Chapter 3 – THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN LEAVING AND LOST

“They aren’t the same thing,” Marco said.

Charlie looked at him.

“Disappearing because you’re hurt isn’t the same as choosing to leave your home.”

Victoria opened her mouth.

Marco held up his hand.

“Not yet.”

It wasn’t a threat.

It was the voice of a man trying very hard not to say something he couldn’t take back.

Charlie moved closer to me.

I lowered myself into the chair beside the bookshelf so he wouldn’t feel trapped between three standing adults.

“Can I ask something?” I said.

Marco nodded.

I looked at Charlie.

“When you wrote that you wanted to disappear, where did you imagine going?”

He thought for a moment.

“Nowhere.”

“Nowhere?”

“Like when you hide under a blanket and nobody bothers you.”

I nodded.

“That makes sense.”

Charlie looked relieved.

“People always think I mean something worse.”

Marco sat on the edge of the desk.

“Has anybody asked you that before?”

“Victoria did.”

“And what did you tell her?”

“That I just wanted quiet.”

Victoria spoke carefully.

“He was withdrawing from everybody, Marco. You weren’t seeing it.”

“I wasn’t seeing enough,” Marco agreed. “That doesn’t mean you understood everything you saw.”

Her face colored.

“You think I enjoyed watching him suffer?”

“No.”

“Then stop talking as if I invented his grief.”

The room fell silent.

It was the first time Victoria had sounded genuinely wounded.

She looked at Charlie, and for a moment the polished confidence disappeared.

“I’ve sat outside this room for hours wondering whether to knock,” she said. “I’ve brought meals he wouldn’t eat. I’ve tried books and music and games.”

Charlie stared at the floor.

“I know.”

“You never wanted me around.”

“I didn’t know you.”

Victoria swallowed.

“I was trying.”

Her words sounded sincere.

That was what made the situation harder.

A person could try to help and still do terrible damage.

Marco looked at her.

“Then why didn’t you tell me he thought I was replacing him?”

Victoria didn’t answer.

“Why did you let him pack?”

She looked toward the suitcase.

“Because I thought a change might help him.”

“You let him believe he wasn’t wanted.”

Her silence was answer enough.

Charlie spoke unexpectedly.

“Victoria said I could take Dad’s glasses.”

Marco turned.

“What?”

“If I went to school. She said they’d probably let me keep them.”

Marco glanced at the reading glasses resting on the desk.

He picked them up carefully.

Daniel had apparently kept them long after the frames went crooked.

One arm was held together with a tiny piece of clear tape.

“Your dad wore these every time he read the newspaper,” Marco said.

“He said they made him look smart.”

“They made him look like an accountant who’d lost a fight.”

Charlie smiled.

Then Marco handed them back.

“You don’t need permission to keep your father’s things.”

Charlie took them with both hands.

“Even the desk?”

Marco looked surprised.

“The desk?”

“Victoria said you’d turn this into a guest room when the baby came.”

Victoria closed her eyes.

Marco stared at her.

“Is that true?”

“I mentioned that the house might need rearranging.”

“Daniel’s study?”

“It’s one of the largest rooms on this floor.”

“And Charlie spends every afternoon here.”

Victoria looked exhausted.

“Marco, we cannot preserve every room exactly as it was fourteen months ago.”

The statement was reasonable in isolation.

But nothing about the past three weeks had happened in isolation.

Marco looked around.

The pencil holder lay broken on a folded napkin.

A stack of old newspapers occupied one corner.

A worn cardigan still hung over the back of the leather chair.

Daniel’s absence was everywhere.

And so was Charlie’s love for him.

“You’re right,” Marco said finally.

Victoria looked relieved.

“We can’t keep everything untouched.”

Then he added, “But we don’t get to erase the things Charlie needs just because remembering makes us uncomfortable.”

I watched Victoria absorb the distinction.

For the first time, she had no immediate response.

Marco turned to Charlie.

“Would you like the study to stay the way it is?”

Charlie looked around.

“Mostly.”

“Mostly?”

“The chair squeaks.”

Marco laughed.

“It always did.”

“And Dad hated that lamp.”

“Then why’d he keep it?”

“Grandma gave it to him.”

Marco nodded solemnly.

“Fair enough. We can’t offend Grandma.”

Charlie smiled.

Then his eyes settled on the broken ceramic pencil holder.

His expression clouded.

“I broke that.”

Marco followed his gaze.

“Accidents happen.”

“Dad liked it.”

“He liked you more.”

Charlie looked at him.

“You don’t know that.”

Marco picked up one of the broken pieces.

“Actually, I do.”

He showed Charlie the underside.

Scratched into the ceramic were two crooked initials.

Charlie blinked.

“Those are mine.”

“You made it for him in second grade.”

Charlie took the piece.

“I forgot.”

“Your dad kept it on his desk for four years.”

The boy pressed his lips together.

Marco touched his shoulder.

“We can try to repair it.”

Charlie nodded.

Then he moved toward the bottom drawer.

“I have something else.”

He pulled out a folded sheet of paper, worn thin along the creases.

When he unfolded it, I saw a child’s drawing of a small yellow house beside a lake.

There were two stick figures on a porch.

A larger figure stood between them.

At the bottom, in Daniel’s handwriting, were the words:

Our place, someday.

Marco’s expression changed immediately.

“Where did you get that?”

“Dad gave it to me.”

“When?”

“Before he died.”

Charlie looked up.

“If Dad wanted us all to live there together, why did he say we had to leave this house first?”

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