…

We are at the end of Henry’s sojourn and nearly four months have passed, what seems like a lifetime for both.

Michelle is back at work and using drugs to deaden the experience.

Henry is dreading going back home, because he has nowhere else to go, and he will not be seeing Michelle.  That ship, pardon the pun, has sailed.

Felix, The Turk’s enforcer (The Turk is the man who owns the parlours that Michelle and her friends work in, and the man to whom Michelle has an obligation when he forgave her drug debt) goes to see him and tells him Michelle is off to see Henry.

She had found out where and when he was returning and planned to meet him and tell him the truth, and maybe why they could not be together.  The Turk is sure she’ll return.  Now she’s back on drugs, he says Henry will be disgusted and that’ll be the end of it.

In her current state, far from how she looked back in Morganville, he might be right.

…