In this light only my hand is reflected. My computer screen is angled down so I can see out easily, and into five other windows in my neighborhood. Across the back alley and down, through a room-sized sliding window is a five foot flat-screen. A black baby’s face fills it. You can count the flies. A top quality TV. Blue light surges out of the window as the camera cuts to another part of the hospital tent.

I gave $20 to the Red Cross. That was two days after the disaster. I didn’t waste time.

The bay adjacent to the one in which I sit — my neighbor, Jackie’s — is lit from within. Even by pressing my face on the cold window glass, I can see only the left third of her screen. The right side of a woman’s blond head, but from the graphics at the bottom I’m sure it’s Fox. Yeah, now I can see it’s Monica Crowley. Things are starting to add up. I was on my own case about stereotyping Jackie because she drives one of those Jeeps built to look like a Range Rover. And I heard her tell her son (they were on the front steps eating pizza), “Don’t throw it away. Do you know how many starving children there are in the world?” But the way she tossed the line off, she was being facetious. Now, even with that partial view of the screen, I see the top of the same baby’s head. Fox is using the same clip. There are easily fifty flies from the forehead up. It’s impossible to tell if the child is alive.

My notes. All over the desktop. Checkbook. I gave another $100 on January 23rd to Haiti Helpers. What’s the matter with people? Their site shows that as of today, they’ve only collected $58,350. Is this a scam?

It must be 7 pm on the dot. On three of the screens I can make out, I see the opening credits of Seinfeld. Now two. An old woman in a robe just turned off her set.

Now Barney calls. Have I heard anything about some children dying as they were being evacuated by an old twin-engined Beechcraft? I said, yeah, I think I heard something. While we talked, I googled Downed Beechcraft + Haiti. I suddenly remembered the details and I filled him in. He and his wife (really, his wife — she’s got the money) gave $5,000 to Samaritans Purse. It was targeted strictly for Haitian midwives who would be seeing to some 7,000 mothers-to-be. The implication being they’d be targeting more money soon for other problems. It was awkward. The call was ending. I could hear in his voice the anxiety that he wasn’t going to be able to slip it into the conversation before we said goodbye.

Seinfeld on the big screen and there are about five adults and teenagers in the room. P.O.V. in front of windshield, Elaine and Jerry in car. I think it’s the masturbation episode. I am not missing this.

$5,000. Can’t Barney keep that kind of stuff to himself?