They teach you to dress your cowardice in the language of loyalty, until you cannot tell the difference, until you can stop answering a good woman’s phone calls and tell yourself you are protecting everyone’s future.

I was twenty-nine years old.

I had every advantage a person can be given.

And I used all of them to become a man who let his family make his decisions for him, exactly as Gabriela had said on her way out the door.

Chapter 5 — A Bottle of Water

I stood up before my mind could stop my body.