#58

Shoes crunching gravel. Trodding, bearing the weight of millions of breaths and counting, billions of heart beats and ticking. Disappointments and hardships meeting hopes and wishes. Unsympathetic wind pulls hard-earned heat from his red cheeks. Shoes crunching snow. Cars whip by mere feet beside him, sending drifts and dirt and dust swirling around him, settling on his eyelashes, collecting in his lungs. Small faces and hands pressed to glass wonder at his circumstance as they zoom by. When asked, tired voices reply, "I don't know." His thumb is not out. If he seeks help he does not ask for it. He does not slow. He marches on.