Crowd

Crowd

“Hey, look at that crowd over there,” Jim said to Billy, “let’s go see what’s happening!”

They crossed the street quickly, trying to peer over the jam of people, but they couldn’t see anything.

Billy tapped the shoulder of a taller guy, “Hey, can you see? What’s happening?”
But the guy just shook his head, “I don’t know man, something near the door of that store, I can hear a commotion, but I can’t hear what they’re saying.”

The boys tried to get closer, starting to hear some comments. “My jacket is caught on your bag…” “Can you just get up?” “Let me get by; I need to get to work!” Nothing that gave them any clues to the trouble. In the meantime, more people were gathering out of curiosity.

Suddenly they heard a police siren start up. Jim turned to Billy grinning, “This must be something big! Let’s try to find out before the police get here!” Bill was on board, so they squeezed harder through the mob.

As the siren got closer and closer, the boys finally made it to the front of the store. There were a number of people down on the sidewalk, their belongings scattered, trying to sort everything out. The door of the store was closed, and blocked so another bunch of people were inside looking out, waiting for the area to clear so they could open the door. Still the boys couldn’t see the problem.

Finally, Billy noticed a girl their age pressed up against the storefront, he squeezed over near her. “Hey, do you know what happened?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said, a tad sarcastically, “my normally intelligent father decided to stop in the middle of a crowded sidewalk, to tie his shoe…”