Death Sentence

20

The housing on Cottage Grove Avenue was urban redevelopment, squat three-story boxes, shabby and hideous. He walked slowly, crunching snow — a lone white man in a good middle-class overcoat: an invitation to thievery. He kept looking up at house numbers — a bill collector looking for an address?

In his hand the pocketed revolver sweated cold against his skin.

Kids were building a snowman. They watched him walk by.

A snowball hurtled from behind, went over his shoulder and crashed beyond. He wheeled. His fist tensed on the gun.

He said aloud, “For Christ’s sake.” He got down on one knee and scraped a snowball together and threw it at the kids, not hard. It fell short and the kids laughed. He managed a smile, turned away and walked on. For Christ’s sake take it easy. But it was an unnerving place. The cheap modern boxes were so inhuman: there was less dignity in them than in any tenement; no possibility of any sense of belonging, community, home. An awesome architectural confirmation of human rootlessness. No one could have identity in a place like this.

He left the area, hurrying.