elfs | Teh Drama, Live!

Teh Drama

The other day I was in Westlake Center, the big shopping district in downtown Seattle for the middle class who want to overspend, and I happened to spot this pink-haired girl in the middle of the square. She was screaming and yelling at two young men; drama was high! And then, seconds later, she was cuddling one of them as if nothing were wrong. I took the photo mostly because I liked her outfit; I'll probably give it to a character in a story.

Westlake has become inundated with young people. The girl behind the counter watched me watching this and said, "Yeah, it's gotten really bad out there."

"At Westlake?"

"Yeah," she said. "Dunno what it means. It wasn't like this three years ago. But now there's lots of homeless kids, lots of homeless people, everywhere. It wasn't like this before." The countergirl had holes in her nose and ears where jewelry would go off-duty; she had a soft southern burr to her voice and a dense cloud of freckles across her nose and cheeks. I should have taken a photo of her, too.