Jack and Holiwod walked in from the car toward the complex. The lighting was a dusky gray-green, suggesting that there was a storm brewing somewhere in the cloud cover high above. All was calm in the parking lot, though. The trees along the perimeter stood silently on slightly elevated knolls. Beyond, the buzz of late-day traffic wafted from a nearby highway.
Jack noticed two men waiting for him on the grass barrier before the road bordering the mall. He recognized them from the grocery store earlier, where all the displays had fallen. He smiled, remembered the several tons of cascading roma tomatoes.
"Hi. My name is George, and this my friend," said one man. His skin suggested African descent, though it was mottled and lighter than that of his friend. His accent was also African, though Jack would be hard-pressed to identify the region.
"Sure, I remember you," said Jack, returning the man's handshake.
"Hey, thanks again for not leaving me out in the cold on the invite," said George gratefully.
"Yeah, thanks!" waved his friend from behind.
"Oh, well...you know," offered Jack weakly.
"Really, it is not fun to show up and find you have been left out in the cold. It is not so good," George said.
"Well, it's not like it's an exclusive thing," replied Jack. "Or not even a thing at all. Really, any old person could just walk in off the street and do fine. Well, maybe not any person..."
"You know," George said more quietly, leaning in as if he was afraid to be overheard, "we are doing research on the area, you see. It is seeming to be a very nice, uh, very white and sexy place."
"Oh!...well, yeah, I guess..."
"It is just seeming to be this way," George asserted.
Jack looked around at all the shopping centers and strip malls and considered the well-manicured grass strips and flowerbeds.
"Sexy...eh, yeah, a little, though not necessarily a lot. Definitely white. Very white. Which is, uh, not bad, I suppose, but not overly great. I guess."
George smiled and nodded.
