“He can’t keep up with you guys,” Ben said. “You, Graham, Morgan—you guys can handle your shit and still pass your classes and like function in front of faculty, but Ahmed can’t. He hardly goes to class anymore.” Ben knew he himself wouldn’t be able to keep it together if he started doing any drugs, and he wanted to ask Tommy how he had learned to do it.

“You don’t give Ahmed enough credit.”

“What?”

“You don’t see what he’s good at.”

“All right, what’s he good at?”

“You’d know if you were his friend.”

Ben was too exasperated to speak for a long second.

“Why would you even hang out with Ahmed at all? You’re cool. He’s not cool.” Ben was embarrassed to have said it this plainly. “And he got Ennis kicked out.”

Tommy laughed again. “I hated Ennis. When I was a newb, Ennis hit golf balls at me with a tennis racquet. And it wasn’t even Ahmed’s fault. Ennis would have gotten kicked out for hazing some other newb.”

“Seriously,” Ben said, “there’s no reason for you to take him up.”

Tommy shook his head. He was amazed and half impressed that Ben, this antenna of a person, had ventured into his closet. But Ben was also so owned by what the school had told him to be. “You don’t see him.”

“What?”

“Ahmed’s not ashamed of himself. Everyone else here, their worry makes every move for them, just the fear of putting a foot wrong. But like, my Chapel seat is near Ahmed’s? And he sings the hymns. He sings them loudly. No one else does that.”

With a sudden filling of his throat Ben saw Ahmed, blazing with unselfconsciousness, walking flat-footed to the bathroom in his robe, carrying his shower caddy. Hutch arrived in Ben’s mind, and he knew that it was exactly this that affronted Hutch so thoroughly: Ahmed’s original, unveneered lack of shame. But now the marks of guile had started to appear.

Then another idea came to him and was out of his mouth before he could stop it. “Is he paying for all the weed?”

“Ha!” Tommy’s eyes went wide in disbelief. “You—of all people—you’re the one coming to my room, accusing me of using Ahmed for his money? That is just amazing.”

So it was out. Of course Ahmed had betrayed him.

Ben didn’t say anything. He expected Tommy’s face to turn mocking, gleeful, for him to leave the room now and pull aside everyone he saw on the paths, telling them about Ahmed’s paying for Ben. But Tommy’s face stayed solemn, and then turned heavy, as though he were holding up some familiar weight of his own.