Foster crosses his arms over his bulky chest. “Don’t forget—you gotta take five whole minutes to make sure he eats all his food.”

A vein throbs in Con’s forehead as he snatches Pablo off the table. It looks like he’s about to whip the egg against the wall, but at the last second he curses under his breath and spins around. Low mumbling comes from the kitchen.

I gape at Matt. “He’s not going to prepare actual food, is he?”

“Nah, it’s not in the rules.”

“What exactly are the rules?”

“They’re whatever we make them,” Foster replies with a grin. “But basically, five minutes are required whenever Pablo is in play.”

“But you can’t abuse the system,” Matt says.

“What system?” I sputter. “It’s all nonsense.”

“He eats three times a day, shits twice a day, and requires attention whenever one of us is bored and wants to harass whoever has him.”

“But you can’t play the attention card more than a few times a day,” Foster adds. “With that said, texting between the hours of one and five a.m. is highly encouraged.”

“This is all very reasonable,” Alec tells me. “What aren’t you getting?”

“Are you gonna do this to me when I have him?” I shudder. My turn is on Friday.

“Nah, we would never do that to you,” Foster assures me.

The others chime in.

“Never.”

“Of course not.”

“Never do that to our captain.”

Goddamn liars.

On Thursday night, Demi and I manage to squeeze in a second study session for the week. Once again, we convene in her bedroom at the Theta house. She’s sitting cross-legged on the purple bedspread, sucking on a grape lollipop. I’m sprawled on her little couch, regaling her with a juicy new tale in the sordid history of Dick Smith.

“So she promised to pick up a strawberry cheesecake along with the usual pumpkin pie. Meanwhile, everything else was coming together beautifully. The catering staff was top-notch. The table was set with the crystal my grandparents gave us as a wedding present. We had family coming in from Palm Springs and Manhattan. Thanksgiving in the Hamptons is always an important event.”

Demi observes me carefully. I know she’s trying to figure out where I’m going with this.

“But the pièce de résistance was going to be the strawberry cheesecake,” I brag. “That was the first cake my parents ever sold when they opened that original little bakery on Burton Street, which they turned into a massive dessert empire. It was perfect—Mother would be so touched that I remembered, that I’d gone out of my way to please her. God knows my brother Geoffrey doesn’t care about her happiness.”

Demi’s lollipop pokes into the inside of her cheek. “Is this typical for you, taking great pains to seek the approval of your mother?”

“It had nothing to do with approval. I just told you, I wanted to make Mother happy.”

“I see.”

I huff in annoyance. “Anyway. Dinner was spectacular, and then it was time for dessert, and you know what happened? The servers come out with a fucking pumpkin pie and nothing else. No cheesecake. I was forced to paste a smile on my face, but inside I was seething. Kathryn apologized after dinner and insisted that all the bakeries in the area were either closed or sold out, but a fucking apology didn’t help me in the moment. She made me look bad in front of the whole family, and then goddamn Geoff made a joke about pumpkin pie and how original that was, and I wanted to clock him. Happy Thanksgiving, right?”

There’s a beat of silence. I glance over to find Demi shrewdly inspecting me.

“Wow,” she says slowly. “There’s a lot to unpack here. I guess my first question is—if all the bakeries were closed for the holiday, do you think it’s fair to blame your wife for not being able to get the cheesecake?”

“She could’ve picked it up the day before,” I say coldly. “There was no excuse.”

She shakes her head a couple times, as if jarred out of the charade. “Jeez. You’re good at this,” she remarks.

I give an awkward shrug. “Right? You think I should quit hockey and get into acting?” It’s a lame joke.

The actual punch line is, it’s not a joke at all. The story I just told is the unfiltered truth. The only part I left out was how the asshole’s son endured weeks and weeks of obnoxious boasting about that stupid strawberry cheesecake prior to Thanksgiving, and then years of bitter griping about the pumpkin pie following it.

Yup, that’s my father for you, doesn’t give a shit about anybody but himself. He wanted to look good and one-up his brother, and fuck all the closed bakeries and my horrible selfish mother for depriving him of his needs. Poor Mom was walking on eggshells for months afterward. That man is impossible to please.

When I opened my “PATIENT” envelope last week and saw the disorder I’d been assigned, I’d almost laughed out loud. Hardly any research required, as I’m wholly familiar with the symptoms and how it manifests. I’ve lived with it my entire life.

“Why was it so important for you to look good in front of your family?” Dr. Demi asks.

“What do you mean?”

She rephrases. “What was supposed to be a happy family gathering turned into a competition between you and your brother. I’m simply wondering why you engaged in it?”

“I don’t turn shit into a competition, he does. He’s jealous of me because I’m older and more successful. And, what, I’m supposed to let myself be humiliated when he tries to put me down? No way. I’m going to fight back.”

“I see.” A pause. “Do you feel like you have unreasonably high expectations of the people in your life, or an average level of expectation?”

I wonder what conclusions she’s reaching. It’s evident that Demi is highly intelligent. That’s just one of the many reasons I enjoy hanging out with her. The main reason is that she’s easy to talk to, and there’s no pressure whatsoever to be anything but platonic. She has a boyfriend who she clearly loves, so there’s no temptation on my end. Sure, her body is hot as fuck, and she has a habit of wearing tight tops that hug her perky tits and bare her midriff, but I’m able to admire her without fantasizing about tearing her clothes off.

Demi jots down more notes, then says, “’Kay, let’s finish up. I’ve got dinner plans with Nico. But I think I’m starting to form an idea about your diagnosis.”

“This really is fun,” I admit. The irony is not lost on me that I’m having a good time describing—in detail—the way my father’s brain works.

Dad isn’t my favorite person, but I don’t typically complain about him to anyone. My whole life, I just went along with the cookie-cutter perfect family thing we’ve got going on. Anything else would’ve felt self-indulgent. I mean, I’m a rich dude who grew up in Greenwich and attended elite private schools. Other people have it worse. Some of them suffer from actual physical abuse, which is far worse than simply being unable to meet the unrealistic standards of an egomaniac.

Nevertheless, it is fascinating to describe these events of my childhood from Dad’s point of view. I don’t know if I’m hitting the right notes, but more research on the subject will probably help me zero in on specific thought patterns.