The Novel in the Drawer (Chapter 1a)

"Everyone I meet has a novel in their drawer, even people without a drawer."
W. Faulkner

Extended Family

Chapter 1

It was raining on the first day of summer vacation. A young boy sat on the steps of a small apartment building and considered his possibilities. He was tossing a pimple ball in the air with one hand and catching in with the other, counting each successful catch. He caught it most of the time, but when he missed, the ball would hit the steps and bounce off in one direction or the other, and the boy would throw himself after the ball, trying to catch it before it hit a parked car or bounced into the street. If it hit a car, he lost five points. If the ball made it to the street, he lost ten. If he caught the ball on three or fewer bounces, he only lost one point. If he caught a bouncing ball on three or fewer bounces with his left hand, he added five points. (He was trying to get better using his left hand.) He’d been playing since 9:30 and his score was one hundred and nineteen. He decided to play until he reached one hundred and fifty.

Usually the boy wouldn’t play ball on the steps in the rain. Sometimes, if the wind blew from the east, rattling against the kitchen windows in the back of the apartment that looked out onto the tiny fenced yard, he would sit on the front steps, under the small aluminum awning that created a narrow, dry space by the front door, and watch the wind that carried the rain toss and shake the sycamore leaves, their silver backs shimmering in the rain.

The rain today was strange, and the boy decided the strangeness must mean something. He had learned the word “omen” from a book of Celtic folktales his third grade teacher had given him on the last day of school. That had been on Friday. He had swooped through the book over the weekend, reading it late into the night, as there was no need to get up early the next morning. Mrs. McGill didn’t mind, as long as he was reading “good books,” which meant he had to wait until she fell asleep before slipping the comic books and Mad magazines from their hiding places deep in his book bag.

The rain, he decided, was a omen that foretold the events of this summer, the summer of 1969. He had never seen rain like this. There was no wind at all, not even a zephyr (another word he had learned recently, this time from a book on Greek mythology he’d found in the library.) The gentle rain fell straight down, like a soggy curtain, off to the west as far as he could see, sliding down the cars in the bank parking lot and soaking the houses on Lawrence Street, then stopping abruptly in the middle of 4th Street. He sat on completely dry steps, the sun warm on his thin, pale white legs which had only been allowed the freedom of shorts that morning watching the rain not twenty feet away.

The boy’d seen sun showers, but this was different. Across the street, it was dark and wet, like you’d expect during a rainstorm. He could see edges of the clouds that ran to the north and south up and down 4th Street. It was as if a magic spell was protecting his side of the block. He shoved the ball in his pocket when he reached one hundred and fifty, and turned his full attention to the rain. He had chosen today, the first day of Summer vacation, as a day to make some decisions, and he was sure the omen of the rain had to mean something. He considered a magical solution to the mystery, but a quick look up and down 4th Street and a consideration of the people that lived in the rowhomes and duxplexes didn’t suggest anyone magical lived nearby. There was the old house around the corner on Third, the one that all the kids knew as “The Witch’s House”, but he knew she wasn’t a witch. She was just Mrs. Umkauf, an old lady who was too old and sick to go out or to keep her small front garden neat and tidy. He knew this because when his Mom had found out that he was shooting dried peas at her windows through straws with some other kids, she had taken him to the house, introduced him to Mrs. Umkauf, and arranged for him to clean up her yard for her and to go back every other week to keep it clean. His mother refused to let Mrs. Umkauf pay him, although she offered a dollar a week. The other kids still thought she was a witch, but it’s hard to convince yourself of that when you sit in her kitchen every other Saturday morning, eat a piece of cake, or two, (she was a wonderful baker), with a cold glass of milk. No, Olney was not a magical place, no matter how hard the boy tried to make it so. But then, what about the weird rain?

The boy finally decided that rain had to stop somewhere. He knew that it could not be raining everywhere at once. You could tell that from the weather maps on the news. He’d been on buses and in cars as they drove in and out of rainstorms. He decided that this time he just happened to be at the right spot to see the edge of the storm. But could that be the omen? This being in the right spot? Maybe, he thought. He didn’t want to give up on the possibility of magic because of the great stories in the Celtic book. He wasn’t ready to give up on the possibility of magic, but he couldn’t just ignore the answers that made sense. It was like when he was trying to sleep in Mrs. McGill’s living room, and he’d lie awake staring at the weird shadows on the walls and ceiling. He’d be frightened, until he could determine what had made the shadow, perhaps the street light shining through the lace curtains, and then the monster would be gone, and he couldn’t see it again no matter how hard he tried. Once he realized the monster was the shadow of a Hummel, he could only see the Hummel’s shadow, never the monster. The loss of the monster, of the magical, left him a little sad. But why had the rain stopped right there, twenty feet in front of his apartment? And on the blessed first day of summer vacation? Why, indeed, if not to presage a special summer.

“There you are.” The hissed whisper penetrated the boy’s reverie and he twisted his neck to follow the voice to the open window of the apartment above his. “Come on up, Peter, I need to see you.”

“OK, Mrs. McGill,” called Peter, his voice matching her whispered tone. Jumping up, he gently opened the aluminum screen door, holding it open to keep it from banging while he opened the heavy front door. He closed them with a learned delicacy at odds with his natural urge to slam doors, to do all things at full speed, heedless of what he doing at the moment, his mind driving his body to speed up, speed up, to get to the next thing.

Peter glanced at the closed door on his left and an image of his sleeping mother flashed across his mind. She’d been asleep for only a few hours. He’d heard her come in at the usual time, a little after six, while he pretended to sleep. He didn’t like her to know that he often woke before dawn and couldn’t get back to sleep until she was home. He’d only recently, after his tenth birthday, been allowed to sleep by himself in their apartment and he didn’t want his Mom to change her mind. He’d listen in the stillness before even the morning birds were stirring for the rumble, grind, and screech of the 26 bus slowing to a stop at the corner, holding his breath, waiting for the hydraulic woosh of the door opening that told him his mother was almost home.

When he was younger, Peter spent the night in Mrs. McGill’s apartment while his mother worked through the night at the bakery. He would often wake in the pre-dawn hours and sit by the second floor window that overlooked the street and peer intently into the glow of the streetlights to catch a glimpse of his mother getting off the bus. Now, believing that turning ten should have freed him from such childish fears, he relied on his well-trained ears to recognize the hiss of the bus doors. He’d silently count out the seventy-five seconds or so before he would hear his mother’s key in the lock of the outside door. Then he’d let out a muffled sigh of relief when he heard her key in the lock of their apartment.

Peter’s mother’s job at the bakery ran from nine to five-thirty. When he asked her why she had to work all night, she told him that jobs were hard to find and she was good at baking. As long as people expected fresh bread and pastries for breakfast, somebody was going to have to work through the night baking it. Besides she was paid extra for working through the night and the extra money helped.

Arriving home a little past six, Peter’s mother stepped quietly across the dark living room to the sofa, the only light provided by the streetlight slicing through the closed Venetian blinds. She fussed a bit with Peter’s blankets, and lightly kissed his forehead. She smiled at him and gently ran her hand across his summer buzz-cut, the thick blond hair standing straight up in quarter-inch spikes.

She went into the kitchen, still moving carefully through the unlit apartment, and set the white cardboard bakery box on the table. From there, she walked back through the central hallway and into the bathroom to clean up and change clothes. Peter lay with his head on the end of the sofa nearest the bathroom wall, and he was usually lulled to sleep by the rhythmic sounds of the water splashing against the tiles and his mother softly singing, but today he was too excited to sleep.

After cleaning up and changing into her nightgown, robe, and slippers, his mother returned to the kitchen to get the bakery box and, after checking on Peter again, she went up to Mrs. McGill’s apartment for coffee and fresh pastry. The older woman had become a kind of aunt to her, not a mother, she had a mother and didn’t think she could survive another, but a helpful, non-judgmental aunt. As she walked up the stairs to Mrs. McGill’s apartment, she thought once again how lucky she’d been to find her, especially at a time when luck and the promise of the future seemed to have deserted her.

Peter heard his mother’s and Mrs. McGill’s light footsteps moving across the floor above his head, heading for the kitchen. He smelled the coffee from upstairs, but the cinnamon, he knew, was from the warm bun in his own kitchen, where his mother had left it for him. He quietly tossed back the blankets and slipped into the kitchen, poured a glass of cold milk, and made short work of the sticky bun, his mother had learned to leave only one bun, before returning to the sofa, and reaching under the sofa for a Mad magazine and his flashlight.

Peter was asleep when his mother returned about an hour later. She checked on him once more and smiled at the magazine lying where he’d dropped it. She gently slid the magazine back under the sofa with the toe of her slippered foot, clicked off his flashlight, and delicately lifted his arm which was dangling off the sofa, folding it across his chest. Kissing his forehead once again, she went to the bedroom to sleep.

Turning from his door, Peter stepped across the small entryway and walked lightly up the stairs to Mrs. McGill’s apartment. He kept to the edge of the worn carpet runner to muffle his steps. The door at the top of the stairs was left open as usual so he and his mother could come and go freely, but as he knocked and entered he was surprised to find the living room empty. He expected to find Mrs. McGill sitting in her favorite chair by the front window that overlooked 4th Street, a mug of coffee on the side table, a newspaper or Readers’ Digest Condensed Book in her hand.

“In here, Peter,” she called from the kitchen. He walked through the central hall into the kitchen and saw her sitting at the table which was still cluttered with the remnants of his mother’s breakfast and the later one that Mrs. McGill had made for him. The percolator and frying pan were still on the stove and a few odds and ends were piled in the sink. Peter had never seen Mr. McGill’s kitchen so disheveled. Her oft repeated instructions to him were “clean up as you go,” a practice that often found him reaching for his glass to get a second helping of orange juice only to find it washed and in the cabinet before he noticed it was gone.

“There you are,” she said, smiling weakly. “Would you mind going to Mr. Fisher’s and picking up my medicine? I know it’s your first day of summer vacation, but I just don’t feel up to walking today.”

“Are you alright?,” Peter asked with real concern. “Do you want me to get my Mom?” Mrs. McGill had seemed fine last night, Peter thought, and he had been so excited about summer starting that he hadn’t noticed anything different at breakfast this morning.

“No, no, let the poor girl sleep. Working all night like that.” She shook her head in disbelief that a young mother should have to work such hours as Peter’s mother. “Don’t bother her. I’m just getting old. I’ll be fine after I’ve rested up a bit.”

Peter looked thoughtfully at her and wondered, not for the first time, how old she was. She certainly looked older than his grandmothers. She looked older than Old Miss Welch at school, the fearsome eighth-grade English teacher who retired in June and was generally considered by the students at Morrison Elementary to have been Methuselah’s teacher.

“The aches and pains are adding up, that’s all,” Mrs. McGill said, seeing the concern on the boy’s face and desiring to reassure him. “I’ll be fine. Dr. Sarkis is coming by this afternoon to check up on me.”

“I’ll go and get the medicine,” said Peter, turning away toward the door and stairs beyond. “I hope you feel better soon.”

“Oh, Peter, I almost forgot. Could you also stop by Al’s on your way back and pick up my groceries?”

“Sure. Do I need my wagon?”

“Oh no, it’s just a few things for dinner tonight. Your mother and I are going to try a new recipe. Besides you’ve shot up so much since Christmas, a big boy like you can easily carry the bag.”

Mrs. McGill reached into the pocket of her apron and pulled out a quarter which she pressed into Peter’s palm. “Get yourself a soda at Mr. Fisher’s. By then Al should have the order ready.”

Peter thanked her and headed quietly down the stairs.

Once outside the apartment building, stepping briskly into the summer sunlight that had chased away the strange rain, Peter’s carefully contained energy slipped the leash and he leapt off the top step, hitting the sidewalk running. A burst a speed propelled him down 4th Street and around the corner to the top of the steep hill on Clarkson Street. He threw himself down the hill, giving himself over to gravity, his feet barely managing to keep pace as he recklessly threw his head and chest down the hill and wildly pumped his arms. The air roared past his ears, rippling over the stubble on his close cropped head. He ran full speed past the row of private garages that lined the south side of the block, stumbling across the cracked, oil-stained driveways. He glanced up at the roof, swerving close to the green wooden garage doors so he could not be seen from above in case any of the older kids were lurking up there, drinking beer stolen from their father’s cases and waiting to pelt unsuspecting kids with rocks and dirt bombs.

At the foot of the steep hill, he sped across 3rd Street and turned right past the gray granite Presbyterian Church that ran the length of the block. Leaping up onto the marble steps parallel to the great red doors with their gleaming black strap hinges, he vaulted across the iron handrails and bounced down the farther side. Past the entry, he left the sidewalk and cut a looping path up and down the embankment that ran along the length of the sanctuary. He skidded to a stop just past the church to wait for the light to change and the traffic to clear on Tabor Avenue. His forward motion halted, he bounced on his toes, leaping up and tapping the bus stop sign on the corner. He smiled as he had managed to reach the sign for the first time about a month ago and already it was so much easier.

The light changed, and he crossed Tabor, walking now as he passed Al’s. Maybe he should skip the soda and buy two packs of baseball cards. The new series was out. Still excited about great ’68 World Series last Fall, he wanted to get all the Cardinals and Tigers. After a quick and heated debate, appetite defeated acquisition. He hurried past the metal open doors of Al’s basement beside which a grocery truck was parked, the driver unloading cases and sliding them the along the rails, over the rows of wheels mounted where the rungs would be, down into the basement. Al’s son, Frankie, caught the boxes as the rolled down and stacked them onto shelves. Peter considered leaping over the rails, but a warning looking from the driver chased that thought away. Instead, he ducked under the rails, a case of Bosco rumbling over his head, and cut across 3rd aiming for Mr. Fisher’s front door, picking up speed as the soda fountain exerted its magnetic appeal. Angling across the street, Peter shot past a stand of row homes and slammed into the door, turning the handle only slightly before his shoulder smacked into the middle of the door and threw it inward.

Mrs. Kennedy had seen him coming through the front window and so narrowly avoided the adolescent missle named Peter. She leapt back and protectively clasped her bags to her. “Peter! For God’s sake!,” she snapped. “Watch where you’re going.” She gathered herself and left the pharmacy, muttering to no one in particular, “The boy’s a positive hazard.”

“Sorry, Mrs. Kennedy,” Peter called after her, ducking his head in embarrassment, and walking carefully over to the soda fountain. He climbed onto a stool and began twisting from side to side.

“Peter, Peter, Peter,” said Mr. Fisher, shaking his head as he came out from behind the cash register and walked over to the soda fountain. “You’ve got to get a handle on that energy, my boy. The way you’re going your going to use it all up before high school.”

Peter grinned at him and shrugged. Mr. Fisher walked by Peter and rubbed his hand over the boy’s velvety head. “Summer buzz cut, huh? I imagine you kids are lined up over at Louie’s.”

Peter nodded, “Some kid’s moms do it. Billy Calahan’s dad’s cut his with dog clippers.”

“Yes, well, let’s hope it was early in the day. I wouldn’t trust Sam Calahan with any sharp instruments after two o’clock or so.” A sour look crossed Mr. Fisher’s face. He was a Presbyterian, an elder at Oleny Pres and the Presbyterian’s of Olney did not drink. Olney’s overwhelmingly Catholic majority was German or Irish and untroubled by this theological injunction. Mr. Calahan was foremost in the Papist ranks of advocates of drink.

Stepping behind the soda fountain, Mr. Fisher picked a damp rag and wiped the counter in front of Peter with a flourish. “What’ll it be, stranger?” he asked in B-movie Western accent. “Rotgut? Sasparilla?”

“Cherry coke, please,” said Peter, sliding his quarter across the counter.

“Ah, a paying customer. Well, well,” said Mr. Fisher, as he set about drawing the soda and mixing the syrups. “How about a tiny, little dollop of vanilla in there? A smidgen, perhaps?,” he asked, raising his eyebrows and swirling his index finger in a mixing motion.

“OK,” said Peter, “Thanks.”

“Only the best for my regulars,” answered Mr. Fisher, splashing a small squirt of vanilla in the glass, briskly stirring the concoction with a long, gleaming silver spoon, and sliding the drink across the counter to Peter.

“Anything else, my boy?,” asked Mr. Fisher as Peter happily slurped his soda.

“Oh yeah. I have to get Mrs. McGill’s medicine.”

Mr. Fishers jovial face turned serious. “How is Mrs. McGill doing?,” he asked. “I’m worried about her.”

“Um, OK, I guess. She said she was just a little tired.”

Mr. Fisher straightened up and held a small bag that he had taken from under the counter. He tapped the bag thoughtfully and said somewhat distantly, “Tired, yes, tired.” He shook his head slightly and returned his attention to Peter. “Here you go. Say hello to your mother and give my best wishes to Mrs. McGill.” Peter pushed the empty glass away and hopped off the stool. He thanked Mr. Fisher for the soda, waved goodbye, and headed across the to see if Al had the groceries ready.

The delivery truck was rumbling up 3rd Street, its gears grinding as it climbed the long hill that ran three blocks from Tabor to Chew Street. Frankie was disassembling the slide lowering the sections into the basement. He swore under his breath and banged the equipment sharply with his open hand when the latches jammed. He slid the last piece into the basement and roughly yanked away the iron rods that kept the metal doors from dropping into place. He snapped the rods onto the clips on the underside of the heavy doors and dropped the heavy doors into place. The smashed into place with a resounding clang. A faint “Jesus Christ!,” drifted through the screen door that lead to back room of the store. Frankie smiled darkly and gave the finger carelessly in the direction off the voice as he picked up a heavy padlock and chain.

“Hey, Frankie,” said Peter and he kept moving at a respectful and, he hoped, safe distance from the disgruntled teenager.

Frankie glared menacingly at Peter, abent-mindedly wrapping the chain around his fist. “Punk,” he muttered, and turned away kneeling down to lock the metal door that had slammed into their frame that was recessed into the sidewalk. Peter wasn’t too worried about Frankie, he usually didn’t bother anybody around his Father’s store, but Peter kept moving just in case.

Frankie was a junior at Oleny High. He’d be a senior in the Fall, but in Frankie’s case it was never safe to assume academic advancement. Victor, the second chair barber-slash-bookie at Louie’s had speculated the odds at 3 to 1 that Frankie’d do time before he’d graduate High School. Frankie’d spent three years at Cardinal Dougherty, pulled along in the wake of his classmates after his nine years at Incarnation, the Catholic elementary school across the street from Morrison, Peter’s school. It was generally assumed that the only thing that had kept the nuns from kicking Frankie out and his ending up at Morrison was that Al cut the nuns a deal on groceries. Some folks suspected that the teachers at Morrison slipped Al a monthly donation to defray the cost of his charity.

Frankie was still a sophomore after three years of High School because of his sporadic attendance, his absences sometimes due to his exploration of non-traditional educational opportunities with like-minded apprentice felons (stealing car batteries was very popular at the moment). This absences were augmented by enforced periods of time away from school when the Jesuits caught him engaged in on-the-job training (extortion, mostly) directed toward the student body, or more correctly, students’ bodies. When both the patience of the priests and usual Jesuitical intimation failed, Frankie transferred to Oleny High where he quickly became a fixture at the twice-weekly brawls between the neighborhood Whites and the black kids bused in from West Philly. Al had hoped his son would transfer to Mastbaum, one of the public technical high schools, and learn a trade, but Frankie couldn’t be bothered with the bus ride. Besides, he figured he was set. He planned on selling the store as soon as he got his hands on it.

“Is Mrs. McGill’s order ready?,” Peter asked.

“How the fuck should I know?” growled Frankie, his cigarette dangling loosely from between his lips, bobbing up and down in emphasis. “Been stacking those fucking boxes all goddamn morning. Old bastard works me to death.”

“OK,” said Peter, “ stepping briskly past Frankie in an only slightly modified Great Circle route that took safely to the front door via the gutter. “I’ll check with your Dad.”

“You do that, punk,” said Frankie. He bent down and ran the chain through the hasp.

Peter heard the lock click closed as he entered the store. The screen door slammed shut as he stepped into the cool dusty dimness of Al’s. The buzzer in the back room roused Al and Peter saw him appear at the curtained door behind the meat counter. Since his wife had died, Al had largely abandoned the upstairs apartment they’d lived in for years, where they’d raised Frankie, and spent most of his time in the small back room of the store. Peter had been in there once when he’d helped Al, the man’s arm was in cast at the time, lift a case of beer out of Al’s trunk and carry it to the backroom. There was a two-burner electric cooktop mounted on the far wall by the sink, a shallow sink nearby to it, with a small counter in between. An ancient ice box, it’s huge cooling coil piled on top of it like a bee hive hairdo, squatted in the corner on the other side of the cooktop. A daybed was pushed against the exposed brick of the common wall. A faded and stained armchair held pride of place in the center of the room, a side table with a battered old lamp on it to one side, a dented metal TV tray on the other. A crudely repaired footstool sat in front of the chair. The whole arrangement was directed toward a beat up portable TV, complete with bent hanger aerial, that was pushed into the opposite corner of the small room.

Al walked up narrow aisle the aisle that lead from the back room to the counter, a path chosen so that he see both the front door and the cash register. His grimy apron was loosely tied around his ample belly, and he swept his thick, white hair back from his face as he walked. He walked with a slight limp that he told people was a war wound, but most folks thought it more likely due to an accident aided by alcohol.

Al saw Peter and smiled. He liked Peter and hired him for odd jobs when Frankie would disappear for a time. “Petey! There you are, boy. Come to the back. I’ve got Mrs. McGill’s order ready.” He jerked his head toward the storeroom and lead the way. Peter followed him to the small shelf-lined storage room between the meat counter and back room. Al pointed to a box on a lower shelf. He was jotting down figures in an account book. “Over there, Petey,” he said, aiming his pencil at the shelf, “The Cracker Jacks box.”

Peter nodded and moved toward the small box. He slid off the shelf carefully to test the weight. No problem, he thought, a little heavy, but not too bad. He slipped the white bag into the open box, folded the flaps closed, and picked it up.

“How’s Mrs. McGill doing these days,” asked Al, looking up from his figures.

“OK, I guess’” said Peter. “She says she’s a bit tired.”

“Ah well, it’s hell getting old, Petey. Yes indeed it is,” said Al shaking his head from side to side.

Peter smiled and started for the door.

“Did you see that son of mine out there?,” asked Al.

“Yeah, he was locking up.”

Al nodded, a sour look crossing his face as it habitually did when he thought of his son and heir.

“See you later, Al,” Peter called as he backed through the screen door and started up 3rd Street. He carried the box jammed against his belly, his hands cradling the far corners of the box. The cans and bottles clinked softly in time with his steps. He turned left onto Clarkson and started trudging up the hill. He walked on the north side of the street, opposite the garages. His encounter with Frankie had made him nervous about running into any of Frankie’s friends.

The houses on the north side of the block, built in the 1880’s, where some of the oldest houses in the neighborhood. These gray stone, Victorian houses had wide porches and small front gardens. Grandparents and Great-grandparents, widows and widowers lived there and had since they were newlyweds around the time of the Great War. They were Scots mostly, although one German Catholic family infiltrated the Presbyterians between the wars.

Peter’s part of Olney, what he thought of as Olney, was a patchwork of housing varieties ranging from these large, brooding Victorians to Peter’s squat apartment building around the corner. Row homes, duplexes, and few old farmhouses filled out the neighborhood. There were several small apartment buildings built in the 50’s and every shop had an apartment above it, usually lived in by the owner, but sometimes rented out.

The original residents had been mostly the Scots who’d built Olney Pres. Their children or grandchildren rode the wave of post war prosperity north to the more prosperous neighborhoods of far North Philadelphia or out to the suburbs, Cheltenham mostly. They spent a good deal of their time driving down to visit their parents and trying to pry them from the old neighborhood that was sliding toward collapse.

The young couples that filled up the neighborhood were also moving north, many came up from working class Kensington where their Scottish, Irish, or German immigrant parents or grandparents had settled. It wasn’t unusual for newcomers to meet their neighbors and discover the boy or girl that sat next to them in second grade. There were a few Poles, Ukrainians, and assorted other Eastern Europeans, even a small cluster of Armenians, but the tone of the neighborhood was now set by the large Irish families bursting at the seems with Baby Boomers. Where once Sunday morning found the sidewalks jammed with families walking toward the red doors of Olney Presbyterian, now most people flowed past on their way to the Church of the Incarnation (R. C.), eight blocks south. The old Scots fought upstream, against the flow, with a determination born from countless generations of opposition to the Papacy, England, and countless other troubles their stern Calvinist God threw at them. If you listened closely, the mumbled “Damned Papists” could often be heard followed by a soft, but insistent, “Hush, dear.”

Breathing heavily as he topped the hill, Peter turned onto 4th and set the box down for a minute to catch his breath. The street was quiet. There weren’t many kids on his end of the block. Peter was the only child in the apartments. The kids from up the block must have slept in on this first day summer vacation, although Peter couldn’t imagine how they could sleep on such a day.

He inhaled deeply and picked up the box. The sun had dried the sidewalks across the street, removing all signs of the strange shower. He walked the short way to his door and let himself in, bending at the waist and balancing the box on his thigh as wrestled with the doors. He carried the groceries straight up to Mrs. McGill’s apartment and found her drowsing in the kitchen, her head nodding and swaying a bit, her chin resting on her left palm, her elbow propped on the kitchen table where he had left her.

“Mrs. McGill, Mrs. McGill,” he said softly. “I’m back.”

She slowly opened her eyes and Peter noticed that she very pale.

“I think I’ll go lie down for a bit,” she mumbled indistinctly and Peter had a hard time understanding her. “I’m not feeling quite right.”

“Your medicine,” he said, as he fumbled for the bottle of pills and handed it to her.

“Would you bring a glass of water, dear.”

He went to the sink while she attempted to pry the lid off the brown bottle. He returned with the glass and she handed him the unopened bottle, her arthritic hands shaking slightly.

“Would you mind opening this? My hands don’t seem to be working too well today.”

Peter popped the lid off with his thumb and held the bottle out to her.

“Two, please,” she mumbled.

He handed her two pills and watched her with growing anxiety as the swallowed them and returned the empty glass to him.

“Would you help into the bedroom, please.”

Peter extended his arm to her and she pulled herself up from the table. He lead the way, taking small, slow steps, to the bedroom. She staggered once or twice and clung fiercely to his arm. He guided her to the bed where she laid down on top of the multicolored afghan and closed her eyes. She said something, but so quietly that Peter couldn’t make it out. He was scared and knew that he needed to get his mother right away. He went to the far side of the bed and carefully folded the afghan over her. Then he ran downstairs to get his mother, unconcerned about the din as his feet hammered on the stairs.