Page 13 of The Rulebreaker
I do, but I don’t list them.
“Just stick to the grind. Put the work in, and the results will come. Then you’ll have options for next year, and since I’m your agent, we’ll make sure whoever wants you will have to pay handsomely for you.” He shoots me a toothy smile and digs into his meal.
As I put butter and jelly on my bread, I hope he’s right, because I’m sacrificing a lot. Penelope has been mine in every way that mattered since before I knew what that meant, and I’m doing everything in my power to keep her out of the wreckage of a life I’m still trying to hold together.
Chapter
Seven
Dr. Nora Bell
* * *
I’ve learned to read the room before the door even closes.
Today the room says that they didn’t speak in the car, and whoever suggested this topic can go dive off a short pier.
That would be me, for the record.
I settle into my chair and let the silence do its job for a moment. Outside, a city bus hisses past the window. Someone’s dog barks twice. It’s apparent we’re still in the “I don’t want to talk about my feelings” stage.
“Last week,” I say, keeping my voice level, “we talked about starting at the beginning. I’d like to go back to the divorce. You were nine when your parents divorced, but you two were separated at eleven, correct?”
The word divorce lands in the room like a bulldozer dropped from the top of Willis Tower.
On the far end of the couch, Foster pulls at a loose thread on his sleeve. He’s been doing that for three sessions now.
Decker has his eyes trained on the middle distance. He does that when he’s deciding how much of himself to share.
“It wasn’t a big thing,” Foster says, which is the most telling sentence a person can offer me. “People get divorced.”
“People do,” I agree. “What happened afterward?”
Neither of them answers immediately. But something moves through the room. Not discomfort, but more like the feeling before a storm when the air pressure changes and everything gets very still.
“Dad took me south.” Foster’s voice is even and sounds like a practiced answer. “He had a connection down there. A coach who thought I had something worth developing.”
I turn my attention to Decker. He’s barely nodding, as though he still can’t stomach hearing this chapter of their story.
“So you were separated,” I say. “Not just across town, but across states?”
“Yeah.” Foster shifts in his seat.
“How did you stay in contact?”
Decker shifts, an echo of the same movements his twin just made. “We had these—” He stops. Starts again. “Mom got us both these phones. Just for calls. No texting, basically. The plan was terrible, and it cost a fortune.”
“Sunday nights,” Foster murmurs.
Decker turns toward him. It’s the first time their eyes have met this session.
“Sunday nights,” Decker confirms. Both of their lips almost tip into a smile.
I let the moment sit. Two boys with a bad cell plan on Sunday nights. There’s a whole childhood compressed into those three things.
“What about pictures?” I ask. “Seeing each other’s lives?”
Foster makes a sound that isn’t quite a laugh. “It predated cheap smartphone plans. You didn’t just send pictures whenever you wanted. That wasn’t a thing. We weren’t old enough for email really. Sometimes I’d send him a baseball card from whatever team was local.”
