But what truly froze me where I stood was her food.

There was no sandwich.

No fruit.

Not even a small bag of chips.

She was holding half of a plain dinner roll.

And she took slow, small, careful bites of it, and then, as I watched, she wrapped the remaining half in a napkin and tucked it carefully into her backpack, and took a sip from a refilled plastic water bottle, and stood up.

I ducked behind a pillar before she could see me.