Sensing Light by Mark A. Jacobson Read Free Book Online

a lot.”
    Seeing a giddy sparkle in his eyes at odds with such an earnest assessment, she was emboldened to move beyond talking about Eva.
    â€œSo…is this job fun for you?”
    â€œIt is. Doesn’t pay well, but it is fun. Plus, I get to do something useful. At least I’m not making bombs.”
    And there was the grin she was anticipating. Gwen crossed her arms, looked down, and giggled.
    â€œYou like what you do?” he asked with an intensity that could hardly be misconstrued as making idle conversation.
    â€œI do. I’m proud of it, too.”
    She met his eyes again and thought how wonderful it would be to have this in common—enjoying your work and feeling it made a positive social contribution—how much it would help in building sustainable intimacy. She remembered once sharing that bond with Daniel. It was the main reason she agreed to marry him. What a mistake that had been. But this man didn’t take himself so seriously.
    As Rick started to ask what she did, Eva stomped between them. She scowled and dug a shoulder into Gwen, knocking her off balance. Gwen regained her footing and gave Eva an exasperated frown.
    Though tempted to say, “Use your words, Eva, instead of hitting,” she realized forbearance would make a better impression than treating her daughter like a four year old.
    â€œHow was your day, darling?” said Gwen, her sarcasm unconcealed.
    â€œFine,” Eva growled.
    Smiling at Rick, Gwen said, “I think this girl is tired.”
    â€œYeah,” he agreed wistfully.
    â€œSee you.”
    Eva took her hand as they walked toward her car.
    â€œBye,” he sang out to them.
    I can wait until June, thought Gwen. Hope you can.
    After cleaning the dinner dishes, Gwen plopped on their overstuffed couch, purchased at a flea market. Eva crawled onto her lap and braided Gwen’s hair, blond when Eva was a baby, now sandy brown. At eight o’clock, Eva jumped up to turn on the television set. While her focus was on the screen, Gwen watched her laugh at the situation comedy. Eva had Daniel’s looseblack curls and aquiline nose and was as quick-witted as her father. Unlike Daniel, she could appreciate the humor of others.
    Eva leaned forward in anticipation of her favorite moment, when the loveable bigot would call his son-in-law “Meathead.” Gwen marveled at how much happier Eva seemed than she had been at this age. What would Eva’s favorite memory be in twenty years? Watching television at night with her single, working mom? She hoped Eva would have better than that, but laughing at Archie Bunker together would be good enough.
    Gwen’s best memory from fourth grade was reading alone in her bedroom. That was the year her family disintegrated and she started working hard at school so she could eventually escape to college.
    At the first chords of the show’s closing theme, Gwen said, “Time for bed.”
    Eva did her Frankenstein imitation, arms stretched out, legs stiff, rocking from side to side. As Gwen guided Eva to the bathroom, she thought of how “time for bed” might sound if said seductively to Rick.
    â€œGod, I’m pathetic,” she muttered.
    Eva went to sleep, and Gwen lay awake listening to her favorite jazz cassette. She loved the piano’s quirky melodic line, its unexpected shifts in tempo and key, the naked emotion of the music. She wished she had someone to snuggle next to, someone comfortable with life’s capriciousness. This made her think of Daniel, a man with no tolerance for uncertainty. Her fantasy was replaced by resentment.
    â€œWhat had I been thinking, marrying him?”
    They met the summer of 1964 in Hinds County, Mississippi. Gwen, about to be a senior at Stanford, and Daniel, a law school student, were volunteers in a voter registration campaign. Sixty-seven black churches, businesses, and homes were bombed or burned that summer. Three volunteers were