One lace is new in the package. The other is still on the shoe, faded. You prop the scuffed white canvas sneaker on the lowest step of your building’s entry, the one that always holds a faint smudge of bike oil even after heavy summer rain. The plastic lace package crinkles loud enough to make…
Every step on the tile makes the same squeak. The other shoe is quiet. You shift your weight back and forth on your heels, testing the noise to make sure you didn’t imagine it, and sure enough, every time your left heel presses into the grout line, a high, reedy chirp cuts through the hum…
Something thick is under your heel. You pull the shoe off to look. The crumpled edge of the insole juts up right where your Achilles presses, half peeled away from the shoe’s base, crusted with a faint dust of sidewalk salt from your walk home. You prop your hip against the Doorstep Bench, socked foot…
You can slide a fingernail under the cap. It flaps when you walk. You’re still standing on your apartment mat, one boot propped on the lowest step of the Doorstep Bench, rain dripping off the heel onto the coir weave. You wiggle the edge of the rubber toe cap again, wincing when you see the…
You tied it twice this morning. It was open again by lunch. You’re crouched on your entry mat now, prodding the crumpled lace end of this canvas low-top, rain spattering the toe where you darted through the drizzle ten minutes back. The other shoe’s knot sits tight, smooth, no fraying where it rubs against your…
The tongue is under the laces on one side. The top of your foot is bare against the eyelets. You just jogged up three flights of stairs in the light drizzle that started halfway through your commute home, and you’d been consciously shifting your weight to your right foot the entire climb to keep the…
You can see the crack when you bend the shoe. It was not there last week. You’re still balanced on one foot outside your apartment door, rain dripping off the hem of your coat onto the welcome mat, the un-cracked left shoe still laced tight on your foot. You set the split right shoe down…
The broken lace is on the table. A spare is somewhere in the junk drawer. You huff a small laugh, because you’d meant to replace the frayed left lace on your white canvas low-tops three weeks ago, when you first noticed the threads pulling apart near the toe. You kick the scuffed pair near your…
The metal ring wiggles. The lace running through it is already frayed. You’re hunched on the Doorstep Bench with one scuffed work boot propped on your opposite knee, rain still dripping off the toe from your walk home. A thread from the frayed lace catches on the sharp edge of the eyelet when you tug…
You feel the fold as soon as your heel drops in. The shoe is still on your foot. You don’t yank your foot out fast, because you know that’ll just crumple the soft suede tab more and leave a permanent crease you’ll be picking at for weeks. You balance on your other foot, one hand…
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