It became a rhythm I didn't expect to need.
Wake up.
Sketchbook.
Third bench. Wait.
At first, I told myself it was just curiosity. That I was interested in how someone could sit so quietly, so consistently, in the same spot. No phone. No distractions. Just... herself. Like the world wasn't pulling at her sleeves like it did everyone else's.
But days turned into weeks. And I began setting alarms — not to wake up, but to make sure I wouldn't miss 6:47.
I started noticing details.
Her hair was always tied loosely, but strands would slip free — framing her face like brushstrokes. She wore the same silver ring on her left index finger. And her hands — god, her hands — moved like they were made for something gentle. Maybe music. Or maybe... art.
Some mornings, she carried a sketchbook too. She'd open it, draw something small, then close it again like it held something fragile.
That's when I gave her a name.
Not aloud. Just in my journal, in the quiet between sketches. "The Songbird."
I don't know why. Maybe it was the way she tilted her head like she was listening to a tune no one else could hear. Or how her silence felt like melody, like something you don't want to interrupt.
That day, I finally opened a new page.
My hands were slower than usual. Careful. I started with the curve of her shoulder, the way it dipped slightly when she leaned. Then the soft slant of her head, the headphones gently framed her face. Her expression — not smiling, not sad — just... still. Like she was enough.
It was the first time I'd ever hesitated to finish a drawing. Every time I thought it was done, I'd find something more — a shadow, a fold in her sleeve, the way her toes curled in her sandals.
I stopped trying to make it perfect. I just let my hand move the way it wanted.
When I looked down at the sketch, I knew I'd drawn something different. Not just a stranger.
Something closer. Something I hadn't allowed before.
A fragment of someone I might miss.
That night, I wrote in my journal:
"I didn't speak to her. I may never speak to her. But she has become part of the morning I no longer own."