black bruise.

A rainbow of happiness given, in such a gray world.
But indeed, the most enchanting of them all, was when she looked at you. She saw your gray. The gray of the lost. She knew how to find you.

And with a knowing look, the spark of yellow umbrella bobbed into traffic.


Your eyes widened as the girl stood there, eyes closed, as if waiting.









Waiting for you.
And then you know what needed to be done.
A purple rush of adrenaline, stifling the gray cry of fear. A dodge in front of a white Buick. Pain. Scarlet blood. All in one gray blink.
And you lay there on the charcoal-tinted pavement, as the driver bent over you, a sob rising. Onlookers gasped, earth slowing down until the stop. Pounding of your head keeping time to the melody of the end.

But the child’s eyes still shone, the spark of yellow umbrella unscathed. Making it all worthwhile.










Another breath…
Pounding slows.

And the melody of the end stopped, for there was no end, not yet.

And you blinked your grey eyes , softening into blue. As if seeing the world, for the first time.