• tab She could almost taste the dysentery as she languidly chewed her mega-burrito sans cheese. Wolfgang Anderson’s short, scar-pocked fingers crinkled into the foil wrapper, slumped head resting on her shoulder. Her eyes drifted from the asymmetrical mass of flesh that was her brother’s face to the bright yellow, red, and green stripes encircling the inside of the taco joint.
    tab Wolf imagined that this was hell. The blinding florescent lamps that flickered overhead, browned cracks in the seat covers, and loud, cheap mariachi music emanating from ancient wall speakers seemed like her idea of eternal punishment. Stomach complaining hungrily, she set down the last half of her lunch on her brother’s plate. He knew better than to question her by now, and picked it up to greedily to maneuver it into his mouth with his left hand. His right didn’t move from the table – it would have been useless to try and eat with it anyway. The whole forearm below the elbow was a single club-like mass with thin, bony protuberances serving as an excuse for fingers. It would be a tough choice between his feet or that arm for his next surgery, although she knew that if she asked Queue, he would want his feet done. Anything to keep walking.
    tab The boy finished his food, wiping a pristine, beautiful mouth with the back of his good hand. “Kay. You’re working soon, I don’t want to hold you up.”
    tab Wolf didn’t respond, but slid out of her seat and padded to the counter, leather boots crunching on remnants of purchases long past.
    tab “Four churros to go.” That would be dinner. She had to wait a moment as the spotted young man behind the counter took the appropriate time to stare at her hands and wrinkle his nose in disgust at her profession. He briskly snatched up the wrinkled, greasy bill when his attention moved from her to her brother, stepping away from the table with an awkward but practiced shamble. You didn’t have to be that superstitious to think a kid like that was bad luck – not to mention bad for business.
    tab Sliding the handles of the bag up to her elbow, she held the door for Queue, who was dragging his feet more than usual. It was larger this last week and now almost facing completely the wrong way. His shoes didn’t fit him anymore; she’d had to wrap the bulbous things in the bandages she used for her budding breasts. Walking like a herald before her little brother, she examined one of her hands. The mark of the rat catcher covered her fingers and palm, tiny half-moon scars running together into an intricate pattern. She had an innate affinity with scar tissue, she thought to herself. A sort of friendship and liking that she hoped was mutual. It was the human body, round two. Skin that’s been broken up, and grown back less pretty, but stronger. She liked that. She understood it.