Chapter 32

As I’m trying to make my exit from his bedroom, Gabe sits up and tosses off his covers for, I don’t know, probably the eighth time. “Daddy…”

“Lie down, bud.” I say it gently, but a fist tightens in my chest. I’m losing patience with him. I want to get back to the living room to talk to Maddie about the apartment thing. I want to tell her she needs to postpone it a week or two. I mean, what’s the difference to the landlord whether they move in now or in two weeks? We can go over there on a daily basis and check up on the place, or whatever it takes to ease the landlord’s fears about it being vacant for a little longer.

And that will give me more time to convince her that—

That what?

That I’ve changed? That I’ve become the kind of guy who commits? A father? A husband?

Like my father, who was the worst kind of father and the worst kind of husband? Hateful, and then…gone.

What kind of an asshole would I be if I selfishly kept Maddie near me, knowing how little potential I have to make her happy?

“I need a drink of water, Daddy.” Gabe slides his legs out from under the sheets toward the side of the bed.

I steer them back and pull up the covers. “You had a drink. If you drink more, you’ll have to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night.”

“But I’m thirsty.” He kicks his legs out against my hands, catching me in the wrist. It hurts surprisingly much for an injury inflicted by a preschooler.

Don’t you dare kick me!

A little twist of anger wells up. I want to shout. Get in his face. Scare him just a little so he doesn’t try that again. Ever.

I crush the impulse and get him one more small cup of water. He doesn’t even drink it. He just takes it and puts it on the bedside table, which irritates me even more. He was manipulating me. I was manipulated by a four-year-old.

I make my voice calm and say, “Okay. Now time for sleeping.”

“I’m not sleepy.”

I take a deep breath, rebuild the wall holding back the wave of anger. “It’s bedtime, bud. You need to lie down. Here. I’ll put the radio on.”

I reach over and dial his radio until I pull down an a.m. station that’s broadcasting a basketball game. He settles onto the pillow, and I breathe a sigh of relief.

“Sleep tight, bud.”

“G’night, Daddy.”

I kiss his forehead.

In the living room, Maddie is standing by the fireplace.

“He down?”

“I think. He was tough. He didn’t want me to leave.”

Maybe he doesn’t want to leave.

I don’t want him to leave.

I don’t want you to leave.

“Maddie, about the apartment.”

She turns an agonized face to me. “Jack, please.”

“Maddie, I don’t think you should take it. I mean, things are…” I cast around for a way to say what I’m feeling. “This thing between us. It’s not—”

It’s not just sex.

It’s not like anything I’ve ever experienced.

It’s not something you can walk away from or throw away.

“It’s not over yet.”

That wasn’t right. That wasn’t what I was trying to say. I open my mouth again, but she breaks in.

“Jack, we agreed. We said this was just until I got an apartment.”

I want to reach out and haul her into my arms. Kiss her until she gives up resisting and says the thing I’m trying to say but can’t. That we need to give this time. That we need to give each other another chance.

“Maybe we were wrong.”

“Jack, I can’t do this again. It hurt too bad the first time. I can’t put my heart out there again and feel hopeful and then have you decide you’re not this guy. That this isn’t a thing you can do or commit to. That you’ve got an itch to scratch—”

I open my mouth to tell her. To tell her how fucking wrong she is, about everything. My head and chest are full of words, scrabbling to get out.

“Daddy, I can’t sleep.”

All the words I’d been trying to corral, the ones swirling around, clawing for purchase, gather themselves into one dark funnel cloud.

Jesus Christ, Gabe, for fuck’s sake, you are supposed to be in bed! How hard is it? Just get your ass down the hall—

I am so frustrated with him I’m shaking. And in that moment, I foresee it. I glimpse myself turning on my son, getting in his face, unleashing the ferocious emotion that feels twice as big as I am. I feel the words gather and fling themselves out of my mouth in the direction of the small figure who has appeared in the door of the living room. They will come out of my mouth in my father’s voice, they will sail on a mist-cloud of spit, the droplets hitting him in the face, my breath and my words and my spit and my anger an assault on his tiny toddler form.

He’ll cry, because he’s still little enough not to be ashamed of his tears. (By the time he’s six, he’ll know that tears will just bring more angry words raining down.)

My fists are clenched. My whole body is clenched, holding back the words like the last wall between me and what I’m meant to become.

“Jack,” Maddie says quietly. “I’ve got this.”

She reaches out a hand to touch the muscle at the corner of my jaw, which throbs from how hard I’ve locked it down.

My fists unfurl. The anger goes out of me.

But it was there.

He’s there, inside me.

And she saw it.

Not that she needed to see it. She’s always known it was in there.

With one quick glance at me, Maddie hustles Gabe out of the living room and down the hall.

I stand in the living room, my arms limp by my sides. My mind is blank, except for one thought. My mother used to do that. Try to keep me out of my father’s hair so he wouldn’t, couldn’t lash out at me.

Maddie comes back in. “If he comes out again, I’ve got him.” She looks at me warily, the way you watch a strange dog. “You okay?”

I nod.

“It’s frustrating, right, trying to get him to bed? It can make a saint crazy.”

And you’re no fucking saint, Jack Parker.

“Maddie.”

She gets this look on her face, like she’s gearing up for another fight.

“I know you’re right.”

Her eyes are big with surprise. That wasn’t what she thought I was about to say.

“It’s better this way. It’s better if you guys move out now.”

She hesitates, as if she’s about to say something.

When she opens her mouth, what she says is, “Okay.”