*Knock knock knock*

Repeated on James’ door for several minutes until he finally pushed himself up off his old, far past its prime couch - vibrant red many moons ago, it was almost grey from decades of cigarette smoke and wear. He grunted heavily as his body found and upright position and his feet found a rickety path to the front door of his apartment.

He peeked out the peephole. It was dirty, but he could just make out the face of his usual Instacart delivery person, and their unmistakeable scruffy teal hair. He opened the door slowly - hell, at his age he did everything slowly.

“Hiya Mr. H!” Trinitee’s shrill voice rang out, so loud it nearly echoed thru the empty hallway. James winced.

“Thank you.” He said quickly, scrambling for his grocery bags.

Before he could grab his final bag, two uniformed police officers came storming around the corner and down the hall towards them. “We need everybody to evacuate the building immediately!” They called.

James stood in his doorway, still holding a grocery bag, seemingly dazed as his neighbours left their apartments and filed out towards the stairwell.

“Mr. H, do you need help down the stairs?” Trinitee asked, extending their hand.

“Down. The. Stairs.” James repeated, half questioning half repeating.

“Yeah, so we can get outside.” They said, pulling back and reextending their hand out to him. James came back to reality as he heard the word “outside”. He looked down at Trinitee’s hand and slapped it away.

Trinitee glared up at him, tears welling in their eyes. James clocked this and his gaze softened.

“I’m sorry.” He said. “I’ve barely left this apartment, let alone this building, in over ten years. But that’s no excuse. I should never strike a woman.”

Trinitee grimaced and rolled her eyes at the word ‘woman’ but replied “So, you gonna stay and tell the pigs to suck it? I’m sure they’re just looking to clear out witnesses for whatever they’ve got going on.”

James scoffed. “They are not ‘pigs’” he said, holding up air quotes “They are law enforcement. And I’m sure there’s a reason they’re clearing everyone out of the building, much as I might detest it.”

Trinitee stared at him a moment, unimpressed. “So, you going then?” They asked, gesturing towards the stairwell.

James huffed and pushed past them towards the glowing exit sign at the top of the stairs. Trinitee trotted behind him.

——

James took the final step down to the main floor, huffing and puffing as he tried to catch his breathe, Trinitee following right behind him. As he made his way to the double doors in front of the building he stopped.

“You good, Mr. H?” Trinitee chirruped. They scooted around him and held the door open for him. As sunlight came pouring into the lobby, James shielded his eyes with his hand.

“Say kid, could I borrow those sunglasses?” He asked, pointing to the blueish aviator sunglasses hanging off Trinitee’s instacart shirt collar.

They looked confused for a moment, but obliged, still holding the door open with one hand.

Once he had the sunglasses situated on his face, James slowly sauntered outside, into the world he had - up until now - been able to avoid thanks to modern miracles like delivery services and Telehealth.

The summer sun beat down on his face, the tops of his feet his slippers didn’t cover, and his exposed arms, unprotected by his typical tattered T-shirt.

The sunglasses did little to keep his eyes from feeling like they were on fire, the sunglasses seeming to be more fashionable than useful.

The sounds of the city were no better, assaulting his ears with cars, busses, police sirens, and endless chatter from the crowd across the street that Trinitee was making their way to just a few steps ahead of him, while still turning to look back at him. James met their gaze and pressed on slowly until he got to the edge of the crowd.

He lamented in his misery being outside in the city, trying but failing to focus on the nap he’d most likely have when he got back to his apartment. He only refocused on the outside world when Trinitee came back up to him, giving him quite a start as she began rambling.

“Sooooo, I heard from my friend Shawna, who actually only lives 3 floors above you, well, she heard there was a bomb threat called into the front desk and that’s why the police cleared everyone out of the building. Gods, this city man, it’s something else.”

Without missing a beat James replied “Only 7.5 percent of bomb threats are legitimate. Someone just wanted attention and-“

He was stopped mid sentence by a loud noise, and then a rumbling. The rest of the crowd noticed too, and began to scatter, screaming. Trinitee grabbed James wrinkled hand, pulling him as fast as they felt comfortable pulling an elderly man down the street.

The 30 story apartment building went down, imploding into itself into rubble. James felt as though his vision and hearing were blurring, he had glimpses of search and rescue dogs, civilians crying as they had just lost their homes. *He* had just lost his home. His solitude. He felt queasy. He hardly noticed that Trinitee was still hanging around right beside him, offering their multicolour handkerchief to him.

He hadn’t even noticed the few stray tears rolling down his own face. Wordlessly he accepted it, roughly blotting his tears and shoving it back towards them.

Trinitee accepted it and tucked it into their pants pocket. They thought for a minute.

“Would you like to come stay with me?” They asked.