Home Field by Hannah Gersen

she’d lost her specificity, all the micromovements and small gestures that made her special to him. Her dark hair was in a low ponytail at the nape of her neck, with a few long strands left loose. She came in through the side door and headed straight to the refrigerator for a glass of orange juice.
    â€œStephanie,” he said quietly, so she wouldn’t startle. He was sitting at the kitchen table, waiting.
    â€œDad!” She turned around, surprising him with a warm smile—an intoxicated smile, but still.
    â€œLate night at the Red Byrd?”
    â€œYeah, and then I went out.” She sat down at the table to drink her juice. “Sorry, I should have called. I feel bad, you waited up.”
    Her lie was so transparent that he was reminded of the fibs she told when she was a little girl, how obvious they were, and how stubbornly she clung to them. Lying, in small children, was a sign of intelligence.
    â€œSteph, the boys and I went to the Red Byrd for dinner.”
    â€œYou came to check up on me?”
    â€œI wanted to see you,” Dean said. “And the boys did, too. You left them alone.”
    â€œIt was only for, like, fifteen minutes.”
    â€œThey’re little kids.”
    â€œI’m sorry.” She got up and poured herself some more juice. “Mitchell called and he really needed me to come over—he’s going through a hard time—so I got Katie to cover my shift. And I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want it to be some big thing. But I had to go, he’s my best friend.”
    It bugged Dean that Mitchell was her designated “best friend.” Why couldn’t she be best friends with another girl, a typical girl, a girl who was happy, who didn’t view high school as one big hard time?
    â€œHow much have you had to drink?” Dean asked.
    â€œI wasn’t driving,” she said. “Mitchell dropped me off.”
    â€œSo where’s your car?”
    â€œIt’s parked at Sarah Auerbach’s. She had a party, okay?”
    He noticed now that she was dressed up, wearing a flowered sundress. It was the kind of modest, feminine dress Dean preferred for her to wear—or would have been, if Stephanie hadn’t cut it short, leaving the edges ragged.
    â€œIs that one of your mother’s dresses?”
    â€œYeah.” Stephanie tugged at the hem of her skirt, pulling on a loose thread. “It’s not like Mom cares. She’s gone. The dead don’t care, that’s what Mitchell says.”
    Robbie’s phrase, dead-lady clothes, came into Dean’s mind. Along with Robbie and his flushed cheeks, Nic’s pale blue dress.
    â€œI don’t care what Mitchell has to say,” Dean said.
    â€œYou’ve always been hostile toward him. What’s that about? He’s really smart. He’s probably the smartest person I’ve ever met. Just because he doesn’t care about football doesn’t mean he’s not worth your time.”
    â€œSteph, I don’t want to talk about your friend right now.”
    â€œI’m just trying to have a conversation,” she said, slurring as she navigated conversation ’s four syllables. “But if you just want to walk around all stoic, that’s fine, we can pretend everything’s okay. Just like we did with Mom.”
    â€œThat’s something, coming from the girl who barely spoke to her mother for a year.”
    Stephanie got up and put her juice glass in the sink. She stood there and Dean could tell by the way her shoulders were hunched forward that she had begun to cry. It had been so long since he had seen her cry that he was almost heartened by her tears, by their intimacy. But then, seeing her pale face reflected in the darkened window above the sink, he felt as if she had eluded him yet again, as if the cheerful girl he had once known—the girl he hoped would be restored to him at the end of adolescence—had