written about the football team.
“I just didn’t think the players would appreciate being described that way,” I explained. “And for what it’s worth? These changes are at my discretion. Editor trumps writer. Sorry.”
Nicholas rolled his eyes. “Whatever. Hey, Alice, have you seen Pulp Fiction yet?”
That Friday night, he borrowed his roommate’s car so we could drive to a megaplex in Burlington to see John Travolta make his comeback. We ended up lingering for so long over Moons Over My Hammy at Denny’s, we never made it to the movie. I don’t remember what we talked about, but I know we were both wearing green corduroy zip-up shirts. The waitress asked if we were twins. At the time, we thought the question was hilarious. Yes, the two of us are Irish and German sides of the same coin: dark hair, green eyes. But I have freckles; Nicholas has dimples. I tan; he burns.
On our way back to school, a deer jumped out in front of the car, and Nicholas swerved to the side of the road to avoid hitting him. We rolled to a stop and he exhaled, loudly. “Did you see how scared he was?”
“I did,” I said, my head full of the quick pulse of blood through my ears. The deer had been so close, I’d seen the wild look in his eyes and the razor-thin grooves in his antlers.
Looking past Nicholas, through the driver’s side window, I noticed three rolls of hay in a field lit by the moon. Along the horizon, the Adirondacks rose and fell in a dark line, looking like a row of women in strapless dresses wearing body glitter made of stars.
We sat there for a minute before pulling back onto the narrow ribbon of Route 7. We were quiet. This wasn’t when he kissed me for the first time; that was later, on a pleather college-issue couch, in the middle of a video of Fast Times at Ridgemont High . But that pause in the car was the beginning of something, and I knew it was important.
• • •
“Alice?”
“Yes?”
“Can I ask you a favor?”
“Anything.” We were lying in bed, staring at the ceiling.
“Can we not tell anyone about this? It’s really embarrassing.”
“Of course. But, Nicholas, this happens to a lot of people. Law firms are notoriously—”
“No, I’m serious. I’m going to need clients and I don’t want anyone thinking of me as some sad sack.”
“Who would think that? Are you kidding?” (The words passed over flashed through my mind like subtitles in a poorly translated movie. I banished them immediately.)
“Alice, I’m serious. You need to promise this is just between us.”
“I promise.”
“Especially your dad.”
“What about my dad?”
“I don’t want him to know.”
“Okay, Nicholas, but eventually we’ll have to tell him.”
“I know. I just want to . . . live with this decision a little bit before I hash it out with him. He’ll have his own opinions and—well, honestly, I don’t want to hear them right now.”
“Okay.”
I remembered my dad at Nicholas’s law school graduation, his lanky frame folded into a plush chair at Carnegie Hall. The dean was firm about holding applause until the last juris doctor accepted her diploma, but when Nicholas strode across the stage, baby-blue robe shining in the spotlight, my dad rose up in the middle of the audience. Just stood there, ramrod straight, no sound except the thump of his chair folding closed, wearing an ecstatic grin.
My mind reeled with people I might talk to in strictest confidence—my brother, Will; my mom; my friend Susanna; one of my college roommates—but then I focused on my own potential to be a hero in this private family drama. I would forge ahead, quietly, full of grit and grace. I would channel my grandmother, who moved to Boston from County Roscommon when she was eighteen, married an underemployed charmer who died when she was pregnant with their sixth kid (my dad), raised her family on the top floor of a Dorchester triple-decker while cooking for afancy family in Winchester, and