Pandora's Children Book 1: In The Chair previews

The Devil's Toothache

It was a brisk October night, the air ripe with the smells of autumn and the impending holiday season, and I was sitting on my favorite chair on my front porch, one eye on the sunset, the other on the newest Stephen King paperback, and a Coors Light in my hand.  My family had just finished dinner and my son Matthew was e-mailing his friends while Jenna, my second wife and Matt’s step mother, was exchanging gossip over the phone with her mother in Florida.  Rocky, my twelve-year-old arthritic golden lab, was curled up at my feet, vigorously going at a bacon-flavored rawhide I had brought home earlier that day.

The slow creak of the screen door opening behind me pulled my attention away from both the book and the bleeding sun.  I craned my neck just enough to watch as Matthew stepped from the house onto the porch.  He stood an inch over six feet, tall like his old man, but with a lean athletic build instead of my broad frame.  The old wooden porch groaned softly under his feet. Rocky ignored his arrival and continued to gnaw at his treat.

There was a plastic blue and white Igloo cooler next to my chair stocked with bottles of cold beer.  Matthew pulled one out and twisted off the cap.  He collapsed into a chair identical to mine on the other side of the cooler and took a long draw of his beer.  He closed his eyes and sighed.

I looked at my son, twenty-seven years old and all grown up, and allowed myself a tiny, self-satisfied smile.  Despite my limited role in his life as a weekend father for most of his childhood, he had grown into a man I was proud of.  Straight A student in high school.  Norethwestern University undergrad.  Yale Law.  Junior partner with a prominent, powerful law firm in New York that dealt with international contracts (I couldn’t even begin to explain what he actually did).  He had it all- intelligence, a wicked sense of humor, classic good looks, money.  The traits that could drive a man down the wrong path rather quickly.  But he had a good head on his shoulders, and despite his success he remained humble and down-to-earth, refusing to allow his good fortunes, both god-given and self-made, to corrupt him.

“Thanks for inviting me up here, Pop,” Matthew said, smiling.  “It’s so beautiful here in the Pacific Northwest.  It’s clean.  It’s quiet.  And the air doesn’t reek of exhaust fumes.”

“You know you’re always welcome here, Matt.  You don’t have to wait for an invitation.  If you ever need to get away from the east coast rat race and relax, you always have a room here. My home is your home.”

“I know,” Matthew said, but his smile faltered for a moment as he spoke those two words, and I knew what thoughts were running through that agile, rational mind of his.  He was thinking that this wasn’t his home, had never been his home.  He hadn’t grown up in Oregon, had never had his own bedroom in the four-thousand square foot house that sprawled behind us.  I didn’t move to Oregon until he had finished college, vowing to stay close to his mother in Chicago for as long as possible so we wouldn’t become estranged.  I wanted him to think of this home as his home, but part of me acknowledged that he would never consider Oregon home.

Matthew changed the subject, his next words catching me by surprise.  “I’m thinking of proposing to Amanda,” he said, smiling once again, that prideful shit-eating grin he learned from me blossoming on his lips.  He leaned forward in his chair, planting his elbows on his thighs.

“Good for you, Matt.  She’s quite a catch.”  And she was.  Intelligent and witty, affable and generous.  Simply beautiful.  She seemed perfect for him, sharp enough to keep him on his toes, quick enough to keep him honest, gorgeous enough to keep his eyes from straying to far.  I had met her on several different occasions, both at his home in New York as well as here, and I could see the adoration and love in their eyes when they looked at each other.  She would make him happy.  They had been dating for three years, since he graduated law school, and I was surprised he had waited so long.

“But I wanted to talk to you before I proposed.  Face-to-face.”  His expression melted back to sober as he nursed his beer.

“Hey,” I joked, “you don’t need my permission.  I think you need to talk to her father, not me.”

He offered a ghost of a smile in response.

I knew where this conversation was going.  I had been waiting almost ten years, since he became a man and left for college, for him to ask the Question.  The curiosity must have gnawed at him all these years, yet for he had chosen to wait until he was ready to marry to approach me.  To ask me.  To learn the truth.

“Why did you and mom get divorced?” he simply asked.  There was no bitterness in his voice, no resentment that a younger man still ignorant of the intrigues and mysteries of the adult world would vocalize.  I don’t think he wanted to know.  I think he was happy in his ignorance.  The divorce hadn’t soured him towards either his mother or I.  But he wanted to know because he needed to know.  Because he stood at the precipice, the rest of his life suddenly looming before him, the future cloaked in mystery and doubt, and he wanted so hard to avoid the quagmire that so many of us, no matter how intelligent, no matter how successful, no matter how confident, stumbled into all too often.  I could see it in his eyes.  I could read it in the wrinkles of his face.  He wanted to learn the secrets of his genes, to understand the chemistries that had created his mind.  He wanted to know me better so he could know himself better.

I owed him at least that much

“I’m surprised you waited so long to ask,” I answered.

“I never needed to know before.”

“Did you ever ask your mother?” I asked.  I assumed he had, long ago, and was surprised when he shook his head.

“I don’t think she ever knew the truth.  I don’t think she ever truly understood why.  And I didn’t want to open up old wounds and ask her.  And… and I never cared until now.  It didn’t matter.  It just was.  I wasn’t old enough to care when it happened.  My earliest memories are of having a mom and dad who lived in different houses.  And it wasn’t just me.  It was a lot of my friends’ parents also.  It’s just how it was.  Divorce was… so normal.”

“But now there’s Amanda.  And you want to make sure that divorce is not something inevitable for the two of you.  You want to make sure that at least have a fighter’s chance.”  I paused, then quietly added, “You want some insight from someone who’s been there, done that.”

Matt nodded, drummed the side of his beer with three fingers.  “How quickly the world becomes complicated.”

“You work in international law, Matt.”

“I know.  It’s not half as complex as love and infatuation.”

I laughed.  He smiled.  I sighed and collected my thoughts.  I had gone over the story in my head hundreds of times over the years so that I would be flawless in my recitation when the time came, but as the words began to spill from my mouth, I knew that they were fresh from my heart, not stale from my head.

“The year was 1980.” I began, “I was thirty years old and I had just opened my first dental practice.  It was a cold, rainy September night and just as I was about to close up for the weekend, the Devil walked into my office.”

 If you like what you've read, don’t be shy about hitting the LIKE button or sharing with your friends.

If you liked this preview and want to read the rest, don’t hesitate to purchase Pandora’s Children Book 1: In The Chair, which this preview is from, and  Pandora’s Children Book 2: Too Young To Die, both only $.99 and both available at Amazon.com, BN.com and Smashwords.com

 Keep up with the latest news at www.notjustaboringdentist.com and look for me at Facebook by searching for Bradley Convissar author, where you will find adorable pictures of my wiener dog as a puppy.