What Happens to Goodbye(48)

“I’m watching it,” I said. “It’s a good game.”
“It’s an amazing game from, like, the best freaking vantage point ever,” he corrected me. “I can’t believe you’re basketball royalty and were so secretive about it.”
“I’m not basketball royalty,” I said. “And what is that, exactly?”
“Peter Hamilton is your stepfather.”
“Stepfather,” I repeated, a bit louder than I probably should have. I cleared my throat. “Stepfather,” I said again.
This got his attention. He looked at me, then down at my mom and the twins. “Right,” he said slowly. Then he gave me a look that made me feel sort of weird, vulnerable. Like I’d said more than I had. “Well, thanks for the invite. Seriously.”
“You’re welcome.” He was still looking at me, though, so I pointed at the court. “Hello? I can’t believe you’re not watching this.”
Dave smiled, then turned back to the game, just as his phone buzzed again. This time, I didn’t look at it, instead focusing on the players running past in a blur, the ball whizzing between them.
Now, at Boeuf, I told myself to be patient. I showed up with a boy—of course my mother would make assumptions. “Just neighbors,” I told her. “He lives next door.”
“He seems very nice,” she said. “Smart, too.”
“He only said, like, two words to you,” I pointed out, just as one of the twins let loose with a holler, protesting something.
“What?” she said, leaning in closer and cupping her ear.
“Nothing.”
Dave was now returning to the table, where he promptly crashed into the back of my chair, knocking me sideways. “Sorry,” he said as he groped for his chair and sat down“It’s just so freaking dark in here. I walked into another room and joined some other table.”
“Whoops.”
“Tell me about it. I don’t think they could see me, though.” He picked up the menu, and my mom, watching him, smiled at me as if I had in fact admitted something to her in his absence. To her he said, “Thanks again for the ticket. The game was incredible.”
“I’m so glad you enjoyed it,” she replied. She looked at Peter, who was still talking, his phone pressed to his ear, then said to me, “He should be done with all this press in a second. Then you can tell us everything that’s going on with you.”
“Not much to tell,” I said as I flipped through page after page of wines by the bottle, trying to get to the food options. I could hear my dad in my head, critiquing this as well. Spend enough time with a restaurant troubleshooter and you start thinking like one yourself. “Just school, mostly.”

“And your father is well?” she asked, her voice cheerful, polite.
I nodded, equally civil. “He’s fine.”
My mom smiled at Dave, for some reason, then took a sip of her wine. “So what else? You must be doing something besides going to school.”
A silence fell across us, during which all we could hear was Peter, talking about a strong offense. I could feel my mom watching me, waiting for something else she could seize and keep. But I had nothing else to share, no more to say. I felt like I’d already given her my time, and my friend. It was enough.
As I thought this, though, Dave cleared his throat, then said, “Well, there’s the model we’re working on.”
My mom blinked, then looked at me. “A model?” she said. “Of what?”
I thought about kicking Dave, but wasn’t sure I could see him well enough to make contact. Instead, I just glared in his general direction, not that he noticed. “It’s of the downtown and surrounding areas,” he told my mom, as the waiter glided past, filling our water glasses. “For the centennial. They’re doing it above Luna Blu.”
I felt my mom glance at me. I said, “Dad’s restaurant.”
“Really,” my mom said. She was still looking at me, as if expecting me to pick this up and run with it. When I didn’t, she said, “That sounds interesting. How did you get involved in it?”
I was pretty sure this comment was directed at me, but I didn’t respond. So Dave, after helping himself to a roll and a pat of butter, said, “Well, to be honest, in my case it was kind of required.”
“Required,” my mom repeated.
“Community service,” he told her. “I got into some trouble a couple of months back. So I owe hours to the, you know . . . community.”
I felt my mom kind of start at this. “Oh,” she said, glancing at Peter, who was still on the phone. “Well.”
“He got busted drinking at a party,” I told her.
“It was stupid,” Dave admitted. “When the cops showed up, everyone else ran. But they said to stay where I was, and I tend to follow directions. Ironic, right?”
“Um, yes,” my mom said, looking at me again. “I guess it is.”
“Truthfully,” he said, clearing his throat, “the volunteering hasn’t been bad at all. As it turns out, my parents are a lot stricter than the courts. They’ve basically had me on lockdown ever since the whole thing happened.”
“Well, I’m sure it was very alarming for them,” my mom said. “Parenting is so difficult sometimes.”
“So is being someone’s kid,” I said.
Everyone looked at me, and then my mom reached for her water glass, keeping her eyes straight ahead as she took a sip. So typical. Dave was openly confessing to an arrest and yet I was the bad one here.