It was late. Mr. and Mrs. Hughes and the boys had gone home. The Cartwrights were all in bed—all except Ward. He’d tried to sleep. He couldn’t. He tossed and turned. His mind kept going back to dinner that night. It had gone well, except for the eight hundred pound gorilla sitting in the chair that was meant for Tyler. It was probably his imagination, but he felt everyone, with the possible exception of the boys, was keenly aware that Tyler wasn’t among them. No one, except Ward, knew why he wasn’t there, and none, he thought, were brave enough to ask.
It was over—his wild dream that he could come home and Tyler would have changed enough since high school that their love affair could come to a happy ending. Ward just had to accept it. But he knew he wouldn’t be able to do that if he saw T
