Twenty-Four Shadows. Tanya J. Peterson

nice to have Dominic here rather than at daycare.” She paused. Her tone brightened when she resumed. “I have an idea. Why don’t I take care of Elise when you’re at work? It’ll be good for Dominic to help take care of someone, it would be fun for me, and I really want to help out a friend.”

      Once again, Isaac was by Reese’s side. He wedged himself between her and Max. “Reese, you’re a genius. And a good person.” He looked at Max. “What do you think?”

      Max covered his face with his hands. “I don’t know what to think right now. I just can’t believe this happened. I can’t believe Gretchen up and left.” He paused and stood with his head in his hands for several moments. Slowly, he lowered his arms and looked at his friends. “Okay. Thanks, guys. I don’t want to be a burden, but it would be really great if you’d take care of Elise during the day, Reese, at least for a while.”

      “Thank God. This is the right thing, Max. Trust me.” Isaac closed his eyes and heaved a sigh of relief. When he opened his eyes and saw that he, Reese, and Max were standing in a line against the counter, he shook his head and stepped forward to break the bizarre formation. He looked over at Dominic playing with Elise on the floor. He smiled. Dominic was a terrific kid, so caring. That gave him an idea. “Hey!” he exclaimed as he turned to face Reese and Max. “How’s this for a solution? What about Reese looking after Elise during the day?” Isaac was surprised when the two looked at each other but said nothing. They seemed perplexed. “What? What’s wrong with that idea? Elise needs someone to take care of her when you’re at work, Max, and Reese is wonderful. She’ll take great care of her, and Dominic will, too. Look.” He gestured toward the two tots on the floor. “And it will be good for Dominic, don’t you think, Reese?” Isaac looked from one to the other. “What?” he repeated, growing increasingly confused at their unresponsiveness. He shifted on his feet.

      “Isaac, honey, please tell me you’re kidding around.”

      He knitted his brows together. He opened his mouth to ask a question, but no sound came out. His heart pounded. He thought he was making sense, but maybe not. What had happened this time? Had he done something horrible? Again? Try as he might to behave properly, he always ended up doing something bad. He looked at Max when Max spoke.

      “Dude. We just discussed this. And we settled it. Reese is going to take care of Elise while I’m at work. You were part of the conversation.”

      Isaac felt sweat bead on his forehead. They couldn’t find out that he didn’t remember the discussion that supposedly had just taken place. He forced a smile. “Yeah. I know. I just wanted to try to throw things off a bit, you know, to maybe take the focus away from the elephant in the room, the reason we needed to talk about care for Elise.” The instant that was out of his mouth, he regretted it. He felt like a heel for shifting the focus back to the fact that Gretchen had left Max and Elise. He felt his shoulders sag. “Max, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”

      Max shook his head. “No. It’s okay. It’s pretty obvious, isn’t it? We can’t pretend that Gretchen didn’t leave. You guys know she’s gone. I know she’s gone. I, uh…” He looked up at the ceiling for a moment. When he looked down he squeezed his eyes shut and pinched the bridge of his nose hard.

      “Max.” It was all Isaac could think of to say. He looked at Reese. She began to speak, but Max talked over her.

      “It’s fine. I’m fine. Really.” He still didn’t look up, and he continued to pinch the bridge of his nose.

      “Sit down at the table. Talk to Reese. I’m going to take Dominic and Elise out of the room and keep them occupied so you two can talk. Then you and I are going to hit the courts. Playing tennis today will be good for you.” He strode across the kitchen to the breakfast nook, snatched up Elise, winced at the pain it caused the raw burns, and said to Dominic, “Come on, Tiger, let’s take the baby and do something fun.”

      “Okay!” Dominic leapt to his feet. “I wanna drive my new Jeep that I got for my birthday! Oh, but first, Daddy, I’m hungry.” He sat down at the table.

      “Of course you can eat, little man, but I have a better idea than eating in here. Let’s have a picnic. Inside or outside?” When Dominic enthusiastically indicated an open-air breakfast, Isaac instructed, “All righty, then! Go grab the blanket and spread it out in the backyard. And can you find some of your toys to share with Elise? Things that won’t hurt her, like maybe some of your blocks. I’ll get some grub and meet you out back.”

      When Dominic took off, Isaac gathered a box of Pop-Tarts, the carton of orange juice, and two plastic glasses. He threw everything into a shopping bag and slung it over his shoulder Santa-style.

      “Isaac!” Reese chastised. “What kind of a breakfast is that? That’s so unhealthy. He can’t have that. Those stupid things you keep buying are supposed to be for snacks, and only occasionally.”

      Isaac slid the bag around so he could rummage through it. He looked at the Pop-Tarts box then back at Reese. “These are fruit. Cherry.”

      Reese rolled her eyes. “Flavor.”

      Isaac glanced around, spotted the bananas on the counter, grabbed two from the bunch, which was a bit tricky with Elise balanced on one arm, held them up for Reese to see, plunked them into the bag, and said, “There. Real fruit. I think this will do for today. I’ve got the kids. You talk with Max.” He nodded toward Max, who had dropped his arms but still stood with his head hanging down.

      Max began to protest, “No. I need to get out of your way. I’m truly fine, I—”

      Isaac stepped over and nudged him. “Stop. Hang out in here with Reese. Maybe complain about the fact that I’m going to kick your ass on the tennis court later.” Without waiting for an argument, he turned, stopped to kiss his wife on the cheek, and then headed to the backyard for a picnic with his son and Max’s daughter.

      #

      To steady himself as his eyes adjusted to the sudden dimness, Isaac grabbed the pointy hat of one of the waist-high gnomes standing sentry just inside the door of Hobgoblin, a quaint little restaurant and bar tucked away along a quiet street full of other such small restaurants and eclectic, eccentric shops. He blinked a few times before looking behind him at Max. “Let’s sit out there,” Isaac nodded toward the fenced-in back courtyard. “I’m not ready to give up the sunlight.” When Max agreed, Isaac suggested, “Why don’t you go grab a table? I’ll get us a couple drinks and meet you out there.”

      After receiving his drinks and snaking his way around the gnomes placed haphazardly around, supposedly to mess with patrons of the drunk variety, Isaac found Max and plopped down on the chair across from him. He slid a beer across the table to his friend before taking a swig of his own. He watched Max stare blankly at the beer. “Hey. Earth to Max.” A cat sauntered past their table. They both watched it sashay by.

      Max looked up and toyed with the bottle before lifting it to his mouth. He tilted the bottle toward Isaac. “Thanks.”

      “Don’t mention it. Although you should be the one buying after all the running and fetching tennis balls you made me do.”

      “Hey. You’re the one who wanted me to hit out of the hopper.”

      “Yeah, well, the way you were hitting, I was afraid for my life. You didn’t need to play a game; you needed to hit the hell out of as many balls as you could as quickly as you could.” Isaac studied Max again as Max resumed toying with his beer. “You doin’ okay?”

      Max nodded. Then he shrugged. Isaac searched for the right thing to say. He knew how miserable he would be if Reese up and left him and Dominic, and he knew that there wasn’t a thing anyone could possibly say that would make it better. So, not knowing what to say and not wanting to say the wrong thing, he kept his mouth shut.

      The heavy silence was shattered when a group of three people approached their table. “Isaac! What’s up?” Without asking, each grabbed a chair and crowded around the table. One pulled up uncomfortably close to Isaac. If Isaac had foreseen this,