We sit on the curb. “Do you think she will? Get away with this?”

Nate shakes his head. “No, but even if he wins, he loses. We may not go to trial, but Billy won’t walk away unscathed. That’s how these things work.”

“A few days ago, you said the exact opposite.”

“A few days ago, I hadn’t talked to Peter or been to court. Now I have. So, yeah, I’m worried. Plus, Billy is acting like this is no big deal. Like this girl isn’t fucking up his whole life.”

“I think he’s in shock, Nate. He doesn’t know how he feels.”

“So let’s set him straight. Let’s drive to Hawkins Cove, build a fire, have a come-to-Jesus.”

“Southampton is out of range. His monitoring bracelet?”

“Fuck.” Nate’s face crumples. “He really is a prisoner, isn’t he?”

Twenty minutes later, Billy appears in the distance, a blur of joyful fury. Running takes him to a place where he’s free and at peace. His head is thrown back. His arms move like pistons. Bathed in the golden glow of the sun, he looks like a Greek god.

“Can you believe that kid is our brother?” Nate asks, marveling.

“He’s not a kid anymore.”

My brother’s body is both a work of art and a machine. He didn’t come to running until high school, but it changed everything in his life. He was miserable at Groton and begged to come home. But when a teacher suggested he join the cross-country team, around the same time he went through a growth spurt, a star was born. By fifteen, Billy had an ideal sprinter’s body. He gains and loses weight easily and has a higher percentage of what’s called “fast-twitch” muscle, so he excels at explosive sports that demand force and speed.

Billy is intense and obsessive when he finds something he likes. Running was no exception. He trained four days a week, eleven months a year. He competed around the state then across the country, breaking records, winning medals, and impressing recruiters. For our family, seeing him run was thrilling, but so was seeing him gain confidence. Now he’d introduce himself without being prompted. He had friends, went to parties. It was a revelation, like watching time-lapse photography of a flower in bloom. But despite his physical transformation, Billy was still inexperienced with girls, and his shyness persisted in college. He was like an innocent kid, naïve and trusting—the ideal target for Diana Holly, a manipulative woman seeking a boy to mold however she pleased.

* * *

As the sun sets, Nate, Billy, and I head out of the park. Our shadows stretch along the pavement, so it looks like we’ve multiplied and are walking with a crowd. The air has grown chilly, and under my tank top my sports bra is damp.