“You should have answered,” he said. His voice cracked. “I thought… I thought you…”
“I know, buddy. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
Sam stood there a moment longer. Then he stepped forward and put his arms around his father, and Greg put his arms around him, and they stood like that in the parking lot of the Lantern with the engine still running and the beer sign buzzing over their heads.
I turned away. I didn’t want to watch. It felt like something that belonged to them.
On the dashboard, through the open truck door, I heard Frank say quietly, “Laura? You still there?”
“I’m here.”
“Thank you,” he said. “There’s a meeting at St. Mark’s at three. Can you get him there?”
“Yeah,” I said. “I can get him there.”
We left the truck in the lot. Greg sat in the back seat of my car. Sam sat in front. Nobody said much. When we pulled up in front of St. Mark’s, Greg sat there for a moment with his hand on the door handle, the way Sam always did outside his school.
