Read Online When Sparrows Fall by Meg Moseley - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Meg Moseley
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braids. She’d pulled her long nightgown all the way over her feet, and she’d draped what she called the cuddle-quilt around her shoulders. Her lips moved as she sounded her way through the Seuss book. Sometimes, she spoke a word out loud, savoring her mastery of the symbols that stood for sounds that madewords that built worlds. She owned those worlds, but her mother kept her locked up, safe from the big, scary, real world where bad things happened.
Bad things could happen in a run-down log home on an isolated back road too. Like a very bad thing once happened in a small brick house in an ordinary town where a boy looked into his mother’s eyes and saw unthinkable darkness but did nothing.
“Not this time,” Jack said quietly. “I’ll make a fool of myself first.”
Martha looked up with a smile so happy that it broke his heart.
six
I t was still dark out, and oddly quiet compared to the thrum of Chattanooga. Waiting for the coffee to brew, Jack drifted through the previous day.
The family could have survived without him. Timothy acted as the man of the house, keeping the wood stove fueled and lecturing Jonah about staying away from its hot surfaces. Rebekah did a fine job of washing clothes and putting meals on the table, but her gratitude for Jack’s help made him realize what a load she was carrying.
Ten. She was ten .
The younger ones carried on as best they could, doing their junior-size chores, but they were getting a little ragged around the edges. They missed their mom.
And Miranda? She’d called several times, perfectly lucid. Uptight, but lucid. No one else had called. Just that early-morning visit from her pastor. The memory was almost enough to put Jack in a foul mood.
Sitting at the kitchen table, he eased into his day with a paper from a student who always took a highly original view and set out to prove her point with style if not with impeccable logic. T. S. Eliot himself might have enjoyed her thoughts about the psyche of J. Alfred Prufrock.
Jack leaned over the paper, red pen poised. He would make her think harder and dig deeper. When parents entrusted their young people’s minds to R. Jackson Hanford, PhD, they got their money’s worth.
His troubles retreated to a dull rumble in the back of his mind while he played with words, ideas, arguments. He loved teaching. Loved his students. Most of them, anyway. Most of the time.
Halfway through the paper, he tripped on Eliot’s line about Prufrock’s thinning hair. It conjured up memories of a dad with a receding hairline and an existential crisis of his own.
Jack ran a hand through his hair. It was still thick, a legacy from his mother’s genes. His temples were going gray, though, and he was barely past his fortieth birthday. At forty, his father already had two failed marriages behind him. Jack had one, and that was one too many.
Struggling to focus on his student’s paper, he saw instead his father’s odd, blank expression. It had cropped up with increasing frequency after his not-quite-ex-wife’s memorial service. Roger Hanford had blamed himself, for good reason, but he wasn’t the only one at fault.
Outside, the wind lifted its head. Rain began to fall, light but steady. Jack poured more coffee and dug into his work. When he heard feet on the stairs, he was startled to see daylight at the window above the half curtains.
Rebekah was shepherding Jonah down the stairs. “Hurry up. If you don’t make it in time …”
“No.” Jonah’s sleepy fretting was like a fiddle played out of tune. “Don’t hafta.”
“Yes, you do.”
They reached the bottom of the stairs. Rebekah wore a long, floral-printdress, while Jonah shuffled along in his red footed pajamas, clutching a blue jay’s feather.
Rebekah smiled. “Good morning, Uncle Jack.”
“Good morning. Hey, Jonah.”
Jonah only pouted as they proceeded to the bathroom. Not a morning person, obviously.
The rain poured harder, a depressing flood of gray. The
Bad things could happen in a run-down log home on an isolated back road too. Like a very bad thing once happened in a small brick house in an ordinary town where a boy looked into his mother’s eyes and saw unthinkable darkness but did nothing.
“Not this time,” Jack said quietly. “I’ll make a fool of myself first.”
Martha looked up with a smile so happy that it broke his heart.
six
I t was still dark out, and oddly quiet compared to the thrum of Chattanooga. Waiting for the coffee to brew, Jack drifted through the previous day.
The family could have survived without him. Timothy acted as the man of the house, keeping the wood stove fueled and lecturing Jonah about staying away from its hot surfaces. Rebekah did a fine job of washing clothes and putting meals on the table, but her gratitude for Jack’s help made him realize what a load she was carrying.
Ten. She was ten .
The younger ones carried on as best they could, doing their junior-size chores, but they were getting a little ragged around the edges. They missed their mom.
And Miranda? She’d called several times, perfectly lucid. Uptight, but lucid. No one else had called. Just that early-morning visit from her pastor. The memory was almost enough to put Jack in a foul mood.
Sitting at the kitchen table, he eased into his day with a paper from a student who always took a highly original view and set out to prove her point with style if not with impeccable logic. T. S. Eliot himself might have enjoyed her thoughts about the psyche of J. Alfred Prufrock.
Jack leaned over the paper, red pen poised. He would make her think harder and dig deeper. When parents entrusted their young people’s minds to R. Jackson Hanford, PhD, they got their money’s worth.
His troubles retreated to a dull rumble in the back of his mind while he played with words, ideas, arguments. He loved teaching. Loved his students. Most of them, anyway. Most of the time.
Halfway through the paper, he tripped on Eliot’s line about Prufrock’s thinning hair. It conjured up memories of a dad with a receding hairline and an existential crisis of his own.
Jack ran a hand through his hair. It was still thick, a legacy from his mother’s genes. His temples were going gray, though, and he was barely past his fortieth birthday. At forty, his father already had two failed marriages behind him. Jack had one, and that was one too many.
Struggling to focus on his student’s paper, he saw instead his father’s odd, blank expression. It had cropped up with increasing frequency after his not-quite-ex-wife’s memorial service. Roger Hanford had blamed himself, for good reason, but he wasn’t the only one at fault.
Outside, the wind lifted its head. Rain began to fall, light but steady. Jack poured more coffee and dug into his work. When he heard feet on the stairs, he was startled to see daylight at the window above the half curtains.
Rebekah was shepherding Jonah down the stairs. “Hurry up. If you don’t make it in time …”
“No.” Jonah’s sleepy fretting was like a fiddle played out of tune. “Don’t hafta.”
“Yes, you do.”
They reached the bottom of the stairs. Rebekah wore a long, floral-printdress, while Jonah shuffled along in his red footed pajamas, clutching a blue jay’s feather.
Rebekah smiled. “Good morning, Uncle Jack.”
“Good morning. Hey, Jonah.”
Jonah only pouted as they proceeded to the bathroom. Not a morning person, obviously.
The rain poured harder, a depressing flood of gray. The
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