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“Still, I’d rather you didn’t have to do it all alone.” His daily schedule includes gym time and study time, and every time I take out my card to pay for something he acts like I’ve just insulted him. Cooking is literally the only thing I’ve got right now that can take some burden off him.

He looks over my shoulder at the stove, and then at the fridge, like he’s asking both appliances Are you boys okay with this?

“I’m fine, baby boy. Just…don’t try anything involving a knife or a blender or…fire before I’m home, okay?” He kisses me. “I’ll call you after class. Love you.”

The door closes before I can respond.

To my credit, I decide to go to the public library first, where I go and check out a book that alleges that Chinese cooking can, indeed, be made easy.

Then I park my car on Roosevelt across from the old movie palace, the one with half its marquee letters missing, which promises to show me the G BL T OF FIRE and RETRO TU SDAY T E BIG SL EP.

Patrick’s secretary still has the manner of a woman guarding a bridge. She does not offer me coffee. I sit in the empty waiting room with my hands on my knees like a man at a clinic, feeling guilty.

“Dr. Saint-Jacques.” Patrick holds the door. “Come on back. Is Levi parking?”

“He couldn’t make it,” I say.

Patrick looks at me for a beat longer than the answer deserves, like he’s understood in a second that if Levi knew, the list of things that would keep him away would involve hospitalization, incarceration, or death. He says nothing, and I follow him into his office.

He’s less tentative this time. He takes me through the contract clause by clause, and unlike the first time we went through this, he has statutes on his side, case law to cross-reference, and a list of people he’s already interviewed.

“Which gets me to the final pay they gave you. They showed their hand. We can make a case that they came to a conclusion without due process. It’s a shame you didn’t marry him on the spot in DC. You would have had a cast-iron case.”

“Yes, that’s exactly what Immigration Services likes to hear,” I deadpan. “I met a man and married him within hours. I thought you said they had no case. Well, they decided anyway.”

Patrick smiles. “They wrote a check they can’t cash. We’ll get around to that. Their counsel is Holis and Speck. They’ve had the contract since the Reagan administration. And I can guarantee you that they were not consulted about the decision to terminate you. They were already in violation of your contract with the extra class, and even though they are trying to tell themselves that the committee meeting is an internal process, it has real-world consequences. Roger Holis would have taken one look at everything you’ve submitted to me and told them exactly how problematic it would be if they filed against you.”

“How problematic would it be?”

“This is clear-cut wrongful termination, but depending on what their own documents can prove, this is a civil rights case. The lawsuit they’re opening themselves up to could be massive. Which means they’ll want this decided somewhere that isn’t a courtroom, and it means the only real danger between now and the hearing is you.”

“Me?”

“You.” He caps his pen. “So. Between now and the fourth, you are going to be the most boring man in Virginia. Do you use social media?”

“Not really.”

“Don’t. You don’t comment. You don’t answer a reporter, you don’t answer a colleague’s email. If asked about anything, I will email you a script, and it’s going to say, ‘The matter is currently being handled by my legal counsel, and I am entirely confident the truth will prevail.’ That’s it. Especially in a room full of sauced-up academics looking to land fifty large.”

“You heard about the Kirkfield Grant, then. Levi had to talk me into going. I was going to cancel.”

Patrick sighs. “I’m not going to lie to you. Levi’s sense of the moment is better than yours. I went over his notes, and I could take them straight into any courtroom in the country today. He doesn’t have the training, he doesn’t know the case law that backs him up. But what he does have is the instinct. Whatever he’s doing at Fairhaven, fold pre-law into it. I’m telling you. I am starting to get more work than I can handle, and he has a mind I would confidently entrust my clients to.”

“Law school. We haven’t talked about that yet.”

“Actually,” he says, taking out a folder from a drawer. “There is a workaround that doesn’t cost him a dime. The reading law alternative. Twenty-five hours a week of study, forty weeks a year, and three hours of direct supervision by an attorney mentor who has been an active lawyer for ten years. Currently, I am at six years. By the time he walks across that stage, I will have ten. I have never been willing to act as a mentor before. I am now. When he’s finished, he can set up here and work his way to full partner. This is something we can talk about later, but I wanted it to be on the record now. Your husband’s good, and this advice about the Kirkfield gala just proved it to me. Hiding him is an admission of guilt. Full stop.”

“So, wear your best suit and biggest smile,” I summarize.

“Exactly. You need to be confident and secure. It is very difficult to paint you as a liability when you are standing in a room as a finalist for a very large cash prize.”

“I will lose. The same guy wins every year.”

“That’s a different problem. That you lost because of a backroom smear campaign is going to be hard to prove. Here’s what can be proven: this whole incident, which should have been handled quietly and discreetly, has leaked. If it has poisoned your relationship with people outside Fairhaven, that constitutes defamation and demonstrable damage to your professional reputation. It’s highly actionable.”

“What if they say I can’t attend?”

“It’s at the Fairhaven Inn. If they attempt to bar you from attending, it will heavily compound the punitive damages in our upcoming lawsuit. And believe me, Bastien, there will be a lawsuit. They will try to bait you. Say nothing. If you win, the university is trapped and the Dean’s case is effectively dead in the water. Dr. Saint-Jacques, they want you in a closet. They took your job, forced you to air a radio show from inside a two-by-six closet in the Needles, and they want you to go gently into that good night. Don’t. You have good sense. Be an ordinary married couple. You won’t be making out at the bar. You’re just holding hands and being seen together. I’ll craft something for Levi to say. But no matter how much it hurts, your husband is right. They will feel triumph if you don’t go. Arthur Hughes wants you isolated. Don’t give him that.”