One evening, he sat by a small folding table with a woman named Marthe, who lived in a converted school bus two spots down. They shared a bottle of cheap Bordeaux and a tin of sardines.
Fernand looked out at the vast, open sky. "To stop is to wait for the end," he said softly. "Here, if I don't like the view, I turn the key. I’m not running away, Marthe. I’m just catching up to the world I missed while I was sitting in a chair for forty years."
"Do you ever think about stopping?" Marthe asked, her hands wrapped around a steaming mug.
When the contract ended in January, the warehouse manager offered him a permanent position. It meant a steady paycheck, a chance at a small studio, and four walls that didn't shake in the wind.