“Which one are you? Wonder Woman?”
“Which superhero? I don't know. Superman I guess. I only know Superman and Batman and Batman is the rich one so I can't be him,”
“Do you like superheroes? There are a lot of superhero movies coming out now,”
Like wolves, men are, she thinks. Clever, singleminded, opportunistic.
“How old are you?” she asks.
“Superhero stuff is for older people now too. It's not just for kids,”
“I’m thirty six,” she says, “I think superheroes and Supermen and knights on white horses and all that stuff is just make believe. I'm not interested,”
“So what? I’m twenty five. I think superheroes are great. Think about all the real, actual villains in the world. Wouldn't it be great if someone could just swoop in and flush all those bastards down the drain?”
“It’s a good story,” she says, “but it's just make believe,”
“I think we need make believe no matter how old you get. Life is hard. I like the Hulk. You know the Hulk?”
“He's green right?”
“Yeah but he also gets stronger the madder he gets and I like that. I think it's pretty cool. When life is hard I get mad and I just want to be strong enough to make a change. Like smash a building or something, you know what I mean?”
“Why is it that men always need to blow something up when they get upset?”
“Stop. Come on, I was just trying to say I like that the Hulk can do something about being upset. Most of us, we just sit here and have to take it. Or drink,”
“Get out of here,” she says, dismisses him with a wave “I have a job to do,”
“It’s a hard job,” he answers, “I know all about it. I don’t know why I stay sometimes,”
“I don’t know why I stay at all,”
“You should check out some other bar. The place I used to work at, the girl bartenders would make money left and right. Old rich guys, young rich guys, all you have to do is pour them a drink and they’d slide you all kinds of bills. If you went, I would put in my word,”
“You can just walk up and ask?”
“Yeah. You just say you’ve worked in other places and you want a job,”
It’s always easy, isn’t it?
“Can you just get out? I have to do this,”
“Alright. Goddamn. You want me gone so bad, I’m gone. I’ll be back at five,”
She doesn’t thank him again. When she hears the door close she pours herself black coffee and takes the eggs from the carton. She cuts pork roll from the torpedo in the freezer with the bread knife and fries it on the flat top while she toasts bread in its fat.
When she cut the packaging, she held the knife tight. She fried up her sandwich and wiped the sweat off her forehead when she realized she was sweating.
It feels like all the blood in pooling in her feet, but she goes out to the front door, cuts some of the eyeshadow with the knuckle of her thumb, turns the latch and pulls till she sees the faces of the men beyond. She smiles and says,
“Good morning, boys. Don’t you all want to come in?"