Prologue:
Daisy slammed on the breaks, laid on the horn, signaled and changed lanes. Her abrupt stop triggered the passenger side seatbelt alarm because she hadn’t thought to buckle in her college textbooks. She shifted gears then pulled her book bag in between the bucket seats pushing it onto the floor mat in the backseat.
“Shit,” she murmured stopping at another red light.
She flipped radio stations, bit her cuticles and wondered whether her afternoon job qualified as modeling or prostitution, the age old question, is it art or is it pornography? Absently, she rotated the Google map wishing she could slow time as her thoughts raced, reaching back to the sound of her mother’s strangled cough in the early morning hours. When the light turned green she hit first gear easing off on the clutch as her back tires slipped a burnt rubber smell against the asphalt until the heel of her hand firmly pushed the 91 Ford Probe into fifth gear. As she closed the sun roof and turned on the wipers she concluded that the definition of her afternoon activities didn’t matter as long as she was on time and paid in cash.
