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I put the file aside and pulled my feet out of his hands so I could kneel next to him.
“Mr. Sterling,” I asked. “Don’t you have any friends?”
“Yes, I have friends,” Brandon retorted a little too strongly. “They’re just…I really only see them at functions, you know. Or business meetings. Sometimes at the gym.”
“I don’t think those qualify as friends,” I informed him. “Those are business acquaintances.”
“Ihavefriends,” he insisted as he shut his laptop a little too harshly and set it on the couch. “I do.”
“Name three,” I dared him. “Three people you hang out with randomly, no plans needed, or whom you talk to about personal issues.”
“Fine,” he said, turning toward me to take on the challenge. His arm snaked along the back of the couch, and his finger snagged a stray lock of my hair to twirl as he talked. “No problem. Okay, there’s Mark Grove.”
“Mark Grove is fifty-seven years old and your business partner,” I replied. “He is not your friend. He is no one’s friend. What do you guys do, grab brandies after work and compare notes on guerrilla trial tactics?”
I had seen Mark Grove when he poked his head into the intern room occasionally. He was a cutthroat securities attorney with a sharp eye that roved like a hawk’s and a mouth that was twice as dangerous. We had all sat up a little straighter whenever he popped in, worked just a little faster.
“Fine, fine,” Brandon conceded. He drummed his fingers absently on the surface of the sofa, thinking. “Okay, Kieran. Kieran is definitely my friend. We talk on the phone about stuff that’s not related to work, plus she’s known me since I was a kid. So there!”
I nodded. “Okay, I’ll give you that. Kieran is your friend. That’s one.”
Brandon ran through a few more names that I quickly disqualified on the basis that he barely knew them or that they were only work or charity associates. One he even made up—I refused to believe that Joe Smith was a real name. But the joke soon faded when it became clear that Brandon lived in a bubble, a giant ivory tower of his own making.
“What about your other friends from Dorchester?” I asked, trying to help him out. I no longer cared about winning. “You said you see them sometimes…”
“My mother’s friends. The others...I didn’t really keep in touch with any of them.”
We sat in silence. And a thought occurred to me that I really didn’t like.
“You don’t...you’re not ashamed of me or anything, are you?”
I hated the question as soon as it came out, but there it was. I had to ask.
Brandon looked at me, clearly shocked. “What?” he asked. “What?”
I shrugged, avoiding his gaze. “I just...I am kind of young, and inexperienced, and—”
“Stop right there,” Brandon said. “I’m serious, Red. It’s not your fault that I’m an antisocial workaholic. Got it?”
I nodded, relieved. “Then what is all this”—I gestured to the bachelor-pad decor surrounding us—“for? Because as comfortable as this couch is, you said yourself you barely come up here. You don’t even like shitty beer.”
Brandon followed my hand gesture toward the PBR sign, then shrugged, slightly red-faced again. “I used to have some buddies from back home, but we sort of had a falling out. It’s…a long story. I had all of this stuff put in here when I first bought the place. I should probably have it redone.”
I glanced around at the paraphernalia. It was a little juvenile, I thought, but there was obviously something more here than just wishful thinking.
I turned back to Brandon. “I don’t know. I think a lot of guys would probably like watching the Sox here.”
“Well, the TV does get a pretty good picture.” Brandon gave me a shy grin that had my heart thrumming in response. “What about your friends, Red? What are they up to tonight, since you’re feeling social? I haven’t met any of them either.”
I smacked a quick kiss on his mouth, quickly pulling away when he tried to turn it into something more. “I don’t know. Let’s see.”
I snagged my phone off the coffee table and snuggled into the crook of his arm while I flipped through my text messages. There weren’t many; I probably had only a few more real friends than Brandon.
“Jane says she and her latest hottie are going to trivia night at Cleo’s,” I said, referencing the spot by HLS many of the law students frequented. “It’s a bar that—”
“I know what Cleo’s is, Red,” Brandon chafed. “I went to Harvard too, remember?” He looked at me in faux horror. “Just how old do you think I am?”
I pulled my face into as serious an expression as I could muster. “I don’t know. It was pre-internet that you were there, right? Isn’t your fiftieth reunion a-coming, Grandpa?”
