Chapter Sixty-Four

RED AND BLUE LIGHTS FLASH ON the worn, once-white siding of the house. Red, blue, and gray.

A different kind of American dream.

It’s cold outside, and each of my hands is wrapped around a smaller one. Our flannel pajamas aren’t holding up against the wind.

Officer Bill DiMarco is the first to arrive. When I see him, I feel that thing trapped in my chest panicking. Will he just let him go again?

But he doesn’t. He puts him in handcuffs. He acts like he doesn’t even know him.

Another officer arrives and calls a judge at home, waking him to request an emergency protection order.

The second officer pulls Mom aside, but I can hear them. He explains that because of the holidays, a real hearing will take some time, but we can extend the temporary order until we get into a courtroom, probably after the new year. If he’s released before that, the order bars him from the house and any of us.

And according to the order, he has twenty-four hours upon release to surrender his firearm.

Officer DiMarco walks over after putting our father in the back of his car. I wonder if they said anything to each other.

He shifts back and forth on his feet. He looks so uncomfortable. I imagine he’d rather be anywhere else but here responding to this call tonight.

“I read the essay, Leighton. I’m sorry. I, uh—I’m just sorry. That was really hard to read.”

“It was really hard to live in.” I’m exhausted. And freezing. I’m not in the mood for any more of the halfhearted atonements of grown men.

Officer DiMarco just nods once and turns to Mom, promising her that he’ll personally deliver a physical copy of the temporary protection order later in the day.

Mom never wavers.

I don’t think about tomorrow. I don’t think about the possibility that she could change her mind again. Tonight, for the first time in a long time, I feel like we’ve been heard. I feel like maybe we are safe.

And it feels so damn good.