Small Places : Nick L Belardes [26 of 128]

• Ten.
• Today is like yesterday only worse. I walk up to Buildicon where a bum pisses on a tire in the parking garage.
• Thank God I don't have a car. I say: "Don't you have a goddam outhouse? Or a newspaper? Or a friend to piss on?
• Cause you're pissing me off!" He laughs in my direction. I snap out of it as Buildicon's self-imposed beauty queen,
• Kira de Frito passes by. She builds spreadsheets that Mulani has to fix.
• She talks to Brazilian product buyers, perhaps about lingerie. She's the Wicked Witch of the West Indies, kind of dark, with a hook nose.
• Kira de Frito slinks by in a jaguar of an outfit, very catlike, with tight black pants and cleavage you could put a pineapple platter on.
• By the copier Mulani tells me about Kira de Frito's crisis: "I will not suffer this one alone. She has to dance for her husband." Me: "No!"
• Me: "He can't?" Mulani: "Nope." Me: "So she dances a jig each night before they salsa?" Mulani: "Every night." Me: "Horrible!"
• I mean, don't get me wrong. Shake it don't break it. "But that's not all of it," Mulani says. I run the copier again to buy more time.