Out of the west-northwest, ominous clouds rolled like silent battalions of war machines, driven by a high-altitude wind.  Though the day was still calm and pleasantly warm at ground level, the blue sky steadily vanished behind those thunderheads.

Janet Marco parked her broken-down Dodge at one end of the alleyway.  With her five-year-old son, Danny, and the stray dog that had recently attached itself to them, she walked along that narrow backstreet, examining the contents of one garbage can after another, seeking survival in the discards of others.

The east side of the alley was flanked by a deep but narrow ravine filled with immense eucalyptus trees and a tangle of dried brush, while the west side was defined by a series of two- and three-car garages separated by wrought-iron and painted-wood gates.  Beyond some of the gates, Janet glimpsed small patios and cobbled courtyards shaded by palms, magnolias, ficuses, and Australian tree ferns that flourished in the ocean air.  The houses all faced the Pacific over the roots of other houses on lower tiers of the Laguna hills, so they were mostly three stories tall, vertical piles of stone and stucco and weathered cedar shingles designed to make maximum use of the expensive real estate.

Though the neighborhood was affluent, the rewards of scavenging were pretty much the same there as anywhere else: aluminum cans that could be returned to a recycling center for pennies, and redeemable bottles.  However, once in a while she found a treasure: bags of clothes that were out of style but looked unworn, broken appliances that would fetch a couple of dollars from a second-hand shop if they needed only minor repairs, unwanted costume jewelry, or books and old-fashioned phonograph records that could be resold to specialty shops for collectors.

Danny toted a plastic garbage bag into which Janet dropped the aluminum cans.  She carried another bag to hold the bottles.

As they progressed along the alleyway, under a rapidly darkening sky, Janet repeatedly glanced back at the Dodge.  She worried about the car and tried never to get more than two blocks from it, keeping it in sight as much as possible.  The car was not only a means of conveyance; it was their shelter from the sun and the rain, and a place to store their meager belongings.  It was home.

She lived in dread of a mechanical breakdown severe enough to be irreparable - or irreparable within their means, which was the same thing.  But she was most afraid of theft, because with the car gone they would have no roof over their heads, no safe place to sleep.