Daniel told me how a man tried to save him on the street, how he was stopped for two hours caught up in a Jesus conversation. He just wanted bread and cheese from the market. Those people are relentless. They want recruits.

I spent my last night in Baltimore with him. It turns out that we’ve both worked at a Shoprite and he knows the hospital I was born in. We talked about animal parts, like cow's tongue, that you could buy in the grocery store’s meat department. He said he stocked shelves but never made much progress because he had terrible OCD and was constantly fixing the same arrangement of cans.

 He picked me up in a car with a broken window covered in a garbage bag and duct tape and drove me to the harbor. The boat he lives on was one of the smallest in the marina, besides the tiny boats that are rented out for a day, but I loved it. I watched families in crisp, white boating clothes that were probably from LL Bean walk along the docks and a group of girls wearing plastic leis, clambering out of a rented boat in short dresses and heels. Then there was me and Daniel. He looked like he’d been on a deserted island for a few months and I felt different than everyone else. I liked that we were the odd ones out.

The cabin space below was cramped, six by six feet, but it was cozy. There was a tiny kitchen table and stove with bags of food and a tea kettle hung overhead. At the top of his spice rack was a tin of Lady Grey tea. When I told him that’s the only kind I drink, he said it was the favorite of the first person he fell in love with. I sat on the back of the boat and smoked a cigarette. A pair of male ducks swam over. I said they were probably a couple, which Daniel also thought.

He made a meal of Indian food for us and a kettle of tea. He had painted the walls inside blue and nailed a framed photo of his grandmother to one, next to a shelf of Russian eggs that were glued into their holders. I think I’ll remember every detail of that boat. We talked about Baltimore pizza and the conveyor belt ovens, which I’ve taken more notice of around the city.

When he asked if I wanted to go out in the boat I agreed, so long as he brought me back.

The harbor skyline looked beautiful from the water, with warm lights and a sky turned red lavender with pollution. The city looked so calm. I could forget everything that was happening there and the people seemed to have disappeared.

He had built all of his own rigging for the sails and we ran into some problems, but it went well, especially considering it was the first time he’d taken the Edward Lee out since January. (Edward Lee? I think it was. It’s his father’s name). A sail came undone from the rope and he lost his hat, and at one point the boat tipped over and most everything inside the cabin fell to the floor, including a pan of melted butter.

We laughed at the pirate ship that bounces around the harbor with tourists and listened to wedding announcements that were blaring from a restaurant, or a ship, I couldn’t tell which.

After a few hours we docked and cleaned up everything that had fallen and was covered in a thin film of butter. It could have been worse. The bottle I gave him to throw into the ocean survived.

I had stuffed a few pieces of fabric, a note, a photo of my parents at their wedding and a flower into an empty bottle of Gordon’s dry gin. I told my sister a few days later and she was angry with me. “Those photos are supposed to stay in the album.”

I tucked a letter into his spice rack and he packed two pipes with sweet-smelling tobacco. I wanted to stay for another cup of tea, but I knew I had to go back.

He took a parking ticket from the windshield of his car and added it to a pile of at least ten. We stopped at Rite Aid for cigarettes and I gave him one. “Now I’ll teach you how to smoke a cigarette,” I said after my pipe had gone out.

I hugged him twice and he told me to keep the pipe. I’ll never see him again. I loaded the van the next day with all of my belongings, and one of the last things I brought was that pipe. I held it in my mouth when I carried my last armful to the car, and my father asked where I got it and why the hell I had it.

I wonder if you’re reading this. I know most people call you Dan, but you always seemed more like a Daniel to me.