Umber.

Half the train was filled with sleepy commuters; eyes rimmed red from the squalor or solitude of the night before.

Deir rubbed in a spot on her knee, counting up the coats in front of her.

There were six brown wools, two varying shades of drab, one camel suede jacket, and the last, all the way to the left, looked like the coat she tried on yesterday, the color of “Raw Umber”.

Brown. Bearish burnt bits of it. Monday’s morning coffee in ten different shades.

Deir licked her finger, and again rubbed the spot on her knee.

In the corner of the car, an elder woman touched her ancient hair, pin straight and tinged purple. Her wrinkled right hand toyed with a bobby pin, while her wrinkled left held onto some reddish curly kid. The passengers held twelve of the twenty seats, and six were empty. The last two she filled herself, one with her copper body and mulberry coat and one with the Solyian Sun, a tacky sort of Today’s Paper, abandoned on the seat next to her: “The Solyian Republican Council reconvened for its fourteenth session”.

Huh. Funny. Simply. Deir reached out for the paper, finally, and placed it on her lap. Just sort of held it for the next two stops. Cover up her knees, maybe. She didn’t take it with her; oh-so-casually dropped it on the floor as she left. I wanted to pick it up, but for some reason, I blushed every time I meant to…. A slight shameful, just picking up an old paper like that.