Walter Washington, also known as Pops, is a former NYPD police officer who drinks too much and carries a lot of hostility towards a lot of people. Only six months before the start of the play, he lost his wife to illness, and his unresolved emotions about his marriage as well as his role as a husband continue to bother him and to play out in interactions with his son, Junior. He lives in a rent-controlled apartment on the West Side of Manhattan with Junior, Junior’s girlfriend, Lulu, and a friend named Oswaldo, whom Pops treats as a guest, refusing his offers of monetary contributions to the rent.  

When Pops was still on the force, he was shot by a white police officer in what Pops describes as a racist act. After eight years, Pops is still waiting for a substantial payout from the city that he believes will offset the injuries to his body and to his dignity; Pops feels that the injury has stolen his masculinity as well as his identity and self-confidence, so he feels justified holding out for more money. In Pops, one can perceive the individual fighting against many different systems: civic entities, age, grief, and addiction. His fate remains largely ambiguous at the end of the play.