Cornelia Vane

She entered the room to stares and grimaces alike. They gawped at her attire, they gasped at the door, slammed very shut behind her. Yet Cornelia Vane moved gracefully through the Post Town Library as if she were entirely unencumbered by anything. Much less the wildly thrown about rags she wore, or the snot dribbling down her nose.

It was like witnessing an injury in an athletic field of play where after a time one wonders if anything will resume in a timely fashion. But since no one in the book rooms had a thing to do, on they stared. On and on. As if Cornelia was unbreeched by these jumpers over the wall of her very fragile comfort.

When she took her place in an abandoned chair by the window on the second floor nearest the comic books, she unfolded her book and began to scan the pages.

A moment had to be short for in it a strange woman tapped her on the shoulder and spoke;

"You might as well bathe when you get home, young lady. We can smell you all the way in the History section upstairs and it is not for a lady, like yourself, to be unwashed in this day and age. Are you well taken care of?"

"No," replied Cornelia Vane.

"Where is your mother? Your Father?"

Twice Cornelia shook her head. Then began to cry.

"Of course," said the woman. "Come with me."

Cornelia Vane could have turned no redder in the face. She followed the woman to the ladies room and there she was washed with dispensed soap. It took nearly twenty minutes to cover her head and foot, some parts she covered on her own, and she was dried with brown paper towels.

Her undergarments were thrown in the trash and she was left in a stall while the woman ran out to fetch clothes from the local thrift. When she returned she had items fitting her age: a regular maroon hoodie, underthings, a small t-shirt, and some baggy jeans. When Cornelia Vane finally pulled her head out of the hoodie, she said "thank you" to an empty room.

Fin.