The Losers by David Eddings

cabdriver carry up his bags and turn on the heat. Then he had the cab take him to the shopping center at Shadle Park, where there were a number of stores, a branch of his bank, and a supermarket.
    The shopping was tiring, but he went at it methodically, leaving packages with his name on them at each store. His last stop was at the supermarket, where he bought such food as he thought he would need to last him out the month. The prices shocked him a bit, but he reasoned that in the long run it would be cheaper than eating in restaurants.
    At last, when the afternoon was graying over into evening, he called another cab and waited impatiently in the backseat as the driver picked up each of his purchases.
    After the patient cabdriver had carried up the last of the packages and come back down, Raphael climbed to the top of the stairs, stepped out onto the roof, and locked the door behind him with an immense feeling of relief.
    “There, you little bastards,” he said softly to the city in general, “try to get me now.” And then, because the night air was chilly, he hurried inside to the warm brightness that was home. He locked the apartment door and closed all the drapes.
    He put a few things away and made the bed. He fixed himself some supper and was pleased to discover that he wasn’t that bad a cook, although working in the tiny kitchen was awkward with the crutches. After dinner he unpacked his suitcases and hung his clothes carefully in the wardrobe. It was important to get that done right away. It was all right to live out of a suitcase in a hotel, but this was his home now. Then he bathed and sat finally at his ease in his small living room, secure and warm and very pleased with himself, listening to the scanner murmuring endlessly about the terrón from which he was now safe.
    For the first few days there was an enormous satisfaction with being truly independent for the first time in his life. At home and at college there had always been someone else in charge, someone to prepare his meals and to look after him. The hospital, and to a lesser degree the hotels where he had stayed, had been staffed. Now he was alone for the first time and able to make his own decisions and to care for himself.
    He puttered a great deal, setting things first here, then there, arranging and rearranging his cupboards and his refrigerator. When his belongings finally arrived from Port Angeles, he dived into them with enthusiasm. He hung up the rest of his clothes and spent hours meticulously sorting and placing his books and the cassettes for his small but quite good tape player in the low bookcases. He rather lovingly ran his fingers over his cassettes—the usual Bach, Beethoven, and Brahms and the later Romantics, as well as a few twentieth-century compositions. He worked to music after that. He kept very busy, and the days seemed hardly long enough for everything he wanted to accomplish. The apartment was small enough so that he could move around quite easily in it, and he felt very comfortable knowing that the door at the top of the stairs was locked and that he had the only key.
    And then, after a week, it was done. Everything was arranged to his satisfaction, and he was quite content.
    He stood in the center of the room and looked around. “Okay, baby,” he said quietly to himself, “what now?” His independence was all very fine, but he finally realized that he didn’t have the faintest idea what he was going to do with it. His life suddenly loomed ahead of him in arid and unending emptiness.
    To be doing something—anything—he crutched outside ontothe roof, although the air was biting and the leaden skies were threatening. It was only midafternoon, but the day seemed already to be fading into a gloom that matched his mood.
    A light in the upstairs of the house next door caught his eye, and he glanced at the window. The man in the room was talking animatedly, gesturing with his hands. Several cats sat about the room watching