KITCHEN

STREET

BUILDING

"Greg sat in the small, pale green kitchen listening,

knowing the lecture would end with his father saying

he couldn’t play ball with the Scorpions."

"Down the block there was an old tenement that had

been abandoned for some months. Some of the guys

had held an impromptu checker tournament there the

week before, and Greg had noticed that the door, once

boarded over, had been slightly ajar."

"It was a large room that might have been someone’s parlor at one time. Squinting, Greg could see an old table on its side against one wall, what looked like a pile of rags or a torn mattress in the corner, and a couch, with one side broken, in front of the window."