Free United We Stand by Eric Walters

wasn’t unusual for my neighborhood. It seemed like sometimes the only people I saw out on the street were the ones who worked for the lawn-care companies. Everybody else was in houses or in their cars.
    With school being canceled there probably should have been some kids around, but there weren’t that many kids in my neighborhood to begin with. My mother called our area a more “mature” community. That just meant that the houses were so big and expensive that most of the owners had kids who were already grown up. There were a couple of kids that were my age or a little older, but hardly anybody younger.
    James’s neighborhood was only a dozen streets over, but it was completely different. The houses were smaller and there were always lots of kids. Funny how that worked: smaller houses equaled more kids; bigger houses equaled fewer kids. Not that we were going there. I didn’t know where James was leadingus, but it was pretty much in the opposite direction from his house.
    “Cross over,” James said suddenly.
    “What?”
    He bumped into me, and we abruptly crossed the street.
    At first I wasn’t sure why he’d done that, and then I saw the reason. There were some people coming down the street, and I figured he wanted to avoid them. That was probably the whole logic of going away from his house. The farther away we got, the less chance he’d run into somebody he knew.
    “You hungry?” I asked.
    “Nope.”
    “Thirsty?”
    “No … well, maybe a little.”
    “How about a coffee?”
    “I don’t have any money.”
    “My treat. You can get the next one.”
    I wanted a coffee, and we both knew the best place to get one. But more important, I liked the idea of actually heading to a specific destination. I didn’t like just wandering.
    We cut through the park and headed down the main street. I was shocked by how quiet it was. There was barely any traffic, and a lot of the stores were closed. I knew that businesses in the city had shut down, but I hadn’t really thought about the stores on our little main street not being open. I just hoped that didn’t apply to the coffee shop … No, therewere people at the tables and at the counter, waiting to be served. It was actually quite crowded. I guessed that even disaster didn’t stop people from wanting caffeine.
    James abruptly stopped in his tracks. “I don’t want to go in.”
    “You can wait here and I’ll bring it out.”
    He sat down on a bench.
    As soon as I opened the door I knew he’d made the right decision. There was a TV on, tuned to coverage of what people were now calling “9/11.” Since when had there been a television in here?
    I joined the back of the line. Everybody in the whole coffee shop had their eyes on the screen. I didn’t look. I just wished I couldn’t hear, either.
    The commentators were talking about the digging that was going on, looking for survivors … looking for people like James’s father. I couldn’t help glancing up at the T V. It was a live picture—that’s what it said in a little box in the corner of the screen. It was beginning to look like a familiar scene. Smoke or steam was rising up from the twisted girders. Firefighters and men with yellow or white hard hats were moving through the debris, removing it, little by little. Flashing lights pulsed.
    “And the search continues,” the unseen announcer said. “The workers are now being aided by sonar devices, and rescue dogs, specially trained to smell people beneath avalanches, have been brought into service.”
    The scene changed to show one of those dogs. It was a Golden Retriever wearing a bright- yellow harness with a long leash attached … and what was on its feet?
    “The dogs have been equipped with shoes so their paws are not burned,” the announcer said, answering my question. “The metal remains hot as there are fires still burning below the surface.”
    “What can I get for you, son?” the man behind the counter asked.
    I started back to the