"Yeah, that’s right," Alex told her. "I was hiding. I mean, not so much from those contrabandista medicos that I burned down in Nuevo Laredo—they’re a tough outfit in their way, but hell, they don’t really give a shit about me, they’ve got a line of no-hope suckers outside that clínica that’s longer than the Rio Grande. I was hiding here from my own goddamn life. Not my life, but that thing that I do, that other people call living. I am real close to dead, Carol. It’s not all in my head, I’m not making this up. I can’t prove to you what’s wrong with me, but I know it’s the truth, because I’ve lived in this body all my life, and I can feel it. There’s not much left of me. No matter what anybody does, no matter how much money anybody spends, or how many drugs they pump into me, I don’t think I’m gonna make twenty-two."