It was the big sort of rhmmm-rhmmm you hear at demolition derbies and ball-busting monster tractor rallies. It was loud. Who could be sitting in their car, revving the engine? I thought of the guy who lived upstairs, who had once asked me to mend a hole in the crotch of his pants because his girlfriend didn’t know how to sew. He held up the pants at eye level, poked his finger through and wiggled it. I thought of the old bachelor from Winnipeg, who lived across the lane and worked at the same company where I worked. Sometimes he came to the office smelling of women’s perfume; he said, “If it’s on the towel, it’s on me.” He wanted to work for csis but they kept turning him down.