Week 0: Pamphlet dodging

Sheherazade, one of the centre dance instructors, sits perched on the edge of one of the sofas in the lobby, with a clear view of the bulletin board. A water bottle sits next to a small stack of pamphlets on the coffee table in front of her. In her hands is a clipboard she is currently scribbling notes on, occasionally making complex motions with one hand in midair as she does so.

When someone passes nearby she sometimes almost rises out of her seat and tries to make eye contact, one hand holding out a leaflet with "Dodgeball" written across the top. She's surprisingly succesful at getting the people she stands up for to take them, although often she merely glances at them and sits back down, letting them continue un-pamphletted.

After Sheherazade has been sitting for a while, enough to have a full cup of tea if she were so inclined, two masculine people enter the community center talking. One is average height, a white guy, with short mousy blond hair and stubble, and his friend is a balding man of West Asian descent with dark hair and hazel eyes. They are animatedly discussing a TV show, and after a moment, it becomes apparent, some kind of cartoon. They have low booming voices and seem boyishly unaware of how loud they are, but the darker, taller man looks over at Sheherazade in an inquisitive way as they get closer.

"Good afternoon." said Sheherazade, quickly puling a leaflet from the pile. "I am attempting to organise regular dodgeball game sessions here at the centre, and I am attempting to gauge potential interest. Would you two like to come to a tryout session?"

Sheherazade words came out quickly, with no breaks for other people to jump in. it sounded like she had rehearsed the speech.

The two men made eye contact before the Asian man stuck his hand out and took the proffered paper. He nodded to himself, holding the page out and open so the white guy next to him could see. "What do you think, Donnie?"

Donnie shrugged a shoulder, looked and Sheherazade and then back at the pamphlet. He was much more put off by the abruptness of Hera's speech than his companion. He bit his chapped lip. "I used to be real good at dodgeball in second grade."

"Oh good, you play at a second grade level? Maybe I'll stand a chance." They both laughed; this small interlude aside, they began to walk away with a nod like, yeah, maybe, to Sheherazade.