Trevor said nothing.

“Do you think he could tell?” Carol asked.

“Think he could tell what?”

“That we both lied to him?”

Trevor considered that. “I hope not.”

FOURTEEN

IT was a long walk to Jessica Frommer’s house, but Brian Gaffney wasn’t troubled by that. Besides, it was closer than going back to his place and getting his car. He patted the front pocket of his jeans. At least he still had his keys. The bastard—or bastards—who’d done all this to him had stripped him of his wallet and his phone, but at least he’d be able to get into his apartment and start his car.

It sure was nice to get out of the hospital. Even though his family had come to see him, the visit had stressed him out. When his sister and mother started arguing, all he wanted was for them to leave. Once his mother left to find Monica and his dad, Brian decided he’d had enough. He wanted out of there before they returned to his room and started bickering all over again.

He felt badly for his father. It wasn’t his fault that Brian had decided to move out. He’d already been thinking about doing it. He’d landed this job at the detailing shop, and while it didn’t pay a fortune, it gave him enough money to rent a tiny apartment. It wasn’t like rents in Promise Falls were all that high. The town had lost so many jobs in the last few years—and a year ago, so many people—that a lot of rental units were going empty. On top of that, a lot of people had decided to leave, move away. The town had had such a run of bad luck that many feared it was never going to end. Best to get out before things got worse.

But even though Brian believed it had ultimately been his own decision to move out, his mother blamed his father for it. Albert had fully supported his son striking out on his own, learning to live independently. While Brian was no dummy, he was willing to concede he was no Steve Jobs or Mr. Spock or Sheldon Cooper—okay, those last two weren’t real, but still—and that sometimes people could get the better of him, confuse him.

Like this whole hepatitis thing. They were going to test to see whether he was positive for it. To Brian’s way of thinking, positive was good, so if he tested positive, that would mean he didn’t have it. But the doctor had explained to him that a good result would be a negative result, which would mean he did not have hepatitis.

Fuck, who knew. Why they couldn’t make things simpler, he didn’t know.

His dad had told him that if he ever had a question about anything, all he had to do was phone him. But he’d be okay out in the world, Albert assured him. He’d do fine.

And Brian was doing fine. Until he wasn’t.

The really good thing about being on his own, though, was privacy. Having your own place, you could come and go as you pleased. You could eat whatever you wanted. You didn’t have to explain yourself.