I focused on getting out of there and followed the road along the side of the school building. But around the corner, I got stuck behind two school buses. Kids swarmed my car, talking loudly, on their phones, headphones in place. I wasn’t used to this side of our new community, the noise and clamor.

Knock. Knock.

Two short raps on my car window startled me. Greg Hendricks was leaning in, waving. I rolled down my window. “Hey,” I said, glad to see a familiar face. “What are you doing here?”

“Debate team has a tournament next week. We’re prepping.” He was freshly shaved, a blue-checked collar peeking out from his gray jacket. He pointed at the unmoving buses. “I don’t think you’re going anywhere for a while. And I’m on my way to get coffee across the street. Why don’t you pull over and walk with me?”

Why not? I needed a reprieve from my fight with Lily before I went back to my glamorous day of home improvement projects. And I’d meant to reach out to Greg anyway after talking to Kendra on Sunday, but had been too distracted by Lily’s misbehavior. I swung my car to the curb and shut off the engine.

“It’s weird to run into you here,” I said as we started walking. “I always think of GU campus as your domain.”

“Ah, yes. Well, it still is,” he said. “You know, you should stop by sometime. I’ll give you a tour. A lot has changed since you were there.”

“I’ll bet,” I said.

“Your turn,” he said. “How’d you get stuck at the school?”

“I was torturing Lily.” I hesitated, realizing the reason I was here actually had everything to do with his daughter. “I don’t know if you heard, but she and Ellen skipped yesterday.”

Greg gave a quick bark of laughter. “I suppose I should apologize for my bad influence daughter.”

“Lily can make her own decisions,” I said. “And apparently she makes terrible ones.”

“Well, Ellen needs to take responsibility, too. This doesn’t shock me, tragically. She’s been suffering from ennui. She says school doesn’t challenge her. I really think she’ll excel in college.” He smiled. “Or die trying.”

He opened the door of the coffee shop, and I caught a whiff of his woodsy cologne as I passed. I remembered all the times we’d gone to a coffee shop on campus, sitting close, pretending to discuss a research paper. The table had been carved over the years with student names, cryptic messages, stick figures. If it was still there, somewhere along the side, in a small corner, was the GH + TP Greg had etched one day with his pocketknife, cheesy as it was.

But that was a long time ago. I’d been a different person. We both had been.