Tears of a Tiger Chapter 17 Summary

Christmas Without Rob

  • Back at the psychologist's office, the doc asks Andy about his Christmas vacation.
  • Andy shares that Christmas was rough because he usually did a bunch of fun stuff with Rob during this time, so he was super reminded of how much he misses his friend.
  • He and Rob would go to department stores to look around and bug all the salespeople. According to Andy, the salesgirls would get on edge because they thought Andy and Robbie might steal stuff because of their race.
  • They wouldn't, of course, but Andy and Rob had a fun time walking around the expensive sections anyway, just to freak everyone in the store out.
  • When the psychologist asks Andy how that made him feel, he reports that it felt pretty terrible. Sure, they would laugh about it and turn it into a game, but in reality, it's no fun having people make assumptions about you.
  • The guys would also ask where the black Santa was, and then get in trouble—this is why Andy thinks about Rob any time he sees Santa or anything Christmas-y.
  • He feels badly about getting depressed when he was out with Keisha, but he knows she's cool about it.
  • Then the psychologist asks about his girl. How are things going with Keisha? What would happen if she weren't there anymore?
  • Andy hadn't really thought about that. He depends on Keisha more than anyone else to get him through his ups and downs; she's the only one who lets him vent and doesn't tell him to get over it (like his parents do).
  • Andy thinks about how it was with her over the holiday and tells the doc that on Christmas, he managed to have a pretty normal day—to start with, anyway. He and his family were hanging out, trading gifts, and then Keisha came over. Everything was great.
  • And then Robbie's mom called. She always calls Andy on Christmas and jokes with him that Santa won't bring him anything if he was bad, that all he'll get is a rock.
  • And then, in the past, Andy would tell her he'd been good that year and she'd give him his real presents.
  • This year, though, Andy got really sad when she called, and they didn't do their usual inside joke about gifts.
  • This wound up ruining his Christmas because it reminded him of all his fun times with Rob.