“Okay, look,” I started, “I know you’re not happy to see me, so you don’t have to smile like that.”
Robby didn’t even pause. He immediately turned away and was about to open the door when I locked it. His hand clutched the handle.
“I want to talk to you,” I said, now that we were both encased within the car.
“About what?” He let go of the handle and stared straight ahead.
The division in the car asserted itself, as I had expected it to.
“Look, I want all the bullshit dropped, okay?”
He turned to me, incredulous. “What bullshit, Dad?”
The “Dad” was the giveaway.
“Oh, shit, Robby, stop it. I know how miserable you’ve been.” I breathed in and tried to soften my voice but failed. “Because I’ve been miserable in that house as well.” I breathed in again. “I’ve made everyone miserable in that house. You don’t have to pretend anymore.”
I watched his smooth jaw clench and then unclench as he stared out the windshield.
“I want you to tell me what’s going on.” I had turned in my seat so that I was facing him. My arms were crossed.
“About what?” he asked worriedly.
“About the missing boys.” There was no way to control the urgency of my voice. “What do you know about them?”
His silence emphasized something. Around us, kids were piling into cars. The cars were maneuvered out of the circular drive while the Porsche sat stationary against the curb. I was waiting.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said softly.
“I talked to Ashton’s mom. I talked to Nadine. Do you know what she found on his computer?”
“She’s crazy.” Robby turned to face me, panicked. “She’s crazy, Dad.”
“She said she found correspondence between the missing boys and Ashton. She said the correspondence was dated after these boys disappeared.”
Robby’s face flushed and he swallowed. In rapid succession: contempt, speculation, acceptance. So: Ashton had sold them out. So: Ashton was the traitor. Robby imagined a streaming comet. Robby imagined traveling to distant cities where—
Wrong, Bret. Robby imagined escape.
“What does this have to do with me?” he asked.
“It has a hell of a lot to do with you when Ashton’s sending you files to download and Cleary Miller is sending you a letter and—”
“Dad, that’s not—”
“And I heard you in the mall on Saturday. When you were standing with your friends and someone brought up Maer Cohen’s name. And then you all stopped talking, because you didn’t want me to hear the conversation. What in the hell was that about, Robby?” I paused and kept trying to control the volume of my voice. “Do you want to talk about this? Do you want to tell me something?”
“I don’t know what there is to talk about.” His voice was calm and rational, but the lie was turning its black head toward me.
“Stop it, Robby.”
“Why are you getting mad at me?”
“I’m not getting mad at you. I’m just worried. I’m very worried about you.”
“Why are you worried?” he asked, his eyes pleading. “I’m fine, Dad.”
There it was again. The word “Dad.” It was a seduction. I momentarily left earth.
“I want you to stop that.”
“Stop what?”
“I don’t want you to feel that you have to lie to me anymore.”
“What am I lying about?”
“Goddamnit, Robby,” I shouted. “I saw what was on your computer. I saw that page with Maer Cohen. Why in the hell are you lying?”
He whirled toward me in horror. “You went into my computer?”
“Yeah, I did. I saw the files, Robby.”
“Dad—”
He momentarily forgot his lines. He began improvising.
(Or better yet, the writer suggested, he sent in the understudy.)
Suddenly Robby started smiling. Robby slumped forward with exaggerated relief.
And then he started laughing to himself.
“Dad, I don’t know what you thought you saw—”
“It was a letter—”
“Dad—”
“It was from Cleary Miller—”
“Dad, I don’t even know Cleary Miller. Why would he send me a letter?”
I asked the writer: Are you writing his dialogue?
When the writer didn’t answer, I started hoping that Robby was being genuine.