Most people have patterns, many by conscious design, but most by some unconscious clock that drives them into habits they would swear they don’t have. My man was inconsistent in the morning, but constant in the afternoon and evening. He probably told people he worked out every morning, and maybe he thought so himself, or maybe he did something inside the house I wasn’t aware of, but some mornings (and never at the same time) he went by himself to an outdoor basketball court and shot baskets. There were two courts and four baskets, and he would move from one basket to another, shooting until he made ten baskets at each net. It took him forever. Each shot was a line drive, no arc, no touch, just a straight heave at the rim. He started running after each ricocheting ball, but soon gave that up and walked. Sometimes he took breaks to look at his phone, which he’d placed on a towel at the far end of the court.

None of it looked like much fun, and barely like physical activity, but it was more than I was doing. I spent the majority of my life sitting, and it was beginning to show. I was starting to sag into the shape of a man hunched over a wheel. I was too fucking young for that. After another twenty minutes of me telling myself I’d start doing something, running, swimming, yoga, anything to exercise, as soon as this was over, as soon as I stopped working at the energy-draining, soul-crushing warehouse and more time to get my shit together, after telling myself all that, he got in his car and drove. Around noon he parked at the assisted living complex and was there for about two hours, then home and around dinnertime he was back at the complex.

I let this play out another day. I sawed the broom handle into two pieces about a foot long each and attached about the same length of wire to connect the handles. That went back into the bag in the trunk.

I played it out in my mind at work, and tried not to think about it too much, just figure out the how and when, concentrate on the wire and how securely it was attached to the broom, think of the saw that cut them and the sawdust, think of the warehouse and the door somewhere in the distance that opened outside for the last time.