Page 15 of Bad Husband

“Yeah, in 2011 they opened up a sealed zone around the reactor. I want to go there.”

You’re laughing, aren’t you? I see the humor in the way Callan is. It’s funny. But that’s because he’s not your son and you’re not living with him and wondering, what the fuck? This isn’t normal, is it? Should we be concerned? Madison laughs his behavior off, but I see that he’s not like the other kids. He’s different. He reads at something like a fifth-grade level and his math skills… don’t even get me started on that.

“What if you turn into The Hulk?” I tease, raising my eyebrows as I tickle his ribs.

He squirms away from me, his hands over mine to push them away. “I’m being serious, Dad. I want to go to Ukraine for my birthday next month.”

“Buddy, we can’t go to Ukraine next month. Besides the fact that you don’t even have a passport, I don’t think your first out of country trip should be to a nuclear reactor war zone.”

“It’s not a war zone, Dad.”

“What do you want for your birthday?”

His eyes light up. “I want to go to Ukraine.”

“Besides that.”

“Well, how about a book on Chernobyl?”

“Do you have one in mind?”

He nods and hands me a note beside his bed. “It’s calledVoices from Chernobyl. The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster.”

I think I should be worried about his obsession here.

And then he seems to lose focus about Ukraine when he looks at my wedding ring that catches his eye in the dim lighting of his room. And then he stares at me like he’s waiting for me to tell him no completely, or that I have to work so going out of the country for his birthday isn’t an option. I can see the questions on his face so I decide to change the subject.

“Does Mommy have any boys that are friends?”

That catches him off guard. “Boys that are friends? Like Uncle B?”

“No, like boys I don’t know.”

“Pedro?”

“Who’s Pedro?”

“I don’t know. He’s Pedro. He cleans the pool on Thursdays.”

We have someone who cleans our pool?

I don’t know why I didn’t know that. You’d think I would. I’ll have to look into this Pedro guy. “Does he come in the house?”

Callan shrugs and turns over onto his side like he’s ready for bed now. “Sometimes.”

Nodding, I pat his head and then lean in to kiss his forehead. “Night, buddy.”

“Dad?”

“Yeah?”

“Are you going to be home early every night?”

I realize then how odd this looked to him, me coming home so early and taking him to soccer, two things I’ve yet to do in years. I swallow, feeling like my throat is dry. “Probably not,” I tell him, honestly. “But I know I need to make more of an effort to come home earlier, don’t I?”

“I liked it.”

And the look on his face, the one where he finally shows me today he’s the almost seven-year-old boy and not some kid who needs to be studying nuclear reactors reminds me I still need to be a dad, regardless of running a business. It’s not his fault I don’t trust anyone to hire them out for bids.

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