WE LOST the championship game in Salinas; it wasn’t close. I’d been waiting to see if anyone would update me, but no one did, so I saw it on a bunch of Instagram posts. I wanted to say something to Brandon, but also I wanted him to say something first.

My mother drove me to our spring show the next day—none of my friends said anything about carpooling, and I didn’t want to ask. I knew she would immediately notice that I was sitting in the first chair, so I’d told her Jason was sick.

When I saw Brandon backstage, he didn’t break into his usual, easy grin, that one that always felt like home to me.

“Hey,” he said, and I said, “Hi.” Then I said, because it seemed absurd not to, “I’m sorry about your game.”

“Yeah.” He ran a hand through his hair. It was loud backstage, a stuffy room with low ceilings and faded carpet. “Sunny said everything seemed fine, though? With Jay?”

“I guess so.”

He started to say something, then stopped himself. I’d almost never seen Brandon do that—he always just said what he wanted to, and if it didn’t come out the way he wanted, he would fumble around aloud until he hit on what he’d meant, and he didn’t mind that you were there for the process. It was something I loved about him; it was one of the ways he shared himself.

Today, though, he didn’t give me that; he said only, “All right, well. Good to hear.”