Well, okay, cool, Arthur's just going to nod and move to the left instead of speaking, because the emotional constriction of his throat makes it feel like he's trying to inhale a bowling ball. He slows as his cane skips off the edge of the first step, moves his fingers at about waist height until they find the rail, and then, gripping it, exhales the last of the air from the bottom of his lungs.

He feels pathetic. As if Parker found a stray cat and nursed it back to health, only to turn around and find it even more mangy and flea-bitten than before, even more of a mind to claw and bite. But Parker is still holding out his hand to it.

"I think you just love feeling like Sisyphus." And the cat can still give him shit for it.