Have to wait. He walked toward the friend. “Hey man, where ya been?” Before he could answer, Eric said, “The mayor wants us to do some work in his private quarters.” He laughed as they moved back toward the maintenance area, “I think his own closet rods finally fell. He mentioned some more shelves and another repair or two. Thought I better have you along.” The afternoon was busy but seemed to be dragging to Jackson. Finally, the work was finished and he was back in his room. The note with the neat handwriting that Anissa had passed to him lay on the small table in front of him. He looked out the window at the city. The tall village buildings rose with the upper stories eerily dark against a twilight sky, broken windows. Vines twisted up and around, some brown and dying from being trimmed and lopped off to keep the lower floor windows clear. Some were oddly green and alive, their snaking limbs finding a place to root all the way down at ground level. Dots of light emanated from the lower stories of the buildings and cast shadows of the stream of people that ebbed and flowed along the cracked sidewalks.
