The kids were downstairs and Ray was still watching Spongebob. How long had it been? He wasn’t sure.
He remembered desperately searching for another game after the Rockies loss, but Taylor and McKenzie were too quick for him. They caught that fleeting glimpse of giggling yellow animation as he cycled through the channels.
“Daaaaaad! Spongebob!”
“Let them watch their show, Ray” Gina chimed in before he could protest. “I’m going to Brady’s. Go mow the lawn or something.”
Somewhere between then and now the kids had moved on to something else, and Ray was still watching a talking sponge. He began searching the channels again.
“Daaaaaad! We’re watching that!” he heard a distant voice call from the basement. Apparently selective hearing had picked up on the fact that the channel had changed. Ray ignored it.
It took several more clicks of the up arrow to get past the block of kids channels. The satellite service Ray had switched to last summer lumped the various networks together by genre.
Kids channels.
Movie channels.
Sports channels.
Law and Order.
Law and Order.
Law and Order.
Heading in to the news block Ray already figured he’d have to take another look through the channels from the beginning. The news was all Hezbollah and Anna Nicole Smith these days, and that was not how he wanted to spend his Saturday.
His attention was just about snared by a Food Network show about a “Build a Better Hamburger” competition in Texas somewhere, when something told him to go back a few channels. Midway through the news channels he saw his own face staring back at him. It was his driver’s license photo, in fact. He turned up the volume.
“…any information contact authorities. Moving on, news today in the Anna Nicole Smith…”
Ray franticly began paging back and forth through the other news channels. Back and forth until finally there was his face again on another station.
“…Authorities in Denver are seeking this man who they describe as a person of interest in a string of local night club robberies. If you have seen this man do not approach him yourself. He may be armed and dangerous. Contact your local authorities if you have any information.”
Ray jumped up from the couch and raced to his wife’s computer, spilling some Fritos and stepping on a Spider-Man Happy Meal toy in the process. He remembered the website for one of the local news stations, DenverNews.com. Just beneath the ad for Dealin’ Dan’s Ford there was his photo again.
Ray was just about to click on the story when his eyes shifted focus from the computer screen and out the back patio door in the distance. There he saw part of a head peering above the fence. It was the neighbor from behind, who’s name he did not know, but who he’d often seen watering plants. His eyes scanned the yard back and forth like a security camera, across the lawn and finally up to the window. As Ray and his neighbor of 3 years met eye to eye for the first time there was a knock at the door.