Bastian looked at her, and then he laughed, a real laugh, big and surprised and a little rusty, and Imre looked up from his plate at the sound of it with an expression on his face that Gerrit would remember for a long time, an expression of such naked, startled hope that it was almost painful to see.
"Okay," Bastian said, still laughing. "Okay. Fair. My mistake."
When they left, Imre walked them out to the car. The sun was going down behind the houses across the street and the air had the sharp clean smell of the first real cold of the year. Noor went ahead to start the car. Gerrit stopped at the bottom of the new wooden ramp and turned around.
"Can I ask you something?"
"Sure."
"On the bleachers. You knew what was going on. You knew I didn't remember. Why didn't you just say it? Right there. Why'd you tell me to ask her?"
Imre looked at him for a long moment. "Because if I'd said it, you would've heard it from the guy you thought was messing around with your girlfriend," he said. "You'd have thought I was making it up. Or trying to get you benched. You wouldn't have believed a word. And everybody in that parking lot would've heard me say the quarterback had a brain injury, and by dinner it would've been all over the school, and you'd have spent the whole next week proving them wrong instead of getting help." He shrugged, a small economical movement. "It had to be her. She's the one who did the work. She's the one you'd listen to. I just had to get you to stop long enough to go ask."