Poppy's jaw dropped as she recognised the pathetic shoeshine 'girl' through the window of the upscale coffee shop in the Arab Quarter. She swiftly removed her expensive thick framed spectacles to get a totally unobstructed view of the sleazy looking woman across the busy narrow street. Worn for style (and because Poppy believed they conveyed an added frisson of nerdy intelligence) the chunky spectacles were fitted with clear glass lenses. Poppy's big brown eyes zeroed in on the sordid girl's make-up bereft face as she wordlessly gazed at passers-by and presumably offered her shoeshine services. Surely not...
"It really is her!" Poppy obnoxiously blurted into the bustling ambience of the coffee shop. A few sets of eyes looked up from newspapers and clocked the chubby young professional woman in the business executive attire as she gazed through the window and across the street. Poppy collected herself, but had little regard for those she disturbed. Quite apart from the improbable identity of the shoeshine 'girl', Poppy wondered how such a questionable street-side concession was permitted to even operate in such a culturally conservative district.
Poppy was only in the area to attend a business meeting regarding a buy out of some failing fabric wholesaler. It was a task way beneath her executive salary, but the chairman of the board had specifically asked Poppy to oversee the deal. The young high-flyer was left with little choice but to spend her Monday morning far from the comfortable environs of her lavish air conditioned corner office.
It was a part of the city that she was personally unfamiliar with, but knew it well by reputation. Upon alighting at the Metro Station Poppy found that other than the increase in Arab citizenry, it was a lot like any other part of the city. Suited commuters filled the busy narrow streets near the Metro, but the shopfront businesses were a lot more bazaar-like, noisy and hectic. Arriving well in advance of the meeting and in need of a decent Cappuccino, Poppy had confidently strutted around for ten minutes until she found a decent looking coffee shop that wasn't full of chain smoking Arab men.
Poppy's mind boggled at the fortune of spotting her compromised old rival while supping a Cappuccino in the random Arab Quarter coffee shop. She'd probably have purposely avoided looking at the nasty woman if she'd wandered past her on the street. It was only Poppy's idle 'people watching' through the window that afforded her such an exquisite discovery.
Are shoeshine stands even a thing anymore?
Poppy wondered as she took in the antiquated concession planted beneath an awning across the road. The sun beat down on the dusty street between the shadowy coffee shop and the shade of the shoeshine stand. The old-world style stand was made up of a raised platform on which four tacky looking chairs sat in a row. All four of the dirty stuffed chairs sat empty, but were attended to by the quite unexpected shoeshine girl, who sat lounging with her legs crossed, but thighs spread indecently wide on the stoop down below.
White, slim and plainly attractive, she was clad in an unflattering, revealing ensemble that appeared to be the polish smeared underthings of somebody who had fallen on hard times and hocked everything but the very shirt from their back. Despite having no takers for her shoeshine services, the girl's pleading presence didn't go unnoticed. Commuter (non-Arab) visitors to the area gazed slack-jawed at the humiliated white woman toiling as a demeaning shoeshine girl. Men and woman performed flustered double-takes before quickly moving on with eyes averted. Yet curiously, Poppy noted that the local Arab population wandered past her concession as if it wasn't even there. Those robed men who Poppy assumed would be up in arms at the stripped down presence of a fallen woman pleading for custom seemed entirely oblivious.
The whole thing was unbelievable. Still not entirely convinced that her big brown eyes weren't deceiving her, yet excited beyond logic at the notion that her old rival had become a shoeshine skank in the Arab Quarter, Poppy grabbed her designer shoulder bag, stumbled up onto her ostentatious shiny red platform heels, overpaid for her drink and dashed from the air conditioned coffee shop and out into the sweltering street.
Not wanting to approach the woman directly, Poppy strutted up the street and then crossed through the crawling traffic. She slowed her pace and dawdled towards the shaded stand. The twenty-six year old corporate executive cut quite a figure. The tailored three piece suit may have been inappropriate attire for the weather, but it certainly signalled the BBW's career status. A fine pin-stripe pattern decorated the black jacket, lightly flared, sharply creased trousers and waistcoat. The thick knot of a black silk tie held together the broad collar of her bright red silk blouse. Despite her size, Poppy strutted expertly upon the shiny red high-heeled platform boots that peaked from beneath her flared trouser cuffs. Bountiful raven curls settled upon her shoulders and framed a petulantly cute chubby face. A narrow, slightly upturned nose and big brown eyes collided pleasingly with the full dimpled cheeks upon which her glasses sat. Gazing at her target, she puckered her petit mouth with full lips painted a glossy red. A smooth little ever-present double chin rounded out her face. An almost jet black beauty mark sat on the left side of her face between the corner of her mouth and her somewhat pointy nose. A thick layer of cosmetics slightly darkened and smoothed out her naturally pale white skin-tone. It was only the skin on her chubby ringed fingers that hinted at her natural paler colour. Poppy was a big woman uncaring of what others thought of her shape, yet well aware of how to use what she had to make an impact. The young executive used her obvious abundance to startling effect. Of smaller than average height, the platform heels more than bumped her up a few inches. Poppy was visibly big all over, but this didn't prevent her from emphasising her bust and walking with a high-heeled swagger unique for a woman of her size.
Poppy stopped against the wall nearby the shoeshine stand and surreptitiously lit a slim cigarette, while taking in the scene up close. No doubt about it. Poppy was looking at the destitute remains of her most hated executive rival Karolin Hawksmoor. Entirely unaware of being watched, the woman lazily span her shoeshine rag and shot (what she surely considered to be...) inviting expressions at shocked passers-by. For the women, a desperate submissiveness intent to evoke feelings of pity and appeal to their own sense of superiority. For the men, a teasing grin accompanied by a lazy uncrossing of the legs. This gave an unavoidable view of her barely crotch beneath the blouse.
Poppy cast her mind back to the Karolin Hawksmoor of only a year prior. A high-flying executive at the company alongside Poppy, Karolin was in her early thirties and was certainly considered to be the woman more likely to make it to the very top. Her calm, calculating intelligence and warm demeanour overshadowed Poppy's desperate ambition to succeed. Poppy had hated how everything seemed so effortless for the tall, toned, genuinely pleasant blonde. She recalled the last time that she'd seen Karolin. A meeting like any other. Karolin in her usual lilac trouser suit. A shiny white blouse. Her tanned ankles emerged from the black suede zip-up high-heeled shoe-boots she frequently wore. Glossy blonde hair cascaded down to her shoulders and she wore minimal make-up on her tanned face. Karolin was a conventional athletic beauty and arguably better at her job than Poppy was. Poppy had hated her. As long as Karolin was around, Poppy knew that she'd be forever in the slim woman's broad shadow. So nobody was as surprised and elated as Poppy when that turned out to be her last day with the company. Karolin never returned. Confusion and worry initially reigned, but after the board made some inquiries, they convened a meeting to bluntly state that Karolin Hawksmoor would not be returning to the company. Poppy enviously assumed that she'd been headhunted for an infinitely better position, but when the dust settled, the second best female executive found that she'd been promoted to number one. Karolin gradually departed from her thoughts entirely...
How the mighty had fallen. Poppy couldn't help contrasting how Karolin had looked back at that meeting with how she looked on the shoeshine stand. It was almost as if she'd stepped out of the office on that day and immediately drifted into work at the abhorrent concession.
Karolin appeared to be wearing that same white shiny blouse from the meeting. It looked to have originally been of very nice quality, but over time it had clearly become smeared with dark polish in places and stained to a dull hue far from dazzling white. The buttons were long popped off and only a chunky safety pin held it together at the front. Poppy dragged on her cigarette and gazed pointedly at the woman's chest. One look through the obscenely revealing front of the shirt and Poppy knew that she was looking at Karolin Hawksmoor. Those tiny little titties were unmistakably the 'bosoms' of the once proud Karolin. It had infuriated Molly no end that her colleague had proudly refused to get breast augmentation surgery or even stuff her button-up conservative blouses. She almost seemed proud of fronting it out with a flat chest. Poppy couldn't bare to lose even a smidgen of weight if it meant a reduction to her own sizeable rack.
