Con’ brought them to him, his face dark and bewildered.

Danny stepped into his pants and then found his shirt hanging over the foot of the bed. He slid into it, one careful arm at a time, and considered his father and brother. “Look, I’ve played it your way. But I can’t anymore. I just can’t.”

“Can’t what?” his father said. “You’re talking nonsense.” He looked at the old black man with the broken leg as if for a second opinion, but the man’s eyes were closed.

Danny shrugged. “Then I’m talking nonsense. You know what I realized yesterday? What I finally realized? Ain’t a fucking thing made—”

“Ah, the language!”

“—made sense in my life, Dad. Ever. ’Cept her.”

His father’s face drained of color.

Danny said, “Hand me my shoes, would you, Con’?”

Connor shook his head. “Get ’em yourself, Dan.” He held out his hands, a gesture of such helpless pain and betrayal that it pierced Danny.

“Con’.”

Connor shook his head. “No.”

“Con’, listen.”

“Fuck listening. You’d do this? To me? You’d—”

Connor dropped his hands and his eyes filled. He shook his head at Danny again. He shook his head at the whole ward. He turned on his heel and walked out the door.

Danny found his shoes in the silence and placed them on the floor.

“You’re going to break your brother’s heart? Your mother’s?” his father said. “Mine?”

Danny looked at him as he pushed his feet into his shoes. “It’s not about you, Dad. I can’t live my life for you.”

“Oh.” His father placed his hand over his heart. “Well, I wouldn’t want to begrudge you your earthly pleasures, boy, Lord knows.”

Danny smiled.

His father didn’t. “So you’ve taken your stand against the family. You’re an individual, Aiden. Your own man. Does it feel good?”

Danny said nothing.

His father stood and placed his captain’s hat on his head. He straightened it at the sides. “This great romantic notion your generation has about it going its own way? Do you think you’re the first?”

“No. Don’t think I’ll be the last, either.”

“Probably not,” his father said. “What you will be is alone.”

“Then I’ll be alone.”

His father pursed his lips and nodded. “Good-bye, Aiden.”

“Good-bye, sir.”

Danny held out his hand, but his father ignored it.

Danny shrugged and dropped the hand. He reached behind him and found the papers Luther had given him last night. He tossed them at his father and hit him in the chest. His father caught them and looked down at them.

“The list McKenna wanted from the NAACP.”

His father’s eyes widened for a moment. “Why would I want it?”

“Then give it back.”

Thomas allowed himself a small smile and placed the papers under his arm.

“It was always about the mailing lists, wasn’t it?” Danny said.

His father said nothing.

“You’ll sell them,” Danny said. “To companies, I’m assuming?”

His father met his eyes. “A man has a right to know the character of the men working for him.”