The Genesis Code Read Free Page A

line.
    “I just wanted to check in. Make sure you were okay,” she said.
    “I’m fine, Mom. Don’t worry. And tell Dad not to worry. I’ll be fine.”
    She sighed softly. “Are you sure you won’t come up to the house for a day or two? Stay in the guest room. Let me feed you some home-cooked meals. You shouldn’t be by yourself today.”
    Madison squinted at the digital alarm clock on his nightstand with one eye.
    7:04 A.M .
    June 11.
    Justin’s birthday.
    Next to the Sharper Image alarm clock was a framed photograph of a small boy in a gray Scooby-Doo sweatshirt, at least one size too big, grinning at the camera from astride an old trail horse at the base of the Grand Canyon. Madison’s gaze lingered on his crooked smile and bright blue eyes.
    “Christian, are you there?”
    For a moment he considered, and then rejected, the offer.
    “Thanks anyway, but I’ll be okay. Besides, I’ve got the Biogenetics Conference just around the corner. I really can’t afford to be away.”
    Another uncomfortable pause.
    “Did you get the card I sent?”
    “I did. Sorry. I meant to call and tell you thanks for the card. And for the money.”
    Mrs. Madison always sent a crisp ten dollar bill in each greeting card to her son, delivered well in advance of holidays and other noteworthy occasions by U.S. mail.
    “And I promise to buy something that will cheer me up.” That was the perennial condition of Mrs. Madison’s maternal cash gifts, folded between the front and back covers of Hallmark greeting cards. She required that the cash be used to purchase an item solely for the purpose of self-gratification.
    “You better,” she replied.
    Madison could hear the smile in her voice.
    After another beat of silence, she asked the dreaded question.
    “Have you spoken to Kate?”
    Madison’s stomach knotted instantly. He flopped back sideways on the bed, hanging his head upside down over the edge of the mattress.
    “No. Not for quite a while.”
    “Maybe you should call her again.”
    “I don’t think so, Mom.”
    Christian and Kate had separated shortly after Justin breathed his final breath. The loss of their only child had ripped apart the marriage in a way that Madison now knew could never be mended.
    For once, his mother let the issue drop.
    “Christian, I’m going to light a candle for Justin at mass. You should start going to church again. Attending services would be good for you. Father Donovan always asks how you’re doing.”
    Madison hadn’t been to church for years. Raised Catholic, he had stopped going to mass after graduating from high school and going away to college. The only time he had set foot in a church in at least the past decade had been the day of Justin’s funeral service.
    “Maybe you’re right,” he said.
    “Okay. Well, I won’t keep you. But call me tonight. Just to let me know you’re okay,” she said.
    Madison shifted the phone to his other ear.
    “Okay, Mom. Deal. I’ll speak with you soon.”
    “Have a good day, Christian.”
    Madison placed the phone back in the receiver and sat on the edge of his bed, rubbing his eyes. Memories of his son’s final days surged into his thoughts.
    Justin was a ghost of a child, lying thin and frail under the starched white sheets of a hospital bed. A tangle of tubes and wires crisscrossed his chest, connecting his dying body with IV bags, monitors, and machines.
    “No,” said Madison. He pushed the memories from his conscious mind. Madison looked around the bedroom of his small apartment.
    It was an absolute mess.
    A pile of dirty laundry dominated one corner of the room. Boxes of books were piled against the wall opposite his queen-sized bed, partially obscuring the large window overlooking a tiny park three stories below.
    On a large mahogany desk, surrounding a laptop computer in the center of the desktop, haphazard mountains of paper and research materials marked with a riot of yellow Post-It notes threatened to spill off their precarious