layered

We used to meet after, or around, clients. Check in, see where everyone was at. Open late or open twenty four hours, those restaurants got our money. It was a waffle house or an IHOP, other times it was more high end- a place that catered to the drinkers and the partiers, the third shifters, that could afford champagne.

A table of glamorous ladies tucked into a booth late at night, ordering appetizers and martinis, steak and oysters. It was us looking at one another, and seeing ourselves. We’d slip out of high heels, pull legs under us, or use each others knees as foot rests. Open mouthed belly laughs that were all teeth, elbows resting on the table, lipstick eaten off, casual with physical affection- arms loosely around each other, braiding fingers absentmindedly, cuddling close, touching cheeks, kissing. The work act was dropped for a couple hours- we didn’t have to play sexy, to worry about minding our manners, no hiding behind smokey eyes, conscious of our legs crossed, ours tits forward. We were not just pretty girls or playthings here, there were no egos to stroke, no reading male body language and acting according to fantasy- just us women on a work break, eating too much and laughing too loud. Happy. Feral.