and leaves for work. My mother says “Happy birthday, sweetheart, you’re three.” She says “From your father and me.” She gives me a wrapped present. I can’t get the ribbon off. She opens it. It’s a dog doll. She kisses my ear and goes to work in her office at the front of the house. I play with the ribbon and wrapping in the room Anna’s ironing in. The dream ends. I wake up. Grace calls. Grace called. I go to the bathroom. I read. I shave. I clean the toilet bowl and tub. I look in the mirror. I tweeze the hair out of my nose. I part my hair in the middle and pretend I’m someone else. I brush my hair back the way I always wear it. I work on the crossword puzzle. I check the movie listings. I put water on for coffee. I stand at the stove till the water boils. I make lunch. I eat. I drink coffee. I make a snack. I eat. I peel a carrot. I eat. I look through the cookbook. Grace calls. I don’t answer. Grace calls. Grace called. I look out the window. Across the street a woman in the second-story apartment directly opposite mine is looking at an oil truck delivering oil to her building. The oilman reels in the hose and the truck leaves. I stare at the woman. She looks at me. I smile and wave. She leaves her window seat. I look up and down the street. I can’t see a person, animal or vehicle moving on the block. Curtains move in one of the buildings across the street and now a sheet of newspaper moves in the street but nothing else. The leaves on the block’s tree move. A sparrow flies out of the tree and disappears over the row of buildings on my side of the block. A man comes out of a building reading a magazine. He pats his pockets. “Dam,” he seems to say. He goes back into his building. Several children on rollerskates and with hockey sticks pass. A car passes. A bus. I’ve never seen a bus come down this sidestreet. Maybe the street the bus usually goes down is blocked up. The man leaves the building again carrying a briefcase and with the magazine under his arm. The bus stops a few doors down from my building. The car in front of it is double-parked too far from the car parked adjacent to the curb and the bus can’t get past. The bus driver honks. His passengers read, talk, look outside, one’s asleep. The bus driver and the drivers of the two cars and a truck behind the cars honk. A woman comes out of a building. She jiggles her keys to the bus driver. He honks. She points to her watch and raises her shoulders and hands. The bus driver and the drivers of the cars and the truck behind the cars honk. She gets in the double-parked car and drives off. The bus starts for the comer right after her but has to stop for the light. The woman just made it through the light. The bus and car and truck drivers honk and honk. Grace calls. Grace called. I drink a glass of water. I go to the door. The afternoon paper’s on the mat. I throw the paper away. I reheat the coffee. I do exercises and run in place. I wash my hands and face. The pot’s burning. I put out the fire. I throw the pot through the window. The police come. One policeman says “Your landlord called to complain. First fires, he says. Now deliberately destroying his property.” I hear honking from the street. I go to the window. The policeman says “When I’m talking to you you don’t move.” The driver of another bus is honking the double-parked police car in front of my building. I point to the street. The policeman says “What now, for god-sakes?” He looks outside. He says “I’ll take care of our car, you take care of him.” He leaves. The second policeman says “Why you do these things we don’t know. You’ve a nice place. Nice and neat. Plenty of room. It’s a good building. Your landlord seems like a nice enough guy. It’s a nice street and good neighborhood. You’re lucky to live here, believe me, and from what I hear, you’re getting it cheap. So no more fuss now, please.” He leaves. I go to the window. The bus is gone. The police car’s backing into a parking spot. The policeman who just left my place taps the police car’s roof. The car stops. He gets inside. The car drives out of the spot and goes through the red light. Several people across the street have come to their windows. Some are looking at me. I smile at the woman sitting on the window seat. She lets down her Venetian blinds and flicks them shut. I drink water from the kitchen tap. I let the water run to get cold. Grace calls. Grace called. I see water trickling out of the kitchen. In the kitchen I see I’ve caused a small flood. I shut the water off. The fire department comes. They drag a hose through my place. The fire chief says to these men “No need.” He says to me “For the safety of all your neighbors, you ought to be locked up.” They leave. I get the mop from outside the window. Someone knocks. I mop. The landlord says “This is your landlord, Mr. Lingley, open up.” I mop. He says “I said open up.” I open the door. He says “I’ve called the police and department of buildings and mayor’s office. If you aren’t out by tomorrow morning I’ll be very much surprised.” He leaves. I lock the door. He says from the stairway “Remember what I said last time about your paying next month’s rent? Don’t.” Grace calls. I drink a glass of beer. I hang the mop over the bathtub. I cut my hair. Grace calls. I run in place. I eat a celery stick. I hear music. I go to the window. A street band’s passing. I haven’t seen one in years. I throw a ball of aluminum foil at it. The flutist salutes me. He opens the foil and shakes his flute at me. I forgot to put money in the foil. I throw two quarters at him. Both coins roll under a parked car. The banjoist says “Thank you, thanks a lot.” The violinist hands his violin to the base player and gets down on his knees to retrieve the coins. A car drives by and nearly sideswipes him. The trumpeter blasts his horn at the car. The car honks back repeatedly and makes a turn at the corner. The band resumes playing and walks to the end of the block. I’m leaning out the window to watch them and nearly fall off the ledge. The landlord says from the sidewalk “Don’t tell me. You’re going to jump. That’ll save you the trouble of appearing in court. But jump from someone else’s building, as what I don’t need now is my insurance rates going up.” I climb back inside and slam the window down. It’s the window I threw the pot through and it completely shatters from the impact and the glass crashes below. The landlord says “That’s it. Out you go today.” He runs into the building. I make supper. Police come. I go into the bedroom and eat and drink. Police knock. I lock the bedroom door and try to nap. A policeman yells “Come on now, sir, you’ve got to unlock.” I throw my hairbrush and shoes through the bedroom windows. The landlord yells “Break down the door before he destroys my house.” I set fire to my bed and toss the chair and lamps into the flames. Grace calls. The police are banging on the bedroom door. Grace calls. The fire department comes. They enter through the bedroom window this time. They put out the fire on my clothes. They put out the fire in the room. I’m put on a stretcher. Grace calls. I’m carried downstairs. In the street I look up at the window where that woman usually sits and see her leaning outside at me and shaking her head. I’m driven down the block. I see that black man or black woman made up to look like a white woman peering into the ambulance as we go through the red light. I hear the street band play. I pass out. I wake up. I’m in a hospital. I’m in a hospital bed. A tube’s in my arm. Another tube takes my pee. Several machines and monitors are at the foot of my bed. One doctor says to another that I’ve third degree burns over fifty percent of my body and I’m not expected to live. A hospital aide says “Someone by the name of Grace called.” A nurse says “You really in great pain?” She gives me something to sleep. I fall asleep. I dream of my parents and my dog Red. My mother says “Red’s been taken away.” I say “Where away?” My father says “No use lying to you. Big Red’s been run over.” I say “Where over?” My mother says “She was run over by a steamroller and won’t be coming back.” I cry. The dream ends. I wake up. That incident never happened in real life. I once did have a dog named Red. She got old and bit me in the face. They had to kill her. I remember when they took her away. They came to our house and put her in a cage. I remember hoping Red would bite them. There was something about her viciousness so late in life that I really liked. But Red was put away. “Where away?” I said. “You still don’t know what we mean when we say she’s been put away?” my mother said. “No,” I said. “Not in a trunk or chest of drawers,” my father said. I cried then. I’m lying on my back now in the hospital bed. The food and antibiotic tube’s been taken out of my left arm and put in my right. The catheter’s still taking my pee. With all the painkillers the nurse says they’re giving me, I’m still in great pain. The doctor says “You’re improving.” The aide says “That person named Grace called just before. What message you want me to give should she call again?” But I can see by their faces that it’s hopeless and I fall asleep.