A very tiny grey hand reaches out from the green of the arbor vitae
to the compost pile and snatches a potato peel, a scrap of pizza crust,
the rind of a melon. A startling apparition, especially from the monitor
of Peter’s security system. What is that? The dogs that come later, one
white and one black, are easier to identify. They chow down on the
discarded leftovers while the rest of the dogs in the neighborhood
complain about missing the party. Now that is a caterwauling.

Two days later he sees them: a whole family of raccoons crossing the
road beneath the cone of a streetlight, cubs ushered between the
vigilant adults who are hustling into the shelter of dark as fast as their
legs will carry them. Has it been a week since he heard the footsteps
on the roof and draped the skylight in their bedroom with a paisley
pashmina? Now the sound seems less sinister. It was not a voyeur but
a raccoon.

His landlady calls with a grainy picture from Google Earth asking him
what he is burning on the roof. He has to pause. He has not been on
the roof. He peers intently at the image of what looks like a pile of
kindling—a stack of slightly regular strips which are blackened as if
charred. Days later his dad has the answer: tar leavings from the
roofers. Could have been there for years. The raccoons, contrary to
my fervent imaginings, are not roasting marshmallows overhead, but
simply migrating to the vitae.