Slim points his camera off to the side and buzzes a Polaroid through.
She follows his aim and sees they’re not alone – off at the end of the lot, a black truck, some ugly old man sitting on the fender staring at her with ugly eyes, drinking an ugly beer. ‘Who?’
‘The popcorn guy. Y’know, with the popcorn cart?’
‘The one who eats children?’
‘He doesn’t eat – Jesus, he’s like a local legend, Francie. They practically built the city around him.’
He looks like he could be that old. All the ugly oldness of this city. She’d been to Toronto last summer. Those high-rise apartments up in the clouds. All the restaurants and shops. Everything so new and fun and everything even uglier when she got back here.
The buzz of the Polaroid brings her back to Slim, grinning up at her.
‘Catch me!’ And she’s jumping off the pedestal, Slim trying to grab her with one arm, protecting the camera, both of them tumbling over in a dusty laughing heap. She looks up at the big dumb coin.
Laughing at this great tourist act. Laughing that in all the days of Francie’s days on this planet, this is her first time up here. The whole city down there and the rim of slag like a ring tight around the two of them. She laughs so hard she might puke. ‘Oh god I hate this place.’
She dozes off in the car for what feels like five minutes and then they’re stopping already. Slim pulling up at Gloria’s and she says, ‘It’ll be midnight before we get there.’
‘I’m hungry.’
She sighs, making it as noisy as possible and says, ‘I’ll meet you inside’ in a wait-for-me way. But he’s already out and slamming the door. She pulls the rear-view down and checks her hair, ties it up to one side. She thinks about changing out of her pyjamas but doesn’t.
Every girl in her graduating class wore a pound of makeup. Her friend Caitlin says she’s a natural beauty, but that’s just another way of saying princess and she isn’t that. She just doesn’t like makeup and anyway she does wear a bit of eyeliner now and then. If she feels like it. But not now, now she looks like she just crawled out of bed, but Slim says she looks good any time of the day. The way he takes her picture, he has a way of making her feel easy – not in that way – but in that moment, in the camera flash, she feels like she can be whatever it is she’s gonna be.
Whatever. She gets out of the car. Slim’s waited just long enough to start to wonder.
It’s a blue haze inside the diner, graveyard shifters and nine-to-fivers rubbing elbows over greasy plates and bad coffee. Francie finds Slim in the corner booth, leg up, showing off one of the new boots, back to the wall, reading the menu like it’s the work of one of his Russian poets. Two steaming mugs on the table.
Here comes Lucy, her shoulders all hunched up in her ears, gum going. ‘What can I get you?’
‘I’m fine with coffee.’ Francie slides the menu across the table and Lucy snatches it away, swivelling her little eyes onto Slim.
‘Two eggs over hard, home fries, brown toast.’
‘Only got white.’ Scribbling on her notepad like she might need to testify later. ‘Ham, bacon, sausage.’
‘Nope.’
‘Eh?’
‘No meat.’
‘It comes with meat.’
‘I don’t want it.’
‘No meat?’ Like she’s never heard of this before, like he might as well eat a baby as eat breakfast without meat.
‘Nope.’
She gives him a nuclear stare and then walks off to the kitchen, still shaking her head as the doors swing closed.
Francie goes through her pockets and comes out with her pack of smokes, lights one. Slim giving her That Look. ‘What? It’s a menthol.’ He shrugs as if he doesn’t care and looks away. ‘So I’m thinking, first thing we do is we start looking for an apartment.’
‘Thought your sister had space.’
‘She does, it’s just my parents are going to kill her when they find out. And we can find something closer to school so you don’t have to drag all your lenses and stuff around on the subway.’
‘You know how expensive rent is, Francie?’
‘I know.’ The diner coffee is brewed so black she might glow in the dark. Slim not even touching his. Habits are reassuring. Something to collect, like she used to do with her marbles. Handfuls of alleys and a few croakers still in a bag in her closet. Left behind. ‘But I’ll get a job or something for a bit and I’ll be pulling in some money soons I get an agent.’
‘Right. Might as well get a penthouse, all the cash from the magazine covers.’
‘Don’t.’ That easy, with a tone or a word or a look, to take all the light out of it. To puncture a dream. Like Francie’s sister using a pin on a balloon at her birthday party and her crying, Dad coming over with more, no one understanding that other balloons were not that balloon. So easy to make someone else feel stupid. ‘Don’t make fun of me.’
‘Sorry.’ Because he sees right away what he’s done, and all of a sudden he lets himself not be cool. The leg comes down and he leans across, takes her hand. ‘You’re fucking gorgeous.’
‘Sure sure.’
‘You are. To the max. You’ll be all over the place – billboards, TV.’
‘It’s not about that, it’s just … I want it so bad. I’ll work my ass off.’
‘You’ll be fine. You’re gonna be great.’
‘And you’ll do the photo shoots. My personal photographer.’
‘Sure.’ His hand’s still there but now he’s pulling away.
‘When you can. You’ll be busy with school and putting on art shows at little museums. I’ll help you hang the photos. I’m good at that.’
He leans back to make room for the plate Lucy drops in front of him. Heaps of everything, bacon piled on the side, oozing grease. She refills Francie’s mug. ‘No school today?’
Slim answers by driving his bacon onto the tabletop with his fork. Lucy almost chokes on her gum. ‘Slim Novak, you little devil.’
‘It’s Slider. My last name is Slider.’
‘What?’ Lucy’s eyes bug out like a cartoon character and Francie swallows a giggle.
‘Yeah, I changed it.’
‘Your poor mother,’ Lucy says with a huff and then she’s off with her coffee pot, spreading joy.
Slim picks at his potatoes. Francie grabs a piece of his toast, too bleached for him to
