“Your father went along with that?”
“My father chooses his priorities carefully,” he said. “Which is another way of saying he d
idn’t care as much as my mother did about our names. He wasn’t into naming us after dead relatives or anything like that. He was into ‘Get it over with. I’ve got a meeting.’?”
I laughed, even though he didn’t even smile when he said it.
Then he did smile. “I see you’re someone who appreciates a dry but honest sense of humor. I like that.”
“What’s your father do that he has to have meetings?” I asked.
“He’s the CEO of a major telecom company, Broadscan. It has international reach, so we’ve done some extensive traveling when my mother felt like going along. I’ve been to all the major European capitals, like Paris, Madrid, Rome. What’s your father do?”
“Runs a software company. My parents are divorced,” I added, hoping that would end the questions about family before they could really start.
“My parents should be divorced, but my mother is made of Teflon.”
“Meaning?”
“The things other women would rage over just slide off her. I think she stayed married to my father just to get revenge.”
“Revenge? For what? What’s he done?”
“That’s a list, arm’s length,” he said. “Besides, I don’t like talking about parents, do you?”
“Sometimes,” I said, “but most of my classmates would agree with you, I think. My roommate certainly would.”
“Claudia, right?”
“If you come up with my social security number, I’m not going to be surprised.”
This time, he really laughed. “I can see that there will be little or no pretending with you,” he said, and was silent as he made one turn and then another. “About a minute more to the Dust Mansion.”
“That’s close by.”
“I practically fell out of my bed to get here the first day.”
“Are we going in?”
“Not tonight. My mother is not someone who tolerates surprise visits. Even by me alone,” he added. “So how do you like this school, really?”
“I like it. I hope that’s cool to say.”
He shrugged. “I like most of my teachers. It’s like anything else, I guess. It is what you make of it.”
“I believe that, too.”
He glanced at me to see if I was sincere or simply humoring him. “Do you really?”
“Yes, but beware. I’m not in the habit of agreeing with everything people say, especially people I meet for the first time. It gives the wrong impression.”
“You sure you haven’t taken fencing lessons?”
“I’m sure, but maybe I should.”
“You’d be a natural.”
Would I? I wondered. Is that what Haylee really did to me, made me forever defensive with any boy I’d ever meet? How much would any boy have to tolerate in order to develop a relationship with me? Would anyone think I was worth it, especially after he had learned the truth about me? Could I find someone with that sort of patience and sensitivity? Guys our age weren’t exactly willing to overlook anything unpleasant. It was the snapshot generation. You could meet, fall in love, and break up the same day. There was little time for true compassion.