“Started when you were twelve, huh?” She strikes a match and holds it up for me. “So who’s the lucky girl?”

“Her name’s Sarah. Sarah Foster.”

“How long have you been together?”

“Uh … I guess technically we’re not.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means … I guess it just means we’re not together right now.”

“You broke up?”

“No.”

“Zach, I’m confused.”

“Okay, it’s like this: I’ve loved her for a couple of weeks now, but I’ve known her for years.”

“Does she love you?”

“Yeah. I’m totally certain of that.”

“She’s told you?”

“No, more like a look I got one night, when she was eating fried chicken with her dad.”

“And this look,” Brenda says, lighting a new cigarette off her previous one, “this fried-chicken gaze she gave you. That’s all the evidence you have that she loves you?”

“It’s there, Brenda. You know it when you see it.”

“How often do you talk with her?”

“Well, we haven’t said a word to each other since that night.”

“Oh my God,” she says and explodes into laughter.

“Hey, don’t make fun of me.” But I’m smiling when I say it, because I realize how completely insane this whole thing sounds, but at the same time it feels good to finally speak with somebody about it, especially a woman.

“I’m not making fun of you,” she says, catching her breath. “Sorry.” She pauses. “Okay, so what I’m wondering is why you haven’t said anything to her. I mean, if you’re gonna marry this girl, it’d be nice if you told her about it.”

“I can’t talk to her.”

“What, she doesn’t have a cell phone?”

“I don’t know. It doesn’t matter. I can’t talk to her right now.”

“Why not?”

I tell her about Tank, leaving out the steroid suspicion. Afterwards, she’s silent for a few moments.

“Okay,” she finally says. “Now it makes sense. You’re in love with your best friend’s twin sister, but your best friend is a nutcase who’ll kill you if you make a move on her.”

“Exactly.”

“And the reason he’ll kill you is because this girl’s a female Einstein, and he doesn’t want her to have any boyfriends until she’s at least in college.”

“There,” I say, raising my hands in the air. “That’s all of it.” I lower my hands. “Well, almost all of it.”

“What else?”

“The dad’s a psycho cop and I think he beats them. Well, I know he beats Tank, anyway.”

“Then that explains Tank’s behavior.”

“You mean the ‘like father like son’ kind of thing?”

“Yup.”

“So, what do you think?” I ask. “You’re the first person I’ve told.”

Silence.

“Zach, I think you’re screwed.”

“Screwed?”

“Screwed.”

“Why screwed?”