Page 83 of Antihero

Without breaking stride, Evan dipped his shoulder and liberated a cheap umbrella from the bouquet blooming from a wooden merch bucket. Telescoping, it foomped open, shielding his face as Anca emerged from her building.

Sliding along the opposite sidewalk, he tracked her, one bobbing umbrella among many.

She walked briskly, body language tight and scared, a hand fisting the throat of her jacket shut, the other shoved in a pocket. Shoulders elevated, head ducked submissively, eyes low to the ground. She gave passersby a wide berth, moving skittishly.

She looked terrified.

He eased past a streetlight, across an alley, through a cluster of men smoking sickly sweet cigarillos. When Anca entered a bodega, he loitered at the crosswalk. Taking a twenty-dollar bill from his pocket, he folded it into a stiff rectangle and tucked it into the top of his pocket for easy reach. Then he pretended to study his phone.

Big glass windows protected with accordion security shutters provided a diamond-split vantage into the bodega.

He watched Anca shop.

Hesitating in the first aisle, she plucked a blocky green package from the shelf.

Adult diapers.

To manage the damage to her.

Something sharp-edged turned in his chest. Even beneath the umbrella, flecks of rain pelted his cheeks. He had forgotten to breathe.

As Anca moved to the counter to pay, she held her shoulders back and her posture upright, a bulwark against shame. The clerk started to bag her purchase in a translucent plastic bag and she pointed behind the counter, had him switch to discreet paper.

Curling the top against the rain, she stepped back outside and started back, package tucked beneath her arm.

Across the street, Evan stalked her.

She looked jittery, eyes darting up alleys. Someone behind her popped an umbrella open and she started, her expression wild. She moved faster, feet blurring in a trot.

Halfway up the next block, a clamor erupted before her—bus hissing to a stop, two homeless men squabbling schizophrenically at the bench. Just beyond, a grizzled beggar lay propped like a pile of rags against the side of a stoop, cardboard sign tilted against her hip, dirt-blackened hand loose around a Big Gulp cup that had spilled a slick of pennies onto the sidewalk. She was passed out, head tilted severely back against the rugged stone, face glazed from one substance or another, mouth stretched open, a drugged retreat. Her daughter, no older than five, lingered at her side in a daze, mouth moving silently. Grime formed crescents beneath her nails, her cheeks marred with Dickensian smudges. She’d plucked a dandelion from a weed that had sprouted in a sidewalk crack and spun it between thumb and forefinger, marveling down at the yellow bloom as if it were a kaleidoscope.

Jerking away from the bus stop racket, Anca curled into herself, ducking her head, shoulders hunched protectively. The little girl locked on her.

Over the rain and traffic and the bus-stop quarrel, Evan couldn’t make out the girl’s words, but he could read lips.

For you, she said, raising the dandelion as Anca passed. Lookit my flower for you.

Anca kept her gaze lowered, shuttered up within herself. At her back, the deranged argument at the bus stop continued.

For you, the girl said again, twisting the yellow bud.

Anca stepped around her and the beggar’s outstretched legs, her nose wrinkling at the odor.

A few steps past, Anca halted. Splotches turned the bag under her arm a darker brown. Rain peppered her cheeks, pasted her hair along her forehead and cheeks. She was breathing hard; even from across the street, Evan could see the rise and fall of her chest.

She gathered herself up. And then turned to crouch by the girl, grimacing through pain.

Taking the proffered flower, Anca looked into the girl’s eyes. Thank you, her mouth said.

The girl’s smile was delirious and yet genuine joy shined through. Mouth ajar in a childlike grin, peg teeth showing. She held Anca’s gaze as Anca rose, tucking the flower behind her ear.

Anca continued on.

Evan shadowed her. Passing the newsstand from which he’d appropriated the umbrella, he bumped into the vendor, sliding the twenty-dollar bill into his back pocket. “’Scuse me.”

Anca entered her building.

She stood a moment in the lobby, facing away, rainwater dripping off her, shuddering. Her shoulders canted. One arm dipped low. Her head sagged. The package dropped.