The last shift at the Elmore Stamping Plant was March 14th. The shift started at six and ran until two-thirty in the afternoon, which was the same as any other shift for the past forty years, except for the fact that it ended the plant. Tom had worked the line for twenty-two years and had spent two weeks trying to decide whether to take something from the plant as a keepsake or to leave empty-handed. He had decided, by the last day, to leave empty-handed, but standing at his station at the end of the shift he picked up a stamping die anyway and put it in his bag. The closing ceremony, if it could be called that, was a short speech from a plant manager who had been there for four years and who thanked everyone for their service, which was the correct thing to say. Tom had expected to feel something more specific than what he felt, which was a general heaviness with no particular object. He had prepared himself for the loss of the job and the pay and the structure. He had not prepared himself for the loss of the specific sound the line made, which he had stopped hearing years ago and only now noticed was gone. He drove home on surface streets instead of the highway, which added eleven minutes. He still had the die in his bag. He did not take it out when he got home. He put the bag in the closet and made coffee and sat at the table and looked at nothing specific for twenty minutes, which is what he did on any weekday afternoon when his shift ended.