Nobody messed with you in Mr. Sippee. She knew that from her previous stay in Los Angeles, and that was what brought her here now. Close to the tents under the freeway, Mr. Sippee catered to an eclectic clientele of the more functionally homeless, sex workers of varied gender and presentation, pimps, police officers, drug dealers, office workers, artists, musicians, the map-lost as well as the life-lost, and anyone in serious search of the perfect broasted potatoes. You ate standing up, if you had a car to put your food on. If you didn’t, you sat on the curb out front. She had often thought, while eating there, that the United Nations could do worse than investigate the pacific powers of broasted potatoes.