Part 1

A cigarette rolled between Emile’s lips. He walked up the worn stairs, and his heels landed lower than toes, stretching his tendons. Freezing wind streamed down the stairs from the pale streets and spread into the subway tunnels. On the last step, he pulled out a lighter and lit the cigarette. Wind blew the smoke deep into his lungs.

He looked around.

Hellen, hunched from the cold, stood under the grey building in a grey parka. They’d bought the jacket when guilt about her relentless tears gripped him. Tears poured out of her after he stopped coming home from work on time. Shopping for things they could not afford improved the situation. For a while, anyway. He didn’t live with Hellen anymore.

“Hello, Emile.” Hellen’s eyes sparked with excitement. His eyes tried to roll, but he prevented the rotation. He smiled with yellow teeth.

“How are you?” he asked and watched how her head descended between her shoulders with a quiver. “Let’s walk.”

They walked eastward, and the forest of grey buildings enveloped them. Above them, their peaks blazed in the red sunshine, crushing the two small flesh drops of them in shadows beneath. They strode through the turmoil of the afternoon traffic. Wind cut through caverns of the streets. Ice dust scratched their faces. The wind choked Emile’s cigarette. He inhaled, and the cold wind blew the smoke deep into his lungs, choking him, again, and again. He walked a step behind her, holding his distance, and observing her in silence.

The grey jacket concealed Hellen. Cords wrapped the strings that were her legs. The legs touching the sore, grey pavement covered in salt. Salt crunched under the frozen soles. He couldn’t look any longer. He hastened and turned toward the shop windows carved deep into the concrete walls. Fine leather bags, fur coats, and diamonds laughed at him. Why were they walking in this upper-class, Bloor Street ghetto and its godless success? Isolated and isolating. How did their tired bodies find their way here? Emile looked up. The rays of the sun leaned further against the peaks of the buildings. The rays warped the harsh, straight lines of the glass citadels. Red reflections landed in his eyes. Vertigo launched an image in his mind: citadels descending, grey concrete mulch and iron rods crushed the two flesh drops of Emile and Hellen, burying the whole world under the smouldering heaps. Emile stood, a captive and a witness to the collapse.

He halted by the window filled with shimmering watches. The watches in refined forms twinkled under the lights. One clean form struck Emile: the thin, polished silver case, creamy dial under silver numbers, the green leather strap. The watch stopped a long time ago, time, dates, and days not reflecting reality. Emile’s head slanted, and he looked under the strap of the watch. The little white sticker stuck out from the plastic stand, red ink, neat handwriting, affirming $2,549. A sheet of a man in a suit leaned against the glass behind the display and gave him a judgmental look.

“I would have bought it for you, if you’d just waited with me,” Hellen said.

Anger nudged Emile’s stomach. His arms tightened. Deep in his pockets, his hands constricted into fists, nails slicing into his palms.

“I don’t need a snobby watch. Do you really think that’s why I left?”

“Why did you, then?”