Renée sometimes thought the city resembled one of those over-the-hill harlots, with messy hair and blackened teeth stumps, too much powder and rouge covering up the spots and blotches on her face, her skin yellow from some untreated disease, coughing up spit and baring her teeth at anyone who dared to come too close to her pitch. Her shrill voice was the sound of the streets, the crates and rags in the alleys the tattered clothes covering her bony body. Greasy, sleazy, too loud and too vain, instilling revulsion and not trust, and yet she gave you what you needed and deep inside you knew you couldn't live without her