Twelve hundred for the apartment.

Two hundred and eleven for the electric bill.

Forty-five dollars still owed to the shoe repair shop that had fixed the clasp.

Nine whole days, and nothing to print my exhibits with.

At one o’clock the smell of burnt sugar rose up through the floorboards, and then came a man’s voice in the alley that wasn’t Enzo’s.

I went down the back stairs, my briefcase still in my hand.

A city code inspector in a windbreaker stood beside the kitchen door with a clipboard, and Enzo stood in the doorway with his apron wrung up in both fists.