The Prostitute

She stands beneath the flickering neon, a shadow stretched thin against the pavement. Smoke curls from her lips, vanishing before it reaches the cold night air. Eyes like doorways left open too long, stories trapped in the hollow of her gaze. She shifts her weight, heels digging into concrete, as headlights pause, then pass. The street hums with voices that never ask, hands that never linger, bills folded tight like secrets. Somewhere, a child waits for morning. Somewhere, a name she no longer speaks echoes in the quiet. But here, under the hum of the city, she is just a silhouette- a woman who walks, a woman who waits, a woman who is.