Steven was the one to break me out of my reverie. Frowning, he said, “Why would Conrad be calling you?”
I ignored him and took the phone from my mother. I walked away from Steven, from the remote, from my melting dish of ice cream. None of it mattered.
I made Conrad wait until I was on the staircase before I said anything. I sat down on the steps and I said, “Hey.” I tried to keep the smile off my face; I knew he would hear it over the phone.
“Hey,” he said. “What’s up?”
“Nothing much.”
“So guess what,” he said. “My roommate snores even louder than you do.”
He called again the next night, and the night after. We talked for hours at a time. When the phone rang, and it was for me and not Steven, he’d been confused at first. “Why does Conrad keep calling you?” he’d demanded.
“Why do yo
