I had an interesting conversation today with my brother. I was wondering how people sign names—if they spell them out or use their meanings. Little brother thought they probably spell them out. And then he had an iiiiiiinteresting idea. Which I have expounded upon, and now offer to you.

-Misunderstandings-

Harmony Mulligan was not pleased.

She had woken up on the wrong side of bed, she was certain. Well, actually, she wasn't. She had woken up in an alley, in a city she didn't recognize. She'd stumbled around for a while, trying to find out where she was, but the natives didn't even speak English.

So now here she was, wandering a city full of foreign weirdos with weird clothes and even weirder hair.

Harmony thought she would like to scream. But that was another problem: she couldn't. She had, in fact, been born mute. She didn't consider herself disabled—far from it, when her three brothers could make a zoo sound quiet—but it was certainly not convenient. Even if ASL was "universal."

By noon, Harmony gave up the search for a pay phone. No one recognized the phone gesture (she was pretty sure "sumimasen" meant "are you insane"), and her pajama pants didn't have pockets, let alone cash. Plus, she hadn't seen a single cell phone. What kind of culture didn't have cell phones?

Harmony Mulligan was not pleased, and she was very hungry. So, since she was a very moral individual, she decided to ask for food. She would try a restaurant.

"Hello," Harmony signed, trying her best to appear friendly.

The woman behind the counter smiled and rattled off a sentence. Harmony licked her lips. She hated using sign language in public. It was why she had developed an uncanny awareness for her family's whereabouts. "Do you know—" Harmony began self-consciously.

The woman flinched. "Deteke!" she shouted, drawing every eye in the building. "Deteke!" Face burning, Harmony fled.

Her next attempt was a boy in the street. He was wearing a coat and sunglasses, but he seemed the quiet type. There was also a bug on his shoulder. If he didn't shout or call her "sumimasen," Harmony decided she would politely brush it off. She was curious what type of beetle it was, anyway.

Harmony squared her shoulders and marched up to the stranger. She signed, "Hello." Smiled apologetically.

"Konnichiwa," the boy replied. A second beetle landed on his head.

Harmony chewed the inside of her lip, then squeezed her eyes shut. "Do you know American Sign Language?" she signed. When she opened her eyes, the boy was gone. There was a beetle on her shoulder, though.

She lost count of the people she tried to talk to. She was tired, starved, and still utterly confused and borderline scared. Was gesturing some social taboo? Something flickered in the corner of her eye, and Harmony looked up to see a man with a white mask.

She shrugged, quite beyond caring about the local quirks. "Can you understand me?" she signed in frustration.

The man stiffened (but didn't scream or disappear, thank goodness!) and moved his hands so fast that she could barely see them. Hand spelling?

Harmony grinned and quickly spelled, "H-E-L—"

She never even saw the fireball.

The more I wrote, the more I found myself liking this character. Therefore, the ending is ambiguous.

Sumimasen: formal way of saying "sorry" or "excuse me."

Deteke: "Get out." Impolite.

Konnichiwa: "Good afternoon."

Thank you for reading; I hope you vaguely enjoyed it!