The service was good there and that is why she went. There wasn’t much else to recommend it and so it was never very crowded and she liked that too. Mostly she liked watching the crowds of people that never became customers pass by. She sat there watching them go under the grand arch and up the block. There was always a moment when they were under the massive vault of stone that everything became alive. Everything hung in a balance – the tiny human form/the great heap of white stone. Each person seemed like a key, sliding into a lock – and the world opened up and was alive and then they were through it and the door was locked again.
The table cloth lay before her like a map, or chess board and she played a game with her fingers, connecting different shapes and countries and colors and then sprinkling them with a snow of salt. The men in the back were growing drunk and at turns quiet and then loud. One was yelling at the football on television. He went on and on exhorting and cajoling the players on the screen, but the television igonred him and She ignored him too. She simply sat there and sprinkled more salt and sipped her wine and smiled and watched another person pass .
Then there was a screaming sound and a hole opened up in the wall and light rushed into the dark room with rust red dust. The dust rained down onto the salted table cloth and it was time to go home, she thought. “Time to go home.”
