I listened to him groan and sob like a dying animal, and thought about what his higher power had done for him lately: strangled his daughter, forced him to take her off life support and arrange a funeral eulogized by a monsignor who couldn’t pronounce the name of the girl in the coffin, and then made him an intimate witness to an exploding toddler. It was a miracle he hadn’t started drinking again, and I wouldn’t have blamed him if he did.
