The reality is, his family can no longer afford the rent on the house in another part of the city that a church friend helped them with, so they may be forced back. But it is just as well, he said: “Our home is in that neighborhood,” though he worries that he has little means to make repairs.

Things in the neighborhood seemed to have settled down. Another neighbor that afternoon, too, was cleaning up her house with the idea to move back soon. But with a 12-year-old daughter, she fretted over taking the chance.

“I am going to see how things look in the next couple of weeks,” said the woman, Ana, who was too afraid to give her full name. “If the soldiers have control, if the gang does not come around for rent, it may be time to come back.”

Pastor Rivas said he would leave for the United States if there were a legal way to do it. But the long wait and cost for a visa makes that idea impractical, he said. And he does not have the $6,000 or more to pay a smuggler.

His son Jorge dreams about life in the United States or even another part of Honduras. He is torn about the idea of moving back to the neighborhood; he misses friends but is not even sure how many are still there. He knows roughly 10 have made it to the United States or Mexico.

But he fears a repeat of the worst in the neighborhood.

“We always had to throw ourselves to the floor and pray one of the bullets doesn’t get you,” he said. “We were always locked in there. It wasn’t a lot of fun.”

He paused, searching for a way to make a stranger understand.

“You go to birthday parties, right?” he said. “There used to be birthday parties and house parties. Now, there aren’t any because with so many people there, it gets the gang’s attention, and sometimes they would kill people.”