“You mean you didn’t run up gambling debts again? You aren’t here dipping your hand into daddy’s extra-large supposedly secret piggy bank?” Cruise’s voice drips sarcasm.
“Okay, so it’s exactly what it looks like, but this time it’s deadly serious. The guys I’ve been playing with are fucked up, Cruise. They’re dead serious. If I don’t pay them back, I’ll be dead.”
“I’ve heard this entire story before, haven’t I?”
I shift a little bit and peer around the pillar. I can see Adrian’s frantic eyes. He’s not thinking fast enough.
“What do you mean?” Adrian asks.
“Isn’t that why I went to jail? To keep you alive? Because you were totally going to turn over a new leaf, but you needed to pay some guys off?”
Cruise sounds matter-of-fact now, but I know that after the night we’ve had, he’s anything but. He just wants to trick his brother into complacency.
“You went to jail because you’re a thief.”
“C’mon, Adrian. We’re alone in here. Why don’t you tell the truth? Why can’t you look me in the eye, and admit what you did to my life?”
“I can’t admit what I didn’t do.”
I can barely see Cruise from where I’m standing, but his voice indicates a revelation.
“Was this whole thing a set-up?” Cruise asks. “Dad kicked Maya out last night, and so I was moving out, as well. And on this particular night, since you knew I wouldn't take the fall for you again, you happened to get out of bed and come down here. Tomorrow morning Dad would’ve found himself poorer by one son, who he wouldn’t miss much, and by twenty thousand dollars, and whatever chump change you could get into your pockets. Is that right?”
“I didn’t plan anything,” Adrian sounds really scared now. “I just don’t want to die.” He lifts his shirt to reveal a long jagged cut. “They did this to convince me. You don’t know—”
Again, Cruise’s quite rage is more frightening than if he was screaming. “I don’t know? You think I spent a year in prison, and somehow you know criminals better than I do? I had to watch my back every day. They knew I was a rich boy from the coast, knew I was doing time for stealing. Do you think I didn’t get approached by a million different lowlifes, offering me a life of crime?”
“And here you are, an ex-con, and still better than me,” Adrian sneers.
“I don’t know what universe you live in, Adrian,” Cruise says. “You have the whole world in front of you, and I have nothing except a record. How am I better than you?”
This rapidly declining argument is interrupted by the arrival of Richard Bancroft.
He must walk very quietly, because I didn’t even notice his arrival. He walks into the office, his back blocking my view. But I can still hear everything.
“What the hell is going on here?” Despite being out of breath, his voice books, echoing from the office walls.
“I caught Cruise trying to steal again,” Adrian says immediately.
Cruise stares down his nose at his brother, with all the contempt in the world.
“Is this true?” Richard’s eyes beg Cruise to deny the allegation, but Cruise stands, back straight, and won’t answer.
“I let you stay here. You know I didn’t want you to go to jail—” this frailty, coming from Mr. Bancroft, shocks me.
“But you never visited, did you, Dad?” Cruise says finally. “You never wrote, or picked up the phone to call, to see if I was still alive.”
“They would’ve called—”
“Yeah. They would’ve called if I’d died. Did you know I was in the infirmary for three weeks with an infection? Got cut on something, and infection set in. Apparently I was delirious and calling out for my mom. The other guys didn’t let me forget it, until I convinced them it would be better to drop it.”
Richard stares at his son, as if he doesn’t recognize him.
“Dad,” Cruise says. “I’m just going to ask you once. Did you never, ever wonder if maybe I wasn’t the one who stole the money?”
“You admitted that you stole the money. You pled guilty.” Richard’s face is an ashen grey.
“But did you never wonder?”
“You were kicked out of Carleton Preparatory Academy—”
“But not for stealing. What I was kicked out for was a long way from stealing, wasn’t it, Dad?”
Richard shakes his head, unwilling to let Cruise manipulate the conversation further.
Adrian sighs impatiently. It’s his word against Cruise’s, and we know which one his dad is more likely to take.
“Nick knows.” Cruise says finally. “Adrian came to him, trying to borrow money, crying about his debts.”
“Why would I do that?” Adrian whines. “Nick is your friend, not mine. And Dad knows better to understand the bartender, who was the one caught doing drugs with you, the reason you were kicked out of school.”
“We were sixteen, and smoking marijuana,” Cruise says. “It was dumb, but—”
“It would’ve broken Mom’s heart,” Adrian asserts.