My Brother Said One Sentence in the Bank Lobby

fixed his Wi-Fi once and he’d paid me in tomatoes for a month.

He held a silver balloon shaped like a star.

Behind him were three more neighbors.

Pam from two houses down had a casserole. Tom and Cheryl Burke had a card. Someone had taped a little paper crown to a bottle of bubbles.

Mr. Alvarez looked embarrassed.

“Kowalski told us the kid had surgery,” continue reading …