ON THE WIDE cement step outside the warehouse, Lamont took his first outdoor breath in a very, very long time. It was a big disappointment. In fact, it reeked. There was someone at his side. The girl. Maddy? Was that her name? Lamont was still trying to figure out who she was. A secretary? A nurse? She was standing close—as if she expected him to tip over.
His brain felt like cotton and his eyes were slightly out of focus. Everything in his view was cloudy. It was just one of the thousand ways in which his body didn’t quite feel like his. He tried to orient himself to his surroundings.
“Is that…the East River?” he asked.
“It is,” said Maddy.
“Why is it so high?” asked Lamont. The brackish water lapped across the bare lot in front of the warehouse, only a few yards from where they stood.
Maddy shrugged. “The water’s been rising for years,” she said. “For as long as I’ve been alive.”
“And what’s that in the air?” Lamont asked. “Is something on fire?” The air near the river was filled with smoke.
“Just cooking fires,” said Maddy. “People need to eat.”
Lamont shook his head. It was like the damned Depression had never ended. As his vision started to clear, he saw small groups of people shuffling nearby. They all had matted hair and wore shapeless clothes. He saw a line of them passing close by the warehouse, heading for the river. A young woman was in the lead, trailed by a string of small children, following like silent lemmings.
“Where are they going?” asked Lamont. Then something flashed in his memory. He’d seen this before. More than a century ago. Drowning was one way to end the pain, and sometimes the poorest of the poor took that way out. This was a suicide walk!
Lamont stepped off the cement step and walked toward the woman. In seconds, he was in water up to his calves. Maddy tried to support him but he shook her off.
“Stop!” he called out to the woman. His voice was still weak. It didn’t reach. He heard Maddy shout too. She was right behind him. The woman heard Maddy. She paused as the children crowded around her, just inches from the edge of the water.
Lamont was close now, close enough to reach for her. The woman turned her face toward him. Lamont looked at her intently, deeply, deliberately.
“Do not jump,” he said. “Back away.”
The woman was hollow-eyed and pale. She said nothing.
“Do not die,” said Lamont. “Do not die.”
Slowly, the woman turned away from the river. The others followed. The woman placed her hands on the shoulders of the children as they shuffled back toward the smoky campsites beyond the warehouse. Lamont looked down. Maddy was staring at him.
“What did you just do?” she asked.
Lamont looked out over the river, where a few abandoned barges floated aimlessly, then back at the woman and children, disappearing into the haze.
“Maybe,” he said, “I gave them hope.”