Chasing Forgiveness Read Free Page A

him.
    â€œAround back, Tyler,” I tell him. “Don’t go in the front way.”
    Tyler sighs, the smile slipping away from his face. “Again?” he asks.
    I nod. From here we can see them in the living-room window, as if they are on display. Dad paces back and forth, shaking his head and gesturing with his hands. Although I can hear them, I don’t listen.
    I wave to the driver who is waiting to see Tyler get safely in the front door, and she waves back and leaves. I turn to see Russ, standing on the front lawn with his hands in his pockets. A little red mark shines on his forehead where the Ping-Pong ball hit him, but he isn’t angry anymore.
    â€œI forgot the score,” he says, not too enthusiastically. “Who was winning?”
    I glance once more at my pacing father in the living-room spotlight.
    â€œYou won,” I say.
    Russ nods. “I guess I’ll see you tomorrow.” He glances once at my parents, then jogs across the lawn and into the street. “Don’t forget to bring your skateboard,” he calls, and then vanishes around the tall hedge.
    Alone with my brother, I lead him around to the back. As I open the back door, I help Smiling Tyler shove all his loose papers into his pack before they end up sprawled across the kitchen floor.
    â€œWhat’s for dinner?” Tyler asks.
    â€œWho knows?” I answer. “Probably nothing.”
    We get to the hallway, close to the battleground, and I hurry him toward the bedrooms. We don’t say anything to each other anymore about the fights. What’s the use? Occasionally Tyler used to whisper to me, “I wish they’d stop,” as if he were telling me a big secret. Eventually he stopped wishing it to me, when he realized I couldn’t do anything about it. I always tell him to save it for his prayers.
    I go into my room, and Tyler follows, since his room doesn’t have a TV. I close the door, so now their voices seem farther away. Farther away, but still clear as a bell.
    Tyler immediately turns on his cartoons—and laughs at Wile E. Coyote getting blasted by some Acme dynamite. But the cartoon explosions are never loud enough to drown out the voices in the living room.
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    Today it’s Mom’s turn to slam the door. And by the weight and direction of the noise, I know it’s the front door. I can always tell how bad it is by which door slams. The bathroom door means they’ll be talking again by the time the night is over. A bedroom door means somebody sleeps in the den.The front door slamming means they may not speak for days.
    In a moment I hear Mom’s Cadillac start up and drive away. She’ll go to Aunt Jackie’s, I think, or Grandma and Grandpa Pearson’s. Maybe she’ll come back late tonight; maybe she won’t come back till morning.
    Tyler fell asleep without having dinner, lying on the floor, with cartoons dancing across the television. I turn off the TV and the lights and lie back, trying to fall asleep as well. Downstairs I can hear Dad busily working to keep his mind off Mom. I can smell frying meat, and it makes me hungry, but I don’t feel like eating. I don’t feel like leaving my room. Dad’s always been a good cook, but over the past few months, it seems he’s been having to cook for us a whole lot more. Not just cook, but also do a lot of other things that Mom used to do. It’s like Mom suddenly got too busy at her job at the bank, or too upset, or just lost interest.
    What I don’t get is that Mom always says she would rather stay home and be a full-time mom than have to work. That’s what she says, yet when she’s home with us these days, it’s almost like she doesn’t want to be there either.
    The door creaks open slightly, and a bar of light cuts across the dark room.
    â€œPreston?” says my father. “You all right?”
    â€œShh,” I tell him.