Ann Neumann

The entrance is flanked by concrete lions that have lost their features to time and weather; they could be sea lions.

Richard is on his front porch smoking a cigarette; the rest of the street is deserted. From his chair you can see a round, white surveillance camera at the end of the block, craning from its mount on a telephone pole. Per capita, Lancaster is one of the most heavily surveilled cities in the country, with about one camera for every 350 people.

Kimo is early, anxious. He propped open the doors of his bodega hours ago, left his oldest son, Mohammed, behind the counter. Now he’s outside the Department of Consumer Affairs, which doesn’t open for another forty-five minutes. Nine-to-fivers hustle past. The sun has not yet struck the last of Broadway’s thirteen miles.

Tiffany—“like Tiffany & Co.”—has lived here her whole life. Her hair is woven into a neat French twist. “Cops come and sit in here,” she says, waving her hand at the shadows on the small plaza around us. A white plastic bag rustles in a spring tree. Tufts of white flowers cover the branches like a sweater, against the chill of early evening. We raise our voices over the noise of a generator, one of a score of rumbling machines across the city that has flooded housing projects with chemical light, noise, and the guise of safety for five years.

Tiffany needs to fix dinner; her kids are hungry. Her forty-first birthday is coming up. Tomorrow she’s going to a pole-dancing class with friends. “You look good,” I say. She tosses a hello to a passing neighbor who’s pushing an overflowing grocery cart. Her gold hoop earrings sparkle.