He had been a grade school janitor, years ago. When he retired, he had a good pension and money saved to travel. He tended to save it, just in case. (His parents had been Depression survivors.) But his wife had died when she was 65, heart attack. He didn’t feel like traveling after that.

Mornings, he went to McDonalds for coffee, which he drank while he scratched lottery tickets and read the paper. On weekends, he met his nephew coffee and Scrabble, which they played on the deluxe board, the one with the plastic ridges to hold pieces in place.