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track of what he was saying.
    “ This . This exclusive, members-only crap,” he said, gesturing around the main room at Hillcrest, which looked out onto the golf course. “They built it because the gentiles wouldn’t let us join theirs.”
    “Right. I see what you mean.”
    “Everybody’s gotta have somebody to step on. Makes ’em feel important.”
    “But there have to be better, more productive ways of proving your worth in the world—ways that don’t involve crushing other people. Isn’t that why we fought the war?”
    He turned to me with a slightly surprised look on his face, which slowly melted into a smile.
    “I sure as shit would like to think so, Greyson.” Then he squeezed my shoulder. “Do me a favor, Grey?”
    “Sure, Mr. Rothman.”
    “Keep being friends with Alan.”
    I laughed. “Of course. Why wouldn’t I?”
    “No reason. Just—you’re a mensch , Grey. You know what that means?”
    “I’ve heard—”
    “It means you’re a good person. A good man. In here,” Mr. Rothman said, tapping on his chest above his heart. Then he drained his drink and looked around. “Look at these putzes …” He put his arm around my shoulder and rattled the ice cubes in his glass. “I think you may be the only one in the room,” he said.
    I have never before given much thought to that exchange. But for a moment, it makes me feel hopeful, optimistic. Mr. Rothman thought I was a good man. And then the moment is gone.
    “It’s never too late to start again,” he says. “God will always welcome you back.”
    “Trust me, Matt, God wants nothing to do with me. I’m not a nice man.” As if to prove my point, I nudge the shot glass closer to him. Because I feel like getting drunk. And I don’t feel like doing it alone.
    “Maybe just one,” he whispers.
    “Just one.” I give his shoulder a squeeze. “They’ll never know.”
    And come dinnertime, I’m happy to pick up the tab for all the Italian-Irish fish-and-chips those doughy, greasy-haired, pasty-faced Montana teenagers can eat. So Matt and I can get just a tiny bit shit-faced. And Matt tells me his story. It turns out he wasn’t always so good.
    “I was addicted to smack,” he confesses when he’s several shots in. “I mean, you know, before I was saved.”
    “Is that right?”
    “Yes, sir. I was a young man in trouble. Drugs. Women.”
    “And look at you now,” I say, slapping him on the back.
    “I’m living proof, Jesus can save anyone.”
    “Trust me, Matt, keep Jesus and God for you and those kids and whoever else believes. Leave me out of it.”
    “Why? Because you think you don’t deserve His love? What did you ever do that is so unforgivable?”
    “Well, there were the drugs. They almost wrecked my marriage.”
    “We do stupid things when we’re high. But you got clean—”
    “Doesn’t matter. There were nights … parties … business things … women. I’d stumble in the next morning smelling of alcohol and another woman and I’d kiss my wife on the mouth. And then I’d sit down at the breakfast table and eat Cheerios with my perfect little girl.”
    “That’s the drugs,” Matt says, coming to my defense. “You’d never do that now. And every marriage goes through difficult times.”
    “Does every husband rape his wife?”
    Matt is silent.
    I pour him another round. “It was the late seventies and people were getting high and fucking right out in the open. Right next to the buffet tables. I came home from a party one night—I had wanted Ellen there with me and she wouldn’t come—and I came home all coked up, and I really wanted to fuck. I told her I’d spent the whole fucking night staring at a bunch of naked models, and I hadn’t touched a single one. She asked me what I wanted, a fucking medal?”
    I pour myself another shot and knock it back fast so I can feel it burn going down. “Well, you know what, Matt? I did want a fucking medal. Hadn’t I made good on all my promises—my