He’d been shutting her out all morning. She hadn’t done anything wrong, of course, but she might, and he couldn’t stand to look at her because of it. Fuck this, he thought. Then: “I’m going to market.”

“Okay, babe. Check and see what they have in the discount fridge.”

He walked out and shut the door behind him without looking back.


On the other side of the door, it was midday and fair. He walked to the end of the alley and turned on the main drag in the direction of the neighborhood market. It was nice having one so close, he often thought, even if you had to pay eight dollars for an apple, but hell, he’d been stealing from them for years and didn’t mind paying full price now and again. Besides, every so often a clerk would chat with him and smile, a recent development after fucking two of the chicks that used to work there. Some of the remaining female staff, jealous, most likely, had started rumors of him being some kind of scheming fuckboi. In reality, he had been looking for love and didn’t get out much.

As he walked, he came to a trashcan that had fallen over and spilled a greasy pizza box and empty twelver of Dos Equis into the street. He uprighted the bin, cleaned up the mess. It was good to be out of the house. He’d been feeling cooped up. Sharing space with a woman was something fierce. Sometimes, he’d want nothing more than to be completely intertwined with her, the two of them wrapped up in one another’s undivided attention, spending the mornings and nights making love in the safe, warm bed, her skin against his. But there were other moments when he’d drift off, deep into the dark recesses of his imagination until it had poisoned his mind against her. He’d then steel himself against the inevitable future. Him leaving, having to wring himself out, and start anew. The market was coming up. He only had to turn the corner and he’d be there. 

He noticed a woman waiting at the crosswalk across the road. She had a dog on a leash and was looking both ways, up and down the perpendicular street. When the white man said go, she looked surprised and started running as if she might miss her opportunity. The woman had a curvaceous body and wide hips. Her breasts and the rest of her bounced as she scampered across the street, smiling. He turned into the market’s parking lot: just three parking spaces and a loading dock. On the opposite side of the street, he saw another woman jogging. Clad in skin tight running shorts and tanktop, she was young and thin and she wasn’t smiling and her small tits rippled with each lightly placed step. It was warm. The sun was out. He was feeling better and better all the time.

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