After the child leaves I am alone, feeling like a child myself. A child deserted in the middle of town on a snowy day. That’s me. If only she would come and take me by the hand. “Let’s go shopping,” she might say, or “Let’s go home and have dinner.” If only I had these repetitions to protect me. Then two hands reached out, looking for protection from a strong woman—the hands of a ghost-child wandering the streets. She doesn’t need me. And I’m fed up with being a child. I want to be someone people can depend on. I had been hunched over like a coward, but now I straighten up, throw out my chest, and stick my elbows out. That very moment my body changes into an Indian teepee, large enough to hold three children. There’s no telling when another attack might come. Two of the children huddle together, peering fearfully outside. The third, too young to sense the danger, looks happy, as if this were a game of hide-and-seek. This scene is a sketch by Kathe Kollwitz. The arms of the mother protecting her children look as thick and strong as logs. Like this mother, she would probably spread her arms over her daughter and grandchildren if war came, not flinching even if a bomb fell on her shoulders. Stretching a thin vinyl sheet to protect them from sparks would be all I could manage. Or would I be in prison by the time the bombing started, arrested for handing out antiwar pamphlets?

In front of a health food store a man was squatting down to unlock his bicycle when our eyes met. I was sure I’d seen him before. A child about the height of the saddle stood in front of the bike, off to one side. The streetlamp lit up his tearstained face in an odd way, making it look round and bright as the full moon. A child seat was attached to the back of the bike. Actually it was more like a two-wheeled trailer with a green tent on top, big enough for a smallish child of seven. When the snow’s piled up, you don’t see many bikes with trailers like this. Probably because the mounds of snow on both sides of the road narrowed the bike paths, making navigation more difficult. The man—probably the child’s father—was still young and not at all fat; nevertheless, he had a reassuring sort of fatherly fleshi­ness. I couldn’t remember where I had seen him.

“Come on, it’s time to go home.” The voice sounded strangely sad in the cold air. The child stood there, pouting, refusing to move. “Are you still mad?” the father asked. “I’ll buy it for you next time.” He reached out for his son’s arm, but the boy darted back and hid behind the bike. When the father moved sideways, the boy moved, too. With the bicycle between them, the father couldn’t catch his son. “We’ve got to go home now.” This time he tried to trick the boy, taking one step to the right and then swinging back to the left, but the boy, imitating his father’s movements perfectly, got away again. “It’s getting late.” The boy’s expression didn’t change. “Mama’s waiting for us at home.” Hearing this, the boy’s resistance disappeared like air seeping out of a balloon, and he obediently sat down in his trailer. His blond hair then turned into a prince’s crown, his red jacket into a velvet robe, and horses neighed as they pulled the royal carriage through the snow, heading for the palace. I suddenly remembered who the father was. The left-handed man who worked at the post office, the one who always took my envelopes in his left hand.