CHAPTER 7

Fifteen hours later, I’m standing at the edge of the security zone, watching out for Danny to come through concourse B of the Louis Armstrong International Airport in New Orleans. My flight got in an hour and a half before his so I told him I would rent a car and wait for him to give him a ride to his hotel. He seemed more lost than me when I reached him to break the news.

He must have been at work at the bar judging from the noise level in the background and I was a little surprised he took my call. I played our conversation over and over in my head on the flight, analysing if there would have been a better way or time to call. I also replayed all of my recent conversations with my dad, all of them painfully too short and full of meaningless updates and banter.