Spadina streetcar, on at Kensington.

Asian woman, late 20s, with long black hair twisted and draped over her shoulder, wearing a short grey coat with black-and-white checkered scarf tied loosely across her chest.

Treble, Evelyn Lau (Polestar)

About page 29:

From “The Sinking Houses”:

I wanted to tell you a story
about the people with no boundaries,
to see the pain on your face like a flame
that burns neighbourhoods down,
but instead I told you about the dwarf
trapped inside the littlest orange house,
condemned to live alone forever.

She works with a man who is 4’2” tall. His chest is broad, his neck stiff. His eyes are warm and crinkly, his smile easy. His voice is compressed ever so slightly and he glides when he walks the hallways, his funky patterned shoes a daily conversation piece. Once, when he was in university, he told her, he was sitting on the train heading home for the weekend. His car was full of elementary school students on a field trip to the zoo. The teacher, exasperated, had grabbed him forcefully when he wouldn’t leave the train. Fighting her off in the aisles, he stood at his full height and yelled, “Get your hands off of me!” The other passengers all looked away, thinking him a disagreeable child.