Buildings here, buildings there, making buildings everywhere. It used to be that patches of red brick stuck out in green furry lawns.

Taking the trees, adding cement, stacking up homes like boxes. What happened to my view? What happened to all of the pretty colors? How far must I scoot my chair onto the sidewalk to feel the sunshine?

Thirty-nine years we've been here, I say. Thirty-nine years! We raised two boys in our store, and probably some others. Back then knew each other. Faces today are ones I never see again. They glide around like kites looking for strong winds. My sons joke with me. They say, "Ma, nothing used to escape your eye, not even an untied shoe." They buy me eyeglasses on a beaded string. I let them hang around my neck.

Our family store, it has enough memories to fill an ocean. But the store is like a tossed book now. No room for it on a crowded shelf. What is the use to sit out here and guard the door? There is nothing inside to take. Go ahead, I say, steal my cans of peas and corn. I pick up my chair and set myself into the street where sunshine flows.

II.

Lilly turns down East John. She loves this street, like some men love her name. It stretches; it hangs, then it wraps itself back around. She hasn't lived here in years. In fact, she never actually lived on East John. For six years she lived one block over. A handful of years before, she visited her lane several times a week. All in all, ten years of her life weave in and out of this street.

Her little yellow car pauses as she tries to round the first curve. Mrs. Shu, the owner of the corner store, is perched in the middle of the road. She sits in a metal fold-up chair with plaid striping. It's the kind Lilly's mom set up at picnics when she was young -- young and weightless. A gust of wind then, could blow her backwards and backwards tumbling along.

She unrolls the window and learns that Mrs. Shu is closing her store. Nearly all of the goods are gone. She's saving the last items for a local charity that was supposed to pick them up an hour ago. She hears that the other shops on the curve are closing as well. Rent price has gone to the moon, according to Mrs. Shu.

The open window blows Lilly's hair around, into her mouth and onto Mrs. Shu. Strands flutter everywhere, like paper ribbons on a float.

"I am sorry," Lilly says. "The whole neighborhood will miss you. You and your family were always so kind."

She slowly drives away. In the side mirror she sees Mrs. Shu seated in her chair waving a pink palm. Blades of grass sprout up around her. Petals slide from her shoulders into her lap. Lilly shifts her eyes forward. The road straightens and reveals large square holes, where small houses used to stand. A giant spinning cement truck is rambling toward her. It pumps dark clouds into the sky. She hopes it will stop before reaching Mrs. Shu.

She pulls up to the building with wooden panes and long-winded sighs. Hungry ivy stretches to the roof; the first two stories have already been devoured. She remembers the night she buried the locket in the courtyard. If she still had keys to the gate, she would dig it up. She'd do anything to hold the pain in one hand.

III.

You've kept the same set of bells tied to the door. When I push it open, it jingles as it always has. The worn wood flooring could use a polish. In all of these years, I think it's only seen a broom. But this is why I like you. You and your unnamed store remain the same, hobbled against the ivy building where it started and unwound.

I peer through the postcards to find your eye. I do this for your sake not mine. You like to know right away if a person is safe or risky. There you are, huddled on a stool reading a comic book. You raise your eyebrows, which is a sign that I am free to roam.

I walk down the single aisle and grab my favorite crackers. My pantry is full of these boxes still unopened. You don't know this. You don't know that I moved away from this street either. If you ever found out, you might wonder why I keep coming back.

Turns out, I married that man who lived next door. It took six years of biting before we burst apart. After we lost each other, I lost myself. This is about when Mita died. Do you remember my black dog? You never asked why I stopped bringing her in. You've never asked me anything. This is another reason why I like you. You don't speak. There was just that one night that you spoke and that was years ago. I had come in just after a robbery.

"The police do nothing!" you scream. "They do nothing!" You slam the empty register door shut.

That was the night of our big fight, the night that I buried the locket in the courtyard. Things were never the same for us after, even though we later married. Maybe your life wasn't the same after that night either.

II.

Lilly drops the crackers into a trashcan outside the unnamed store. She has what she truly came to get. Cupped in her hand is a string of small bells that once hung from the silent man's door. She shakes the string. A nearby cloud stoops and picks her up. As she glides away, she steps out of her skin and flings it over the side. Like a plume, it floats and curls its way down. East John appears flooded in dirt and stone from here. She sees Mrs. Shu, a tiny pink spot near the edge.

Lilly is finally on her way home.