opposite side of the desk, holding a proof in his hands.
“Yes, David, very good news.”
“I’m glad because I got bad news. Everything’s running short on page one. We got holes all over and no copy to fill it. Meg’s asking if you want to tear up the whole layout and start again.”
The grin stayed on Simon’s face. He couldn’t get rid of it if he wanted to. I didn’t kill someone! Gone was the threat of being interrogated, arrested, humiliated, tried, and jailed. He had nothing to hide now, especially since he had confessed to Amy. Paul Walker couldn’t hurt him or his family anymore.
“Mr. Howe?”
“Yes, David, blow up page one. I’ll start over after lunch.”
It felt strange to Simon, turning the key to his own front door. It had only been a few days’ absence, but he felt like a stranger here, a trespasser. Amy was at work—he had counted on that. Davey was gone, too, to wherever she had found for him to be while she was at work. She certainly wouldn’t let him stay alone now, even during the day.
“Hello,” he called from the hallway, out of habit. There was no answer.
He looked into the living room, saw the space where the old piano had been, the light rectangle remaining on the darker wood floor. He wondered what she would choose to put there—a new piano? He went upstairs, looked in Davey’s room. Casper was there, as usual, curled on his pillow. She did not raise her head. There were clothes scattered about, shorts and T-shirts, as if Davey had pulled them off before bed and tossed them in whatever direction he liked—an uncharacteristic disorder.
Simon walked down the hallway to their bedroom, dragged a suitcase from under the bed, and filled it with shoes, shirts, pants, and belts. There were so few things one really needed to go out into the world.
When he went downstairs again he turned into the kitchen. The sink was full of dishes, waiting to be washed. The counter was stacked with plastic bags full of oranges, grapes, and tomatoes. Simon took the postcard from his pocket and leaned it against the oranges, where it could not be missed.
He drove back to the Register faster than he should have on the narrow roads, outlining in his head the Setting the Record Straight column that would fill up the vacant space on page one. There was much to set straight. In the editorial room he shifted his computer away from the window, turning his back to his staff, his signal not to be disturbed. Then he began: Dear Readers …
But where to begin, how far back to go? He would confess his involvement with Jean Crane, what she thought he had done to her on graduation night—rape her—and his evasiveness to the police chief about knowing Paul Walker. He would admit to knocking his accuser off the dock and being slow to try to rescue him. He might even say that some part of him was relieved to think that the stalker of his wife and son had drowned and would not be heard from again. But what about the rest of his life, was that fair game now, too? Should he admit that he embellished his inheritance by twenty thousand dollars to secure the loan to buy the Register? Imagined during the abstinent last months of Amy’s pregnancy what it would be like having sex with his young editorial assistant? Or that he continued smoking marijuana for years after college, even sneaking a few puffs behind the garage while Amy was inside nursing Davey? If the truth set one free, why not confess it all? In a lifetime there were so many weaknesses and deceptions one inevitably succumbed to. He was sure he was just scratching the surface remembering them. What would all of these indiscretions add up to, anyway? Nothing remarkable. In the end he was sure his sins were pretty ordinary. Except one, perhaps.
In the crowded paste-up room, amid stacks of unsold copies of the Register dating back years, David Rigero fit the last strip of copy onto page one, the two left columns. He stepped back and admired his work. “You did it, boss, no more empty space.”
Simon leaned forward to read The Weekly Quotation: “We live amid surfaces, and the true art of Life is to skate well on them.” —Emerson. Barbara had chosen well this week, an observation that seemed to fit him perfectly. He did skim the