There are things lying on the crosswalk that shouldn't have been left there. A plastic comb with three broken teeth, a crumpled receipt whose ink has faded into a ghost of numbers, a glove without a partner, a key without a lock. They're not there by chance—nor by design. They're the remnants of actions that once had meaning, now stuck between two sidewalks. Things that no longer know where they came from, let alone where they're supposed to go. The wind sometimes shifts them a few inches, as if trying to give them a direction, but even the wind has no plan. The comb scrapes briefly against the asphalt, the receipt flutters like a nervous butterfly, and then comes a moment of complete stillness. The sun burns a white line down the middle of the road. No one crosses. The world holds its breath for a moment for this mess that no longer forms a story.
