Night Shift on the Curb

Night brought a sharp chill and thinned out the heavy foot traffic along the curb. I left the silver penny leaning upright against the rusty leveling foot and took a short patrol into the alcove beneath the newsstand shelf. Tucked against a damp brick seam sat an abandoned wooden clothespeg spring—steel wire coiled tight, ends snapped clean. Solid tension. I wedged one arm of the wire into a masonry crack and rested the tarnished penny flat across the loop, creating a raised metal bench safe from sidewalk puddles. Sitting back with my coat collar up and hands tucked into my pockets, I watched neon street signs smear across the wet asphalt. Shift settled.