Chapter 24 - Robert’s panic explained
Years later, Lucas asked:
“Why did Dad look so scared at the box?”
He had seen photographs? Maybe he remembered the scene faintly and adults had told him. At eight he asked.
Robert answered himself.
“Because I recognized the kind of packaging Grandpa’s medicine came in.”
“You knew it was Aunt Megan’s?”
“I suspected.”
“Why didn’t you say?”
Robert took a long breath.
“Because I realized something terrible at the same time.”
“What?”
“That I had known Aunt Megan might have a problem with medicine again, and I hadn’t told Mom.”
Lucas frowned.
“So you thought Mom would be mad.”
“Yes.”
“Were you scared of jail?”
“No.”
“Mom?”
Robert laughed once.
“Honestly? A little.”
I rolled my eyes.
Then he became serious.
“I was scared Lucas was hurt because I had hidden information.”
Good.
That was the truth.
Not:
I knew the poison.
Not:
I caused it.
Recognition plus guilt.
That was why his hands trembled.
The title version of our story would always make that look sinister.
Reality was sadder.
He had realized, in one second, that secrecy he considered compassionate might have helped create the conditions for our son’s emergency.
May you like
No villain face.
A father understanding consequence.
