"The salami witch is here." Jake whispered to me as I was helping a middle aged blonde. I looked up and there she was in her mob of black curls and that signature snarl. I wondered if she knew how much she resembled a dog when she snarled like that. We made up stories about her during our lunch breaks at the deli. Jake came up with the idea that she had been abandoned at birth by her mother because of how ugly she was. I thought perhaps she got cheated by a boyfriend when she was young. I deliberately took my time scooping the potato salad to aoivd helping the witch. I strolled to the weighing machine slowly, I could see Jake was doing the same. Neither of us wanted to help her.

"Anything else I can get for you?" I asked the blonde sweetly, hoping she would sense my desperation and order some hand-made ravioli that were kept in the back.

"That's all."

I sighed. I could see the salami witch twitching impatiently. Her pudgy fingers scartching her left eye. She was in a bad mood, as always.

The blonde left without turning to say thank you. The salami witch came forward to the counter. I noticed that she took up the length of the counter completely. I put on my friendliest smile.

"Hi, are you back for more salami?"

She growled at me. Tapped her bloated hand on the counter, made a clicking sound with her tongue then nodded, glaring at me as if I had just mowed down her entire family with a monster truck.

"Ok. More pepperoni salami I assume." I kept being cheerful, thinkg that maybe that would piss her off further.

I grabbed all the pepperoni salami we have hanging off the side of the counter and plopped them down in front of her. I knew what was going to happen. She was going to inspect each and everyone of them. If they weighed too much I would have to take them back. If they had a little unnatural bump, she growled and tossed them back to me. It was a little ritual I was familiar with. If she was not satisfied with the batch she made us go to the back to bring out more until she was happy.

I watched her eyeing the salami like a diamond expert. She was searching them out for flaws. I tapped my foot and watched her face--that frown, the slightly crossed eyes, her face which resembled a cold pudding more and more by the second. She is a perfect specimen of ugliness. I thought it was possible that she had been abandoned at birth by her parents. Perhaps her parents took one look at her face and decided that there was no God and left her to her own devices.

"I'll take these." She groweled. She clawed me as she handed me a twenty. When I handed her the change, she snatched them right out of my hand and stormed off but not before giving me and Jake another evil look. I looked at the clock. There had been an improvment today, she only took twenty-seven minutes to pick her salami.

"I wonder why she only buys salami." Jake was still gloating from the fact that he got lucky.

I was still sore that I was the one who had to serve the witch.

"I don't know. Maybe it's her staple diet. That would certainly explain her looks."

Jake laughed. I felt better.

"Hey." Jake came closer.

I could sense that he was hatching some kind of no-good conspiracy. He was always trying to get me in trouble.

"Hey." He tapped me on the shoulder as if wanting to let me in on some secret.

I swept his hand away."What is it?"

"You want to know something?"

I frowned at him. Jake can be such an asshole. "Just say it."

He leaned in. "I know where the witch lives."

"How do you know?" I tried not to sound too interested.

"I saw her walking her cat." Jake sniggered. "She had her siamese on a leash. The cat is as ugly as she is."

"No one walks a cat." I could not help but smile.

"That's why she's a witch." Jake was up to no good, I could tell by the way he smiled and looked at me with his impish eyes. "I followed her to her apartment. She lives five blocks from here."

"So?" I didn't want to give Jake the idea I wanted in on whatever plan he was cooking up.

"So, I'm saying. Let's go check out her lair and see what she is brewing up there."

"You're stupid." My true sentiments--if Jake ever had an idea, it was dumb.

"She lives on the third floor, I saw her at the windows. She always walks her cat at night. I say we go in when she's out."

I should have said no. But if I did, Jake would call me a chicken and make life hellish at the deli for me for months. I said nothing. He took it as a yes.

That night, we walked over to the witch's arpatment building after we locked up the deli. Jake pointed at a window. It was dark.

"Let's go."

Jake must have been planning the thing for a while. He knew exactly where the staircase was. He climbed up the stairs two steps at a time.

"I bet you, she is doing some vodoo with those salami."

Jake was excited like a puppy. I followed him, feeling a sens of dread at the bottom of my stomach. I didn't think it was a good idea at all. But I couldn't say no, not after we've gotten so far.

Jake got to her apartment door. Signaled a monkey grin and pulled out a swiss army knife.

"Watch." He nodded at me, showing off. "I learnt this from my cousin."

He took the smaller blade and stuck it into the keyhole, twisted it around and miraculously we heard a click. The click seemed to echo down the empty corridor. I wanted to go home.

"After you." Jake extended his arm and bowed like a head-waiter at some fancy restaurant.

The room was dark. I stumbled around and found the light switch. I flipped it on and the room came into view. It took a moment for our eyes to adjust to the light. But we caught sight of the thing at the same time.

On top of a large dinning table that could easily have sat eight people was a whole city made out of salami. It looked like one of those medieval towns. It had a castle inside a fortress, there were towers, a cathedral. There were even stables and farm houses. We walked closer to inspect the town. EVery part of it was made out of salami. The witch had cut up little salami slices and placed them on some kind of wood or cardboard for support and she made a whole town out of it.

"Oh My God."

I could hear Jake's gasp. "Oh man, she is crazy. This is sick."

I couldn't say anything. All I could do was look at the intricate town made out of slabs of salami. The salami I sold everyday. Common chucks of meat. Even the floor of the town had salami cobblestones.

"Oh My God. She is sick. Let's go. I don't want to have anything to do with the crazy woman." Jake was pulling on my elbow.

"I wonder how long she has been working on this thing." I still couldn't take my eyes off it.

"Who cares. Let's go. This is creeping me out." Jake was already walking towards the door.

I didn't want to admit it, but it was the most amazing thing I have seen in my life thus far. I took one more look at it. Its red marbled majestic towers, cathedral and castle walls. I thought I could hear trumpets sounding in the little city.

"Hey." Jake called impatiently.

I switched off the light and ran out. Jake slammed the door and we ran the rest of the way. We didn't stop until we reached the deli.

"That is the craziest thing I have ever seen." Jake muttered.

I nodded, but all I could think of was the pieces of salami that formed a whole city. I thought of little salami people and little salami cows.

"Want to grab a pizza before you head home?" Jake interrupted my thoughts.

"Sure." I said, "just as long as it is not pepperoni."

He laughed and we headed off into the night, our thoughts still on a salami world that existed somewhere out there.

The sensation struck him as he was working on the numbers. He had been doing numbers for the past thirty-five years. It started from his chest then it spread to his abdomen then down to his legs and his fingertips. It was a soft kind of rumble, like a tingling but much subtler and gentler. He had not felt this way for as long as he remembered. He got up from his chair and started for the coffee machine, but when he got to the pantry, he changed his mind and kept walking. He walked past the managers' offices, the receptionist who gave him a strange look and out the door. His briefcase, his lunch box, his coffee mug all still at his desk like soldiers on duty, anxious to be of some kind of use. All he had on him was his wallet, but the feeling was so strong, he kept going. he hit the down button for the elevator and when it arrived he got in without hesitation. It did not strike him as strange that at ten-thirty in the morning when he should be working numbers he was instead leaving his office building.

The morning sky was beautiful at ten-thirty on a wednesday, but the people he passed by on the streets seemed not to notice the sky or him or anything. They were all busy in their own thoughts. He had not idea where he was going, all he was sure of was the feeling warming his chest spreading up to the root of his hair. And that his legs were leading him and all he had to do was to follow. It was a feeling of security familiar to children, but for a man of forty-seven, it was strange as it was assuring for a child.

He had trouble walking. It had to do with his weight. He knew he was overweight and sometimes people gave him unpleasant looks on crowded trains or in restaurants. The waitresses were especially accusing when they took his order. It was as if his wanting to purchase food was indulging in some great personal evil that they were ashamed of being an accomplice in. For the longest time he could not see any priviledge to being fat. People assumed a lot of things when they saw his size, his belly hanging low, his waddle. But now he understood the beauty of obesity, it is privacy that the world afforded him in moments like this. No one gave him any attention, they steered clear of his path. And that morning, it was as if the sun was shining for him alone and the road glistened under his feet only for his eyes.

He followed his legs. They brought him to the train station. They skipped down stairs with a lightness that surprised even himself. Then the legs just stopped right at the platform. He watched people come and go with the passing trains and his legs remained still. He found himself a seat on a stone bench and just waited. People rushed in and out of the train doors. They all seemed to have a blindness to them that had little to do with being underground. They dashed around madly, and the trains rushed in through one end of the tunnel and left. He just sat and watched. THings, people moving into and out of view, the world forever in motion. That warm feeling that had summoned him here had faded a little. He started wondering at the strangeness of it all.

An emergency phone sat beside him. Above it was a huge sign that said: Only for emergency use. The sign was red and obnoxious, but the phone itself was a quiet navy blue. It hung lonely and still on the wall. He had always wondered what kind of a voice would be at the end of a phone like that. Then that same feeling drove him to pick up the phone. He had expected the feeling to be exhiliarating--doing something illogical and illegal. But it all felt quite normal. It was merely a phone with a sign above it.

A strong vibrant voice that he attached to a face of a sturdy black woman picked up the call. "Yes, how can I assist you? What seems to be the problem."

He stuttered a little from the confusion of having nothing to say. "Nothing is the matter. It's just that I...it's all going to sound very strange to you."

"Sir, is this a matter of emergency?"

He could detect a hint of irritation in the voice. "I wouldn't say so, no."

"Then, why, may I ask are you using the station's emergency phone? "

He had no answer to that, so he stayed silent.

"This phone is reserved for use in case of emergency. "

Then there was a silent. Both of them now had run out of things to say. He had revealed that there was no emergency and she had stated clearly that the phone was only to be used in the case of one.

"Should I put down the phone?" He asked doubtfully.

She said nothing but he imagined a irritated grimace on her face. She must be thinking he was such an idiot.

"You should be fined five hundred dollars to teach you a lesson."

She waited for a response but he was silent.

:"Is this some kind of a cheap thrill for you?"

"No, not really, no" he tried to find words to explain himself "Quite honestly, I don't know why I did it."

There was an expectant silence on the other end, so he continued. "I had this strange feeling that took me from work this morning and brought me here. That same feeling made me pick up this phone."

The voice muttered a disbeliving "hmm"

"It is so nice out. I have never noticed the world outside at ten thirty. I am usually so busy working, I don't see the sky until it gets dark. I never knew that this phone existed until today."

There was a sigh at the other end of the line. "Next time, do not use this phone unless it is a matter of urgency. I usually give citations for offense like this, but I'm going to let you off this time. Don't pick up this phone again, you understand?"

He nodded, but before he could say anything. The woman hung up. He put down the receiver and sat drinking in the vibration of constant movements and the slight rumbling of trains that trailed and hung in the air like a signature.

Grace, put down the phone. Marcus, a station security, walked into the station information booth. He was a big Latino who looked like he could rip a phone directory in two. He watched her face.

"What happened?"

Grace shook her head " just a weirdo."

Marcus rubbed his eyebrow as he watched his own reflection on the glass of the information booth. "The city is full of them."

Grace nodded. She looked outside. It was ten-fifty. Indeed, she thought, the sky is beautiful.