cory anotado

1. A body of water, smaller than a river, contained within relatively narrow banks. Creek.

2. What the thing you push around the grocery store is called. Cart.

3. A metal container to carry a meal in. Lunch box?

4. The thing that you cook bacon and eggs in. Frying pan.

5. The piece of furniture that seats three people. Couch.

6. The device on the outside of the house that carries rain off the roof. Aren't those gutters?

7. The covered area outside a house where people sit in the evening. Porch.

8. Carbonated, sweetened, non-alcoholic beverages. Soda. Pop's a slang term for Dad and Coke is a specific type. All the rest of you assholes don't know what you're talking about.

9. A flat, round breakfast food served with syrup. Pancakes!

10. A long sandwich designed to be a whole meal in itself. Hoagie. Heros are only in stories and subs go underwater and are generally named Red October. Fuckers.

11. The piece of clothing worn by men at the beach. I'll assume not Speedos. I call them shorts.

12. Shoes worn for sports. Sneakers.

13. Putting a room in order. Cleaning it up?

14. A flying insect that glows in the dark. Firefly. Ala Joss Whedon.

15. The little insect that curls up into a ball. Pillbug. Eew.

16.The children's playground equipment where one kid sits on one side and goes up while the other sits on the other side and goes down. See-saw!

17. How do you eat your pizza? From the point to the crust, usually kinda folded.

18. What's it called when private citizens put up signs and sell their used stuff? Yard sale. We have rowhomes; garages are too out of the way to sell shit out of.

19. What's the evening meal? Dinner. Or, Fourthmeal™.

20. The thing under a house where the furnace and perhaps a rec room are? Basement.

21. What do you call the thing that you can get water out of to drink in public places? Wudder fountain.

The skyline looms overhead. The purple and pink sky smiles down on Philadelphia. Clouds start to vanish as night looms overhead. He can see the tall buildings, lit up in their majesty. Liberty One lights up in red, white and blue as it pierces the sky. The public service announcements scrolling by on the PECO building catch his eye for only a second. “I cannot be distracted,” he tells himself. That shows weakness.

The air is thick and humid. You can see the haze as the street lights turn on. A car passes by momentarily, spitting out loud beats and pollution. It only adds to the smog surrounding the city. No matter, he thinks. Global warming isn’t on his mind right now.

The owner of the corner store drives away some kids loitering in front of his business. He screams in a mixture of Chinese and English, which confuses the kids enough to move them along. Whatever, he says to himself. He’s not getting driven away. He has to focus.

An ambulance turns on its sirens suddenly. His eyes avert their gaze for only a second. He wonders what happened, if someone got shot, or maimed, or fell and broke a bone. He worries about his grandmother, alone at home, watching television. Could she have gotten hurt? His concern turns to apathy as he realizes that it’s not his problem.

He eyes down his opponent. He lowers his head and squares his shoulders. He works himself up into a frenzy. His enemy, the pitcher, launches one faster than light. He swings. Hard. The ball ignores physics and launches into orbit. It shatters through poor Mrs. Johnson’s window. They all scatter.

Originally printed in the La Salle Collegian on September 27, 2006. Written by Cory Anotado.