Page 48 of The Lessons

“It’s a picture of my mom when she was young.”

“Oh,” I said softly, my heart surging despite my better judgment. I was such an asshole. I mean, Jesus, hadn’t he said his mother had died? That wasn’t something to be getting excited about, and you’d think I’d know. “You said she passed away, right? Did she get a chance to see it?”

He stiffened. “No. Actually, both my parents died when I was nineteen.”

My eyes flicked back up to his face. “What happened?”

Ryan looked over at me. “It’s a long story,” he warned.

I gestured around the elevator. “I’ve got time.”

He rubbed his hand across his brow and took a deep breath. “Okay, I’ll give you the abbreviated version. My dad had always been a grade-A asshole. He drank a lot, had a terrible temper, and liked to beat up anyone who was smaller than him. That’s how I got this—” He reached up and took a thin wire from within his ear.

“What’s that?”

“Hearing aid. I’m ninety-five percent deaf in my right ear.”

“Deaf?” I whispered, and then I realized I should probably repeat it louder. “You’re deaf?” I’d never known anyone who was deaf, at least, not that I was aware of. Although that wire was tiny—I supposed I could have easily missed it, like I apparently had with Ryan. “I don’t understand. How?”

He replaced the wire. “That’s what happens when you let a grown man beat a seven-year-old for leaving his dirty soccer shoes on the living room floor.”

I gasped. “No.”

“I know, right? Who the fuck smacks around a seven-year-old kid?”

“And your mom let him do that?” I asked, incredulous.

“Yeah. I mean, she didn’t know what to do. She didn’t have any family here.”

“She should have called the police.”

Ryan shook his head. “My dad was the police.”

I gasped. “No way. He was a cop?”

Ryan nodded. “Notjusta cop. Police Chief.” He sighed. “So she stayed.”

“Jesus Christ,” I whispered. “So, wait. What happened to them?”

Ryan sighed. “You really want to hear this?”

I nodded.

He took a deep breath. “Once I hit my growth spurt, he stopped whaling on me. For a while, I thought he was getting better. Until I realized he was just doubling down on my sister and my mom. Then the first Christmas home from college, we got into a big fight, like really big. Over something stupid, like not loading the dishwasher the right way. He broke my nose, and I’m pretty sure I broke his. So I high-tailed it out of there and went back to school. My sister called me two days later on New Year’s Eve. She told me our dad had shot our mom and then himself during a fight.” Ryan leaned back against the wall of the elevator, looking as if he was pondering the thought for the first time.

I sat there in silence, stunned. “That’s insane. I’m so sorry.”

Ryan shuddered. “It’s fine. Thanks. I spent a few years being pretty angry about it, but then one day I woke up and was, like, ‘You know what? He’s not on this earth anymore, and that’s a good thing.’ It’s just a shame he had to take my mom with him.”

“So the tattoo is in memory of her?”

“Yep.” Ryan paused for a moment while he considered his response. “Part of my angsty period.”

I look over at him, eyes wide. “Youhad an angsty period?”

He chuckled. “What? Why are you looking at me like that?”

I shook my head. “Well, I mean…it’s just—”

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