Oscar gazed emptily at the back of the bus. The blank shell of the bus suddenly struck him as an alien and horrible thing. It had stolen him from his home and the woman in his bedroom. The campaign bus had kidnapped him. He turned his back on the bus and began walking with his phone, randomly, toward the tangled Texan woods. "No," he said. "I know. It’s the work. It’s our careers. I did it first. I took on a big job, and I left you. Didn’t I? I left you alone, and I’m still gone. I’m far away, and I don’t know when I’ll come back."