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them. He was under no illusions that they could very well have just been carjacked. Maybe they would have, if the retired moving truck had been something the thugs would be caught dead in.
    His heart was still hammering as he turned left, turned again, and approached his building. The dingy parking lot with weeds sprouting up between the cracks where he paid three hundred a month to park was open, too. He’d been expecting it to be full of strangers’ cars, tourists’ cars, given the rioting. But somehow the battered Private Parking sign had managed to do its job.
    Even though the rest of the neighborhood had apparently gone straight to hell.
    The block Tim lived on was mainly residential, with Mom-and-Pop businesses on the first floors of the old brick four- or five-story buildings, and apartments or condos above. His apartment was two floors above a Clip House franchise that gave twelve-dollar haircuts, no appointment necessary. He’d never had the same stylist more than three or four times, but at least it was convenient to keep his hair from getting to that annoying stage where it hung in his eyes. It was a good neighborhood. Not pretentious, but not too shabby.
    But now Clip House was dark, and the Closed sign on the door was turned over. Closed. In the middle of a weekday afternoon. Other stores were closed, too. The coffee shop. The music store. The little boutique that sold “natural” cosmetics in flecky brown packaging that were made with the same ingredients as any other soaps, shampoos and perfumes, though they had much “greener” names.
    More people were loitering around on the sidewalk than was usual for a weekday afternoon, too. Not walking somewhere, like people usually did. Just…standing. People he didn’t recognize—all of them male. They lurked in entryways and beneath awnings, smoking, or listening to headphones, or scowling at the sleet. Waiting. For what, Tim didn’t know. But he dreaded it.
    “Go to the entryway to the right of the Clip House,” he told his passengers as he pulled into his spot. “Don’t stop. Don’t talk to anyone.” It might have been overkill, but Tim didn’t care. He’d seen enough at the protest to err on the side of caution. Nelson Oliver was the last out of the truck. He stumbled, and Javier caught him on one side, Marianne the other. “What’s wrong with him?” Tim asked.
    “He’s out of it,” Marianne said. “He took some meds.”
    Meds? He was staggering like a drunk.
    “It’s fine,” Javier said. “We’ve got him. Let’s go.”
    While it might have been overwhelming to think of fitting four other people in his small efficiency, Tim had to admit he was glad to be part of a group while he made his way from the truck to the entryway—even if one member of that group was a petite young woman, and another needed to be dragged—since his Mom-and-Pop neighborhood suddenly didn’t feel much like its usual self.
    Their five pairs of feet sounded loud on the stairwell, but even the steady tramp of stairs being climbed didn’t drown out the distant sound of sirens. Tim unlocked his door and sized up his apartment. He had, at least, straightened up; he’d been expecting Javier. The trash had been disposed of, the clutter stashed away, the sheets changed.
    “Get in. Come on. Hurry.” He hustled everyone into the room that was his living room, office, kitchen—the room, in all its ten-by-twelve glory, where he kept everything he owned but his bed.
    Javier leaned Nelson against the wall so Marianne could strip his coat off. “He needs to lie down somewhere dark,” she said. Nelson didn’t seem to notice all the commotion. He was busy staring up at the light fixture. Tim followed his gaze. He saw the globe held at least a dozen long-dead flies, their wings and spindly legs clearly visible through the milky glass.
    So much for his housecleaning skills.  
    “There’s a bedroom, through that door.” Tim wasn’t about to let the opportunity to