It had been so long since the girl had last encountered another living being that she wasn’t sure how to begin. By and by she gathered her thoughts, and said, “Who are you?”

The boy had grey tousled hair and appeared to be resting, head drooped and one arm draped over his knee. At the girl’s words he stirred and lifted his head, but the girl noticed that his eyes remained closed.

“I dunno,” he said. “Who are you?”

Suddenly the girl realized that she did not have a name. She understood the concept of a name, and had seen names being used before, but she herself had never received a name.

The girl was silent. If she could not identify herself, how could she expect others to do the same?

The girl decided to change her tactics.

“Why are you here?” she asked.

“It’s so wonderfully silent here,” said the boy. “It is so noisy out there nowadays that I have a constant headache. I heard the silence through the chaos, so I sought it out.”

The girl was intrigued, and scooted closer to the boy. As she did so the boy unfurled his palm and relaxed his shoulders.

“You heard... the silence?” said the girl. “What do you mean?”

“I hear... things,” said the boy. “It’s hard to describe.”

“Try,” said the girl.

“Well, that old woman there, she sounds like a babbling brook,” said the boy. For the first time the girl peered out of her void for something more than food, and realized that she was in an abandoned town square. The only one there was an old woman sitting in the corner on some crumbled red brick, humming happily and turning some yarn over and over in her hands.

“Let me see...” said the boy. He stood up, carefully, and eased out of the whiteness surrounding the girl like a cat through a tight square. Immediately he winced, and eased back inside. When he did so he blinked, and the girl saw beneath his lashes a pair of colorless, milky-white eyes.

“Not far from us there are a few more people,” said the boy. “They sound like nails scratching on a chalkboard. They must be very unhappy.” He paused.

“How did you do that?” said the girl.

“I told you,” said the boy. “I hear sounds. Trees sound like a deep, low hum. Flowers sound like a feathery tinkle...”

“No, no,” said the girl. “I meant how did you come close to me -" without turning to white sand, she wanted to say, but for the first time in a long time she felt a twinge of something like shame, and stopped short.

The boy seemed to understand.

“You mean how did I not get consumed by the silence, right?" he said. "I can... sort of hear the spaces between the silence. And as long as I stay within those spaces, I'm okay."

The girl nodded. She thought she understood. It was like how she was able to reach out and grasp food and water, except this time, instead of her focusing, the boy could do it of his own free will.