Working on my novel

Brown eyes, brown hair. Through a glass darkly, I can see her face, her eyes. Or are those my eyes, is that my face, the face I see in muddied pools of last weeks rain? The memory is........ I shift my focus to the present. I am hungry, and crouching in this building, sifting through my memories for gold is not going to ease my immediate need for sustenance. Memories of my mother are not gold anyway. She wasn't all that nice, although I suppose she did the best she could with what she had. Maybe. Maybe not.

I stand up and stretch my legs. I am in a building, that in historical times served as what was called a Pharmacy. A building where people could purchase medicines. I saw a picture of a pharmacy once. A building with bright lights, people smiling, dressed in white coats, behind counters, shelves populated with as many pills as there are pebbles, sorting them into little bottles for distribution. People smiling, exchanging paper money for their medicines. Nice clothes, nice smiles, bright lights. This building must of been at one time, like the picture I saw. Now, it's just a dark and broken shell. The shelves that would have housed pills are empty and covered in dust. File cabinets are toppled over and a smashed computer monitor next to where I stand appears to at one time have been home to a family of mice, maybe a rat. Throughout the pharmacy are empty and toppled metal shelves, broken glass, and fallen ceiling tiles. The sun begins to set over the concrete shells and slats of light shine through allies and in between buildings in a last ditch effort at illuminating my part of the planet. When the dusk sets in, I quietly emerge from my shelter, avoiding the glass and trips that I have set to alert me of dangers when I sleep during the day. Before stepping over the threshold, I stop, slowing my breathing, and focusing on sounds. It is quiet. I scan the windows of the surrounding buildings for movement. I direct my attention to a shell down the silent street and squint at a building at the end of the block. In the dimming light a figure appears in a window of the building, then moves back into the shadows. Everything else is still. I scan the street once more. Seeing no other movement, hearing no sounds, I dart across the street, and move quickly down a cracked and uneven sidewalk, then slip quietly into the building. Inside, the figure I had seen before steps out and motions to me, then slips through a back door. I follow, and once through the back door, I close it behind me. Complete darkness, then a flame. The figure strikes a match and begins lighting candles around the small room, then looks at me and smiles.

"Hello Firen," the figure says.

"Russoe," I reply.