“It’s fine. I hope things get better, though,” I said.

“I doubt it will. I mean, I’m here ready to sleep on the swing.”

“I’d take the slide if I were you. At least you could lay on your back.”

“Good idea.” He smiled. His bottom teeth were slightly crooked but very white. “Maybe I’ll do that.”

I lifted my left wrist to check the time on my rectangle-shaped watch. If I stayed for another minute, my parents, particularly my dad, would call the SWAT team to look for me. He was that protective and paranoid. “Look, I have to get back. My parents will worry, so I’ll see you around?”

“See you around, neighbor.”

I felt guilty leaving him there, and I couldn’t stop thinking about him for the rest of the evening.

For several nights in a row, once the sun had set, I would find something I needed to buy at the mini-mart—excuses to go out and meet Bryan. I’d bring him food and we’d talk about being Hellenicus and rant about all the Royal pain in the asses at school. One week went by and his dad had still not allowed him back home, so I offered to let him stay at my house. In secret, he’d climb in and out of my room using the tree outside my window. He’d sneak in late at night and leave early in the morning before my parents, or any of our prying neighbors, woke up.

We quickly became inseparable, partners in crime, each as silly as the other, and we did everything together. It was hard to describe the connection we had because I didn’t fully understand it myself. It was as if we had always been friends even though it had only been a few weeks. He made me feel comfortable. I was myself around him, and he never judged me. Bryan was the only person I knew who understood what it was like to have a turbulent family life. I trusted him with everything.

Our friendship continued even after his mom finally awoke from her coma, returned home, and brought him home. Bryan would still sneak into my room when the rest of the neighborhood was asleep, and we’d talk for hours. He vented about what was going on at home, his parents’ divorce, and how his mother cried herself to sleep every night, haunted by the fact that she was able to hear his father’s thoughts about the other woman. Bryan cried as he poured his heart out. Together, we agreed that neither of us would ever experience the click—the invasion of privacy was too much. We had seen how it could all go wrong. If only his parents’ minds were not linked, perhaps his mother could have moved on.