After so many years of doing her homework at the small kitchen table back home, Rosie felt very silly and incredibly cosmopolitan about what had become her usual routine in Darrow: sitting in a cafe, a mug of something hot beside her, alternately working on her assignments and watching people pass by outside. The general sketch of it hasn't changed much at all, maybe; the table still a little small and her drink of choice still either tea or cocoa, depending on her mood. But here, there's no parental disapprovals to tune out, no older brother or his friends plodding loudly through the room on their way to the parks for a game of football. Above all, it feels different enough, which is what matters most.

Having finished her drink, but not her grammar worksheet, she unfolds herself from the chair she'd curled up in and picks up her mug, thinking she may as well get another before she dives back in. At this point in the afternoon, there aren't many other people in the cafe; it's easy to notice a familiar (or semi-familiar) face, like that of her new roommate at the Home. Rosie had overheard the staff talking about accommodations for the other girl, something about installing a new fire alarm with a flashing light, since the new girl wouldn't be able to hear the old one. That she's deaf makes Rosie uncertain about how to proceed with saying hello; was it ruder just to wave, or to start off with a note?

After a bit of deliberation, she tears a blank piece of paper from her notebook and writes, trying to keep her penmanship as clear as she can. Carefully, even a bit hesitantly, she approaches where the other girl's sitting, trying to catch her eye and smile before she lays the paper on the table.

Hello, I'm Rosie--we're roommates at the Home. Please tell me if this is an awful way to say hello. The people at the Home said you're not able to hear so I didn't just want to start talking to you, but maybe that might've been better. I'm not sure.

Sorry, I talk an awful lot. Or...write, in this situation.