I study my waitress’ face and find it beautiful. Attractive. Not like a man or a woman, but something inbetween. Drag queens have their own brand of beauty. Something that escapes the rest of us. I like the way she clomps around in battered black platform heels. The way she shuffles back and forth with some kind of lazy urgency. The heat does that to you: makes you feel like the street is something you swim through, not walk down. Makes you feel like you are pushing up against something gelatinous, some insubstantial obstacle. I hate the heat, the humidity, the way it makes me feel trapped in my own skin. A claustrophobia too close to home. There is no where else to go. I hate the way it makes me lethargic, unmotivated, slow and dead. It almost seems like my molecules are dissipating into the air, becoming one with the heavy, stagnant atmosphere. In weather like this, smells stick to you. Everything sticks to you. The air is pregnant and we are all waiting for its water to break.