across the street there is a fashion store whose golden days, however, seem to lie somewhere in the past. perhaps that’s why the owner, an older lady, isn’t the cheeriest of people. she also has a short temper and is strongly opinionated.
some people left e-scooters in front of her shop. they might’ve been placed there by juicers, those who collect and charge them during the night. or they were just left behind by a bunch of mildly rebellious teenagers. whatever the reason was, it made no difference to her. she looked grumpy when she arrived at the store that morning and saw them propped up right in front of the shop window. after an angry pause, she grabbed them by the handlebars, one by one, and started dragging them on the pavement, gathering them in a pile in the middle of the street. she moved as if she was doing this every day, as if she were a butcher, pulling goats to the slaughter.
the loud sound of metal scratching the concrete felt like a war song letting everyone know that “this is my turf! you get your e-wheeled devices outta here!”. it didn’t matter that there was nobody there to hear it. nobody on the street, nobody in the shops around, nobody in her tiny store.
not even me.