Kevin handed Neil his racquet back and the three went to the locker room. Aaron and Nicky were already in the showers when they arrived. Neil heard water running and sat on a bench in the changing room to wait.

"We're not taking you by Abby's like that," Kevin said. "Wash up."

"I won't shower with the team," Neil said. "I'll wait, and if you don't want to wait on me, just go on ahead. I'll find my way there from here."

"Nicky going to be a problem for you?" Andrew asked.

Neil didn't like the look of his manic smile, but he liked Andrew's veiled warning less. "It's not about Nicky. It's about my privacy."

Kevin snapped his fingers at Neil. "Get over it. You can't be shy if you're going to be a star."

Andrew leaned toward Kevin and put a hand to his mouth, but he didn't bother to lower his voice. "He has to hide his ouches, Kevin. I broke into Coach's cabinet and read his files. Bruises, you think, or scars? I think scars, too. Can't be bruises if his parents aren't around to beat him, right?"

Neil felt cold all over. "What did you just say?"

"I don't care," Kevin said to Andrew, ignoring Neil.

Andrew, in turn, ignored Kevin and gestured at Neil. "Showers aren't communal here. Coach put in stalls when he built the stadium. The board wouldn't pay for it—they didn't see the point—so it came out of Coach's own pocket. See for yourself if you don't believe me. You don't believe me, do you? I know you don't. That's probably for the best."

Neil barely heard him. "You had no right to read my file!"

He regretted not flipping open the folder when Wymack put it down by him at the stadium. He couldn't believe Hernandez had said such things in his letters to Wymack. He knew Hernandez had to explain his situation, or at least as much as Hernandez understood it to be, to prove Neil was a fit for the Foxes' halfway-house team. Neil still felt betrayed, and on its heels was anger that Andrew had dug up those papers about him.

Andrew laughed, sounding delighted to have crossed such a personal line. "Relax, relax, relax. I made that up. We were locked in Coach Arizona's office to watch your game on the local TV station, and he said our secret meet-and-greet would be easy since you always shower alone last. Told Coach he still couldn't find your parents. Coach asked if they'd be a problem, and Arizona said he didn't know because he hadn't met them a single time. Said they spent a lot of time commuting to their jobs in Phoenix and no time at all checking in on you. But I'm right, aren't I?"

Neil opened his mouth, then closed it before he gave Andrew a piece of his mind. Andrew wanted him to react, so Neil had to reel it in. He sucked in a slow breath through gritted teeth and counted to ten. He only made it to five before Andrew's smile was too much.