The Devils Teardrop

home.”
    She was blaming them. Joan had never learned that nothing was ever the children’s fault, not at this age. If you did something wrong it was your fault; if they did something wrong it was still your fault.
    Oh, Joan . . . It was subtle lapses like this—the slight shifting of blame—that were as bad as slaps in the face. Still, he said nothing. (“Never let the children see their parents argue.”)
    Joan stood. “Richard and I have to go now. We have to pick up Elmo and Saint at the kennel. The poor puppies have been in cages all week.”
    Robby was animated once more. “We’re having a party tonight and we’re going to watch the fireworks on TV and play Star Wars Monopoly.”
    “Oh, that’ll be fun,” Joan said. “Richard and I are going to Kennedy Center. For an opera. You like the opera, don’t you?”
    Stephie gave one of the broad, cryptic shrugs she’d been using a lot lately in response to adults’ questions.
    “That’s a play where people sing the story,” Parker said to the children.
    “Maybe Richard and I’ll take you to the opera sometime. Would you like that?”
    “I guess,” Robby said. Which was as good a commitment as a nine-year-old would ever make to high culture.
    “Wait,” Stephie blurted. She turned and pounded up the stairs.
    “Honey, I don’t have much time. We—”
    The girl returned a moment later with her new soccer outfit, handed it to her mother.
    “My,” said Joan, “that’s pretty.” Holding the clothes awkwardly, like a child who’s caught a fish and isn’t sure she wants it.
    Parker Kincaid, thinking: First, the Boatman, now Joan . . . How the past was intruding today. Well, why not? After all, it was New Year’s Eve.
    A time to look back . . .
    Joan was obviously relieved when the children ran back to Stephie’s bedroom, buoyed by the promise of more presents. Then suddenly her smile was gone. Ironically, at this age—she was thirty-nine—she lookedher best with a sullen expression on her face. She touched her front teeth with the tip of her finger to see if they were dotted with lipstick. A habit of hers he remembered from when they were married. “Parker, I didn’t have to do this . . .” She was reaching into her Coach purse.
    Hell, she got me a Christmas present. And I didn’t get her one. He thought quickly: Did he have any extra gifts he’d bought but hadn’t yet given away? Something he could—
    But then he saw her hand emerge from the purse with a wad of papers.
    “I could’ve just let the process server take care of it on Monday.”
    Process server?
    “But I wanted to talk to you before you went off half-cocked.”
    The top of the document read: “Motion to Modify Child Custody Order.”
    He felt the blow deep in his stomach.
    Apparently, Joan and Richard hadn’t come directly from the airport but had stopped at her lawyer’s first.
    “Joan,” he said, despairing, “you’re not . . .”
    “I want them, Parker, and I’m going to get them. Let’s not fight about it. We can work something out.”
    “No,” he whispered. “No.” He felt the strength leach from his body as the panic swept through him.
    “Four days with you, Fridays and weekends with me. Depending on what Richard and I have planned—we’ve been doing a lot of traveling lately. Look, it’ll give you more time to yourself. I’d think you’d look forward to—”
    “Absolutely not.”
    “They’re my children . . .” she began.
    “Technically.” Parker had had sole custody for four years.
    “Parker,” she said reasonably, “my life is stable. I’m doing fine. I’m working out again. I’m married.”
    To a civil servant in county government, who, according to the Washington Post, just missed getting indicted for accepting bribes last year. Richard was just a bug-picking bird on the rump of Inside-the-Beltway politics. He was also the man Joan’d been sleeping with for the last year of her marriage to Parker.
    Concerned the children would hear, he whispered, “You’ve been a stranger to Robby and Stephie practically from the day they were born.” He slapped the papers and rage took him completely. “Are you thinking about them at all? About what this’ll do to them?”
    “They need a mother.”
    No, Parker thought, Joan needs another collectible. Several years ago it had been horses. Then championship weimaraners. Then antiques. Houses in fancy neighborhoods too: She and Richard moved from Oakton to Clifton to