As he settled back into his apartment Amos felt a wave of emotion. Everywhere he looked, even with what remained of their meagre possessions and old, worn furniture he saw signs of his mother. He wanted to fall onto their old floral print sofa and curl up into a ball and just start weeping but he knew that if he did, he would just end up feeling worse because no one was there to comfort him.

  Amos knew that he had no choice but to rely on himself.

  Ever since his dad had died Amos had felt this moment hurtling towards him, awful, inevitable and unstoppable. He had felt so vulnerable, the sense of loss and shock at losing a parent was so sudden and intractable. Amos had never felt anything like this before but at that time he also realized with no small amount of dread that his mom was just as vulnerable and that this sense of loss could easily occur again and when it did, he would be completely alone.

  “Solve the first problem,” his father would always say to him when Amos was frustrated or overwhelmed and unable to see what to do next. At first, this adage just made Amos even more upset. He had been far too young to manage his emotions and move forward without help but as he got older, he started to have some success following his dad’s advice.

  What his father was trying to instill in Amos was a coping mechanism meant to help him deal with difficult, confusing or challenging situations. Solving the first problem meant that rather than trying to go four directions at once or wasting energy getting upset, finding the most important thing, the thing that needed doing first and doing that thing without worrying about anything else.

  It had become easier each time he was successful, eventually this approach became instinctive and now it was no different.

  After a long night and lots of walking, Amos realized that he was extremely hungry and feeling quite fatigued as a result, so he went to the kitchen and set about making something to eat.

  Amos felt better after some food and his hunger had abated so he decided to refocus and re-evaluate to see what was the next problem that needed all his attention. Unfortunately for Amos he had a lot to choose from. The most immediate challenges were that he had almost no money and there was very little food in the house.

  They had no savings beyond a few small bills hidden in an old coffee tin and he had no way of earning money. On top of that Amos was sure that they were behind on their rent and as soon as their landlord found out that Amos was on his own with no ability to pay the rent then he would almost certainly be locked out of his apartment.

  The first problem Amos needed to solve was to get some money but the “how to” for this problem was much more elusive.

  As Amos sat at the kitchen table and thought he became aware of just how quiet the apartment was with just himself inside of it. He could hear everything in the hallway, and he remembered that when he was bored, he would listen to how people moved in the hallway, the sounds they made and from this information, who they were.

  The easiest was the landlord Mr. Phil or “Filthy Phil” as his mother would call him in a lowered voice. Mr. Phil was short for Filip Wi?niewski, a Polish immigrant, who was old enough to constantly exclaim, “you communists zat ruins everytink” whenever he was arguing with someone which was quite often.

  No one could ever pronounce his last name correctly, so he was Mr. Phil or “Filthy Phil” behind his back.

  Mr. Phil was loud and messy, always unshaven with a scratchy looking dark stubble under his chin and on his fleshy cheeks, messy short black hair, bushy eyebrows, baggy brown work pants and a stained white tank top. He looked and sounded rough and when Amos was younger, he was certain that Mr. Phil gave him his meanest, dirtiest looks just to scare him whenever his parents were not watching.

  Mr. Phil had a huge ring of keys that jingled so he sounded like a team of Christmas reindeer whenever he walked down the hall with his heavy steps. This warning sound would serve Amos very well in the days and weeks to come.

  The sounds of another resident that Amos was very familiar with was Ms. Murphy just across the hall. Every day at noon, like clockwork, she would undo her locks and chain with carefully timed clicks and clunks.

  She never did them all at once, Amos and his mother would sometimes giggle softly together during the long pauses between the unlocking procedure, they could imagine her furtive eye at the peephole, sweeping the hall for any lurking attackers. Finally, once she was sure the coast was clear, Ms. Murphy would exit quickly and lock the two locks that she could from outside the door. She would then scurry down the hall with her bags and shabby overcoat to do her shopping and to go for some lunch.

  They were both sure Ms. Murphy was quite well off as his mother always saw her at the same restaurant, day after day if she was passing by and Ms. Murphy often brought home some groceries or staples in the bags she clutched to her chest on her return.

  Old man Dan lived a few doors down from Ms. Murphy. He was a sad, older man who had been a widower for years now his mother said. His walk was a slow shuffle. Never hurried, never changing, just a slow swish, swish of his shoes as he barely lifted his feet off the carpet, step after step.

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  It was a soft gentle sound, much like the expression on his face which also never differed as he moved up or down the hall.

  After that there was no one really remarkable on the floor that Amos could think of. The building was half empty at least and any new tenants that wanted to live in this neighborhood or this particular building were few and far between. This did not stop Filthy Phil from demanding his rent as soon as it was due, something Amos was dreading now as he had no way of paying the rent at all.

  Since his biggest problem was a lack of money, Amos realized that he needed to avoid Filthy Phil at all times. He decided that he would always keep the door locked but never latched with the chain so that Mr. Phil would not know if anyone was ever inside. He would come and go carefully and only when he was sure Mr. Phil was not in the hall.

  To do this he needed an escape route, and he had to avoid using the front door. If he could come and go without being seen by Mr. Phil, then maybe his lack of money might just be manageable for a while until he hopefully found a solution.

  Amos moved a chair to the front window in the living room and looked out onto the street from behind a curtain. From this angle he could see the front door of the building which was the exit everyone used. These days nobody wanted to be in the back alley or out on the street at night, not even Filthy Phil so Amos did not have to watch for too long before he started to notice residents coming and going while it was safest to do so.

  After just over an hour Amos got lucky, and he saw Mr. Phil leave the building with a dirty jean jacket over his usual stained undershirt. As he headed down the street Amos realized that now was a great time to slip out and try to solve how he would come and go at will from the building without being seen and maybe get some food.

  Amos set off down the hall, not towards the main stairs that led to the front entrance but to the fire escape stairs at the other side of the building that only led down to the back door that was supposed to be an emergency exit. It had been locked up tight for years now as nobody wanted to leave by that door anymore or even worse, have strangers come in through that door off of the back alley.

  As Amos entered the side stairwell he was focused on looking for other opportunities. He thought maybe he could go up but then what? Jumping to other rooftops would not be possible as most other rooftops were much lower and too far to reach. “What if I try the level of the adjacent rooftop” thought Amos as he stood in the stairwell and looked out through the window.

  It was a small window on the wall of the landing and Amos went up to it and peered out. The adjacent building was the only one attached to his building and it looked like the window was about six feet above the roof. The window was locked with a thumb latch, but Amos had brought a few meagre tools with him and using an old, flathead screwdriver, he was able to pry the paint-caked latch over enough to try to force the window open.

  It did not open easily but some careful prying with the flathead managed to finally squeak the window open enough for Amos to crawl through enough to swing his legs out, and then, rotating and hanging onto the windowsill, he dropped down to the rooftop below with a soft thump.

  This flat roof abutted his building and a small thread of a laneway that went to the much bigger alley behind his building and to the main street in the other direction. After checking the two open corners of the roof Amos found an old cast iron drainpipe leading from a cracked and worn rain scupper. The pipe was smooth and round, about four inches in diameter and it seemed to still be firmly attached to the building.

  It led down into the smaller alleyway just behind a garbage bin. This was more than sufficient for Amos, a perfect, hand-over-hand pole he could climb up and down while he braced his feet against the brick wall behind. With this he might be able to come and go as he pleased.

  Amos spotted some wooden crates stacked next to the bin and he immediately realized how useful they would be. He scooted down the pipe and then after making sure no one was watching, he tossed three of the crates up onto the roof and quickly went up the pipe once more to the roof’s surface. A perfect ladder Amos said to himself, quite pleased with his resourcefulness.

  He had stacked two crates against the wall and then one in front underneath the window. The six-foot drop had been reduced to a very manageable climb to and from the window. Now he could enter and leave the apartment building without being seen or without having to use the dangerous back alley.

  Amos had taken the money from the coffee tin with him and a small backpack, and he decided to go to the small grocer at the end of the block and buy some bread, butter and maybe a small wedge of cheese. He thought he could stretch these provisions out for quite a while by making simple sandwiches each day.

  As he hurried back from the shop with his groceries hidden away, he also made sure to stay on the opposite side of the street from his building to reduce the chances of any accidental encounter with Mr. Phil. What happened next to Amos as he got closer to his building was almost as bad, perhaps even worse than running into Filthy Phil and being yelled at for late rent payments.

  Just underneath his living room window was a tall thin man, one of Filthy Phil’s buddies who often came around looking to help with odd jobs around the building. Leaning out of Amos’s window was Mr. Phil himself. In his arms was a loosely gathered bundle of what looked to be a mix of clothing, sheets and towels.

  He let the bundle drop down to the ground below the window where the tall thin man started stuffing it into a garbage bag. Amos was enraged at the sight of Filthy Phil standing at his window in his gross tank top throwing his family’s few possessions out of the window as if it was all just trash. Before he could think he ran across the street yelling at Mr. Phil “stop that, get out of my apartment, get out, get out.”

  As Amos came up to the sidewalk he was trembling with rage, he looked up at Filthy Phil and he was close enough to see the wide smirk on his face. Filthy Phil was the kind of man that only seemed to smile when it was at someone’s misfortune. “You needs to pay all the rent” he cried down to Amos, “you need to pay but you do not.” “I have many friends all over this City and I hears what happens at the hospital.”

  Amos went still at this, his gaze remained fixated on Mr. Phil who paused for a short painful moment and then went on. “I cannot have orphan charity case here in my building, you family owe so much rent, it is too much already.”

  His face became more serious, and he said quickly “so I have to get rid of your things and change the lock.” Filthy Phil bent over inside the apartment and with just one hand this time threw out a bunch of socks, a towel and a few other items. He reached up with both hands and started to pull the window down and as he did, he called out “stay there, I come talk with you” before banging the window shut.