Nothing false. Just tell them what the place is actually like — the heat, the noise, the late rent. Say you thought about evicting. That’s all true enough. — G

“That’s all true enough,” I read out loud.

“It wasn’t,” Abernathy said. “The eviction part wasn’t. Your mother kept that apartment better than the ones I rented to people paying twice what you paid. And you were late, yes, you were late plenty. But I never once thought about putting you out, and I said in a courtroom that I had.”

He looked up at me for the first time. “I want you to know I didn’t ask him for that money. He offered it. And I took it. I don’t know if that’s better or worse.”

“Worse,” I said.

He nodded, like he’d been expecting that, and something in his face relaxed for having heard it out loud.