the skeleton key

they wore clear plastic rain jackets with hoods like the girls in elementary school, walking to their friend's house from their's, only two houses down.

the light skinned women is old. her face is wrinkled and smeared of age. under her plastic rain coat lays a dress that looks like a sheet from way-back-when. she wears old beaten tennis shoes with knee-high dinged socks, looking as though she walked through many puddles. her hair is white and grey, tied in a sloppy bun with peices of it spwaled over her forehead and laying over her ears. she holds an umbrella over them both, even though the sky is blue, not event the distance painted with the littlest streaks of darkness. but she holds it. steady, as if waiting for the pour to come down over them. like a pessimist waiting for bad news.

the darker skinned women had a body to make her seem young, but her face looked as if she was of age ; what having no roof can make a person look like is beyond any of us with decent walls. her raincoat was short, and the floral drapes she wore beneath were just that, drapes. over her body like a dress, stopping just abover her ankles to bare her naked feet. hair ebony and clumbed but long, frizzed and shiny but full of grief. she pushes a shopping cart infront of them, full of bundles of blankets and duvets and sheets and cloth.

they walk together, slow, but in unison, down a long stretch of road where both directions lead to nowhere. where they came from is the same as where they're going. no one really knows.