Pocket Short Story [or the beginning of something]

She was smoldering.  Latino, from Guatemala - outside the city.  She was a waitress in a breakfast café, wearing the mandatory short, red-checkered skirt, bringing around stacks of sausages to men whose moustaches were so long they dipped into the corners of their mouths.  She was saving for college, or adventure, whichever came first.

            She would stand outside on her breaks, smoke three cigarettes in a row, come back in reeking but no one would complain.  Her eyes were stolen from a cat’s, a leopard.  Her hair sprayed out from her head like crinoline, three tiny braids tangled somewhere.  She didn’t know what she wanted.  She liked listening to Nirvana and writing Spanish poetry.

Photo by me, September 2010, Montreal.