Not angry, mind you.

Just disappointed.”

I searched the street through the window.

There was no sign of the dark wool coat or silver hair.

For several months, I wondered whether he had found somewhere safe to sleep that night, whether he had a family, and whether the soup had warmed him at all.

Then a growing child needed shoes, another needed antibiotics, and rent increased by thirty dollars.

Walter became a memory I carried rather than a mystery I could afford to solve.