on, a horrible part of me wanted not to be around him right now.
While he ate cereal, still refusing to speak to me, I stood in the kitchen, poured myself a glass of water, and downed it in one. I didn’t really know what to do or how to feel. With just a handful of hours’ distance, the events of the night seemed distant and surreal. Could I be sure I’d seen what I’d seen? Perhaps it had been my imagination. But no, I had seen it. A better father—an average one, even—would have convinced the police to take him seriously. A better father would have a son who talked to him, not undermined him. Who could see that I was just scared for him and trying to protect him.
My hand tightened around the glass.
You’re not your father, Tom.
Rebecca’s quiet voice in my head.
Never forget that.
I looked down at the empty glass in my hand. My grip was too tight on it. That awful memory came back to me—shattering glass; my mother screaming—and I put it down on the counter quickly, before I could start to fail in an altogether worse way.
* * *
At quarter to nine, Jake and I walked to school together, him trailing along to the side of me, still resisting any attempts at conversation. It was only when we reached the gates that he finally spoke to me.
“Who’s Neil Spencer, Daddy?”
“I don’t know.” Despite the subject matter, I was relieved that he was talking to me. “A boy from Featherbank. I think he went missing earlier this year; I remember reading something about it. Nobody knows what happened to him.”
“Owen said he was dead.”
“Owen sounds like a charming little boy.”
It was clear that Jake was thinking about adding something to that, but then he changed his mind.
“He said I was sitting in Neil’s chair.”
“That’s stupid. You didn’t get a place in the school because this Neil kid went missing. Someone else moved to a new house like we did.” I frowned. “And anyway, they’d have all been in a different classroom last year, wouldn’t they?”
Jake looked at me curiously.
“Twenty-eight,” he said.
“Twenty-eight what?”
“Twenty-eight children,” he said. “Plus me is twenty-nine.”
“Exactly.” I had no idea if that was true, but I went with it. “They have classes of thirty here. So wherever Neil is, his chair is waiting for him.”
“Do you think he will come home?”
We stepped into the playground.
“I don’t know, mate.”
“Can I have a hug, Daddy?”
I looked down at him. From the expression on his face now, last night and this morning might as well not have happened at all. But then, he was seven. Arguments were always resolved in his time and on his terms. In this instance, I was too tired not to accept that.
“Of course you can.”
“Because even when we argue—”
“We still love each other. Very much.”
I knelt down, and the tight embrace felt like it was powering me back up a little. That a hug like this, every so often, would keep me running. And then he ambled inside past Mrs. Shelley without giving me even a backward glance. I walked back out through the gate, hoping he didn’t get into any more trouble today.
But if he did …
Well, he did.
Just let him be him.
“Hello, there.”
I turned to find Karen slightly behind me, walking just fast enough to catch up.
“Hey,” I said. “How are you?”
“Looking forward to a few hours’ peace and quiet.” She fell into step beside me. “How did Jake do yesterday?”
“He went up to yellow,” I said.
“I have no idea what that means.”
I explained the traffic light system. The gravity and supposed seriousness of it seemed so meaningless after the events of the night that I almost laughed at the end.
“That sounds fucking abominable,” she said.
“That’s what I thought.”
I wondered if there was some nominal moment when playground parents decided to drop a certain level of pretense and swear like normal people. If there was, I was glad to have passed it.
“In some ways it’s a badge of honor, though,” she said. “He’ll be the envy of his classmates. Adam said they didn’t have much of a chance to play together.”
“Jake said Adam was nice,” I lied.
“He also said Jake talked to himself a bit.”
“Yes, he does do that sometimes. Imaginary friends.”
“Right,” Karen said. “I sympathize with him completely. Some of my best friends are imaginary. I’m joking, obviously. But Adam went through that, and I’m sure I did too when I was a kid. You probably did as