The photograph arrived at 9:12, from a cousin, with nothing written under it.
A street door, shut, and a notice on the door, the tape at its corners gone yellow. Beneath the municipal seal, the block number; beneath the number, the word demolition, and a date. The date was tomorrow’s. The hour beside it was six in the morning.
The notice was pasted at a height that had once been out of reach.
Two fingers widened the doorway until the grain gave out. The frame ended at the door.
The airline’s page loaded twice, then held. One flight remained that day: 8:55 in the evening, from the airport across the water. The card went through on the second try. Arrival, 10:40.
Seven hours and twenty minutes between landing and the hour on the notice.
The bag took a change of clothes and the prescription folder. The neighbor’s door opened before the second knock. The key went across the landing; the neighbor wrote the flight number on the calendar beside the door.
At 6:20 the lock turned once.