Public Secrets

sulk. If you want to fight, fine. I’ll fight, but I’m going to know what I’m fighting about. If you’re acting like this because I won’t do what you want, be what you want, and say what you want, then tough. Shouting isn’t going to change my mind.”
He held up a hand before she could storm by. Not to block her, but to ask her to wait. The subtle difference was enough to make her hold back the next burst of temper.
“It has nothing to do with you,” he said quietly. “Nothing at all. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have come back here tonight.” He looked down at his wet clothes. “Look, can we throw these in the dryer or something so I can get them back on and get the hell out of here?”
It was there again, she noted. Not just anger, but a deep, dark despair. “What is it, Michael?”
“I told you it has nothing to do with you.”
“Let’s sit down.”
“Back off, Emma.”

He turned away and walked back into the bedroom. He’d been wrong, he decided as he put the whiskey aside. He couldn’t keep that down, either.
“Oh, I see. You want to be a part of my life, but I’m not to be a part of yours.”
“Not this part.”
“You can’t section off pieces of yourself and tuck them away. I know.” She moved to him, touched a hand to his arm. Until that moment, she hadn’t realized how much she loved him. With a kind of wonder it came to her that the need wasn’t all hers after all. “Talk to me, Michael. Please.”
“It was kids,” he murmured. “Jesus, babies. He just walked over to the playground at recess and let loose.” Michael had to sit. Groping his way to the bed, he sat on the edge, pushing the heels of his hands into his eyes. He could still see it. What terrified him was that he knew he always would.
Bewildered, Emma sat beside him, rubbing a hand over his shoulder to try to ease the tension from the muscles bunched there. “I don’t understand.”
“Neither do I. We found out who he was. He’d had a history of mental illness. Been in and out of institutions all his life. Turns out he went to that school, that same school, through first and second grades before they put him away the first time. We’ll find out more, for what it’s worth.”
“Who? Who are you talking about?”
“Just a loser. Some sick, pitiful loser who got his hands on a forty-five automatic.”
And she began to see. A sickness welled up to her throat. “Oh my God.”
“He drove to the school. Walked right up to the playground. Kids were playing ball and jumping rope. It hadn’t started to rain yet . So he opened up. Six kids are dead. Twenty more are hospitalized. They won’t all make it.”
“Oh, Michael.” She put her arms around him, rested her cheek against his.

“Then he just walked away. By the time the black and whites got there, he was gone. When McCarthy and I drove up—” But he couldn’t describe it, not to her. Not even to himself. “We got a make on the car and found it a couple of blocks away. He was right there, eating lunch in the park. Just sitting on a bench in the fucking park eating a sandwich in the rain. He didn’t even bother to run when we moved in. He picked up the gun and stuck the barrel in his mouth. So we’ll never know why. We’ll never even know why.”
“I’m sorry.” She could think of nothing else to say. “I’m so sorry.”
“We’re supposed to make a difference. Goddammit, we’re supposed to make a difference. Six kids dead, and there’s nothing you can do. You couldn’t stop it, and you couldn’t fix it. All you can do is walk away and try to convince yourself that there was nothing you could do.”
“But you don’t walk away,” she murmured. “That’s why you make a difference. Michael.” She drew away, to study his face. “You couldn’t have stopped this. I won’t tell you you shouldn’t grieve over something you couldn’t prevent, because that makes you who you are.”
“You never get used to it.” He dropped his brow on hers. “I used to wonder why my father would come home sometimes and close himself off. When he did, I’d hear him and my mother talking after I went to bed. For hours.”
“You can talk to me.”
He pulled her close. She was so warm, so soft. “I need you, Emma. I wasn’t going to come back here with this. I needed to hold on to something.”
“This time, you hold on to me.” She lifted her mouth to his. His response was so strong, almost desperate, that she no longer tried to soothe. If he needed to