On the morning of June 12, 2016, a Sunday, I woke up in my Manhattan apartment to see several missed calls and voice messages from my mother. “I need to know where you are,” her first message started out. “I saw on the news what happened. Please call me back.” When I called her back, she picked up and sighed deeply. “Oh, thank god. I know you just like to pick up and leave without giving anyone notice. I thought you could have been there. In Orlando. At Pulse.”  Advertisement Advertisement My