It took Luther and Maria three trips to bring out all the food. As soon as they were seated, they bowed their heads. Neil didn't realize what was happening until Luther started to pray. He tipped his head a little belatedly and sent Andrew a sideways glance. Andrew wasn't even pretending to pray, even if on his other side Kevin was politely playing along. Andrew had an arm hooked around the back of his chair and drummed the tines of his fork against the tabletop in awful counterpoint to Luther's words.

Luther had to be offended, but maybe he'd learned long ago not to beg respect from Andrew. When he finished, he straightened and began serving food from the closest platter. The others took that as a cue, but Neil had to wait on either Andrew or Luther to finish before he could get any food. Luther noticed his idleness and looked at him.

"Are you religious?"

"No," Neil said.

Luther gave him a minute to elaborate, but Neil gazed back in silence. Finally Luther frowned in disapproval and pressed, "Why not?"

"I'd rather not get into it," Neil said. "I don't want to start a fight."

"That's a first," Andrew said with a laugh. "You're usually so opinionated, too."

"I don't see how such a question constitutes as a fight," Luther said to Neil.

"Is that really the question you want to start with, Dad?" Nicky asked. "You don't want to ask how we've been or how we're doing at school or how the season is going? We had a game in Florida yesterday. We won, you know."

"Congratulations," Luther said automatically.

"Yeah, you sound like you mean it," Nicky said, but he sounded more sad than annoyed. An uncomfortable silence followed, but Nicky broke it with a half-hearted, "When did you repaint the kitchen?"

"Two years ago," Maria said. "The contractor goes to our church. It looks nice, doesn't it?" She waited for Nicky's quiet agreement, looked to Luther for inspiration, then said, "So what are you studying, Nicholas?"

Some small part of Neil had assumed Nicky was exaggerating how estranged his family was, but Nicky was in his sophomore year and his parents still didn't know what he was majoring in. Neil didn't know if Maria was asking now because she was interested in getting to know her son again or if she was just trying to fill the silence. He hoped it was the former; the latter was too much to stomach. Neil's mother might have been awful and violent at times, but she was fiercely devoted to him. They were two halves of a miserable whole, inseparable co-conspirators.

"Marketing," Nicky said. "Erik's cousin works for a PR firm in Stuttgart. She thinks she can get me in after graduation if I make the right grades."

"You're going back to Germany?" Maria shot her husband a startled look.