What kind of shadow does a family secret cast over the child?
Mark Aherne is a middle-aged, married man living in Chicago. He’s estranged from his parents in Boston, his father having bullied and belittled him throughout his childhood.
One Sunday, he receives a desperate phone call from Leslie, his sister, who has cared for their parents for many years. She needs help: his aging parents are sick and are drinking again. Mark soon finds himself back home with his sister dealing with their parents’ loss of independence.
As he cares for his parents, he remembers the past when he lived with his father’s emotional control over him and the family. Although Mark now recognizes the humor in many of his childhood memories, he still recalls those that filled him with guilt and a sense of separation.
As he slowly comes to understand his family’s dysfunction, he discovers secrets in his parents’ lives that led to their own unhappiness. While coping with his mother’s dementia and his father’s stubborn isolation, Mark fears his own aging as he learns to lay to rest the experiences of his childhood.
Targeted Age Group:: 18+
What Inspired You to Write Your Book?
I wrote several short stories about my childhood in the 1950s for my children but didn't publish them. When my elderly parents required help in their 80s, my sister and I shared caring for them. After they died, I wrote a memoir about their last years and reflected on their lives.
When I wrote the book, I turned the plot from a memoir into fiction. In order to introduce drama, I added family conflict: a domineering father, an estranged son, and an undercurrent of long-held parental secrets.
How Did You Come up With Your Characters?
Originally, the characters in the memoir were based on my family, but as I changed reality into fiction, I reimagined the characters to add conflict and a dramatic arc to the plot. Over the years of writing the novel, the complexity of the story became so vivid, I could no longer remember what had started as a kernel of truth and what I had dreamed up while under the spell of writing.
Book Sample
When our parents stopped sleeping in the same room after complaining they kept each other awake at night, Mom moved to Leslie’s old bedroom with the queen-sized bed.
Mom sits in a chair while I remake the bed with clean sheets, making hospital corners the way I was taught in the Air Force. Dad finds a clean nightdress to replace the one she wore at dinner. I lift Mom so Dad can get the old nightgown out from under her, looking away to give Mom some privacy. When she’s dressed, I help her into bed.
Mom reminds me again that Dr. Madison prescribed two Ativan tablets for her at night.
“I know. Leslie told me before she left.” In her pill tray, the two Ativan are the last pills for today. I pick up the prescription bottle to verify the doctor’s instructions: one or two before bedtime. Perhaps cutting the dose back to one pill would, over time, reduce the lethargic fog surrounding her and leave her more alert. I break one tablet cleanly in half.
Dad comes in with a glass of water. While he props Mom up with pillows, I place both halves into her mouth. “There you go. Two pills.”
She tests the halves with her tongue, then looks at me with narrowed eyes. “I get two.”
How can she tell? I pretend not to hear and turn to pull up the duvet to hide my surprise. How low will a son go to cheat his old mom out of one of her pills?
“I get two pills.” She raises her voice. “Big pills.” And she holds out her hand.
Dad carries over the pillbox. “Here’s the other one.” Mom tries to take it out. “Katherine, let me get it.” Her fingers twitch, and the tablet flies out of the tray onto the rug.
I inspect the pill to eliminate rug fuzz, then hold it up, and Mom opens her mouth.
“Down the hatch, Kat.” Dad is pleased he’s solved the problem. He gives her a drink of water.
At least I tried.
Once they’re in bed with the lights out, I sit on the stairs, listening to make certain they’re settled. I’ll buy a gate for the head of the stairs to prevent an untimely descent. In the living room, I click through the TV stations but find nothing to watch, so I open my book.
Before I finish a chapter, a door opens upstairs. I call up in a stage whisper, “Dad, is that you?”
“It’s my bladder. The fool thing’s acting up.”
“Do you need any help?”
“Nooo waaay.” He stretches out the two syllables and closes the bathroom door.
While opening the couch into a bed, I hear the toilet flush.
“How come you’re still up?” he asks, returning to his room.
“It’s only quarter past ten.”
“Hell, I thought it must be after three.”
All is quiet once again.
I’m exhausted and wonder how many days Leslie and I will need to provide around-the-clock observation. It’s not the best time for me to miss work, with quarter-end financial reports due for thousands of customers. I work long hours during this time to solve problems with data errors and automated loads, but now it’s all the more stressful thanks to the new vice-president assigned to our department six months ago. That’s hardly my parents’ fault, but I can’t help blaming them for not taking better care of themselves. Rachel and I are determined not to be a burden to our children.
I resume reading, but my eyes close, and after dropping the book three times, I call it quits and turn out the light.
Too much has happened today, and my brain won’t resign itself to sleep. I lie awake, my eyes wide open, staring at the gray blur of the ceiling. The hot-water heater turns on with a sound I recognize from years before. But surely it can’t be the same one after all this time?
There’s no light from the street outside. Wasn’t there a street lamp between our home and the Robinsons’ next door?
Trees creak in the wind, and raindrops splatter against the windows. The promised storm has started.
I float on the surface of sleep, remembering my nights as a teenager lying in the dark of my bedroom: worrying about SATs, applying to college, deciding to enlist to avoid the draft, and having doubts before marrying Rachel. I’ve survived all these anxieties and will never have to relive them. That thought calms me as I descend into sleep.
***
The booming thunder awakens me, but I must have had my eyes open a second before the crash because I’m blinded by the stab of lightning that illuminates the living room.
I swing my feet over the edge of the bed and sit up, taking deep breaths to steady my racing heart. In the kitchen, I fill a glass with water and return to the living room. I stop in the hallway when I hear a sound and wonder if my father is up again. Leaving the water beside the couch, I climb the stairs and listen intently, but all is silent. The door to my childhood bedroom at the end of the hall is closed.
I hated sleeping alone in the dark when I was in primary school. Once in bed, the band of light from the hall beneath the door was a lifeline until Mom, after saying goodnight, returned downstairs and switched it off. Watching the light disappear was like the world turning its back on me. Then I would start worrying about something: in fifth grade, buying the book of birds; in sixth grade, cheating on a history test; and many other insignificant events I laugh about today but at the time threatened me with exposure and humiliation.
I’ve avoided my old bedroom since I left for the Air Force. At that time, it represented a past that was gone forever, and I wanted to forget the memories of confessions, anxiety, doubts, and fears, many of which I’d brought upon myself as punishment for the guilt I always had as a child. Returning for visits over the next twenty-five years, I had no interest in entering that room. Although no longer experiencing the dark visions of bedtime, I subconsciously avoided awakening any memories, especially the childish ones.
Half asleep, the storm hammering against the house, I walk down the dark hallway. Standing before the door, I open it, enter the room, and close the door silently behind me.
My bedroom is long and narrow. At the far end of the room, three steps rise to a door set in the wall. When opened, one finds the stairs continuing into the attic. I always tested it to ensure the door was locked before saying my prayers. The slightest sound on the steps behind it alarmed me, and I had visions of moaning witches or ogres trying to reach me. And during a storm like tonight, when the wind blew through the attic vents and shook the attic door, I waited, afraid, for it to burst open.
Tonight, the wind pummels the windows and rattles the attic vents, but I hear no groans. I leave the room and close the door. A childish memory debunked is still one of the more durable that lurk in the back of the mind, like walking up the cellar stairs in the dark and the steps creak several seconds behind you. The skin on the back of your neck prickles with cold fingers.
***
Leslie arrives while we’re having breakfast. She enters the kitchen carrying a shopping bag. “Morning, Mom, Dad.” She kisses them. “Give me a minute. There are more bags in the car.”
I leave the table and put on boots over my slippers and a coat over my pajamas.
“Stay inside. I can manage,” she says.
I ignore her and open the front door. “We’ll be right back,” I call over my shoulder.
We wade through standing water on the front lawn, which is littered with branches.
“Any problems last night? Did the storm keep them awake?”
“I woke up once thinking I heard someone roaming around upstairs.”
Leslie opens the trunk. “I thought I was early enough that you’d all still be in bed.”
“No such luck—they were up at the crack of dawn.”
I hand Leslie a bag from the trunk. She waits while I heft the last two into my arms.
She closes the trunk. “Go and get some sleep. I’m here all day. Can you stay again tonight?”
“Of course. I’ll come for dinner.”
I open the screen door while balancing a bag on the porch railing. “We must talk with them about you know what.”
“I dread it. I thought the last time we talked with them… can’t we wait until they’re feeling better?”
“Unless you want to do it yourself, we have to get it out in the open today, or we’ll lose our nerve.”
“Will you start the conversation? I’m not good at times like this.”
I’d rather not but agree. Leslie is more decisive than I am, but I rise to the occasion when necessary. The wind pulls the screen out of my hand, and it bangs against the railing.
“We’d better get inside before they think we’ve run off.”
With breakfast finished we stack the dishes in the dishwasher and put the groceries away. Leslie and Dad prepare a list of meals for the next week. Mom and I sit in the living room reading the paper. She examines the store flyers and then reads a magazine Leslie brought her from cover to cover. I start the crossword puzzle, but I’m too distracted about the upcoming confrontation to concentrate.
Leslie carries in a tray with tea and slices of coffee cake. My heart pounds as I wait for everyone to be served. I’m back in high school, acting in a play, listening offstage for my cue.
Tea is poured. Coffee cake served. My cue. Enter stage right. “Mom, Dad—”
Leslie interrupts, “Oh, what’s this?” She picks up several pieces of colored and white lined paper tied together with a ribbon. The top page has a child’s drawing of a bluebird.
“It’s Mark’s project from the sixth grade,” Mom says.
“Fifth grade,” I correct her, irritated with Leslie for cutting off my opening remarks.
Mom doesn’t hear me or doesn’t want any snag in the story she’s telling. “Dad found it in one of the chifforobe drawers while looking for his Army discharge papers. I didn’t recognize it at first, but then I remembered it was one of Mark’s school assignments.”
“I see where you wrote your name,” Leslie says, adding a trace of false wonderment to her voice, as she quickly scans the pages. “Here’s a section called ‘Why I picked the bluebird.’ Oh, Mark, you were so clever.”
I glare at her. I’m a fan of self-deprecating humor, but not when others use it against me. I’ll give Leslie a pass because I know she’s desperate to postpone the conversation.
“Did you save any of my school projects?” Leslie asks.
“I don’t think so, but you never took your projects as seriously as Mark. He got an A. See, it’s on the back cover.”
“Of course he did. Mark always got an A.”
“Jealousy is such a nasty trait.” I give Leslie a sarcastic grin showing my teeth, rather than the finger she so richly deserves.
“Didn’t you have to buy a book about birds?” Mom asks. “I remember you took the bus alone to the Center…”
“That’s ancient history.” I take charge, ending any more of my mother’s recollections. I’ll always remember that day, although it’s not one I want to discuss. “Putting aside that brief visit down memory lane, Leslie and I have something we need to talk over with you.”
Leslie is unprepared for my sudden transition, then her eyes widen as she understands.
Dad is instantly alert. “All right.” He sounds a little defensive. Mom is in her usual state: happy to listen to whatever we have to say.
“Leslie and I have noticed you’ve started drinking again.”
Our parents say nothing. They glance between Leslie and me, waiting for one of us to continue.
“We’ve been worried about you.” Leslie quietly enters the conversation. “At first, it didn’t seem to affect you, and I overlooked it—”
“But it’s become a problem again.” I pick up the pace. “Leslie and I won’t stand by until one of you is seriously ill and you can’t help each other. Last week is a good example.”
Dad seems surprisingly composed. I expect him to deny it, but he doesn’t. “I knew Leslie was suspicious when she arrived unexpectedly two days ago,” he says. “We’ve tried to keep it on the q.t. because we didn’t want you to worry. We thought we could handle it”—he glances at Mom, who has a stricken look on her face—“but I guess we can’t.”
He stops speaking. In the silence, Mom is crying. “We were afraid if you found out, you wouldn’t bring our grandchildren to visit anymore.”
Leslie and I are shocked by her words and look at each other in confusion.
Mom turns to me. “You said Jon and Jennifer were afraid of us.” Tears streak her cheeks. “We thought we’d never see them again.”
We did say those words—fifteen years ago when our kids were young! At the time, we believed we were justified. Is Mom reliving an event that took place so far in the past?
Leslie embraces her. “But, Mom, you’ve seen them many times. We’d never tell them not to see you.” She looks over Mom’s shoulder at me, her confusion evident in her eyes.
I feel sick to my stomach. Something is terribly wrong with Mom’s memory. Has she forgotten the family reunions? Jennifer’s wedding? Jon’s party before he left for Japan?
“And we stopped,” Dad insists.
“We know you did.” Leslie reaches over to touch his arm. “And we understand how hard it was.”
“We were successful for years,” he says quietly, “but little by little we thought we could handle a drink now and then.”
“And we’ll help in any way we can.” Leslie dries her own tears as well as Mom’s. “You have to let us know when you need help. I thought one of you had died when I came on Sunday. I was frightened. We don’t want you afraid to tell us if something goes wrong.”
Later, coming out to the car with me, Leslie is still shaking. “My God, that was scary. Our threat all those years ago must have frightened the hell out of her. I’ll ask Dad if this has happened before.”
“Why didn’t he say something today? Or is he used to it? The future isn’t going to be easy. You and I need to talk together soon.”
“I’ll stay tomorrow night after they’re in bed.”
Backing out of the driveway, I look up at the windows of my old bedroom. Talk about the past. Are we ever free of it?
The flooded roads are treacherous. I force myself to concentrate on driving and to not replay the last hour in my mind. Instead I think about the book of birds and Miss Callahan, my fifth-grade teacher.
***
To celebrate the arrival of spring, Miss Callahan assigned a project about birds. “Your first task is to pick a bird and explain why you chose it. Who wants to start?”
Hands shot up. Paul St. Charles grunted, raising his hand the highest to get the teacher’s attention.
“Paul? What bird did you select?”
Paul thought he was the best athlete in the class. “A falcon.”
A sudden burst of whispering. Stewart at the back of the class wanted the falcon.
“Interesting. What information about the falcon do you want to share?”
“Huh?”
“Why did you pick a falcon?”
“It has sharp claws.”
“Oh, my! Nancy, what about you?”
“A crane because it’s white.”
“What a lovely thought, Nancy. Yes, Roger?”
“Flamingos. They’re pink.”
The class laughed, and Roger blushed the color of a flamingo.
Peter, a short kid whose belly shook when he rounded the bases, chose a pelican.
Each student tried to outdo the other: a buzzard, an eagle, a vulture. Gerry, who had won the school spelling bee every year since the second grade, took a deep breath. He stuttered when excited. “A f-f-flightless c-c-cormorant.”
Wendy was half out of her chair, waving her hand. I thought Miss Callahan was ignoring her on purpose. Wendy sat in the front row and always had an answer. Miss Know-It-All.
“Yes, Wendy. What is it?”
Wendy looked around, confident that she’d chosen the most unusual bird. “The blue-footed booby.”
The class erupted into laughter. Miss Callahan clapped her hands to restore order, but the bell rang to dismiss students for lunch. While I ate at home later, I told Mom about the bird project. “Wendy talked about blue boobs in class.”
“Oh, that sounds interesting.”
I don’t think she was listening.
After lunch, Wendy raised her hand as soon as the teacher entered the room.
Miss Callahan sighed and brushed her long hair back behind her ear. “Yes, Wendy?”
“It’s about our bird project.” She held up a book with a bright-red cover.
“We don’t have time to discuss this—” Miss Callahan began when Wendy interrupted.
“It’s a tracing book with every bird in it.”
“Perhaps there’ll be time to tell us about it later this afternoon.” Miss Callahan’s usual answer. Wendy wouldn’t get the time she wanted if she got any time at all.
On the way home, I ran to catch up with Wendy. She was holding the red book with her arms crossed on her chest. She stopped mumbling to herself when she saw me.
“What do you want?” We weren’t friends and usually didn’t speak to one another.
“Can I see the bird book?”
“Miss Callahan’s so mean.” Having a willing and hopefully sympathetic ear, Wendy unloaded her grievance. “She deliberately spent all afternoon on stupid history.”
I needed help picking a bird and tracing it, so I crossed my fingers and lied. “You’re right. History is boring. Where did you get the book?”
“If you must know, Mister Nosey, my mother bought it at Woolworth’s.”
“Let me see it?”
I was too eager, and she pulled back, flipping the pages to show the pictures. Even with pages passing in a blur, I saw that it was exactly what I needed.
I reached for the book. “Can I use it when you’re through?”
She started walking away. “I might need to use it a long time.”
“I’ll copy my bird and give it back to you tomorrow.” I tried not to sound desperate.
She walked faster. “I don’t think so.”
“Why not? I only need it one night.”
“Why should I? You hurt me when you pulled my hair last week.”
I did this last week when she wouldn’t let me use her pogo stick. I waited and waited for a turn because she promised to let me try it. But as soon as she finished, she walked away. I shouted after her, “My mother said you need to share if you want any friends.”
Hiding the book, she turned to walk backward. “Why do I want you as a friend? My mother said this was the last one.” She smiled. “Too bad for you.” Then she ran home.
Maybe I looked like I was ready to pull more hair.
Whenever a teacher assigned a project, I wanted to start on it immediately. I drove Mom crazy, insisting that she take me to the library for a book or to a store for supplies like colored paper. She didn’t share my sense of urgency. “Wait until I go downtown.”
I’d only turned eleven, and Mom hadn’t given me permission to take the bus alone to Arlington Center for my piano lessons in a musty office above the Co-op Savings Bank. If I asked her to take me to Woolworth’s that afternoon, she’d tell me to wait for the weekend. I suspected Wendy had lied about her book being the last one. I wasn’t taking any chances.
Opening my bureau drawer, I found the oyster shell holding my allowance. I needed ten cents each way for the bus and twenty-five cents for the tracing book. I’d seen the price on the cover before Wendy ran away. I put a nickel and four dimes in my pocket.
When I reached the bus stop on Park Avenue, the Hudson Bus was rounding the rotary with the water tower. I took out my money to count it again.
I paid my fare and sat in the back by an open window. I was the only passenger. The spring air was cold in the shade, but once the bus turned onto Mass Avenue, the sunlight washed over us. I counted my money again. Now three dimes and a nickel. Thirty-five cents.
The bus stopped across the street from Woolworth’s. I got off, crossed at the light, and entered the store. The grit on the wooden floor crunched under my shoes. The wood was scoured white. At the edge of the display cases, the floor was still a shiny yellow from the shellac. Easter was the next Sunday, and the candy counter smelled of chocolate eggs and bunnies wrapped in gold foil. I regretted not bringing extra money to buy a bag of jelly beans.
A counter had been moved aside to make room for a pen holding two dozen fuzzy yellow chicks. A sign said each chick was reduced to twenty cents or two chicks for thirty. Most of them hopped about, scratching for food in the wood shavings, but one was sleeping, its eyes closed. I reached over the barrier to run my finger over the soft feathers on its back. To my surprise, the chick rolled onto its side, still sound asleep. I looked to see if anyone had seen me, but the woman at the register was busy with a customer.
“Goodbye, chicks,” I whispered. “Happy Easter.”
Standing in front of the racks with comics and coloring books, I didn’t see the bird book. Had I wasted bus fare for nothing? I examined each shelf with magazines, but everything was out of order. I decided to ask the cash-register lady if there was a copy in the back when I saw a red cover, half hidden behind copies of Classics Illustrated. I glanced through it. Just like Wendy’s, the liar. I counted out my money. Exactly two dimes and a nickel.
I walked toward the cash register, then stopped. Where was the other dime for the bus ride home? I searched my pockets twice. Nothing. I looked under the comic-book racks. No dime. I’d had it on the bus because I’d counted the money three times during the trip. Then I remembered the chicks. I rushed to the pen and sifted the wood shavings through my fingers, careful not to disturb the sleeping chick. But it couldn’t be there. I hadn’t taken the money out while looking at the chicks.
The loudspeaker growled. “Store closing in ten minutes.”
I panicked, walking in circles, trying to think. If I bought the book, how would I get home? Tears of rage stung my eyes. I’ll call Mom, but how much was the phone call? Maybe the cashier lady would let me use the store’s phone. But Mom would be angry I’d taken the bus alone.
“Bring your items to the cash register. Store closing in five minutes.”
The lights at the back of the store were turned off. I had to leave, or I’d be locked in all night. I had to have the book, but I didn’t have enough for the book and the bus.
My beating heart made me dizzy. I rolled the book up and held it against the leg farthest from the cash register. I walked to the front of the store with a quick glance to make sure the cashier was serving customers. Staring straight ahead, I held my breath and walked outside.
I forced myself not to run. At the corner, I heard someone shout, “Stop. Police.”
I froze, expecting more people to sound the alarm. I didn’t dare look and kept walking. My ears were hot and my throat tight. I hadn’t taken a breath since leaving the store. I gasped for air at the same time I heard the hiss of brakes and the rattle of doors opening. I was at the end of the line for the bus. I risked a glance behind me. No one had followed me.
On the bus, my hands shook, and the dime rolled under the driver’s seat. I didn’t care. I wanted the bus to leave as soon as possible. I dropped the other dime into the coin box and turned to find a seat.
“Hey, sonny,” the bus driver called after me. How did he know what I’d done?
I stopped in the aisle and closed my eyes. A hand touched my shoulder. “This is yours.”
Some passengers laughed, enjoying the drama unfolding in front of them. I stared at the bus driver. I wanted to shout, “Go back to your seat and drive away.” Any second now the police would bang on the door.
The driver grabbed my hand and gave me the dime I’d dropped. I mumbled thanks and pushed my way past the other passengers. I hid at the back of the bus, trying to convince myself that no one saw me steal the book and no one called the police. The farther the bus traveled from Woolworth’s, the safer I felt, and when it turned to climb Park Avenue, I wanted to shout, “I’m home free!” I pulled the cord and waited for the bus to stop.
After dinner, I finished my homework in my room. At eight o’clock, I brushed my teeth, washed and dried my feet, and applied zinc oxide to the toes with athlete’s foot. I wanted to forget what I’d done that afternoon. I dreaded being alone in my room in the dark.
After saying goodnight to Leslie, Mom stopped at the bathroom door. “Almost ready? You can read for fifteen minutes. Then lights out.”
I stalled for time, wishing she’d stay longer. “Mom, how come I have athlete’s foot when I’m not an athlete?”
“The germs just like your feet.” She kissed me. “Be sure you clean the sink.”
Halfway down the stairs, she paused. “Where did you go this afternoon?”
Her question took me by surprise. I didn’t think she knew I’d left. “I walked to the Heights to get a book for a school project.”
“If it’s something you need for school, I’ll pay for it. Remind me when I give you your allowance on Saturday. Goodnight.”
The fear I experienced that afternoon returned. If only I’d told her where I was going, I’d have had more money than I needed and none of this would have happened. I didn’t want to read but was afraid to turn off the light.
The evening was mild, the sky still light. I listened to the shouts and laughter of the older kids playing in the Donnellys’ backyard. But soon they went indoors. Someone turned on the TV in the Lunds’ house across the street. Next door, Ronnie Stevenson, who was in junior high, practiced the piano. He pounded on the keys when he made a mistake, which was often. A breeze through the window made me shiver. The branches on the maple tree scratched against the porch roof.
I heard my parents talking downstairs, a rumbling that sounded far away. I no longer belonged in the family. I’d committed a crime that separated me from them forever. I tried to fall asleep but couldn’t with the light on. I wanted to crawl across the porch roof, climb down the tree, and run away, but I remembered how frightened I’d been when I heard someone calling for the police. I pressed my face into the pillow and wished the afternoon had never happened. It was all Wendy’s fault: she wouldn’t lend me her book.
A siren on Park Avenue! I held my breath, waiting for the police to turn the corner, drive down my street, and arrest me. I sat up in bed. My pajamas were soaked with sweat.
I walked to the head of the stairs. If I called Dad, he’d say go back to bed and tell him tomorrow, but I’d never ask him. I didn’t want to tell my mother either, but I couldn’t stay in my room alone. Dad shook his newspaper, folding the pages to make it easier to read. I heard the faint clicking of Mom’s knitting needles. My fear prevented me from making a decision. Could I wait and tell her tomorrow? But the police might arrive at any minute.
“Mom.” She didn’t answer. “Mom!”
The needles were quiet. She looked over the banister. “Have you had a bad dream?”
“No. Can you come upstairs?”
“What’s the matter?”
“Can you come up? Please.”
She started up the stairs. Back in my bedroom, I crawled under the covers and leaned against the headboard.
“What is it?” She sat on the edge of the bed.
“I did something bad today.”
“What?”
I said nothing, wondering how to begin.
“Tell me.”
“I rode the bus alone to the Center to get a book I needed for school, and I lost the money to pay for it and I hid it and walked out…” The story spilled out in a wave of relief.
She listened without interrupting. When I finished, she asked what I thought I should do.
“Give the money to the store?” I asked, hoping I wouldn’t have to do that.
“That’s one idea, but I have another thought. You’ve learned your lesson, and you won’t do it again. I think you should take the money from your allowance and put it in your church envelope for the missionaries. Okay?”
I said I would and gave her a kiss.
“Goodnight. Don’t worry anymore. And don’t take the bus alone without asking me first.” She went downstairs. I was giddy with relief and started laughing. I pressed my face into my pillow, so she wouldn’t hear me.
For the last forty years, I can’t carry a bag into a store without thinking the manager is watching me. When I leave the store without buying anything, I’m certain he thinks I’ve stolen something. I must act suspicious, my face flushed with guilt. Whenever possible, I check my belongings at the front of the store. Doing so, I temporarily unburden myself of a memory, one I will shoulder again when I leave.
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Author Bio:
I grew up in Massachusetts and attended Bates College in Maine, majoring in English literature. During my junior year, I studied at Oxford University and traveled throughout Europe.
During the Vietnam War, I enlisted in the Air Force one step ahead of my draft board's invitation to join the army. I married Susan, my high school sweetheart, before my posting to the Philippines at Clark Air Base.
After my service, I was hired by Liberty Mutual Insurance to attend their computer training course. I learned later that the major reason I was hired was my writing and communications background. I’ve often said, "That only goes to show you an English degree is a valuable asset!"
After thirty-five years working in information technology, I retired in 2012 and then sat down for a long talk with myself: “If you want to publish a book, you’d better take writing seriously.”
My first independently published book Echo from Mount Royal is a novel about a young woman’s strange courtship in 1951 Montreal. It won first prize in the 2016 Next Generation Indie Book Awards in the General Fiction/Novel category. Your Father Has Something to Tell You is my second novel published in January, 2021
My wife and I live north of Boston; our married children live in New Hampshire and Rhode Island. We have four grandchildren.
