Free Light of Day by Jamie M. Saul Page A

river along with the stink of failure, the culture of failure, a door opened and a yellow light spread across the black ground like an apology. It was just before sunset and behind dimly lighted windows there were halting shadows, which were people and their lives. Someone spoke unrecognizable words that sounded tenderly human and so sad Jack had to get up and leave.
    He walked down Chestnut Street, the clean sidewalks edging up to the evenly cut grass. Where the white-shingled houses of Gilbert’s middle class sat, with their small gardens in the back with trellises andspring vines. He stopped to watch the quick shadows behind the curtained windows, listen to muffled voices, pick out a word, a sentence. He could not take himself away from this street, from the neat hedges, the comfortable chant of the lawn sprinklers, the unceasing movement. He could not take himself away from the fathers and sons.
    He pressed his nose against other people’s lives and envied them in a way he would have found unthinkable, unnecessary, twenty-four hours ago. Now he would be any one of them, if only for a day; if only to anticipate the sound of the screen door slamming, the footsteps on the stairs, the sounds that tell you all is well. He wished he could walk up one of the trim little paths, knock on the front door and say, “I’m Dr. Owens, let me sit with you awhile.” “Let me tell you about my son.” “Let me tell you who he was.” He wished he could invite himself inside and be part of someone else’s family, someone else’s story. But all he could do was stand apart, alone in the shadows of the oak trees, and listen to the hiss of the street lamps, watch front doors open and people he did not know walk down the sidewalk, skateboard over the curb, drive cars. All he could do was want what was happening inside those houses and feel the absence of all that had been his just the day before, as though the strength of his desire, the power of his envy, might alter this irremediable night.
    Then he was walking again, where the town met the edge of soy fields and alfalfa was beginning to show through the soil. Where the sun was setting and the air grew dense with carbon dioxide, and the scent of spring crops and fertile earth spiraled up from the ground, spanning the darkness like a veil. He was going home.
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    There were messages waiting for him. Lois, Eileen, a couple of Danny’s friends asking Danny why he wasn’t in school. Bob Garvin, calling from South Wellfleet: “Getting things ready for you guys.” Yoshi in Maine: “Nick and the boys can’t wait.” Clive Ebersol, calling from Canada to talk about the fishing trip.
    There was so much to undo. So much summer to cancel.
    Jack made the calls to Canada and Maine, Massachusetts and Connecticut; to airlines and inns. To people he’d known for most of a lifetime, who asked for no explanations and gave their sympathy. To strangers with nothing to give but their indifference and inconvenience. By the time Jack fell asleep on the couch, there was still more summer to cancel, more summer to undo.
    He awoke with the morning sun shining in his eyes and the telephone ringing on the floor. It was Detective Hopewell: “The coroner turned in his report, Dr. Owens. It was death by asphyxiation. Thanks for your patience.” And Jack remembered everything.
    â€œWhen can I get him out of there?”
    â€œAnytime.”
    â€œDid they have to…”
    â€œThink of it like surgery,” Hopewell answered in the detached voice. “So we can be certain about the time of death and the cause. I’m sorry about the delay.”
    Jack hung up the phone and screamed, “Goddamnit.” He sat on the edge of the couch, breathing heavily through his mouth.
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    For the rest of the morning, Jack listened numbly to improbable conversations studded with the words arranged and arrangements. He felt as though he