I had watched those clips on my phone between meetings, and felt the warm, cheap glow of a man congratulating himself for taking such good care of his aging father.

And here he was.

On a sagging mattress propped up on cinder blocks, in a windowless room by the canal, while my discarded ex-wife knelt beside him and wiped his chin and fed him warm soup she had bought, I would soon learn, with money earned from collecting aluminum cans out of the rain.

“Dad,” I said.

It came out of me broken.

I crossed the room and dropped to my knees beside the cot.