Friday night, summer of 1995, and the bar of Corner Pocket was dead. They were staffed for a busy night of course, scheduling two bartenders to the usual one, and the bar was overstocked, fresh lemons and limes cut to make the alcohol for customers go down a little bit easier to encourage further business and excellent tips. Setsi, known as Seth, sat down on a stool behind the bar and sighed. Sidework was done before the rush was expected, and he was bored.
Raphael, the other of the two bartenders, poured himself a drink. He drank from the well, so it wasn't as if Corner Pocket lost much by his passing the time. Besides, Seth wasn't much for conversation anyway. He always seemed angry, like he wanted to be anywhere else. Like he deserved to be anywhere else. But, he was a wage slave just like his coworker. The sooner Seth realized that there was nothing in this world for the poor except misery and woe, the sooner he could start to just numb himself like everyone else did. Never saw the guy touch a drop of booze. He didn't know how he did it.
The life of humans is a miserable one, Seth thought as he idled the time away, We'll be doing them a favor. They have miserable careers, miserable lives, and they listen to terrible music. The Backstreet Boys? N'Sync? And these pass as music? If we don't turn them into slaves or pets, they are honestly all better off dead... His head perked up when the door opened, an out of breath looking woman stepped through the door wearing a tank top with a beanie suction cupped to her head despite the summer's heat. He got to his feet, noting that Raphael was already seated with his drink GameBoy in hand, rolled his eyes at his coworker, and approached the side of the counter. "What can I get for you today?"
The first thing he noted about the woman was her eyes. Two different colors. It was a rare trait for humans to have but he had heard of it happening. "Uhmmmm hmmmm how abouuuuut~ a mimosa! That sounds good right now. Uhm....where is everyone?"
Seth looked about the empty bar and sighed, "Your guess is as good as mine."
All that is empty in the drawing should be filled in, the teacher said to us kids. First you sharpen the pencil to fill in the thin whiskers, then you use the thick crayon to fill in the wings with brown, meticulously and without letting the crayon leave the page. Six feet can be traced below the soft belly. Now, breathing is hard to detect on paper, the teacher said to me when I asked, but it is easier to feel it in real life.
Even insects breathe.
-Rawi Hage, Cockroach