“You lookin’ for that little boy?” I asked her, but again she just stared at me quiet. Guess the cold had frozen her mouth shut. She probably was just one of those old people who needed to get out of the house every day just to feel alive, so she came here even when she didn’t feel like heckling. She was obviously nuts, standing out in this cold for nothing. If she was going to be out here, she may as well bother folks like we expected her to.

Just as I let her shoulder go and was about to go about my business, I saw a mangy white mutt wavering at the curb. Among the empty cigarette packs and pop cans, it looked ready to run. But right after school and work Seventy-first was busy as ever, and there would be no breaks in traffic before the nearest streetlight turned red. The mutt darted anyway, and because cars had backed up it almost made it—until a bright green Chevy rolled over its hindquarters. The mutt’s howls echoed for blocks and pierced my ears—quick, short screams that sounded like a whooping cough. A sloppy fat guy with a curl cap on his head put the car in park and leaned over the driver’s door to view his victim. The stopped vehicle prevented another car from running over the dog again and ending its life for good, though from its screams death might have been the best thing for it. Everybody on the street had stopped walking to find out where the screams were coming from, but not one man, woman, or child made a move to do anything. I wanted to move forward and at least nudge it to the curb, but I was afraid it could be in shock and try to bite my leg off.

“Somebody need to at least get ’em out the street,” one of the fur-covered hoes yelled from across the street. The men outside the store on the corner shuffled and ignored her, then when she wouldn’t shut up they started cursing her out and telling her she should do it herself. The driver of the car made no move to do anything, and Big Mama just stared at him and shook her head. The kids walking home from school were now chuckling at the sight, moving on to the excitement of waiting in empty apartments before their parents got home. I wanted to make a move, but I had never seen anything close to dead before. Right before I turned away from the scene, a bony dark man in a plaid parka walked toward the mutt with a paper bag and outstretched arms.