He sits, slumped, legs spread. His music shoots past his red headphones. His baggy black dress pants and scuffed black shoes tell me he's a busboy, he's watched people eat all day. Cleaned their plates, gotten his food in his hair, his fingers in their water. He smells like sauces and stale dishrags.
I see his head go down and jolt back, down and jolt back, the steps of a man fighting sleep. He settles into his body then, his head moves slowly to the right, and rests on my shoulder. I don't know how he sleeps with the music this loud but he does.
A woman sits across from me, old and severe and in a fur coat. She scowls at the boy, mouths to me loudly, "Wake him up." I ignore her. She mouths it again and again, she scolds me, she cannot believe it. I do not believe she has ever been tired.
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