Body English. Write a “conversation” in which no words are said. This exercise is meant to challenge you to work with gesture, body language (or, as a baseball announcer I heard once misspeak it, body English), all the things we convey to each other without words. We often learn more about characters in stories from the things characters do with their hands than from what they say. It might be best to have some stranger observe this conversation, rather than showing us the thoughts of one of the people involved in the conversation, because the temptation to tell us what the conversation is about is so great from inside the conversation. “I was doing the opposite of Freud,” Desmond Morris says, of his famous book The Naked Ape that first studied the ways humans speak with their bodies. “He listened to people and didn’t watch; I watched people and didn’t listen.” Because of Morris, according to Cassandra Jardine, “when politicians scratch their noses they are now assumed to be lying—and the sight of the Queen [Elizabeth] crossing her legs at the ankles is known to be a signal that her status is too high for her to need to show sexual interest by crossing them further up.” Autistic children cannot understand human conversation even when they understand individual words because they cannot read facial expressions, which is clear evidence of how important other forms of language are. 600 words.
The clock pointed exactly eleven o'clock when her mom decided she should exercise outside. Her mom had been making her jump ropes as a doctor told her this would help her grow taller. Nuri was lying flat on her bed as if her stomach was glued to the bed sheets. She was deeply immersed in "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban," but her mother never accepted any excuse. Perhaps she felt the strong responsibility to help her grow taller since Nuri was the smallest in her class.
Her mom stared at her disapprovingly out of the corner of her eyes, leaning on the door.
But Nuri did not budge an inch from her position, still holding her Harry Potter book. In fact, she suddenly started to flip through the pages even faster when her mom entered the room to pull her out of the bed. Nuri's eyes were now strictly fixed on the black letters on the white papers in her book. Nuri's mom knew how to handle her better than anyone else; she was standing still on the threshold, staring at Nuri and not moving at all.
Nuri sighed, her eyes looking down at the floor and closed her book with a loud noise. She put on her coat halfheartedly and walked across the living room hallway, thumping her feet as hard as she could. Grabbing her jump rope, Nuri pushed the door and pressed the elevator button to go down. The automatic lighting turned off itself and there came a complete darkness. In the dark, Nuri's eyes were wavering, and so did her hands toward the light bulb. The light turned on again. Dark again. Now Nuri jumped with her hands high up toward the light. The elevator reached 5th floor, and the door opened. She walked in, pressing the ground floor automatically with her elbow, and looked into the mirror. Her face was the only part she could see. She stepped up onto a green box at the edge. Now her shoulders were shown in the mirror.
When the elevator reached the ground floor, the door opened and Nuri came out of the elevator. The freezing wind pierced through her thick parka, and Nuri stopped in front of the door that divided the warmer part of the apartment, and outside, the colder part. Her neck and chin were already buried deep in her coat, and her hands in both her coat pockets, with her jump rope carried under her arm. She gazed outside through the glass door with gloomy eyes. Her eyes panned around the parking lot in front of the apartment, and suddenly, her eyes were fixed on a white Avante, because the car had its yellow lights turned on inside. Under the yellow lights, a young woman was sitting next to the driver's seat.
Nuri's eyes suddenly got bigger, and she carefully opened the glass door when icy cold wind invaded her; she shut her eyes tight. She stepped outside with her eyes still fixed on the young woman. The woman was sitting straight, staring at a tree right in front of the car. Her eyes weren't moving at all, nor was any part of her body. Shivering, Nuri slowly walked toward the car tiptoeing on frozen snow. Then, the woman suddenly turned her head where Nuri was walking. Screaming like a dying little pig, Nuri slipped on icy ground, but quickly got up and ran into the apartment. She pressed the elevator button to go up. She fumbled around the neck area and sighed. For the second time, Nuri walked toward the car, and for the second time, the woman turned to face Nuri. Startled at her movement, Nuri picked up her muffler. Right then, the woman tapped on the driver's seat next to her, looking into Nuri's shaking eyes. Nuri's heart began to beat faster, but her hand reached out and opened the car door. Moving as if she were hypnotized by something, Nuri kept staring at her own feet, occasionally peeking at the woman. Nuri suddenly stopped glancing and watched the woman intently. In the woman's eyes, Nuri saw her own face magnified by the woman's tears.
All of a sudden, Nuri held the woman's hand, which was two times bigger than hers, and Nuri looked deeply into the woman's eyes. Both of them stared at each other holding hands for several minutes. Then, Nuri grasped her hands with greater strength and smiled.
All of a sudden, Nuri held the woman's hand, which was two times bigger than hers, and Nuri looked deeply into the woman's eyes. Both of them stared at each other holding hands for several minutes. Then, Nuri grasped her hands with greater strength and smiled.
The next day, Nuri hears a story; the explanation of the woman sitting there.
