Just rip off the Band-Aid, man. “Has your sister been staying with you for the past few days, or have you been alone?”
Andy turned away and looked back out the window. “She can’t always get away.”
What did that mean? “She just leaves you alone?”
Andy sighed and dropped his chin, focusing on his hands in his lap. “Aly thinks I’m staying with a friend until she can find me a new stupid babysitter.”
Aly? Will paused a beat. Right. Of course his sister had a name. “Let’s back up.” He shook his head. “Howare you staying alone?”
Andy pressed his lips into a straight line. “What do you mean? I just stay home.”
“Always? Between all the other sitters?” Will squeezed the steering wheel so tight his knuckles were white.
“I’m used to it,” Andy said with a shrug, but he avoided Will’s gaze.
He had two nephews Andy’s age, and sure as shit, neither of them could have pulled that off.
“How do you get to practice in the morning?” Andy had never missed or even been late to swim practice, which often started at five a.m.
“Uber,” Andy replied.
“Uber?”Uber? “A random stranger picks you up?”
“Like the app on my iPhone.” Andy’s tone was full of correction, but he didn’t dispute the accusation. He really was climbing into the car with perfect strangers before the crack of dawn most days.
“How do you pay for that?” he asked.
Andy dug around in his bag and pulled out a credit card. Will snatched it from his hand and held it in front of him, his wrist resting on the steering wheel. The name stamped on the Visa was Andre Gomez. “Where did that come from?”
“Aly,” he answered.
“Aly,” Will repeated, like it was an expletive. “What about eating and all that?”
“I get lunch at school,” Andy said.
“Breakfast? Dinner?” Will asked, anger simmering in his gut. He thrived on order and control. He liked things to make sense, and none of this was making fucking sense.
“Sometimes a friend’s mom will take me from swim practice to school, and they’ll feed us on the way. Otherwise, I walk to school and eat a big lunch.” He shrugged.
Will took a calming breath. No wonder this kid was losing weight. “And Aly doesn’t mind that you aren’t eating?”
Finally, Andy turned and looked at him, his eyes harder than any he’d seen on a kid before. “Aly thinks I stay with friends. She probably thinkstheyfeed me. The credit card is to pay to get to swim practice. I told her that the nannies didn’t want to drive me at five in the morning. So now I use the card to Uber. But if I use it for food, she might figure out that I’m not staying with friends.”
What the hell?How did a kid slip through the cracks like this?That thought stopped him in his tracks. He forced his grip on the wheel to loosen and took a breath.
This was exactly what had happened to his family. They’d fallen through the cracks. His mother had died of cancer when he was in high school, and after that, his family had fallen apart. It happened before anyone realized, and it happened so easily. If it hadn’t been for Beth… He shook off that thought.
Will slammed the truck into park in front of Andy’s dark house. Not a single light was on.Because no one was home.
“Come on.” Will opened the door. “Go in and get everything you need for a few days. I’m going to call your sister.”
Silently, they made their way up the front walk. When they stepped onto the porch, Andy pulled a set of keys from his backpack and unlocked the door. Once inside, he took off up the stairs. Seconds after he was out of Will’s sight, the bedroom door slammed.
Will sighed and paced the foyer. From the corner of his eye, he caught sight of a picture of Sue Gomez and her son sitting on an end table in the family room. He picked up the frame of the smiling mother and son. Andy looked a couple of years younger than he was now. It was probably taken before she got sick.
He went back in time too over a decade ago. To a strikingly similar story. One where a son had lost his mom. Except the kid wasn’t with Will that time, the kidwasWill.
Cancer sucked.