An Unfinished Season by Ward Just Read Free Book Online Page B

threw his napkin on the table and strode to the den. The phone was on a table next to the French doors that opened onto the terrace. I suppose it had rung thirty times and when he picked up the receiver and put it to his ear, the abrupt silence was so thick you could feel it gather. My mother watched with her hand covering her mouth so that when we saw the window glass shatter and heard the explosion her scream was muffled until her hand fell away and her voice rose in the high notes of a clarinet. My father stood rigid as a tree, then fell into his hockey crouch, his fists in front of his face. When he dropped the receiver, it broke apart on the parquet floor. I could see the blood on his hands and arms, his shirtsleeve torn as if someone had sliced it with a knife. My mother half rose from her chair and remained there, bent at the waist, clutching the pearls at her throat. We felt the cold night breeze pushing in from the shattered window and smelled the sweet odor of new-grown spring grass. And still my father did not move, except to raise his hand, a command for us to remain where we were. He did not speak but I could hear his breathing. I was watching him, horrified at the blood on his hands, frightened, naturally, but resolved to act as a man should act, as he would wish me to act at this moment when our tranquillity was destroyed, everything familiar vanished in an instant. I waited for another gunshot or for one of them to appear at the window, and then I remembered the duffel in the coat closet, useless. I waited for my father’s signal, any signal—and in some back chamber of my mind I saw him as the skipper of a vessel struck by a terrible and unexpected storm, one that he could not turn from even as it overwhelmed him. This was the violence of the outside world, and he was responsible for it and responsible for us and I prayed he would not fail as I knew my mother expected him to do. And still he did not speak, remaining in his hockey crouch, his head moving this way and that. Considering this, all in a split second, I knew I was traveling from one realm to another, crossing the line that divided youth and maturity, and that this moment had tremendous weight and that I would refer to it often and that later on it would have more than one meaning.
    Then I was standing at the French doors without any clear memory of how I had got there or what I would do now. I could hear my father’s breathing and wondered then if the invaders were still outside, their business unfinished. I looked left and right but could see nothing through the ragged hole in the window glass, the grassy breeze in my face and the sound of the explosion in my ears and all around me. The terrace no longer looked familiar. My father said something I could not hear, and then I noticed it had begun to rain, a soft drizzle that became a downpour as I watched, a ragged line of lightning straight ahead, rainwater flying through the window and puddling on the floor. Beyond the fairway and the green, I thought I saw headlights but I could not be certain, the rain descending in sheets and thunder crashing in the distance.
    From the dining room my mother gave a little strangled cry and my father lowered his hand, wiping blood on his shirt. When I turned, I saw he was white as ash and his eyes were unfocused, his forehead slick with sweat and his shoulders sagging. I did not know how many times he had been hit but he looked as if he might collapse at any moment. His arm leaked blood but he paid no attention to it. When my mother reached his side he seemed not to notice, his bloody arm automatically around her waist and his eyes far away. I thought he would break down and I held my breath; and then I saw the expression on my mother’s face, a confusion of concern and helpless fury and a kind of grim satisfaction that her warnings had come true. Her family was not safe and her husband was responsible. When I reached for my father and took his