Mark came in thinner and grayer and forty pounds down from the man who told my wife not to call me.

He is fifty-one now.

He said what men say at these things: remorse, programs completed, a job lined up with a cousin, a desire to make amends to the families.

He did not look at Noah.

Not once in two hours.

I watched for it the entire time, and I want to be honest that some part of me was hoping he would, because I wanted to see what Noah’s face would do, and that is a thing about myself I have not enjoyed learning.