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were afraid of Zeke Mills they all said what he told them to say, which was that Billy was the one who started it.
    Mrs. Marion said she didn’t really care who started it, that fighting was never an option at her school, and that both Billy and Zeke were getting suspended for the rest of today and all of tomorrow.
    When his father got to school—Mom, as it turned out, was on a big conference call at her office—Billy had to sit there while Mrs. Marion told both versions of the fight. First Billy’s, then Zeke’s. When she was finished, Joe Raynor told her that she had no choice but to suspend him, even if Billy was defending his brother, and that something like this would never happen again, she could count on that.
    When they got in the car, Billy said to his dad, “Do you even care what really happened?”
    “Ben already told me,” his father said.
    “You’re saying I shouldn’t have stuck up for him?”
    “I’m saying that there’s better ways to handle stuff like this than fighting in the middle of recess.”
    “You weren’t there,” Billy said.
    He pictured Zeke squeezing Ben’s hand again, pictured Ben starting to cry, wondered if Ben had told his dad that Zeke had made him cry.
    Just because no guy ever wanted to admit that, especially to his dad.
    “Did Ben even tell you—”
    “Tell me what? That you weren’t thinking? That you don’t know actions have consequences?”
    “Never mind,” Billy said.
    “Even in the schoolyard,” his dad said, “when you want to take a shot, you do.”
    Then he told Billy he wasn’t allowed to practice with the Magic the next night. And on Joe Raynor’s teams, everybody knew the rule: If you didn’t practice—unless you were sick—you didn’t get to play the next game.
     
“It’s not fair,” Billy said when his mom got home and he had told her his side of things.
    “Getting suspended from school,” she asked, “or having to miss the game on Saturday?”
    “Both,” he said.
    “I know,” she said. “You ended up getting socked twice.”
    “So you agree with me,” he said.
    “Not about the fighting,” she said. “Even if you were sticking up for Ben.”
    He was under the covers. She was sitting at the end of his bed, the way she still did sometimes, though not as often as she had before she got this busy.
    “Mom,” Billy said, sitting up now, his back against the headboard, “that jerk was hurting Ben’s hand. I couldn’t let somebody do that, even if it was Zeke the Geek.”
    “I’m glad you were there,” she said. “I know Ben was glad you were there. But the law’s the law. Isn’t there some rule in basketball that if you even try to throw a punch, you get suspended for a game?”
    “The NBA,” Billy said, then he said, “Wait, you know that?”
    “I was . . . I’m married to your father,” she said. “I had to pick up a few sports things along the way.”
    “Why is Dad acting like this?” Billy said. “It’s like nothing I do is right anymore.”
    She said, “Your father likes order in his life. You know that about him, right? Like his tools in the garage, everything in its place.”
    “Now stuff is out of place.”
    “Big-time,” his mom said.
    “But I’m not the one who left,” Billy said. “He did.”
    “One more thing that’s out of order,” she said. “Like we say in court.”
    She reached forward and took his hand, rubbed his arm the way she used to when he was little and she wanted to help him get to sleep.
    Billy let her.
    “I’m sorry I messed up, Mom,” Billy said. “At school, I mean.”
    “Sometimes we all do that,” she said. “Even with the best of intentions.” She winked at him and said, “How come you think lawyers like me stay so busy?”
    “Maybe I needed a lawyer,” Billy said.
    She smiled. He smiled. Sometimes Billy felt like he’d been missing his mom even more than his dad, even though she was the parent still living in the house.
     
His dad called on Saturday morning