At the word the pack of them come spilling out into the lobby, abandoning tablets and drawings and games and deli bags, barking like seals park park park, making a familiar game of it, yelping pork pork pork, laughing, piping the call of small ritual. They get ready: the chaotic one flutters about untangling coat and backpack and headphones from their fathomless cubby, and the artist dashes about urgently looking for her phone, frantically shuffling through backpack pockets and then rushing off, and a young Taurus puts on her shoes s l o w l y, and, overcome with excitement, the littlest one jumps around in the midst of the fray in no coat and no shoes, and three teens, coats and shoes thrown on, play a waiting game where they attempt to boop each other on the head, bumping heedlessly into everyone else, and another one comes down the hall and looks at everyone and then looks at me, bundled in hat and scarf and coat and park sneakers and asks are you going to the park and I say yes and he says I’m coming too, wait for me and I say hurry and then one of the boopers asks who are we waiting for and I say the littelest one and the latecomer and the Taurus are all still getting ready and the boopers remember they’re independent travelers and declare they are going to go ahead and I say you’re independent travelers, go for it knowing full well they’re going to and make a bunch of noise in the stairwell and wait for us at the bottom of the stairs and finally the Taurus has her shoes on and the littlest one, in both coat and shoes, is fully out the door now, holding it open, hovering on the landing, and I say okay we’re actually going now and the latecomer straggles over pulling on his coat and the artist emerges from the bathroom and the fluttering chaotic one brandishes their phone at me and asks if I know this song as I pass the threshold with them, into the stairwell and down through the winding passage and out into the snow.