The campus café is filled with boys
who have long curly hair puffing out of
their heads like toilet cleaners. One of
them looks around himself sharply as though
preparing to dodge shrapnel. What is he
doing? Drinking orange juice from a carton.

Class ends at 11 AM and people line up
for muffins and coffee. The café is a
reliable function machine: x goes in;
x + muffin comes out. The muffins are the
size of a stomach and they are handed out
in plastic bags that people tend to swing
like maces while they look for a seat.

The boy next to me orders a sandwich and
eats it stooped over, arm circling the foil
wrapper protectively. A flap of turkey
dangles from his lip. I wonder, looking at
the transparent flap, why the index of
quality in deli meats is thinness. Light
comes through the turkey like a rose
window.


Index