The flight—seven hours, a few movies, some subpar food—passed quickly, though he couldn’t sleep; he greeted dawn over Ireland with desert-dry eyes but a kind of lightness, like up here in the plane he was made of air. Ireland stretched out, fresh, sparkling, so green.

It was shocking in its beauty.

Maybe it was the sleeplessness, maybe just the anxiety and relief in doing something new, but flying in over Ireland was—he was euphoric. He’d never seen anything like this place, and the grass and rocks and beaches breathed out with all of the possibilities of life—teeming and wild and unknown, mysteries to be unraveled but never fully understood. The plane tilted and circled, and he was drawn toward the earth like an arrow finding its target. As the wheels hit the tarmac, he felt something click in him, as if he’d been missing a piece of himself, as if he had just realized the absence of a limb as it regrew. His feet seemed to meld into the ground as he entered the airport and yet he was buoyant. He had a fire in his head.

He knew he could wait in the airport—read, or watch other travelers, or catch a bit of sleep—but he...

He felt like he needed to get out.

Like a part of him belonged here.

He walked out into cool air and ducked into a black taxicab that seemed to materialize before him.

“Where to?”

He had, despite his fey mood, no idea. And did he have—he felt in his pocket for the money clip Jason Daugherty had given him, stuffed with pounds and euros, and yes, of course, Quinn had snuck in a piece of notebook paper with a list of murals.

The nag.

“Um.” He passed it up.

“Bit of a tour, then?”

“Yeah, thanks.”

At least he’d have something useful to report to Quinn in his first letter back.

The driver kept up a running commentary in an almost impenetrable accent. Jack let his voice wash over him, staring out the window at a foreign city, eyes soaking up shades of gray as the shipyards went by. He remembered something from some history class—the shipyards had been bombed in the Second World War. Now they were complete, towering cranes fragmenting the blue sky, industrial and almost violent in their starkness like the areas of Baltimore he’d never explored.

He thought about the kind of people he hadn’t met at Gwynns. Children of industries which functioned with calloused hands and strong backs. A legacy of hard work. Of a kind of struggle that he, despite his upbringing, had never had to face.