story. You know that.”
There are two sides to every story, Fitz’s grandpa used to tell him. And then there’s the truth.
“I help them tell their story,” his father says. “It’s how the system operates. Somebody’s got to do it.”
Fitz gets that. He’s not naive. He understands the system. But still. It’s disappointing. There’s a lot of stuff that’s got to be done. But you don’t have to be the one who does it. Fitz thinks of one of his mom’s favorite expressions, what she tells him when he tries to get away with something—using SparkNotes, say—because other kids do it. You’re better than that. That’s what she tells him.
“He is a jerk,” his father says. “You got that right.”
Fitz looks over his shoulder and sees the back of the Chipster’s bullet head a few tables away, talking in the direction of a couple of guys who already look bored and tired of him.
“Maybe, if we’re lucky,” Fitz says, “he’ll stay away. Maybe we won’t have any more issues on that front.” He raps the tabletop with his right hand, and for the second time his father laughs.
18
They both order apple pie for dessert. Maddie brings it to them warm, with ice cream. The pieces are huge, tall slices of apple layered in some geologic way, crumbly stuff on top. Cinnamon, apples, brown sugar, vanilla—it may be Fitz’s favorite smell in the world. He leans over it and inhales. If this were a drug, he’d be a junkie.
His mom bakes pies just for special occasions—Thanksgiving, Uncle Dunc’s birthday—sometimes blueberry, but usually apple, always with little pictures or messages etched into the top crust: a turkey, a heart, a smiley face.
Fitz thanks Maddie, picks up his fork, and digs in. He finishes his pie in less than a minute. When he’s done, he feels a little out of breath. But he can’t help himself. It is awesome apple pie.
When Maddie swings by their table to see how they’re doing, how they’re liking it, Fitz is embarrassed. His mom is always on him to slow down. He knows it’s rude to bolt down your food.
She looks at the apple and ice cream smear on his plate. “You know what you need?” she asks.
Fitz is afraid that she’s going to say something like “better manners.” It will kill him if she shames him.
Maddie puts a hand on her hip and turns toward his father. His piece of pie is still more or less intact, just a couple of neat forkfuls removed from the edges. “You know what he needs, don’t you?”
“I know.”
She points at Fitz, a kind of Uncle Sam gesture, only infinitely cuter. “You need another piece of pie.” She consults his father again. “Am I right?” she asks. “Or am I right?”
“You are so right,” his father says. “Right as rain.”
“Because he’s a growing boy,” she says. “And he’s starving.”
“We need to do something,” his father says.
“More pie,” Maddie says. “That’s what the boy needs.”
All of a sudden, they’re double-teaming him. They’ve formed some kind of alliance, reached an understanding, and the basis of it, the core principle, is that he, Fitz, needs more of what he loves. He feels himself blushing. He’s not really used to being the center of attention, not like this.
A second piece of pie, in a restaurant—it just never even occurred to Fitz as a possibility. It violates some iron law, some rule so fundamental and obvious and universally accepted that it never needs to be spelled out: each diner may order one, and only one, dessert. But today that rule doesn’t apply. Today, all bets are off.
In just a couple of minutes, Maddie is back with another piece of pie, more ice cream. “Okay, champ,” she says. “Dig in.”
Fitz looks at his father. “You heard her,” his father says.
It seems to Fitz now, at this moment, with his father and a pretty girl smiling at him, a gorgeous piece of apple pie in front of him, that no matter what happens to him afterward, even if he is arrested, cuffed, expelled, no matter what punishment he suffers for his crazy stunt today, no matter what, it will have been worth it.
His father has his fork in hand. He’s doing some excavating and rearranging on his plate, but mainly he’s watching Fitz. It looks like he’s enjoying Fitz’s enjoyment, feeling his pie pleasure once removed.
Before he starts in on his pie, he wants to tell his father something. “Fitz,” he says. “That’s what they call me.”
19
Fitz reaches