Maybe I watched so much TV during the days following Katrina because I couldn't turn off my photographer's inner lens. It saw more than the water and filth, it saw the survivors' eyes crying for help. Many cried with their mouths too, cursing at camera crews and pleading for rescue.
Some also cried with cardboard signs:
WHERE'S FEMA?
PAGING BUSH & CHENEY!
LOOTERS WILL BE SHOT
KATRINA KILLED MY BABY
NAGIN LIED
During a commercial I sat back on the futon and relaxed my neck and shoulders. I hadn't noticed how sore they'd become from my leaning forward and craning toward the TV hour after hour. That realization made my eyes hurt. And once again I was drawn back to the memories of September 11th and felt the toll the constant coverage had taken on my mind and soul.
I decided some fresh air and lunch in Little India would serve me well. As was my custom, I carried my camera along. The walk was energizing.
I was sitting in Pio Pio's in Jackson Heights when my cell phone rang and displayed an unfamiliar number from area code 504.
"Hello?" I answered.
The man's low smoker's voice was unfamiliar. "This Luke Millward?"
"It is."
"Jerome Harris callin' from New Awlins."
I switched my cell phone from one ear to another. "What can I do for you?"
"Your father is Charles?"
"Yes." I wondered if this call might come. I never imagined I'd be sitting in a Peruvian restaurant.
Just then I remembered a larger-than-usual package I'd received a couple of months ago from Dad. I hadn't bothered to open it. It was the most recent in a string of packages that arrived every six months or so from some new zip code. They usually contained an odd trinket Dad had bought or occasionally one of his random personal belongings he wanted me to have.
I'd always wondered if sending old car keys or a lucky dice keychain from Vegas was his way of making peace. When I asked, he'd said he just wanted me to have those things in case something ever happened to him.
Like all the others packages, it was stacked in a corner of my apartment building's storage closet.
"Nobody's seen 'im since a couple Sundays ago. Night before--"
"Katrina."
"Tha's right. He's been teachin' and playin' with me and my guys at a place on Chartres Street for on about seven months. Livin' in a place in the five-four."
"Five-four?"
"Lower Ninth, son."
I imagined his body was one of those rotting in a public restroom or floating facedown and bloated under a bridge somewhere.
So this is what it feels like to be an orphan. "I'm sorry to hear that Homme Nike Kobe 10 Noir Argent Pas Cher , sir." The words carried unexpected uneasiness. My father is dead.
"Don't be sorry, Luke. Get on down here and find 'im."
"Excuse me?"
"It's why I'm callin'."
"Won't someone just call me when he's found?"
"You kiddin'? You must not got a TV."
Point taken.
"Even the good-meanin' guys down here don't have the time for much of that." He paused. "Come find your father, Luke Millward. For alls we know he's alive somewhere. Most our cell phones aren't workin'--he could be hurtin' somewhere, or in San Antonio or up north. We're hopin' he is.
"Yes, sir. Good-bye. And thanks." I hung up and stepped out of the restaurant and into the noise of the city. I moved through the crowded afternoon streets toward the subway.
I don't remember riding it home.
That night I sat in my apartment with Jordan and listened as she repeated back to me the details of Jerome's call. She seemed to hear things in the story I hadn't said.
"This guy, Jerome, he was your dad's best friend."
"Who knows?"
"And your dad is getting married to this guy's sister--or was anyway . . ."
"Probably true, but still, how did he find you? You sure he doesn't want money or something? Maybe he thinks you're loaded because you helped your dad when he needed it."
I'd forgotten I'd ever told her that. "I haven't sent Dad money in a long time. Not since last time we spoke."
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