His face was hollowed and pulled down on one side, the unmistakable signature of a stroke.

His hair had gone completely white.

It took me several seconds to understand what I was looking at, because it was the last thing on earth I expected to find at the end of that muddy alley, and when I understood it, the floor seemed to tilt beneath me.

It was my father.

Arthur.

For the past six months, I had been wiring three thousand five hundred dollars every month to my younger sister, Maya, for our father’s care in a luxury senior living community out in the suburbs.

Every single week, Maya sent me photographs and short videos — my father walking in manicured gardens, my father in a private therapy session, my father eating in a bright, elegant dining room.