The Catholic Church was, for Emilio, one of the few continuous threads in his life. Both of his parents died when he was young, and he hadn’t been in contact with his sister since he’d returned to Puerto Rico in 1983. Everything he remembered had changed, decayed or collapsed. Everyone he had known had died or moved away. Even Alejandro, with whom he had shared his first apartment in the Bronx, had disappeared one day into the city, leaving neither rent nor forwarding address. Years later, when Emilio had progressed from bus boy to bartender to nightclub manager at El Capitan, Emilio had seen Jandro’s picture on the nightly news in conjunction with a homicide.  Emilio didn’t think he had done it, necessarily, but he also didn’t put stock in friendships the way most Americans did. Events early on in Emilio’s life had led him to believe that the only help or justice in this world belonged to God.