The drive out of New Orleans was as beautiful as when he had first come back, but even the Cajun music on the radio could barely lift his spirits. He had hoped his return to the French Quarter would bring him comfort, but he had been running from a sorrow that had consumed his life.
He would visit again next year to check on Jem, and maybe even drop by the Zydeco Festival, but now he was heading back to Los Angeles in hopes of sloughing off the decay of something far darker than anything he could ever have imagined. Sam knew that eventually he would find happiness again, but he would never forget. He clung to the words Renee Oleyant had told him when he bid his final farewell: “We honor the dead by remembering, not by forgetting.”
He had loved two women, each differently–one good, and on
