Chapter 1 - The Dinner He Wasn’t Supposed to See
The spaghetti hit Mason before Ryan had both feet inside the house.
A wet slap of sauce, noodles, and lukewarm meatballs spilled over the ten-year-old’s hair and gray T-shirt, sliding down the white fiberglass casts covering both arms.
Mason didn’t move.
He couldn’t wipe his face.
His right leg, also casted from ankle to thigh, rested stiffly on a padded dining chair.
Across the table, thirteen-year-old Chloe covered her mouth and laughed.
Vanessa stood over Mason with the empty plate.
“Pick it up and eat it,” she said, “or cross your arms and apologize.”
Mason stared at his casts.
“I can’t.”
“Then you don’t eat.”
Ryan’s suitcase dropped beside the front door.
“What the hell did you just do to my son?”
Vanessa spun around.
For one instant, her face showed something Ryan had never seen on it before.
Not guilt.
Fear.
He had returned to Naperville two days early from a supplier meeting in Frankfurt. Vanessa thought he was somewhere over the Atlantic.
Ryan crossed the dining room so fast his shoulder clipped a chair.
Vanessa reached for Mason.
Ryan stepped between them.
“Don’t touch him.”
“Oh, please. He’s been impossible since you left.”
Ryan looked at the food coating Mason’s head, then at Chloe’s untouched chicken, salad, and bread.
“What did he eat today?”
Vanessa folded her arms.
“He refused what I gave him.”
Mason whispered, “There wasn’t anything.”
Ryan crouched beside him.
“How long?”
Mason wouldn’t meet his eyes.
“Every night you’re gone.”
Ryan’s stomach tightened.
Vanessa scoffed. “He’s manipulating you.”
Mason’s lower lip trembled.
“Dad?”
“I’m right here.”
“I haven’t had a real meal in three days.”
Ryan stood.
“Vanessa, take Chloe and go to your sister’s tonight.”
“You’re throwing us out because he’s throwing a tantrum?”
“I’m asking you to leave before I say something I can’t take back.”
She stared at him, then grabbed her handbag.
Chloe stopped laughing.
Ryan had expected defiance from Mason.
Instead, as Vanessa reached the foyer, Mason finally looked up.
“Dad…”
Ryan turned.
Mason’s face was streaked with sauce and tears.
“She told me you’d stop coming home too.”
Vanessa’s hand stopped on the front-door handle.
Ryan looked at her.
She would not look back.
May you like
Then Mason added, almost too quietly to hear:
“She said you already knew why I fell.”
