One of the covers caught his eyes because of the discolored image that complemented the bad title. He picked up the book and analyzed the old photograph, approaching it from the edges. The sepia tone resembled that of the street that had taken him there. The leaves that had moved from the top of the trees to the sidewalks and the not-so-lush grass made him mentally retraced his steps to where he was before he decided to have a drink to rid himself of the cold that hadn't yet come to stay.

He didn't read a single paragraph; he simply went through the pages and stumbled upon this or that word, but nothing seemed to have the same shade of that scene. He longed for his grandparents' house, the smell of warm bread that would welcome him back home from school, and the homework he had to finish before he could bit off the soft dough sprinkled with fennel seeds and struggle with the layer of cream that would form on the surface of his coffee and milk. He motioned to loosen the tie he wasn't wearing at that moment―the knot on his throat was what really bothered him..