It was nearly five-thirty, and Clay had brought Avery and Talia over to Dylan's house. He'd picked them up from school because Ellie, occupied with some tree thing at the school, wouldn't be getting home until later. Initially, he'd planned to ask Dylan if the two of them could take the kids out for pizza, but Dylan had texted him earlier in the day, asking him to come over for dinner, saying he would prepare it. Clay hoped Dylan just wanted to have some one-on-one time with him, but deep down, he suspected something was awry. They still hadn't hashed out what happened at Thanksgiving.

He and the kids entered Dylan's apartment to find him preparing what looked like spaghetti with frozen meatballs and a jar of marinara. Avery and Talia went straight to Talia's room to play with her toys, and Clay sat down on one of the barstools.

Two empty beer bottles sat on the counter, and Clay wondered if Dylan had finished them before his arrival.

"You want one?" Dylan asked.

"Sure."

Dylan grabbed a bottle opener, pulled a bottle of grapefruit lager out of the fridge, and popped it open, before handing it to Clay. Clay took a sip, finding it to be crisp and with only a subtle citrusy flavor. "That's tasty."

"Sure is."

A subtle awkwardness permeated the air, and Clay wondered if Dylan could feel it. It must be because of the Thanksgiving fiasco. Clay had entertained his ex-wife's new husband the entire morning after so that she could take Dylan to breakfast, and he felt he deserved a thank you for that. The two had played video game golf with Avery and Talia and talked about their work, and it hadn't been awful, but he could have imagined many better ways to spend his day. Still, he wondered if the awkwardness between him and Dylan had to do with his own actions and not Dylan's. He'd apologized to Dylan for what had happened with Leah, but it seemed like Dylan could not let go of his grudge.

Clay took a go at breaking the ice. "How did the rest of your Thanksgiving go?"

"Great. Leah was really happy I came over. She couldn't afford turkey, but we had plenty of Hawaiian rolls." Sarcasm tinged his tone.

"Did you feel happy to see her?"

"Of course I did."

"And her son?"

"He's a cool kid."

"Well, I'm glad you went then, Dylan. I'm glad that she makes you happy."

Clay took another few sips of his beer, wondering if he should apologize for not thinking to invite Leah to Thanksgiving. Ellie probably wouldn't have liked that.

"How was Ellie?" Dylan asked.

"Ellie? I think she felt a little flustered. Things between us and your mom were a little awkward after you told her we hadn't actually invited her."

Dylan shrugged his eyebrows up and down, and said, nonchalantly, "Whoops."

He was being rude and disrespectful, and Clay didn't know how much more he could deal with this attitude. "Look, Dylan, maybe we should just talk more. It really seems like you keep things bottled up, and then your anger comes out at inopportune moments, and you end up making bad choices."

"I do have that problem, don't I? I keep everything bottled up. Maybe it's a family problem. Maybe I get it from you."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Nothing. Let's not worry about it right now. Spaghetti's ready, and I'm sure the kids are hungry." Dylan turned his head, and screamed, "Talia! Avery!" before Clay could ask for more clarification.

Avery and Talia led the dinner conversation, telling Dylan about their days. Clay didn't join in, finishing his plate of noodles rather quickly and opening another beer.

After dinner was over, the kids went back to Talia's room, Clay took the dishes to the sink, and Dylan opened up yet another beer, which worried Clay. Rehab had never become a necessity for Dylan's heroin addiction; after he and Katie had detoxed on their own, he'd started going to meetings and gotten a sponsor, during which time he'd agree to give up all substance use—including alcohol. A couple of years later, Dylan stopped going to meetings, and he'd have a drink every now and then, insisting he'd never been addicted to alcohol and that he'd earned the right to drink for pleasure. Clay had believed him, as he would never personally advocate for total sobriety. But lately, Dylan seemed to be drinking heavily. It didn't help that Judy had told Clay to keep an eye on Dylan's drinking before she'd left, implying that she, too, might be worried about a relapse.

As Dylan sat on the couch with his beer, Clay joined him, leaving the dirty dishes in the sink and, after a moment of consideration, said, "I'm worried about you, Dylan."

"You're worried about me?"

"Yes. You've been drinking a lot. And what happened at Thanksgiving? What was that about? And what is this about you learning to bottle things up from me?"

Dylan laughed like his alcohol consumption was funny, and then he pulled something out from under the couch. It looked like a framed photo. Probably the missing photo from the shelf in the foyer.

"What do you have there?"

"This," he says, turning the photo toward Clay. Dylan's and Ellie's faces, underneath graduation caps, smiled back at him from the photo.

"I was wondering where that went."

"I hate looking at it. You know why?"

Clay nodded, but Dylan didn't seem to care, like he wanted to remind him anyway.

"This is the night you betrayed me."

His words brought up one of Clay's most painful memories, the memory of Dylan first confronting him about that night. In that memory, Dylan had said, "Just answer two questions. Alright?"

Clay had nodded, so Dylan had asked the first question. "When did it start?"

"The night of your graduation."

"...Who made the first move?"

Clay had paused then, not wanting to answer, but Dylan had waited expectantly for his answer, so finally, Clay had responded. "I don't know. It was pretty mutual. It just happened."

"No, Dad, it's never mutual, it doesn't just happen, there had to be someone who did something first, even if it was something subtle."

So, with his face in his hands, Clay had revealed the truth. Ellie had made the first move, and Clay had rejected her, told her that it wasn't right for them to be doing what she wanted them to do. But then, mere minutes later, after going into a separate room and letting his thoughts—no, his lusts—stew, he'd reneged.

But Dylan hadn't cared about Ellie's mutual attraction, as he'd asked for no more details; instead, he'd said, "It doesn't matter that you hesitated at first. It matters that you did it. That makes you the biggest piece of shit ever."

"It's not like I meant to hurt you, Dylan."

"It's not like you meant to hurt me? Dad, you've been sleeping with the girl I love, so don't fucking tell me you didn't mean to hurt me."

"That you love? You two are just friends—"

"—That doesn't mean we wouldn't have been together. Someday. It's not like you bothered to ask."

Dylan had looked so vulnerable right then, so pained, that Clay could barely stomach it. Clay had drunk until he'd puked that night, and while some of that had to do with the prospect of being a father again, most of it had to do with that look Dylan had given him. That was the night Clay realized how being a bad father and hurting your child was an act of masochism. Because children were extensions of you. You let them go out into the world where they were so vulnerable to damage, and you felt that vulnerability. It came in forms of anxiety and sadness and paranoia, but you tried to let go because you knew you couldn't protect your children forever. But when you were the one inflicting the damage, you felt it even more. You were hurting yourself, tossing the boomerang and waiting until it came back and hit you in the face, surprised at how surprised you were, because you knew it was coming. Clay had known it was coming. He could have protected himself against it, could've protected Dylan. That look Dylan had given him that night, it hurt Clay so much, because Clay had inflicted that damage.

That was the look Dylan was giving him right then, as he held the graduation photo.

Clay tried to gather himself. "We can put the photo away, if you want. I can take it back to my house and put it in a box in the attic."

Taking it out of the frame, Dylan said, "Or we can watch it go up in flames."

Now words came out of Clay's mouth, and Dylan's lighter started to singe the photo while he held it over a tin trash can. Clay hoped he had a digital copy somewhere, and that this dramatic act would help Dylan to get over whatever it was he was going through right then. When the ashes of the photo had fallen to the bottom of the trash can, Clay asked, "Feel better?"

"I wish," Dylan said. "You know, I sometimes wonder how things would've gone if I'd asked her to marry me."

"I don't think things would've gone well for us if you'd done that. We need to just...move on from that. Look—we both have two beautiful children now. Aren't you happy about that?"

"This has nothing to do with Talia." Dylan's tone had grown angry. "You don't deserve Ellie, Dad. You're a fucking scumbag. You cheated on Mom, and now you're getting it on with that fake tit LEPO bitch right under Ellie's nose!"

Completely caught off guard, Clay stammered, "What are you talking about?" Dylan had been saying things about Trina during Thanksgiving dinner, but Clay had chalked it up to his anger about Leah, thinking there was no way he could know about his affair.

"It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure you out. I could tell the day after I got here something was off, with you being off in your own world, always making excuses to go use your phone. And Trina gave me her number the week I moved here. Nice try with Patrick Garrett."

Oh no. He'd left his phone at Dylan's that morning, and Dylan had snooped.

"Dylan, let me help you to understand."

"What? Are you gonna tell me you aren't trying to hurt Ellie, like you never tried to hurt me?"

"I'm really not. It's just...look, Ellie and I aren't doing that great. We haven't slept together in months. And we haven't really slept together in over a year. I don't even think she wants to sleep with me anymore, or be around me. I just wanted to let her go through whatever it is she's going through and to help myself get through it, too."

Dylan looked unconvinced. "Mom told me you think with your cock and she was right. Because if you think what you're doing isn't going to hurt Ellie, then you're either full of shit or your head's full of air. So, now we're gonna play that game again, that game where I act like the big guy and give you the ultimatum. Stop seeing Trina, Dad. Stop seeing her, or I'm gonna tell Ellie. You have everything I wanted even though you don't deserve any of it, so do me a favor and start fucking appreciating it. Not just for her, for me."