4.20

I can see it, or I can imagine: the drama, the recrimination, the tears. A Monday, a week--a lifetime, it must feel like--shot to hell in the first rays of dawn.

"I feel lousy," he says, later, after this warning: "I fucked up." And something in his tone and the droop of his shoulders makes me bite back the scold as his profane lapsed-Catholic confession spills out. He's disappointed his parents again. I hear regret when he says, "My mom was all crying. " I hear regret when he trails off, "and my dad. . . " I tell him I'm encouraged that he feels as he does because it shows that, in the end, he cares. He's late, so I send him off with a pass, ask his counselor to check in and go on.

And she calls him down but he doesn't go; at lunch he reappears in my room. I expect him to tune out, feet up, earphones on, at the round table in the back. Instead he unwraps the burger that he slips out of his pocket at a desk shoved up against mine. As he eats, he asks what I would do if my daughter made the same choices. I am no fount of answers, but I take that as a cue. I tell the truth as I know it, describe consequences and options. I empathize, to a point. I thank him for listening and he thanks me for talking. A door seems propped open, at least.

By the end of the day, he'll be back in the corner. Silent, and pretending to read. I sit and let him stew.