Brad laughed so suddenly that he covered his face.
Molly looked offended.
“What?”
“Nothing, peanut.”
“I don’t even have all my grown-up teeth yet.”
Erin laughed too.
But her eyes stayed on Brad.
“You allowed every one of us to change direction afterward,” she said. “You are the only person who still believes changing direction means you failed.”
Brad stopped laughing.
His eyes moved across the photographs.
The tattoo artist.
The graphic designer.
The teacher.
None of them had ended up exactly where they originally planned.
Brad had never called any of them failures.
Only himself.
On the way home, we stopped for ice cream.
Brad automatically reached for the button-down shirt stuffed into the bag with Molly’s muddy clothes.
Then he paused.
I said nothing.
He left it inside the bag.
At the counter, an older cashier narrowed her eyes at one tattoo.
“Is that an onion?”
