It is cold. On foot (slowly) he has less than a mile’s languid footsteps to go; he can see safety and warmth from here. He can walk there (slowly) and in only a fist-full of minutes. Clenched tightly, those minutes may elapse. Unwind. Fade. And he will be there in the time it takes them to die. Quickly enough. And he is thankful for that. For the sight of home—right there, over there nested in the concrete, metal and glass arcology that is The Riverview Complex. He is close. She will not follow him. He will not see her again; he cannot bear so heavy a prospect as that and for all of its chill, the thought is a comforting one. She will not follow him. She is gone. Or is it he who has left? No matter. Things have changed. Gallow Street is a cold, bastard-purgatory of commerce and industrial war. A crude-boned, hard-skinned monster of imported human life breathing its smogged, mongrel air, songs of tainted love, and thrusting lurid, unconscious rhythms (blood rhythms, dumb-animal-lust rhythms) into the heart of the world. But here, where Gallow Street crosses the river, something soft has grown in the name of a bridge. City wisdom names all bridges as places of surrender, places where you spit (for forgotten reasons) into the water currents below. He crosses the bridge, the only city bridge properly named. SURRENDER marks its name-plate, as does the date of its completion. And in crossing Surrender, with little under a mile remaining to his journey, he stops after spitting. His glob has struck water. Currents carry it away. Now, stopped, he thinks of her and all that she will claim to have done for him. He has stolen her gun, to protect against her use of it. And now, with heavy pockets, he stoops low, unlaces his winter shoes and pulls them off. He empties his pockets into the shoes: loose change, odd trinkets…and the gun. It is small enough to fit; it’s muzzle kisses the inside toe, where socks have rubbed the faux-leather smooth and in the shapes of his own toes. He does not feel the chill. His mind is elsewhere, and now his shoes are empty of feet but heavy nonetheless. A breeze tousles his hair, throwing a sand-colored fringe of it across the left periphery of his outward-facing gaze. He sniffs. He wipes his nose with the back of his hand and contemplates her gun in his shoe. He stoops again and removes his socks, stuffing them in the still-warm openings of both shoes. His toes clench raw metal-impregnated concrete, his nails (clipped) grate and threaten breakage. He ignores the discomfort and stands erect, one shoe in each hand. He tests their weight and judges them heavy enough for what must be done. Surrender Bridge is lucky in city lore, and so he wishes for luck (though not for himself) as he drops his laden shoes into the sluggish, lazy river. They strike water and shadow, splashing white and frothy for only an instant. They float, slowly taking on water. They do not sink immediately, and the river (yes, the shadowed and lazy river) takes his offering of gun, change, and shoes and carries it beneath the bridge. He does not see them sink, but he knows that they must. He does not hear the river’s gratitude for the offering, but in the distance, a gull shrieks. It is cold. He will not see her again; he cannot bear so heavy a prospect as that, and for all of its chill, the thought is a comforting one. She will not follow him. She is gone. Or is it he who has left? No matter. Things have changed. The bridge, aptly named, has accepted his earnest capitulation, and the river carries it away, while to the south and a little to the east, the promise of warmth stands on one bank, while an aged and indifferent factory stands opposite, its twin chimneys belching steam. *** This is actually the Harrsion Street Bridge in Chicago, tweaked in the Gimp. And as always, thank you for viewing, reading, and commenting.