Mrs. Fletcher(77)

Eve bristled at his tone.

“Brendan’s very intelligent. He’s just a little lazy sometimes.”

“Well,” Torborg said, after a diplomatic pause. “You know him better than I do.”

“You’re his advisor,” she reminded him. “Maybe you have some advice?”

Torborg gave the matter some scholarly contemplation. “I think it’s totally up to Brendan.”

“That’s it?”

“It’s his choice. If he wants to be in college, he should probably start acting like it. And if he doesn’t, he should probably find something else to do.”

“What if he doesn’t know what he wants?”

“Then he should take some time off and figure it out,” Torborg told her. “That’s my recommendation. I took a gap year after high school and it was one of the best experiences of my life. I went backpacking all over Southeast Asia—Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia, Nepal . . .” He paused for a moment, savoring the memory. “God, Nepal was beautiful.”

“Sounds nice,” Eve said, right before she hung up. “I hope you took some pictures.”

*

Ted came over the following evening for an emergency family dinner, the three of them gathered around the kitchen table for the first time in seven years. It felt unexpectedly normal—comforting, even—to have him back in the house, everyone in their assigned seats, order temporarily restored in the universe.

At the same time, for all the familiarity of his presence, Ted seemed like a different person, not just older and heavier—Eve was pleased to note these changes, though both things could also be said about her—but calmer, too, no longer radiating the impatience that had always seemed like such an essential part of his personality. He even chewed more slowly than he used to.

“This is delicious.” He jabbed his fork at Eve’s sausage mac and cheese. “I don’t get to eat like this at home.”

“I forgot about the gluten,” she said. “I hope you don’t mind.”

“Do I look like I mind?” Ted grinned at Brendan. “Your mom’s a great cook. Always was.”

As gratified as Eve was by the praise—he hadn’t always been so effusive—she was a little irritated by his air of relaxed good cheer, as if this were a pleasant social occasion rather than a family crisis. It was a part of their marriage she remembered all too well—that feeling of being out of sync with Ted’s moods, of always having to swim against his tide.

“How’s Jon-Jon?” Brendan asked.

“He’s okay.” Ted nodded thoughtfully, affirming his own statement. “Doing a lot of drawing at school. He’s very interested in circles. Other shapes, not so much.”

“He seemed pretty good,” Brendan said. “On Parents Weekend.”

“That was fun,” Ted agreed. “Just bad luck with that plane.”

Eve had heard about Jon-Jon’s tantrum on the BSU quad. She couldn’t imagine what that would feel like, to see your child in such pain and not know how to help him, and all those strangers watching.

“You know what I did last week?” Ted said. “I went to an indoor batting cage. Haven’t done that for years.”

“I used to love that,” Brendan said.

“Let’s do it,” Ted told him. “We can go to Five Guys afterward. Make a night of it.”

“Cool,” said Brendan, though Eve doubted it would ever happen. Ted was great with the plans, but less impressive with the follow-through.

It went on like that for a while, Ted and Brendan talking football and debating the finer points of The Walking Dead, a show they both loved that Eve refused to watch. She couldn’t help feeling a little jealous of their connection. The conversation rarely flowed like this when it was just her and Brendan at the table.

“Well,” she said, when everyone’s plate was clean. “Can we maybe talk about the elephant in the room?”

“Really?” Brendan muttered. “The elephant in the room?”

Ted accepted the parental baton with obvious reluctance.

“Tough semester, huh?”

Brendan nodded, unable to hold his father’s sympathetic gaze.

“You want to go back and finish up?” Ted posed the question in a soothing voice, as if he were addressing a child. “It’s only another month or so.”

Brendan shook his head.

“Any particular reason?” Ted asked.

Brendan closed his eyes and shrugged, a gesture more suited to an eighth grader than a college student.

“I hate it. I’m not learning anything.”

“Well, whose fault is that?” Eve snapped.

Ted silenced her with a cautionary hand. Somehow he always got to be the good cop.

“You sure about this?” he asked.

Brendan nodded. Ted sighed and looked at Eve.

“All right,” he said. “I guess that’s that.”

“That’s that?” Eve repeated the phrase in disbelief. “That’s all you have to say?”

“I don’t know what else—”

“So it’s just sixteen thousand dollars down the drain?”

“Eve,” he said. “Don’t make this about the money.”