I took a step further to meet Horace for health, for love, for a leg up.

And at Horace’s everything was gray there with some white accents—and the walls were gray, not paint. They were hung with fabric and he had a gray carpet on the floor.

Once, before I knew him well, I asked Horace to dinner, and after that he was always saying he’d be right over for a chicken dinner, but usually I visited him in his apartment across the street.

His place was very tidy and a bit surprising. He showed me his sword cane and the living room features an owl that’s made of poultry feathers.

This is a snowy owl that contains no real owl parts, but when I saw it for the first time—I had to ask him whether it had been shot or euthanized.