Part 8
“How was drop-off?” he asked.
“He was scared Mrs. Parker would say it was just a toy.”
Daniel closed his eyes.
Anna put her keys down. “I took pictures yesterday. I’m going to keep notes.”
His eyes opened. “Notes?”
“Yes. What happened. What was said. How Caleb reacts. How Mason reacts. What we do.”
“Do you think that’s necessary?”
“I think forgetting has been convenient.”
He looked hurt again, but less defensively this time. “Okay.”
“I am not doing it to build a case against your son.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You were about to think it.”
He gave a tired, humorless laugh. “Maybe.”
Anna sat across from him. The kitchen smelled like burnt coffee.
“I need to say something ugly,” she said.
He nodded.
“If Mason had broken something of yours, really yours, not Caleb’s, you would have acted faster.”
Daniel’s face changed.
“Maybe not,” he said.
“Yes,” she said. “You would have.”
He looked down at his hands. “Maybe.”
“And if Caleb had destroyed something Mason loved?”
Daniel did not answer.
“You know what would have happened.”
He rubbed his forehead. “I would have protected Mason.”
“Yes.”
“I protect him because he’s been hurt.”
“And Caleb?”
Daniel looked toward the refrigerator, toward the box above it.
“I thought Caleb was okay,” he said.
Anna did not speak.
“He’s cheerful,” Daniel said weakly. “He bounces back.”
“He is six.”
“I know.”
“He bounces because he has no power.”
The words surprised her. Daniel looked at her sharply.
Anna continued, slower now. “He cannot leave the house. He cannot change the room. He cannot tell Mason to stop and make it matter. So he bounces because adults like resilient children better than inconveniently wounded ones.”
Daniel’s eyes filled.
Anna stood, suddenly unable to sit with his remorse. “I have laundry.”
It was a ridiculous exit, but she took it.
In the laundry room, she sorted clothes with unnecessary force. Tiny socks. Daniel’s shirts. Mason’s dark hoodie with one sleeve inside out. Caleb’s pajama pants covered in planets. The ordinariness of the pile enraged her. Families could damage each other in the morning and still produce laundry by night.
Daniel appeared in the doorway.
“I called a therapist,” he said.
She folded a towel. “For Mason?”
“For Mason. For me. For us, if you’ll go.”
Anna looked at him. “Not a therapist who tells me blending families takes patience.”
“No.”
“Not someone who treats Caleb like an adjustment issue.”
“No.”
“Not someone who makes Mason’s pain the explanation for everything and the end of every conversation.”
Daniel leaned against the doorframe. “No.”
She wanted to believe him. Wanting was dangerous because it looked so much like progress.
“Who?” she asked.
“Dr. Evelyn Hart. School counselor recommended her last year, and I ignored it.”
Anna remembered. Mason had shoved another student in October after the boy joked about his mother missing parent night. The school suggested counseling. Daniel said Mason did not need to be pathologized. Anna had let the sentence stand because the argument at home had already been long.
“You ignored it,” she repeated.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because I didn’t want proof that I couldn’t handle him.”
That answer was ugly enough to be useful.
Anna nodded. “Make the appointment.”
“I did. Tomorrow afternoon for intake. Just me first.”
“Good.”
“And Mason tonight. I’ll tell him.”
“He will hate it.”
“Yes.”
“He will blame me.”
Daniel looked at her. “I won’t let him.”
She hoped that meant something.
Mason came home at four, moving through the front door with exaggerated exhaustion. He saw Anna in the hallway and stopped. The hallway had become a country none of them could enter casually yet.
“Where’s Caleb?” he asked.
Anna studied him.
“At Rebecca’s,” she said. “She picked him up for ice cream.”
Mason’s face tightened. “So now everyone knows?”
“Rebecca already knew.”
“Great.”
Anna waited.
He dropped his backpack. “Is he scared of me?”
The question came out with more fear than attitude.
“Yes,” Anna said.
He looked down.
“Do you want me to lie?”
“No.”
He kicked lightly at the edge of the runner rug, then stopped himself.
“I didn’t sleep,” he said.
Anna did not comfort him.
“Mason, your father is going to talk to you tonight about therapy.”
His head snapped up. “No.”
“Yes.”
“You can’t make me.”
“I cannot make you want help. Adults can make attendance a condition of living safely in this house.”
He stared at her. “Safely?”
“Yes.”
“You think I’m dangerous?”
Anna thought carefully. He deserved truth, but not cruelty.
“I think Caleb does not feel safe with you right now. I think you used his love for Grandpa to hurt him. I think you threw something precious down the stairs because you wanted him to feel powerless. I think those are dangerous choices.”
He swallowed. “You sound like a lawyer.”
“I sound like someone who stopped smoothing words for you.”
Mason’s eyes flashed. “I said I was sorry.”
“And Caleb said he did not forgive you today.”
“That’s not fair.”
Anna felt a sad, bitter surprise. “To whom?”
He opened his mouth, then closed it.
She stepped closer, leaving space between them. “An apology is not a receipt you hand someone to prove they owe you peace.”
Mason looked away.
Daniel came in from the kitchen. “Mason.”
“Yeah, I know,” Mason snapped. “Therapy. I’m broken. Whatever.”
Daniel’s face tightened, but he kept his voice level. “You are not broken. You are responsible.”
“Same thing in this house.”
“No,” Anna said. “It is not.”
He looked between them, confused by their agreement.
Daniel held out his hand. “Phone.”
Mason laughed. “Seriously?”
“Yes.”
“What about homework?”
“You can use the family computer in the kitchen.”
“That’s humiliating.”
Daniel did not move his hand.
Mason dug the phone out and slapped it into his palm. “This is why I hate being here.”
May you like
Caleb walked in then with Rebecca behind him.
They had returned through the side door from the driveway, quiet enough that no one noticed. Caleb held a small paper cup of ice cream with a plastic spoon sticking up from it. Chocolate smeared his upper lip. He froze when he saw Mason.
