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ANNA was the cashier at sullivan's, the small, family-owned grocery at the corner of edwards and eggleton. she worked most friday nights, some sundays, and always wednesday.

today was wednesday.

from her apartment window anna perched, peering around the moss-colored curtains, her eyes large like a hawk's, always drawn, open, and alert. she flicked her gaze along andres lane, a clouded and drizzly street away from edwards, watching the people about, scattered on the street and the sidewalk like morning dew on the lawn. they were lazy and slow moving, and she watched their progress as they ambled from one end of her window to the other, where they scuffled out of sight.

beside this window, in her living room, in the recliner, she sat, there in that chair. her feet were tucked underneath her, and in her left hand she held a cup of tea with her head turned over the armchair to peer out of the window. sara sat beside her folded legs, purring incessantly, reminding anna of the vents in the apartment, constant and familiar.  she was wearing a black and white striped long-sleeve with blue jeans- the pair she wore every day, whether she was locked indoors or at sullivan's. it was what people knew her by; most did not know her name, not even the old folk, who would talk to her frequently. most people smiled as she scuffled on past with timid and avoiding eyes, and, while they were not looking, whether from her second-story window or not-so-distant spot in the world, sketched their forms in her head. she knew everyone and everything.

anna stood and placed her mug on the coffee table near the chair. she had just seen mrs. sefalou out, walking from the apartment two floors below and off towards lei street, where the local library was. sam smith was also out, the older guy from across the street who owned the bakery; he was walking his golden pomeranian, to which sara watched with cautious, unwavering eyes. mara too, and jackson, the police officer; he held a box of doughnuts as he walked to his cruiser, just bought from sam's bakery. there was jimmy and tamara, the twins; masey and her younger brother, tom, walking towards bard's elementary on eggleton; and joseph, by himself. anna knew all of these people, knew their names and their colors and their most worn outfits; she knew where they were born and where they grew up  and where they were going. she knew everything about these people, and watched them each morning as they scrambled to the streets towards their particular niche. each day she expected them, and breathed with alleviation when she found them in the exact place and pattern she'd expected them to be.

anna put on her purple parka and grabbed her see-through umbrella  she filled sara's bowl and turned on the telly, because sara liked to watch the telly while anna was out working, and put on her blue rain boots. she said goodbye to sara and went down to the bottom landing, where she pushed the glass doors, her weak and pencil thin body unable to hold its full weight, and walked onto the street.

at sullivan's, gary was already restocking the shelves. the boxes from restock were out in each ailse, some empty, some full, and she hung her coat in the break room and took the empty boxes gary was finished with and put them in the boxroom. anna was not fond of the boxroom; its tall ceilings and endless spaced scared her, and the towering shelves upon which the restock sat echoed into the distance without pattern or logic. every time she opened the two metal, floppy doors to the boxroom, she quickly dropped the boxes in their desired spot with her eyes averted before quickly moving out of the room and back into the organized, aisle-lined store.

after helping gary unload the boxes, anna began setting up the store for opening. the place was quiet and small; there were only seven aisle in the whole place, with a tiny refrigerated section that mostly housed beer and cheese and meat. she turned the light on for her register and unlocked the automatic doors; she flipped the neon red sign in the front window facing the streets (edwards and eggleton) to OPEN and made sure the light was bright against the dim of the foggy, wet morning.

they usually had quiet mornings until around eleven, around when mrs. sefalou would walk in, smiling. she never said anna's name but always acknowledged her with a sweet nod. she liked to talk to anna. she'd come to the register with her daily grab, a loaf of bread, some deli-cut ham (which was not from the store, but from a delicatassen near the side of the store, joined by a circular entry way) cheese, eggs, and a gallon of milk. it made anna happy to listen to mrs. sefalou. she was as interesting to anna as her morning walk from anna's second-story window. anna was quiet while she'd talk, speaking of the stars a lot, mr. sefalou, which anna had yet to figure if he was still alive or dead, and jane austen, a favorite of mrs. sefalou. she alwas had clasped in her hand, next to her vintage crimson handbag, a copy of jane austen; sometimes one anna had never seen before, but more than likely one she had seen many times.

there were other people that came in, like masey and her brother tom around noon. they always grabbed the same lunchpack: ham and cheese. anna liked masey, because she was very singular and tough. she had shoulder length brown hair, the kind anna thought like silk- thin and straight and shiny. anna knew her and her brother, a few years younger, were never separate. she knew masey's mother never went walking on the streets nor did she ever come into sullivan's. together the two lunchpacks were a total of three-seventy-five, and masey always paid in coins pulled from her green winter coat. masey did not talk much. she was tall for her age, nearly five-three, towering over her little brother who always wondered with his eyes and his mind around the store; harbored in place by the hand of his sister on his back like a mother. anna liked that about her. she liked that masey never said anything, except "come on, tommy," as she would reach for his hand after paying for their lunches in full. she didn't wait for a receipt or for anna to tell her she had no change. she knew.

around one was when anna usually had her break. she went into the break room that wednesday, opened the yellowed, one story refrigerator and pulled out what she always ate every friday, sunday, and wednesday: a penut butter and jelly sandwich. she'd sit there and eat at the white table, watching the tiny black telly that sat on the counter, stuck permanently, it seemed, on the news channel. today it was talking about a shooting in avondale. anna saw the stills of the crime scene: an apartment complex that looked as if it hadn't been taken care of or lived in a while, wrapped with yellow restriction tape around certain areas. anna knew people lived in there, though. people lived everywhere, she knew, even on street corners, where there was no where left to make a home.

after break she stood at the register again. it was around two, and it was stagnant. she could hear gary checking the shelves and restocking with the things that had been taken by the few customers. anna watched outside the tall glass windows that were parallel from her register. few cars were out among the tall buildings, and even fewer people were walking. she watched as joseph,  with his hands tucked into his jeans, walked from a blue vehicle and into his apartment complex, a tall two story building. anna never wondered of joseph. she like to watch him, though, as he moved throughout the town, to and from work; the walk to work, and the carpool home. he always reminded anna of herself, how quiet and inward they both were. he was tall with a red cloud of hair. he always wore a beige leather jacket and blue trainers. anna didn't like them much together.

around five anna began to clean up before closing time. only a few more customers came in, all of which were easy checkouts; only on the weekends did anna begin to work quickly, sliding things past the scanner, the beep incessant like a heart or hers. it was easy to focus then when things were moving quickly at a beat. things were easy when it was quiet, too; it was slower though, lazy, and nonthreatening.

after helping gary pack up, putting the boxes in the boxroom, and the unpacked boxes there on the endless shelves along the wall, it was around seven when from the backroom she heard the bell ring. anna thought it must be someone new. anna couldn't think of anyone that would come into sullivan's so late, not a frequenter anyways. gary was helping her put the last of the boxes on the shelves when they heard the bells to the store door and he looked up, the box in his arms half on the shelf, and said, "who could that be?" anna watched him as he shoved the box onto the shelf, moved some empty boxes out of the way that were in the path to the door, and said "i'll get it, you finish this up." he waved his hand to the last of the boxes. there wasn't much left so anna nodded, and began picking up one of the last boxes of inventory; it was filled with bags of potato chips.

gary left and anna shoved the box of chips on the shelf. she was never one for potato chips, but in their yellow cellophane container she wondered why so many people ate them. perhaps it was the way they were depicted on the front of the bag, looking like gold. she knew people liked gold, liked to look at it, touch it, have it, but she also knew the chips in the bag looked nothing like the photo, and were really a pale, undesirable yellow.

after shoving the last of the boxes onto the shelves, which was compiled with a variety of different candies, anna turned off the light in the boxroom, and closed the floppy doors behind her, and headed to the break room. out of the boxroom she noticed the store was quiet. she tiptoed on her feet, peered her hawk eyes between each aisle, hoping to catch a glance of gary and the last of their customers. but she heard and saw nothing.

in the break room she grabbed her jacket and slipped on her rain boots. anna poked her head out of the doorway, expecting to see gary coming around the corner to grab his things, too, but he did not. she listened for his voice but only found the unnerving hum of the refrigerators.

the sound of the register trickled through the store. anna could here the rustle of the drawers contents; it was gary, she knew. only her and gary and his son, who worked the days anna did not, had the code to unlock the drawers. she eased the tip of her toes and scuffled to the front towards the register.

the man at the register was not someone anna had seen before. he was tall and darkly colored, with an inky sweater and dark navy jeans. his face was gaunt and pointed, with a zigzag nose and swollen, heightened cheeks, all covered by a thickly growing beard and heavy brows that hung over his eyes. anna watched from the corner of aisle six, near the refrigerators, making sure she could not be seen as she slightly poked her head around as if peering through her curtains.

the man was not buying anything. he had nothing at the register, as far as anna could tell, and yet gary handed him money, as if the man had paid for something uncostly with a large bill. but there was nothing with him and there were no bags at the end of the register, waiting for him. he held something black in his hand, and stared at gary with hawk eyes, much like anna's; they were unmoving and coiled around gary's every move. anna didn't move but watched the man as he, statued and unbroken, watched gary.

"that's it," anna heard gary say. his voiced had fallen from its heavy scruff to that of a softly speaking preacher, the kind that sounds edged but can put you to sleep from its smoothness. the man took the money off the counter and with his eyes still fixed on gary bagged it in a grocery bag to the side of the register. he stepped back from gary, eyes still stuck to him, and moved towards the automatic doors. gary was quiet and the man was quiet, and anna had expected it all to move slowly, but it was very fast and she began to panic. the man reached the doors and, before tucking into the drizzly night, let off a loud cry from the black thing in his hand. anna was confused for a few seconds, and then her eyes began to grace the store floor and the aisle headers and the register for bullet holes. when she didn't find them she searched gary.

the man ran as anna searched and gary slipped to the floor.

at the apartment, anna's door (number three-thirty-two B) let out the hushed sounds of the television as it opened. the house was dark and she heard the quiet thunder of sara's paws approaching her. she was beside her as anna shut the door, purring like the familiar vents in the apartment. anna took off her boots and her jacket and put them in their places, behind the door on the coat ring and on the floor, and placed her umbrella against the wall. she walked to the recliner near the window and sat with her legs tucked in. she was later than most wednesday nights, but she did everything the same; home for wolves was in her hand, opened to page thirty three, the scene of darcy leaving, and a cup of (rather cold) tea in the other. sara curled on the recliner's headrest, purring, and the tv spoke quietly in an excited, inaccessible voice. all was it should be, anna thought, and things began to fall in the places they'd once belonged to, lining her shelves with her unbroken vases as it had been before the quake. everything was the same as anna looked out the window to the people behind her curtains, save for this time, anna only watched, uncertain and unsure of their next move.