... I guess i confused her again- she asked "too windy for you?" and i smiled and said "no, it's just exactly windy enough..."

It was one of those late-summer monsoon evenings, when the dirty brownish-grey stormclouds climbed over, bringing a welcome cool wind and sometimes suprising us with rain.

Tina lay in the hammock, eyes closed and soothing herself in the breeze and counting the tiny plops of moisture that occasionally touched her. a siren in the distance wailing in next block's traffic added an apprehensive note of alarm to her mood- as if there were a finite limit to the mood and she'd better enjoy the cool weather while it lasted, because that ol sol was waiting to bake her brains again soon.

*THUMP* she grasped at her chest in shock when the bird flew into her, and instinctively cupped her hands around the tiny avian before it bounded off again... she lay recovering from the suprise, her hands cupped over her chest and her heart racing, then slowing down as she calmed. after a minute, she could feel the bird's heart thumping too... it was alive then..

She slowly lifted a thumb and peeked into her hands to see the emerald crest of a tiny hummingbird. she hesitated, then opened her hands because she was suddenly afraid for the delicate bird, watching facinated as the bird stood, shook out it's feathers, and then stood, studying her nose, first tipping its little head this way and that, then twisting about to groom its back feathers.

It stood carefully combing its wings for fully a minute before it turned back again, chirped twice and flew away in a burst of emerald and gold...