Chapter 2Nineteen Calls She Never Answered

The next morning, the clinking of dishes in the kitchen woke me.

To be precise, I hadn't slept at all. Every time I drifted toward unconsciousness, Jonah’s pale, bloodless face snapped into focus against the back of my eyelids.

I pushed open the door and stepped out.

The morning sunlight was bright and sharp, glaring against the floor.

Micah was standing by the stove, wearing Jonah’s favorite navy-blue Shiba Inu slippers, pouring milk into a ceramic mug.

Jonah had bought those slippers last month with his own saved allowance. He wouldn't even let me touch them, claiming the plush lining would lose its softness if washed too roughly.

"Morning, Sam," Micah said, turning around with the mug in hand.

The mug was Jonah’s too—the dark blue one with the painted silver constellation map.

My eyes locked onto his feet.

"Take them off," I said.

Micah blinked, glancing down at his toes in confusion. "Oh, the slippers? I couldn't find the guest pair after my shower, so Rachel told me to just wear these."

"I said, take them off."

My voice was flat, devoid of inflection, but something in my stare made Micah take a frightened step backward. A few drops of warm milk sloshed over the rim, splashing across the silver stars on the ceramic glaze.

"Sam, please don't be angry... I’ll wash them before I give them back to Jonah—"

"What is going on out here so early?"

Rachel emerged from the study, her rimless glasses perched on her nose, holding a thick case report. The moment she registered the standoff, her expression darkened.

"Sam, they’re just a pair of slippers. Must you be so relentlessly petty?"

She walked over, smoothly positioning herself between Micah and me.

"Those belong to Jonah."

"Jonah is a child, and Micah is a young man going through a crisis. What’s the harm in borrowing them for a morning?" Rachel’s tone took on that familiar, condescending pedagogical weight. "You have an obsessive need to mark territory. In clinical terms, it’s a glaring symptom of severe emotional insecurity."

There it was again. Whenever I refused to bend to her will, she hauled out an arsenal of clinical terminology to diagnose my moral failings.

"And that mug," I said, pointing at the cup in Micah’s trembling hand. "I gave that to Jonah for his tenth birthday. He never uses it for milk."

Micah’s eyes instantly welled with tears. He bit his lower lip, setting the mug down on the marble counter with trembling fingers.

"I’m sorry, Sam... I didn't know. I’ll scrub it right now—"

"Don't bother."

I walked forward, picked up the constellation mug, and before either of them could react, flung it straight into the metal trash can under the sink.

A dull, heavy "clang" echoed through the kitchen. The mug didn't shatter, but it settled into the greasy remains of last night’s takeout.

"Have you lost your mind?!" Rachel hissed, grabbing my wrist with shocking force. Her nails dug into my skin, white-hot and sharp. "What is wrong with you? First you invent a suicide attempt to drag me away from an intervention, and now you’re throwing tantrums over kitchenware!"

She glared at me, her eyes brimming with disgusted disappointment.

"Micah came here as a guest in good faith! Who do you think you’re performing for? Do you have any idea that he nearly took a handful of sleeping pills yesterday afternoon?"

"Nearly took sleeping pills."

What a catastrophic, world-ending crisis.

Meanwhile, my son was a nine-digit alphanumeric barcode pinned to a toe tag in a basement refrigerated unit.

"Let go," I said.

I didn't pull away. I simply looked into her eyes and spoke the words with terrifying, hollow clarity.

Rachel had never seen me look at her like that—as if she were a total stranger, something rancid and repellent. Her grip faltered, and she let go.

"Where is Jonah?" she demanded, pivoting quickly to regain control of the room. "Why isn't he out of bed yet? He is going to school today. Avoidance solves nothing."

She turned and marched down the hallway toward Jonah’s bedroom, reaching for the brass handle.

My chest tightened.

If she opened that door and saw the neatly tucked, untouched duvet—if she realized Jonah had never come home last night—what excuse would her brilliant diagnostic mind construct?

"Why is this locked?"

Rachel jiggled the handle twice. It didn't budge.

When I had returned home last night, the very first thing I did was lock Jonah’s room from the outside. I couldn't bear the thought of them stepping inside that space.

"I told him to stay home today," I said.

"Are you insane?" Rachel spun around, looking at me like I was completely unhinged. "He already skipped two days last week! You are actively reinforcing his avoidant personality structure! I’m getting the spare key."

"I threw the spare key away," I lied.

"You are impossible!" Rachel jabbed a finger toward my face. "Fine. Spoil him. Enable him. When he completely fails to integrate into society, do not come crying to me for a referral!"

She spun around furiously, grabbing her designer trench coat from the sofa.

"Micah, let’s go to the clinic. Being around someone with zero emotional boundaries is only going to trigger your relapse."

Micah hurriedly kicked off the Shiba Inu slippers, bowing repeatedly to me with a stammered apology, before scurrying out the front door behind Rachel like a frightened bird.

The heavy door slammed shut.

I walked over, picked up the navy-blue slippers from the floor, and dropped them into the trash bag beside the constellation mug.

Jonah wouldn't want them anymore. He had always been particular about cleanliness; he couldn't stand things that had been soiled.

Neither could I.