“Sure, you are.”
“There’s no reason to rush through college,” Cassie said. Andrew looked like he wanted to crawl under the table. This definitely wasn’t the time to grill him about school.
“I need to urinate,” her dad announced.
“Do you want Andrew to show you where the restroom is?”
Her father gave her an irritated look as he maneuvered his boot out from under the table. “I know where the damned bathroom is.”
“Go with him,” Cassie mouthed, but her dad was already clomping off on his own. She was about to urge Andrew to follow anyway, but something in his face stopped her.
“What is it, sweetie?”
“I need to tell you something.”
“Okay.” She felt a rising dread. She’d had a feeling there was more, but what else could it be? What they knew was bad enough.
Her father had made it halfway across the restaurant then gotten confused and now was hovering near the coffee pots. Sheshould go help, but across the table something was happening to Andrew. In the space of thirty seconds, his face had crumbled.
“I’m not going back to school,” he said in a rush. “Don’t try to convince me. I can’t do it.”
She blinked. “But finals are next week. You’re almost done with the year.”
“I keep thinking about what happened. Jack might have brain damage. They don’t know.”
“Oh, that poor boy.” A life ruined. For nothing, a stupid frat party. And Andrew was a casualty as well. Not in a physical way, of course, but so traumatized he couldn’t bear the thought of returning to school. “Sweetie, not going back doesn’t help him. I agree it’s not a good idea to be in the frat house, but we can get you a hotel room or an Airbnb for the last couple of weeks. You’ve worked so hard all semester, you can’t just walk away.”
“I can’t!” He gave her an anguished look. “I just can’t do it.”
“Andrew.” She lowered her voice. “Exactly whathappenedthat night?”
“I told you.”
“The whole thing?”
He swiped fiercely at his eyes but couldn’t quite look at her.
She waited, but he didn’t say anything more. “Have you told Dad?” she said finally.
“Dad won’t fucking listen.”
Her eyes opened up at his language, but she had no time to respond because her father was making his way back to the table.
“He’s looking for the restroom,” Cassie said when a waitress intercepted him. He let the waitress take a gentle hold of his elbow. Maybe they needed someone like that at home instead of Mrs. Macuja, who was turning out to be something of a drill sergeant.
Andrew was breathing in shaky gulps, trying to pull himself together. “I’ve been having nightmares. Where Jack gets up and his head is all bloody but he doesn’t know it. And everyone’s staring at him. Or he’s walking around campus like that and I’m the only one who sees it. No one else even knows anything’s wrong.”
“Oh sweetie.” She scooted around to his side of the booth and wrapped him in a hug. He resisted at first, then gave in with a small shudder. She pressed him to her, breathing in the sweet, peppery smell of him, a little sweaty from the train. “I can’t make you go back, but you have to at least take incompletes. Otherwise, we’ll lose the tuition. It’s a lot of money.” She rubbed his back, something that had always soothed him as a baby. She felt the sharpness of his shoulders, the half-grown angles of him. Whatever had happened, he was her son.
“How about talking to somebody?” she said. “That might help.”
“I don’t know,” he moaned. “All I know is I can’t go back.”
“All right, we’ll figure it out.” But her heart was breaking. For him. For the other boy.
For the way life could change in an instant.
...
