Why did the Tigers have to try and do her and get Owaru involved? She didn't know what to do! All she could hope was that he could take care of himself as well as he claimed. God, she hoped that with all her heart. She wanted to get to know him better, but not too much better. It wasn't safe to let anybody get too close, but still...she glanced at her watch again to distract her thoughts from the direction they kept trying to go. Damn! She was still going to be late in getting to the community center!

Jesse turned up the sidewalk and saw Talia sitting on the bench outside the front doors where the staff left the old folk when their pick-ups were late.

"Talia! I'm so sorry I'm late!" she called and saw the relieved smile come to the old woman's face as she turned age blind eyes toward Jesse's voice.

"No worries. Just sitting here enjoying the sunshine, Sweetheart!" Talia called back lightly, thinking that she was hiding her concern.

Jesse let her think she had as she took Talia's hand and put it on her arm as the woman got to her feet.

"So, did you have fun?" Jesse asked as she guided Talia back down the sidewalk.

Talia nodded and went into a recitation of the events of her morning as Jesse led her home. Jesse tried not to see the frailness, the transparency that hovered around the old woman as she listened and asked after the health and 'going ons' of all Talia's friends.

Out of all the people in Jesse's life, Talia was the only one who had ever loved her. Talia had been the one who had taken care of her while her mother attended to her 'business' when she was little. Talia was the one that had never been afraid of her, never made her feel like she was outcast and different, even after that time at the playground. And it was Talia whom she had fled to at twelve with three broken ribs and a shattered jaw, compliments of her mothers drug-muddled temper. Talia hadn't been quite so blind then, or quite so frail, and had met her mother at the door with a baseball bat and the threat of reporting her to Social Services. Mother had left cursing and screaming and saying that if Talia wanted 'that ungrateful brat so much, she could have her.' Jesse hadn't seen her since. Her mother had left that night on a 'date' and never came back.

"So, what did you learn at the library?" Talia retaliated and Jesse grinned.