Curbside

Rapid press staccato on a keypad and the door clicks shut behind him, back turned to a dust free gallery of meticulous lighting and impossibly vibrant color coordination, face turned into a waning sun. Differences in pressure, temperature and temperament forces a gentle sigh from his lunges and he picks his feet up again.

They glide with soft, determined footfalls over pavement and past people. Pulling on sunglasses, he continues a destined path in the opposite direction of the early evening crowds towards the center of town. It is a place in transition, the late afternoon shift ending and the early evening beginning, and the night of the week that people without some greater purpose seem to gravitate to this place invariably. The air is already ripe with the smells of fried foods, the kinds that bear no value to the body, but some great and unquantifiable gift to the spirit; chewy, sauce-drowned, crisped, and satisfying in a purely visceral way. The sorts of smells that erode discipline and drag people into the gutter.

As he enters the few most central blocks, this smells is mixed with the smell of tobacco, the smoke itself thickening he air and making all the sweet, mouth-watering flavors in the air smell like they've just been burnt. The air vibrates with the thrum of cars and piped-in music, bar stool conversations mingling together into an indistinguishable riff of innuendo. The words themselves didn't matter, the same conversations were taking place inside every bar and every restaurant, the quibbling details were all that changed.

They come into view as he continues his march, spine erect and body quivering with preparation. Behind darkened glass, he can see it all. People convincing each other that they like each other's company over forced laughter; young, mis-matched couples struggling through different stages of the same relationship crescendo; too-youngs struggling to find out what besides times makes you older and the one's who've grown too old and know the answer. The words they pass back and forth across the table sound clever in their uniqueness, but listen to all of them and the banality hits like a tidal wave. The clothing could all be compressed into half a catalogue of thin, glossy photos.

A red light halts a man who moves with the inexorability of a force of nature. Still for but a moment, all of it rushes in on him and shouts demands for reaction. He's not even angry, he's just sad, desperately searching their eyes for something special or unique. The light turns green before he finds it and he walks across the intersection. At the end of block is an old Rastafarian, far from home and utterly sublime in the plucking of his bass. Next to him sits a young, white hipster providing an accompaniment on harmonica. Slumped in relaxation next to one another they strain to be the same despite their differences.

Something. Curiosity. Possibility. In the purple haze around them, parts of each other are being exchanged. If they sit their long enough, will they become something else or will they simply switch places without standing up? He walks past them and the sweet, citrus smell of the smoke his him like a wall. He continues past, and the curb extends onto a bridge as every light before him turns green.

Behind him, the city melts.