Her Backpack Strap Came Off When She Walked Up To The Bookstore Rep And Punched Him In The Gut With A Bag Of Indian Food.

They'd flanked there for hours, with readable t-shirts, already across the street.

She watched him and his friends build wire-frame faces out of double-looped bedsprings and plastic sap, excited like children left in malls and raised by mannequins. The button under her finger promised greatness. Photograph grab! Faces building faces! Forever-look (maybe) of a camera filming its own television feed.

But the first of the witness-crowds was only a group of voices, which had been saying, "Stop it?" in a sort of repeat as others took to the sidewalk like a bulge. It was so shit and lo-fi. Heat came off a fat dog sitting on top a newspaper stack. In the middle of used shoes and bruised work-out suits, a marched line of poor kids stomped and waited, leashed together by a string of cassette tape. Somebody pointed their finger like Posh Spice.

He flinched when she grabbed the back of his head. When the wet came out, he started to turtle-thrash on the floor with people-noticing screams of help. It only took a couple of kicks to get his shock out to the middle of the street.

She smiled. And he didn't. Car blur. Done.

She'd wanted something big, some clever idea on a cold day, but went on in-between the gaps in the road, not noticing the loud sound of the bag against her back.