The football that tumbled awkwardly to rest at Myles' feet interrupted his meditations as he plodded along the sidewalk. With his right hand he reached down and plucked it up.

    It's practically new, he realized.

    His eyes shifted back and forth like warning lights at a railroad crossing as he gave a moments thought to the idea of selling his new find later for a few bucks.

    Yeilding to what remained of a conscious Myles reluctantly moved the football around with his left hand until the stitching was under the fingertips of his right, as they should be, ... he thought.

    Myles then made (as it turned out) an embarrassing attempt to spiral the football back over the fence to the waiting boy of about twelve.

    The child picked up the football, looked up, then, just for a second, stared curiously at the junkie.

    "Come on Bobby!" one of his teammates yelled, interrupting his pondering.

    With the perplexed look still on his sweaty face the boy yelled from a safe distance:

    "Thanks mister," then, tucking the football under his arm, he turned and ran full speed to rejoin his teammates.

    The lad glanced back only once at the man in the black leather jacket.

    The thin stranger, his fingers now laced through the chain link fence that separated their two worlds one from another, watched as the boy ran away.

    How had it come to this?
    How had it gone this far?

    Myles thought of his home back in Chapel Hill, of sitting on the wall downtown, of his store. He thought of her. Did she still think of him?

    He could still taste the hot steak melting in his mouth. He could still see her parents exquisitely appointed dining room and the horrible image of himself dressed up to look like something he was not, ... nor ever had been, ... nor ever would be now.

    As always, there'd been the usual warning signs, there always were. Once again Myles had sensed a presence, perhaps that of a guardian Angel as it were. Sometimes the presence seemed to him to be that of a snitch, ... almost as though he'd turned himself in.

    When Myles did get caught, it seemed to him almost as though he'd done it to himself, ... on purpose.