Mad Honey: A Novel by Jodi Picoult, Jennifer Finney Boylan Read Free Book Online Page B

to reach Adams, New Hampshire. For that reason, when I was growing up, the town celebrated Independence Day two Saturdays after the Fourth of July. There was a little parade, a petting zoo on the green, and a fire engine and police car for little kids to climb in. When Asher was four, Braden happened to have Adams Day weekend off, so we made the trek from Boston to visit my mother. We sat on the curb and let Asher catch candy that was thrown from the parade floats that limped past—antique cars bearing politicians seeking reelection, a local barbershop quartet, the Girl Scouts. While Braden stood in line to get us cotton candy, Asher spotted the police car and darted toward it.
    I chased after him. The blues were flashing, which is why it took me a minute to realize that I knew the officer who was lifting kids in and out of the car in a regulated flow. “Oh my God, Mike,” I said, before I could stop myself. “You’re still here?”
    He grinned. “Hey, Olivia. Old habits die hard.”
    Braden walked up, holding the cone of spun sugar. His arm snaked around my waist. “Who’s this?” he asked, smiling.
    “Braden, Mike,” I introduced. “We went to school together a thousand years ago.”
    As they shook hands and made small talk, Asher climbed into the open rear door of the police car, curling his chubby little fingers through the wire mesh of the cage that served as a divider. Mike reached for him. “If you’re going to ride in a police car, buddy,” he said, “you definitely want to be up front.” He swung Asher into the driver’s seat.
    Later that night, when we were getting ready to go to bed, Braden stood beside me at the bathroom sink. He watched me rub moisturizer onto my cheeks, my neck.
    “Did you date him?” he asked.
    I laughed. “Mike? I mean, for a hot second. But we were kids.”
    Braden’s eyes met mine in the mirror. “Did you fuck him?”
    I closed the jar of moisturizer. “I’m not going to dignify that with an answer,” I said.
    Suddenly his hands were at my throat. My gaze flew to the mirror, to his fingers pressing against my windpipe. “I could make you,” Braden replied.
    As stars started to narrow my vision, Braden abruptly released me. Coughing, I pushed past him. Instead of going to my old bedroom, where we had left our overnight bags, I went to my mother’s sewing room, curling onto my side on a narrow couch, trying to make myself as small as possible.
    Hours—or maybe minutes—later, I woke to the shape of Braden kneeling beside the couch. It was so dark that he was only a shift in the seam of the night. He held out his hand to touch me, and I flinched. “I just can’t stand the thought of you with anyone else,” he whispered.
    “I’m yours,” I told him, as he fitted his body against mine.
    For days after that, Braden would leave me love notes—on the bathroom mirror, in my wallet, in the stack of Asher’s folded clothes. He brought me flowers. He kissed me, just because. Until it got back to the point where, when he touched me, my body instinctively softened, instead of going tense.
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    —
    WHEN WE GET HOME, I am surprised to see the pine boughs and wire and Christmas lights on the porch where I left them. It feels as though I’ve been gone for months, not hours. Asher, shell-shocked and silent on the ride, gets out of the car before it even rolls to a complete stop. His movements are jerky, shuddering, those of a wooden puppet instead of a boy. I hurry after him, but he is already halfway up the stairs when I get inside the house. “Ash,” I call out. “Let me get you something to eat.”
    “Not hungry,” he mutters, and a moment later, I hear the door to his room slam.
    I hang up my coat and go into the kitchen. Even though Asher has turned down dinner, I heat up some soup and bring it to him. When I knock on his bedroom door, he doesn’t answer. I hesitate, cognizant of his privacy, but then remember what Mike said. I balance the tray of food on my