No, she wasn't leaving any group.

"Not and go back to the way life felt before," Marla says. "I used to work in a funeral home to feel good about myself, just the fact I was breathing. So what if I couldn't get a job in my field."

Then go back to your funeral home, I say.

"Funerals are nothing compared to this," Marla says. "Funerals are all abstract ceremony. Here, you have a real experience of death."

Couples around the two of us are drying their tears, sniffing, patting each other on the back and letting go.

We can't both come, I tell her.

"Then don't come." I need this. "Then go to funerals." Everyone else has broken apart and they're joining hands for the closing prayer. I let Marla go. "How long have you been coming here?" The closing prayer. Two years. A man in the prayer circle takes my hand. A man takes Marla's hand. These prayers start and usually, my breathing is blown. Oh, bless us. Oh, bless us in our anger and our fear. "Two years?" Marla tilts her head to whisper. Oh, bless us and hold us. Anyone who might've noticed me in two years has either died or recovered and never came back. Help us and help us. "Okay," Marla says, "okay, okay, you can have testicular cancer." Big Bob the big cheesebread crying all over me. Thanks. Bring us to our destiny. Bring us peace. "Don't mention it." This is how I met Marla.

THE SECURITY TASK force guy explained everything to me.

Baggage handlers can ignore a ticking suitcase. The security task force guy, he called baggage handlers Throwers. Modern bombs don't tick. But a suitcase that vibrates, the baggage handlers, the Throwers, have to call the police.