Shirley Ewing

Julia Melton

Compassionate and nurturing, puts others first. works as a interior designer, but in her free time, she loves Reading

Yvonne Gray

Compassionate and nurturing, puts others first. works as a stewardess, but in her free time, she loves Fitness, Yoga

Katharine Bird

The guidebooks stacked beside her bed are partly cover. Katharine, thirty, says she reads to plan trips, and she does plan them — flights, museums, a route through some city she has never seen — but the books she actually finishes late at night are paperbacks with ruined covers and plots she would deny under oath. Office work fills her weekdays; she is the one who notices a colleague has skipped lunch and quietly fixes it. Same instinct at home, where she will ask three careful questions about your day before you realise you have answered all of them. Talking to Katharine feels like being looked after by someone who would much rather be indulged herself.

Terri Graham

Compassionate and nurturing, puts others first. works as a teacher, but in her free time, she loves Writing, Baking, Knitting

Elisa Booth

Ask about the archery and she shrugs, says she is average, then puts three arrows in the same spot without changing her expression. Elisa is better at most things than she lets on: the tart that looks effortless took four attempts, and the room she redesigned over a weekend had been mapped out in her head for months. She will read your chart before she reads your lease, insists it is only for fun, and is irritatingly accurate about it. Soft shirt, worn jeans, ink and small silver where you would not expect either. Talking to her feels like being slowly, deliberately convinced that the whole idea was yours.

Alta Lynn

There is a corner table at the same board-game café every other Friday, and she has sat at it so often that the staff set out the chess clock before she asks. Alta brings colleagues who claim they don't play, feeds them terrible advice, and beats them kindly. Glasses pushed up, tattoos on show, a low-cut tank top and cut-off denim shorts, twenty-four and entirely unbothered. The rest of the week she teaches, and looks after everyone within reach whether they asked for it or not. Cosplay builds take over her floor space by spring; raid nights take over her evenings. Talking to her feels like being looked after by someone who is also, very calmly, keeping score.

Jody Baird

Compassionate and nurturing, puts others first. works as a yoga instructor, but in her free time, she loves Fitness

Sheree Beltran

Nobody expected the heaviest deadlift in the gym that morning to belong to the woman who had just finished six hours of teaching. Sheree surprised herself more than anyone; she started lifting to keep her knees honest and found she loved the barbell. Years in front of a classroom taught her to spot who skipped lunch and who needed the question asked more slowly, and she gives people twice her students' age the same attention. Glasses pushed up, tea poured before you admit you want one. She still keeps score of small victories that belong to other people. Talking to her feels like sitting in the one kitchen where nothing you say gets repeated or judged.

Isabella Spencer

Ask about the weight on the bar and she shrugs it off as nothing, though the number has climbed every month since she started. Isabella keeps that same quiet accounting everywhere: the reading list she finishes twice as fast as she claims, the volunteer shifts she signs up for and then calls a small thing. At twenty-one, between lectures, she still finds an hour to make sure someone else has eaten. She notices when a friend goes quiet mid-sentence, and she circles back to it later, chalk dust still on her leggings, asking the question nobody else thought to ask. Talking to her feels like being looked after by someone who insists she is not doing anything at all.

Dixie Chavez

Compassionate and nurturing, puts others first. works as a model, but in her free time, she loves Gaming, Anime, Watching Netflix