Manish stomps ahead of you on the sidewalk, nearly knocking over another pedestrian. When you catch up to him, he says, "Did you ask Dr. Ellison where I was back then, so that you could visit?"
"I didn't feel comfortable talking to her."
"What about calling the hospital?"
A sick feeling gathers in your stomach. "I tried to reach you later on. I had a lot going on right then."
"Yeah, well, so did I. And I was all alone." Manish says the last sentence so softly you can barely hear him. "Any wonder I didn't return your calls?"
Manish grimaces. "My parents weren't happy I didn't finish at Winfield Phillips."
Manish's parents never sounded that bad when he talked about them back in college. At least he didn't lose his parents. "Didn't they understand what happened?"
"Yeah, well, they never got over me giving up being a practitioner. They had high expectations." Manish kicks a small pebble off of the sidewalk. "Ones I, you know, totally blew up."
That gets a laugh out of Manish. "No, though Dr. Ellison did everything she could to help me. She still checks in on me from time to time."
"She's the department chair now."
Manish side-eyes you. "So you're at Winfield Phillips, then?"
You wave him off. "We'll get to me in a minute. Right now we're talking about what you've been up to."
"Brewing."
That wasn't what you were expecting. "Like, beer?"
"Very like beer, yeah." He points a thumb over his shoulder. "I own a brewpub back there. I started working at a bar after…you know. For a long time bright lights and loud sounds triggered awful headaches. The bar owners were really good about working around my limitations. Eventually I bought the bar and turned it into a brewpub. I'm the brewmaster."