Read Online For Your Tomorrow by Melanie Murray - Free Book Online

hospital and carry him into the room that Marion has specially decorated for him. Red-and-white gingham curtains hang from the window. A red woollen rug covers the floor. A white dresser, draped with a red scarf, sits against one wall. A wooden rocker, with a red cushioned seat, waits by the window. They lay him in a white wicker bassinet with a red-and-white-chequered lining, pillow and quilt. A fewmonths later, baby Jeff sleeps in a white crib with red flower decals. He lies on his back and kicks his legs, watching red teddy bears and white lambs circle around and around under a red-and-white umbrella-mobile.
    I think about the strange synchronicity—the circle of red and white. They’re not typical colours for a baby’s room. But they would be the colours of the flag under which Jeff would one day serve—the Canadian flag that would blanket him as he lay in the white satin lining of his coffin.

II. CHILD OF DESTINY

    In the myth, the child proves himself by confronting a physical force or by receiving a divine blessing. He kills the giant—the irrational authority of the adult who would suppress him.… Each of us has felt the frustration in childhood of being constantly thwarted by adults, of being treated as a child when we knew we were no longer one.
    David Adams Leeming,
Mythology: The Voyage of the Hero
    The child is the father of the man.
    William Wordsworth, “My Heart Leaps Up”
    O NE MORNING IN N OVEMBER , shortly after his fourth birthday, Jeff isn’t at daycare as he usually is during the week. He’s at home, trying to play quietly by himself while his dad studies for military exams. He watched his favourite TV shows—
Sesame Street
and
The Friendly Giant;
built tall towers with his Lego blocks, then crashed them down withthe shiny silver airplane he got for his birthday. Now he’s sitting up beside his dad at the kitchen table, covered with piles of papers and books—thick books without any pictures. He pulls a brown crayon out of his new Crayola box, draws a big cake—chocolate—like the one his Granny made for his birthday. Four candles on top—red, blue, yellow, green—and an orange flame on each one. He puts red hearts around the cake, thinking
I’ll give this picture to Granny
, and wishing he could take it to her today. His dad doesn’t have time to play; his head is buried in all those books and papers covered in lines of tiny black letters.
    “Dad, can we go visit Granny?”
    “No, not today,” Russ says, glancing up from his book. “Mom took the car to work. It’s a long walk to Granny’s place, and it’s really chilly outside. We can’t walk that far in the cold.”
    “I can walk there, Dad. I’ll put on my snowsuit and boots. I won’t be cold. Please.”
    “Sorry, Jeff, we can’t go today.”
    “But I drew a picture for Granny.”
    “You can give it to her on Sunday when we go there for supper.” Russ gets up from the table. “I’m going to make lunch now; then you need to have your nap. We can play after you wake up.”
    After Russ reads Jeff his favourite picture book,
Little Red Riding Hood
, and tucks him into bed, he stretches out on the couch to read another military manual. He wakes up an hour or so later. The house seems unusually still.
He’s sure having a good nap
, Russ thinks as he tiptoes upstairs and peeksinto Jeff’s room. His bunk bed is empty; only a blue-and-red comforter in a rumpled heap at the bottom.
He must be in the basement, shooting balls into his hockey net
. He opens the basement door; there are no comforting sounds of a stick scraping cement or a rubber ball careening off the walls, no reply to his calling—“Jeff?”
He’s probably hiding, trying to fool his old man
. Russ hurries from room to room, peers under the beds, in the closets, behind the chairs. At the back door, the little black boots aren’t on the boot tray; the red snowsuit is not hanging on the hook. He rushes outside; calls around the empty courtyard of their row