His wife was critically ill; his son would never be classified as normal. But this damaged family was his family. Mine. He shuffled the smooth shell pieces until he had three in each palm. Coins from the ocean. Currency to buy back a life.
“Mine.”
The wind took his word and carried it into the ocean, maybe all the way back to England. Back to Pater’s grave, to his bones.
I will never be you. I will do better.
He pulled out his phone. It was one thirty already. He should get some lunch before driving back to Durham. He turned, and with the wind at his back other sounds broke through the din of the waves: a seagull crying, a distant car horn. Even the waves were less ferocious. He had two phone calls to make: the first one to the school secretary, to explain that Harry would need to stay for after-school care; the second to Robert. To tell him that he was taking the rest of the week off and would not be joining him for the client meetings in Charlotte on Friday night and all day Saturday. Curt would have to take over the Life Plan meeting, too, but Felix could finish hashing out the details from home. Curt would merely have to present his boss’s work with confidence. Confidence was never a problem for Curt. But first, he stopped and typed with one finger:
I promise to make my life all about Harry.
Then he hit “Send.” He’d done it. There was no going back. His word, once given, was a titanium seal. Ella replied immediately with the symbol Felix now recognized as a heart. A shape that had new meaning.
Felix slipped his mobile into his back pocket. If he was going to do this, if he was going to prove to Ella that he could raise their child single-handedly, he needed to reassess his role in the family, step out from behind the desk job, and sign up for the frontlines of active father duty. If he was going to master the nitty-gritty of being an at-home parent, he needed a battle plan. A bloody good one.
Starting tomorrow? There would be no more after-school.
SEVEN
Harry was freeing his calculus textbook from the disaster that was his locker when the spitball thwacked him upside the head. He hadn’t been targeted since second grade, but it was a feeling he’d never forgotten. Little kids could be unconscionably cruel. But there were no little kids around. Hardly any kids, period. Just after-schoolers, and none of them were meant to be up here except to get stuff from their lockers. One of those rules that made no sense, considering the upstairs hall was a huge room crammed with everything that didn’t fit in the rest of the school. Kids and teachers were in and out constantly.
He bobbed his locker disco ball with his index finger, twice, and turned to corner his attacker with well-armed Tourette’s facts. But there, on the other side of the big table that doubled as the art room, was Sammie. Wearing those skinny jeans that were tight enough to make him want to roll out his tongue and pant. She was also grinning at him like he was special. And not special in a challenged way. Which she might think if he did pant. With good reason.
Harry, you dork. Just say hello.
Harry grinned back, and for one whole glorious moment, his body did exactly what he wanted it to do. Nothing.
Then she gave a shy wave and skipped off toward one of the classrooms.
Shit, she was even hotter than she’d been in his dream. If that was possible. Why hadn’t he said hello? That wasn’t so hard. One word: H, E, double L, O. Guys had been saying it to girls for generations. No big deal.
His head jerked in the crazy-ass sideways nod, the new tic from the airport, and his neck cracked. Vagina, vagina. The word threatened to spew out like a hazmat spill. Vagina, vagina. He cleared his throat, made some weird gagging noise, swallowed the word.
The door crashed open, bringing a wave of cold from the stairwell. “Hey, man. What’s up?”
Harry shrugged at Max. “Not much. Getting my stuff.”