Jonathan exits the back entrance of the theater and cuts through the parking garage and across Pennsylvania Avenue. The men are still there, leaning against the building, not talking.

He enters Kahn’s liquors and debates briefly. He can spend twenty or one hundred, it will be the same. He settles for two bottles of Seagrams, which is tolerable but cheap, and he will take the first drink.

It is dark outside and warm for October in Indianapolis. Jonathan leaves Kahn’s and walks to the men. He keeps the bottles in their brown bags in plain view. The men straighten at his approach. The street lights illuminate the sidewalk and alley sufficiently. It stinks of rotten food here. The nightlife of early evening walks past unknowing.

Jonathan unscrews the cap of one Seagram’s, takes a short pull on the bottle, and hands it to the nearest man. The man, with shaking hands and wary eye, has two giant gulps and passes it to the next man. No one speaks, and another man emerges from deep in the alley to join them.

He doesn’t drink on the next turn and opens the second bottle, takes a sip, and hands it off. He watches the four men pass the bottles back and forth until empty, then drop them at their feet. Two of the men walk into the inky black of the alley, and one sits down with his back to the building, looking down the sidewalk. The fourth man leans against the building with one shoulder and looks around a long minute, then to Jonathan. “I thank ya, young fella” he says and looks at the night traffic of Pennsylvania Avenue.

Jonathan is silent. He leans against the building on his side of the alley. In his novel, this scene will take up many pages. The young writer in the book will have much to say, as will the men. He mumbles something about the men “taking care of themselves” and walks briskly down Pennsylvania to Washington Street and cuts over to Meridian.