I was cycling home one evening down a remote unlit path, when I saw this kid slumped up against a tree in a ditch. Concerned, I doubled back and called out to him “hey, are you okay?”
He didn’t look my way, just quietly responded with some hesitation “…yes.” Unsettled by the hesitation, I asked him again another way “is all well? Do you need help?”
Again, he barely looks my way and in a very quiet voice responds “…no.” I didn’t know what to do at this point, as a non-native speaker I’d exhausted my conversation options.
I try to cycle on but do so slowly, looking back at an increasingly skeletal looking figure resting against that tree in that small ditch.
In the distance I see another cyclist coming way, and I hail him to a stop with my flashlight. The guy thankfully speaks English, and I tell him about the kid and the tree, and to check up on him.
I ride on a bit more but I look back to see that the other cyclist did stop and appears to be having an equally difficult monotone conversation with the kid too. Resigned to the fact that I did all I could, I cycle on.
A little bit further down the path I see two kids walking towards me. “Hey!” I cry, “there’s another kid down by that tree over there! Do you know him?”
“Yeah, he’s our friend” comes the easy reply, and then the kicker, “we’re playing hide and seek.”
Grandad, for the last time - those aren’t parrots, they’re people, and that’s not a stick you’re holding it’s a rifle