Overpass

I am standing on a cold cement sidewalk in the massive shadow of a freeway overpass.  It is daylight and the sky is blue, but from where I stand, the wind has a biting chill.  There are multiple cement ramps high overhead, roads in the sky held up by thick round columns that delve deep into the earth.  Not a bit of sunlight makes it past the four overpasses that from my vantage point, seem to be stacked upon each other.  
The sidewalk reverberates with the thousands of cars driving overhead, coming into me through the sole of my shoes and then up through my legs, venturing further within. The sound of the combined motors, all swooshing and speeding so high above is like a mechanized river, sometimes fading in and out with strength, but never ceasing. 
On the street in front of me, shadowed too by the freeway overpasses above, is a white car.  It is the kind of vehicle used for commercial purposes.  The kind with tools and extra seats for capable men and a spot for a water cooler in the back.  It is a new, still shiny, clean and white, baring none of the scratches of a well-worn vehicle. 
There are a dozen police milling around the vehicle.  Some have climbed into it, pulling open the screwed in seats.  Others look through the dozens of compartments along the sides, pulling out tools, inspecting them, holding up greasy bottles to the light. 
Inside the car I can see a brown skinned man crouched in the compartment below where a seat cushion would have hidden him. The vinyl seat is still in a police officer’s hand as he shouts orders. The man is wearing jeans and a white t-shirt.  He remains in the fetal position he had been in as the shelter is revealed, stunned, blinking at the new source of light.  Several Latin men are already on the sidewalk, laying flat against the ground, their arms handcuffed behind their backs.
The cops' voices are loud and harsh.  The motors of the half dozen police cars are still running, their lights are on, the bright colors of their screaming sirens diffuse into the day. The smell of car exhaust is strong, unchanging despite the steady breeze.
People in business suits walk by the scene undisturbed.  Most give only a passing glance to the white commercial vehicle and its occupants. Women in gray dresses and lipstick, men carrying briefcases and sacks of takeout from nearby restaurants.  Barely a glance at the scene. A breeze blows past me, sending chills over my sandaled feet. The chill rises, finding my chest. 
The police men are pale and distant, uncaring in this bust spawned only by human need.  Their bodies are big and covered in muscle, covered once again by thin blue fabric.  Their guns are black, somehow glistening even in the shade of the multiple freeways overhead. 
My white skirt blows in the wind, tempting my calves with a delicate touch.  I am cold, standing in the shade of a thousand moving cars.

Apartment

I am standing in the kitchen of a small apartment. I am leaning against the cool metal siding of a stainless steel sink embedded in a long white Formica countertop. The sink is clean and shiny, all remnants of past meals and dishes have long ago been scrubbed, dried and put in their spots behind white painted cupboards.
There is a window behind the sink. A crystal clear single-pane window that is uncluttered by curtains or shades. In perfect view is the gray cement rooftop of a tall red brick building across the street. It is so close I could jump from the window onto its sun-baked roof.
Two men sit on the cement, looking at each other, blocking the sun from their eyes with the aid of their cupped hands. Sunlight covers their legs and arms, brushing their already tanned skin. Just behind them are two wooden patio chairs which they have ignored, worn but well maintained red wood that lets off waves of glimmering heat.
Along the edges of the rooftop are red and pink geraniums in evenly spaced wide terracotta pots. The colorful petals are illuminated like stained glass, glowing in the afternoon light.
The sunlight streaming into the kitchen has taken on a pale blue color, verging on ice. The few appliances on the countertop are muted and fuzzy, seeming almost ghostly in shape and color.
To my right is a man. I can’t see his face, though I can see that his hair is dark and short, his skin is olive and tan. He wears red running shorts that reach his knees and a long white T-shirt that is baggy and slightly wrinkled. His eyes are fixed on the roof, at the two men sitting on the cement rooftop, on the one in red running shorts and a baggy white T-shirt.
Down the hallway from the kitchen is an open sliding glass door. A warm, yet slightly cool breeze blows through the open doorway. The wind plays with my hair. A black dog runs in circles on the balcony, barking excitedly in intervals to things I cannot see. The balcony is a mixture of sunlight and speckled shade. Any view from the high-rise apartment is blocked by tall, leafy trees and the thick interweaving vines that wrap around their boughs.

Lake In The Jungle

The lake lay just under the earthy banks pierced by roots which dipped their tips into the cool green water. It was long and narrow, making it easy to rest hidden among the trees on one shore to spy on the bank of the next. Tigers of a brilliant orange camouflaged with black stripes did just this, spying on brown skinned men who watched them from the opposite bank.
Floating near the surface of the lake, mid sized alligators let their green bumps and ridges break through the glassy green water like tiny islands, now and then yawning to expose the pink insides of their cavernous mouths with lake weed caught on pointed white teeth. Where the bank provided a beach rather than dropping abruptly from jungle to water, the wily reptiles lay in the dark moist sand pretending to sleep, sometimes with mouths open so that daring little birds could venture inside to pick out the lake weed and worms and leaches that made their own micro dimensional jungle around the white teeth.
The larger jungle which held tigers, and men, and alligators, and tiny birds that could travel between macro and micro worlds, was possessed of the sort of trees whose arms and roots twisted and intertwined so that it was difficult to discern where one tree ended and the other began. They wore streamers of dark green moss the way Spanish ladies wear lacy shawls over their arms and shoulders, and sometimes vines dared to wind themselves around the pale trunks and branches.
Lines of ants employed these thick juicy tethers as highways and marched throughout the canopy and back down to the earth on them, stopping now and again to attack some other insect in mass or to sample the nectar held in the yellow blossoms that interrupted the vines' straight lines like Diners made cheery by a waitress named Doris along an abandoned interstate. They knew the jungle and the lake's perimeter from a vastly different perspective than either the men with their long black hair and dark round eyes or the tigers who went about silently on padded feet or even the alligators and little birds.
The men, the tigers, and the alligators had to be wary of one another, whereas the ants were rarely considered by anyone but the vines and trees whose flesh they tickled incessantly. The men would dive into the lake for a moment now and then, shaking the water from their long hair after bursting back up from the lake's verdant depths. There was an awkward symmetry to the lake's patrons; alligators preferring the sunny bank and men therefore preferring the shady side.
Fish were universally threatened, swimming pink and silver, and green and even striped in the lake's depths. Now and then a school would shimmer just under the surface looking like a trove of jewels before meeting their fate. One third swam into strange pink and white caverns, never to return to the wide open waters, another third became tangled in nets fashioned from retired vines and the other third managed to collect together far from peril and preserve the future of their species.
The lake banks were mostly quiet, disturbed by the occasional growl of a tiger or the laughter of a man or a splash as an alligator rose or descended from the lake's surface. Tiny birds made tiny noises and tigers sniffed through the moist lake smells to make out the odor of edible flesh. The men checked their nets and watched the tigers prowl the opposite bank. They smelled like the lake themselves, with only the tiniest hint of salty sweat betraying them.

Show

I stand in a dimly lit room alive with the sound of gentle murmuring from a few dozen men. They are all dressed in a similar way. Dark shirts and jeans, black shoes and thin dark jackets. They all have dark, dirty hair that has been styled by the salt-drenched wind, left wild and crusted with the taste of tears.
The room is crowded, already filled beyond the capacity of the short walls and uneven floor and more men enter every few minutes having paid the entry fee at the door. They enter through an open doorway off to one side of the room, a man stands just outside the doorway collecting money in a wide coffee can.
Beyond the doorway the night is dark. A wide, flat parking lot sits empty, the black tar and white lines of demarcation are illuminated by a lone double-bulbed lamp that towers thirty feet in the air. The lot looks forlorn in the yellow light, missing cars, people and trash.
The small single-storied room packed with men is attached to a larger structure, having been built at the same time decades before. Through the wide rectangular window facing the parking lot, I can see the larger structure since the entire building is shaped like an L. The surface of the larger structure is covered in corrugated metal, though the small room where I stand seems like an afterthought, a janitor’s closet that has been forgotten, appropriated by a handful of young men in the dark night. The windows of the larger building are dark and I know that we are the only ones here.
I look around and realize I am the only woman in the tightly packed room. There are young men sitting on the floor, others leaning against the wall in silent pensiveness. Others have merged into small huddles talking quietly, filling the air with a gentle murmur of anticipation.
While most of the men sit or stand, there are five among the dozens that move, setting up their musical equipment against one of the walls. At their feet are several amps, half a dozen microphone stands and a crate of miscellaneous cords. There are other hard black cases on the worn blue rug waiting to be opened, waiting for electricity and skilled hands that know all the right knobs and switches to make them come alive.
I look at the various men leaning against one of the walls and see a familiar face. Pale white skin and a long dark beard, his eyes look around the crowd observing it all in interested delight. I know that in this crowded space, among this many men, there will not be any place for me to hide.

Hallway

A young woman stands in a dim hallway. She is on the seventh floor of an old apartment building built with a communist aesthetic. The building is tall, narrow and long. She stands in the hallway, a long corridor lit only by a few small windows on each side of the buildings’ length, beside the stairs. A pale light seeps in and bits of dust travel in its rays.

The young woman is slender and pale, her shoulders revealing the pointed bones just below the skin. Over her slender frame is a red 1920s flapper dress. The fit is baggy, hiding all of her curves, though its low neckline begins to hint at her pointed breasts. The hemline reaches to her knees, where several inches of gold trim sway with each movement of her body. The dress has signs of wear and the seams along the sides have begun to loosen. A thin stretched out spaghetti strap keeps sliding off her bony pale shoulder, exposing the black strap of her bra. The girl’s hair is short, cut just below her ears, it is a messy head of wavy hair. Her cropped bangs hide the shy pale skin of her forehead.

Balanced in the palm of her left hand is a large plastic serving tray. The tray is long, wide, and oval, its shape providing the flooring for several dishes displayed on white porcelain plates. Each plate holds a different type of egg. Sunny side up, poached, boiled, soft boiled, she holds them all on the tray, attempting every now and then to replace the red strap of her dress to her shoulder with her right hand. It slides off quickly and when it does, she lets it be.

She stands in front of apartment #4 with the tray of eggs. Not far from her, in the doorway of a different apartment a few doors down, an older white man in a white tank top and a protruding pot belly stands silently. His large shape and broad shoulders almost block the entire doorway, covering everything behind the threshold. Without any words, with just a cold, indifferent stare, he watches the waiting girl.

The girl looks down at the worn dark carpet in the hallway, then back to the door of apartment #4. There is a small square glass window two-thirds of the way up the wooden door. She peers in, sneaking a glance at four young blond men putting on their military coats. The uniforms are maroon, decorative coats with metal buttons and bits of embroidery along the shoulders. She peeks into their space, then returns her gaze back to the worn carpet at her feet.

The Edge Of The Mountain

A young woman is standing in a small room drenched in soft blue light. It is the kind of light that can only be created without bulbs and switches. It is light that streams in from the single tall and narrow window that hugs the corner edge of one wall. The walls are bare, white when illuminated, but now, in the dimness, they are a pale gray-blue. The floor is covered by dark blue carpet. It is a covering without plushness or comfort, carpet that is just one step above the hardness of stone.

Foam blue yoga mats are laid out on the floor, four of them lined up vertically to one wall, another four across from them against the other cool wall. In the room are several young men in white linen pants that are held up with red rope. Baggy white T-shirts cover their muscular chests. The men look like copies of each other, each having short dark brown hair and olive skin. Each with a solid stare of brown eyes and covered with thick, bulging muscles.

The young woman looks out the room’s only window. The view outside is of wilderness. The sky is blue, though the sun has fallen behind a mountain peak, on its way to the other side of the world. A few meters beyond the window, a grassy clearing has turned yellow and limp, the long stalks of grass laying down like a mass suicide. On the edge of the clearing, a thick forest begins. Tall green pines stand tall and vertical, covering the mountain behind them in a dense green blanket. The gaps between the thick trunks are dark, nearly black, with hardly any light making it through the thick canopy to the forest floor.

Wandering around the clearing are a cluster of at least twenty bears. They swirl around each other, moaning and roaring, sniffing the air. They walk slowly, maintaining the dense cluster though there is plenty of room in the clearing. There are two types of bears, each in equal number. Half have dark chocolate fur, the others have light tan fur with a golden sheen. The bears mingle, sniffing the air and each other, walking slowly and deliberately around the area, stopping every few feet to look around, roar and huff or raise their nose into the air.

Iron Forge

The snow blankets the enormous conifers and distant peaks and the ground, glittering like quartz. The tents in the area form a vague and uneven circle, leaving wide distances between some and almost none between others. There are two varieties, one that is completely enclosed and shaped like a giant mushroom sewn of tanned hides and another that is a simple canopy open on three sides. Everywhere about the encampment, kegs are stacked in pyramids and clumped together in hasty trios. They vary in size from the very small to the enormous, large enough to make a comfortable room for one of the short bearded men littering the camp. Here and there, a keg has been tapped and an assortment of characters is gathered.
The most predominant figures are the short men with their long braided beards and arms and legs bursting with muscles, but there are others as well, a few men, usually armored warriors with a weathered air about them and women as well, with their red hair pulled back in braids and their eyes shining with a hard cold light used to spying stretches of open road or smoldering battlefields. For now they laugh and toast one another’s health and drink frothy brew from beautifully decorated steins.
A tall creature with pale skin and long pointed ears protruding through the silken threads of her cascading blue hair stands apart from the crowds dancing in the center by herself. She wears a red skirt that hangs about her front and back like a loincloth leaving her long legs and toned thighs exposed. Her top barely conceals her moderate cleavage and leaves her mid drift bare. Warmed with liquor and oblivious to the cold, she dances with the sinewy movements of a serpent.
Another similar creature is inspecting a rather large ram, the mount of one of the stocky little men. The creature with the pointed ears looks into the beast’s eyes, ears, nose and mouth while the small man belches and attempts to explain the appropriate way to handle the ram, swaying all the while and occasionally loosing his train of thought or reaching out to steady himself against the taller creature’s kneecap. Every so often, a rider charges into the encampment and the motley crew cheers a greeting. They find themselves a place near a keg or by a small fire where something roasts on a spit and little men already sit around chewing at roasted meats and loosing gristle in their beards.
The sky overhead is a steely gray and a red sun sinks slowly behind the far off neighboring peaks. Horses waiting for their riders stamp the snow and whine to each other and munch bales of hay alongside with rams, while keeping a wary eye on the camp dogs who chew bones with wolfish grins and turn their pointy ears to listen to the laughter and singing of the men.

Pool

The sky is huge, an enormous canvas of blue that seems both far away and close enough to grab the couple of white puffy clouds that decorate its blueness. For miles and miles, there are rolling hillsides covered in yellow and brown grass. Twisted oak trees and small mounds of low growing green shrubs populate the hillsides. The landscape is empty, no powerlines, no cows, no houses, just the soft contours of earth and green speckles of umbrage. Tucked in the contours of the hills, on a naturally level space, is a kidney shaped pool. Carved into the lawn of cultivated green grass, the pool is outlined with walls of cement and filled with crystal clear blue water. The water sparkles with diamonds of light as sun meets with wind-induced ripples. It is completely clean, except for the fact that all the leaves of the nearby maple, the tree that hangs over the pool like a green umbrella, have been swept into the pool. All the dead leaves are in a single line in the center, they vibrate slightly with a touch of wind, but they stay clumped together in linear formation. On the lawn, there are a dozen people spread out in groups of two and three. They lounge and sun on top of colorful beach towels, their skin is golden in the light. The women wear designer white bikinis and large-lensed sunglasses. The men, with firm chests and hard stomachs, recline on their sides, turning themselves to the women they address. Twenty steps from the pool is a ramshackle house. The roof, made of wooden shingles that have turned black, is slightly concave, heavy with an accumulation of old rain water and rotten leaves. A wooden porch by the old front door has long ago been lost to termites, only a thick banister covered in small holes remains. There is a black hole in one of the walls to the right of the decimated porch, the hole is just large enough for a human head to peer through. Inside and directly behind the hole, is an old bathroom. The white tiles that cover the floor and the walls are dusty and covered in a fine black soot. There is a hose attached to the wall and a couple old metal knobs that used to serve as a shower. Beyond the bathroom, not separated by any wall, is an old kitchen. It too, is very dusty. The cabinets are off white, nearly brown. The fixtures on the drawers and the sink are covered in orange rust. There are white and blue tiles that decorate the countertop. Cobwebs hang in every corner. Pale light filters in through dirty windows which face the north, the sun beats through the weathered grime and settles into the room.

Wait and Rest Room

Plush maroon carpeting spreads over the floors like the spilled and drying blood of some regal jungle animal. Neither too red nor to brown, its shade is deep and warm, and creates the illusion that one might be standing within the soft heart of an enormous elephant. The walls are paneled with sheesham veneer, a rich chocolate brown wood swirled with even darker lines. They disappear into anonymity behind the array of fine art hung over their deep complexion like multicolored veils over the faces of exotic but somber women. Many of the frames are gilded with 24 karat gold.
The art itself is so exquisite in detail as to appear more vivid than life. Creamy skinned women stand with blue skinned lovers at the mouth of roaring seas or lay in the arms of furry white beasts playing wind instruments upon stony cliffs or dance in groups upon mossy embankments overlooking misty water falls. They seem as if they might step out of the frames at any moment, or as if perhaps theirs is the real world and the room with maroon carpet is only a crude painting. Antique lamps of fine polished brass, some adorned with tiffany lampshades and dripping with glittering lead crystals emit a warm glow. Scattered throughout the room, they stand upon sleek end tables fashioned of polished dark cherry. These rest near couches, divans, and love seats like faithful dogs at the feet of their masters.
The couches themselves are upholstered in darkest brown suede and some in pomegranate hued velvet adorned with gold embellishments in the baroque style. Many of these are planted so that their occupants might face each other and engage in intimate conversations. All are equipped to function as toilets as well as seats. The soft sued or velvet cushions need only be lifted to reveal the gleaming white porcelain of a toilet seat and bowl. Dainty little handles for flushing rest nestled among the at the back. Some have been neatly worked into the baroque embellishments. The din of idle chat fills the room like the bubbling of hot soup in a black kettle. The mob of individuals crowd together on the love seats, women sitting in men's laps and youths with tousled hair perched upon the arms of the couches. The scent of perfume mingles with that of after shave and the baser smell of hot human breath and urine. The laughter of the women rings out shriller than the baritone he-haws of the men. The smoke of a cigarette drifts along the ceiling, among the crystals of a chandelier and on past the mist seas of a painting. Coughing and nose blowing accent the general hum of unending conversation.
The men wear tuxedos, many have taken off the jackets and have loosen the bow ties and dab at their perspiring brows with embroidered handkerchiefs. The women don tight fitting evening gowns to reveal their bosoms and wear glistening earrings, and pearl necklaces. They grip satin and bejeweled clutches in their delicate and neatly manicured hands. A few fan themselves, the spaghetti straps of their skimpy gowns hanging off of their freckled shoulders. One woman in a clinging blue dress is using one of the toilets while the others around her continue to talk. Perched as she is, she endeavors to keep herself covered with the skirt of the gown, but it is too form fitting to accommodate her much, and her pale thighs and dark curly pubic hairs are apparent to all, while she wriggles like pate trying to go back into its shorn wrapper.