But first, you and I must come to an agreement. To be perfectly blunt, if you wish to maintain your anonymity, you cannot stay in the same town as me and I cannot stay in the same town as you." Brendan nodded, saying, "Agreed." "And you'll let me tell you my name when I feel like I can trust you." "Agreed." "And you'll tell me the truth when I ask you." "Agreed." "And you'll promise to keep this place a secret. Not just from your parents, from your friends, from your acquaintances, but from anyone in the world?" "Agreed." "Agreed." The two men both smiled. ## FORTY-THREE _The Present_ "HELLO?" "Hey, Dad." "How's it going?" "It's good. How are you?" "I'm doing fine. Got the flu and was down for a couple days." "You're kidding, right?" "Wish I was. Sorry I couldn't talk yesterday, I was in the sack by the time you called. Have you talked to Mom?" "No, but she said she'd call back." "Did you get her voicemail?" "Yeah, I called a couple of times yesterday." "And?" "And?" "What did she say?" "I didn't play the messages, and I wasn't about to call her back." "Why?" "Because this is getting old, Sean, so just drop it, okay? I've been through it all. She doesn't want to see you. She doesn't want to talk to you. But if you're going to call back every fifteen minutes, you can come over here and I'll let you in. Got it?" "Yeah." "I'm sorry." "Don't worry about it. Got to get off." "I'll see you soon. Bye." "Bye." He clicked the phone shut and thought about what he was going to tell his father. He didn't like what was going to happen when he said it, but it was inevitable. It was all about the timing, and he'd been over every moment in his head, thinking about each and every choice, as they knew it, he made. He knew he could never get it right. There was no way to have it both ways, to give his father the news but still retain his own privacy. Still, he understood that he was asking his father to put his own relationship with him ahead of his son's. The man had already been through enough, and the pain he'd suffered would never go away. What happened to his son would probably always be there, but he had to make the right choices to ensure that his father never had to learn about it. The man was now happily married, and he still didn't like what he'd learned. He took a breath and let it out, said, "Let's get this over with," and made the phone call. ## FORTY-FOUR I GOT THE NEWS in the middle of dinner. I was at the bar with my family, eating our standard meal of steak and baked potatoes and broccoli. There was no reason for anyone to have noticed I was upset, unless it was from the way I kept looking at my father or my mother. They were both good about not saying anything, though it meant I got to talk to them individually, since I was across the room from them. I couldn't look at them because I could tell they were wondering what I was hiding, and as I'd become fond of saying to them whenever we went out, if you really care about someone, you don't need to know the truth. The phone rang, and I immediately knew who it was. I'd been expecting it. The restaurant phone seemed always to ring, and my cell phone often. This time was different, however. I knew before I answered that it wasn't going to be the person I wanted to hear from. I knew, and it sucked. It was a man's voice, gruff, low. He didn't say anything for a while, just said, "Hello?" I heard the phone click off in my hand, and looked up to see my family staring at me. My mother shook her head at me, mouthed, "Who was that?" I shook my head no, smiled, and said, "It's nothing," but knew I'd be lying, and turned off the phone. My mother said, "What's wrong?" I shrugged, said, "Nothing. I have to go," and hurried out of the restaurant, telling my family I was sorry, but that we had to go. I'd already paid, but I said that was the least of my worries. They were already standing up by the time I got to the lobby, and their shock at my departure quickly became disappointment. I walked out of the building, down to the car, opened the passenger door, and made a gesture for them to get in. My mother frowned, but didn't argue. The three of us drove home in silence. My father asked if I wanted to talk about it, and I shook my head no. ## FORTY-FIVE I WAS STILL driving when she called. "Hello?" "Hey, listen. Can you come home?" "Is everything okay?" "Yeah, but my mom is there and I can't really talk to you about it on the phone." "I can drive in, if it's something we can't talk about here." "Let's get your mom off the phone. I'll be home in thirty minutes." "Okay, I'll be there." I didn't want to tell my mother and I drove home as fast as I could. I was glad she'd changed the subject to my mother, because otherwise I would have had to tell her what my father was doing. I also hadn't told him that I'd invited Sean over. I knew if he found out I was letting my guest room to Sean, he would freak out and probably do the same thing he'd done when I went back to the nursing home to talk to the nurse. I was a smart guy, but he'd found that out already. I loved my father, but he was really a good guy, and he didn't know how to make a decision, and he didn't have to. This wasn't about me, anyway, and the more we debated it, the more he'd dig his heels in, and we'd never actually come to a conclusion. If I was going to make an attempt to come clean with him, I needed to do it when I didn't have to worry about my father looking over my shoulder and calling him names. I knew what he'd say, anyway. It wasn't really about what he said, but what he did. And he said a lot of nasty things, and in one of my less successful parenting moments, I'd told him to stop doing that. "If you don't do that," I'd told him, "I won't tell you where you can shove your anger." "Yeah, right, and where are you going to stick your little finger?" "Anywhere you don't need it." So this time he didn't even try to do anything, but I was aware that he was there with his disappointment. He was not going to let go. I was going to have to let go of him in one way or another. I just hoped that when the time came, I could let it go in a way that protected my mother. ## FORTY-SIX "HOW'D IT GO?" "Not good." "Why?" "I shouldn't even be telling you about this." "Because your mother's home?" "No, I should be the one at home." "Where is she?" "I want to make a phone call first, make sure this is a private conversation." "Okay. Just holler if you need me." "I want to know what I'm doing." "You don't need me." "You're right, I don't. But I want you to know why, in case it turns out to be a bad call." "Fine. What are you doing?" "I'm going to call Sean." "You really want to do this?" "Yeah." "Why?" "I know what you think about him, and I'm not sure you'd want to hear it. He just came by." "He came by? When?" "Today, just a little while ago. A few minutes ago." "Shit." "Yeah. I know, Dad. I get it. It's good. I think it's a good thing. And he told me he's sorry." "Says he's sorry?" "Says it, Dad. Said it twice." "He says it a lot." "This is different." "No shit." "I just feel like I owe it to him, and