Light of Day by Jamie M. Saul Read Free Book Online

you want,” while she made long, quick swipes with her hand. “I suppose I’m just trying to protect you, and I’m only being insensitive.”
    He walked over to the window and turned his back to her. His legs were trembling again and he didn’t want her to see it.
    She said, “It sounds like a bunch of psychobabble, I know,” in a tone that wasn’t mother love and probably wasn’t meant to be, “but I just don’t want you to implode.”
    â€œI want my boy back.” Jack said this simply, calmly, but he had the impulse to put his fist through the window, or grab the coffeepot and smash it, just to hear the crash and watch the flying glass and the stream of black coffee streak the yellow walls. That would stop the threat of implosion. “I’m a mess.”
    â€œYou’re allowed to be a mess.”
    â€œI’m sorry I shouted at you.” He turned around to face her.
    â€œYou’re also allowed to shout.”
    Jack folded his arms across his chest and breathed deeply. “I don’t know what I’m going to do.”
    â€œThere’ll be time for that.”
    â€œI trusted my instincts.”
    Lois nodded her head.
    â€œI was sure I knew what I was doing. It was all working out. But I was just lucky for a while, that’s all.” His body heaved. “I let him die.”
    â€œI don’t think you’re in any shape to make that judgment.” She walked over to him and took his hands in hers. “Listen to me,” she whispered. “You brought him to the safest place you knew, and created a charmed world for him with interesting people, stimulating people. You took him to exciting places. You made him the center of your universe, and his.” She waited a moment, as though she were making sure her student was paying attention. “You gave up your life for him.”
    Jack said he didn’t want to argue the merits of her case or his sorrow. He said he was tired of talking.
    Lois turned her eyes away self-consciously, or self-consciously for her, just for a moment. When she looked at him, she said, “You were agood father. That’s all I’m trying to say.”
    â€œNot good enough.”
    Â 
    They were in the living room when the phone rang. Lois asked, “Do you want me to get it?”
    Jack shook his head and got up.
    It was Eileen, calling because she was a good student assistant, an efficient student assistant. She’d found the office door unlocked and Jack’s briefcase open and the VCR still on. She wanted to know if everything was all right.
    â€œI’ve had a little trouble. I’ll be in later.” Jack turned to Lois and raised his eyebrows hopelessly while he told Eileen, “The senior grades have to be in today, my student list for the fall semester needs to be downloaded and brought to—”
    Eileen reminded him that she knew the drill. “Are you sure you’re all right?”
    â€œI’m fine.”
    â€œDo you need anything?”
    â€œI’m fine.”
    â€œI’ll check in on you later.”
    â€œFine. Everything’s fine.” Jack hung up the phone and walked to the kitchen, forgot why he’d gone there and walked out. On his way back to the living room he stopped to look at the photographs of Danny. There was the one from the day they brought Mutt home from the shelter. Danny had just turned six. “The two puppies,” Jack had called them. Danny held the palm of his hand under Mutt’s jaw, lifting the puppy’s head. The sun reflected in their eyes, the little boy and his puppy squinted and smiled in perpetuity for the camera.
    There was the photograph taken last April, when they went to St. John, when they packed the Jeep with snorkel gear, a few bottles of water, some sandwiches and cookies, and drove the dirt roads.
    Danny had liked that photograph of himself and Jack had liked seeing it hanging on the