…Live Together as Brothers or Perish Together as Fools. -- MLK Jr.

It is late at night, and the sounds in the quarry begin to fade from the boisterous swagger of the pack to the natural rhythms of this troubled bit of wilderness surrounded by city. Distant cars hurtle down the interstate, passengers rarely turning from the focus of reaching their destination to notice the beauty of city lights reflected on the river or the skyline with its myriad of brilliantly lit glass eyes and flashing antennae silhouetted against the starry sky. Nearer to the den, the occasional tractor-trailer down-shifts as it passes under the railroad bridge at one end of the quarry and climbs the hill to the crossing at the other end, heading for the factories that ironically squatted on what could be some of the prettiest riverfront property in the city. Within the steel fences that outline the quarry, the grounds are eerily quiet. Very little life stirs on the barren soil, and a hungry owl silently circles only once before moving on to stalk the lot of the television station across the tracks for mice. Without light to attract insects, even bats find better hunting elsewhere.

Inside the concrete halls of the old gravel plant the lights have been dimmed. The dogs were fed and their kennels for the night, their heavy breathing a low, slow rumble in the cavernous shop. The supplies brought in from the shopping trip lay sorted on the long kitchen counter, a scavenger-hunt mix of big-box store cleaning supplies, hardware store finds, and Habitat for Humanity Restore treasures. The den would take a lot more to make it even passably comfortable, but at least it would start function like a real home.

And like a home, the sounds drifting out of the rooms upstairs blend into a comforting, familiar noise that eases the pack into sleep rather than interrupting it. Deep, harmonious baritone snores let everyone know that Bodycount is already sleeping heavily; the other men resting in the dorm with him had better be sleeping before his twilight a capella begins or risk being kept awake for hours.

From the girls’ dorm a different sound strays under the old sheet tacked up in the doorway. Sweaty clothes lay discarded carelessly about the room, the sweet smell of pot and incense lingers around candles set carefully atop an old crate in the far corner of the room. The two pack-sisters lie in a tangle of sheets on the air mattress, pressed together by the weight of their bodies as the mattress sags in the center. Despite the frustrations, accusations, and tensions of the day, or perhaps more accurately because of them, the two women cling tightly to each other, alpha and omega, pale and dark limbs intertwining in a yin-yang of living flesh. Face to face they lie there, noses touching cheeks. As one inhales, the other exhales, the very breath in their lungs a reciprocal gift of life from one to the other.

As they lie there, sleeping, music thrums softly from Keys’ iPod, just loud enough to be heard in the hall outside their dorm.

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A family is a place where minds come in contact with one another.
-- Buddha