Out of Focus

The wind grows cold and she walks to a bar down the pier and inside everyone is dressed in costumes and she sits down by the window and opens a menu and when the waitress comes over she orders a plate of vegetable tempura and a Dr. Pepper.  Her food comes and she picks the batter off the broccoli and stares out of the window until it’s just a dim square of swirling fog.

The bar is full of zombies and drag queens and pirates and Batman drops a beer and it sprays Lady Gaga’s pink tights with foam.  She plays with the paper wrapper of her straw, folding it around her finger, and watches a group of nurses shoot Jager at the bar.  She pushes her chair away from the table and it scrapes loudly across the floor.  There’s a long line in front of the bathroom and she takes her place at the end, fingering the tiny plastic bag in her pocket.  A burly guy in a dress gets in line behind her and after a minute he asks what she’s supposed to be.  She clears her throat and says,

Nothing.

How come?  Not into Halloween or are you just too grown up?

I kind of … Forgot?

He laughs and puts his hand on her shoulder and she pulls away, into the wall, folding her arms across her chest and he asks,

Do you want to know what I am?

He doesn’t wait for her to answer and pulls up the bottom of his dress.  Underneath, a baby doll is dangling from a red rope, smeared in crimson goo, and she rolls her eyes and looks away while he laughs,

I just had it done this morning!  I didn’t really want to, but my boyfriend told me he’d buy me a Ferrari!

She looks back at the doll bobbing up and down between his legs and she says,

A Ferrari, really?  Mine just told me I’d burn in hell …

Cinderella opens the bathroom door and walks out and she steps in and slams the door, locking it behind her.  She opens the bag with fumbling fingers and cuts out two thin lines on the back of the sink with her hotel room card.  She winces as the coke burns the inside of her nose and she checks her face in the mirror and wipes the dust from the sink with her finger and unrolls the bill in her hand and she leaves the bathroom, pushing past abortion boy, back to her table, where she asks the waitress to take away her plate and bring her a rum and coke.  She sketches empty eyes and lightning bolts on her napkin as cowboy and Indians dance around her.