Stuart and Jacob are in the living room when I come through the front door. As he invariably does when I enter, Stuart jumps up to greet me with a kiss on the lips. In this way, he reminds me a bit of when I was a kid and Harry, our cocker spaniel, would start wagging his tail the moment I stepped into the house. Jacob, by contrast, remains on the sofa, his eyes glued to the television. I wonder if he even knows I’m home.

I plop down next to Jacob, which at least breaks his focus from the screen. If only for a second.

“Whatcha watching?” I ask.

“It’s a movie.”

“I know. Which movie?”

He looks over at his father.

“Jungle Book,” Stuart says.

“Is it good?” I ask Jacob.

He doesn’t answer.

“Your mother asked you a question.” Stuart reaches over for the remote and with the press of a button freezes the screen. A boy wearing a red loincloth is talking to a much bigger black bear. “Jacob, please tell Mommy about your day.”

I brace for my son to object to this interruption in his viewing pleasure, but he takes it in stride. Jacob is like his father in that way. Very even-tempered. Rarely prone to crying or tantrums, which I hear from other parents and the child-rearing websites is pretty unique among little boys.

I now have a small window in which to engage my son. Our conversations are often terse—especially when initiated by me. I’ve learned the trick to get him to talk more is to be specific in my questions. Asking “How was your day?” invariably results in a one-word response: “Good.” Regardless of whether his day was actually positive. But if I ask who he sat with at lunch, the answer often gives me a peek into what transpired at school. It’s actually a technique that works with suspects too.

“Tell me one thing you learned today.” Tonight’s query.

“I don’t know,” he says, an answer that tells me he wants to get back to watching the movie.

“It doesn’t have to be something you learned in school. It could be from a friend. Or a teacher. Or even something you learned about yourself maybe. Maybe a new food you tried. Just something about your day that I don’t know. Let’s see if you can stump Mommy.”

He looks at me with a scrunched-up face, rising to the challenge. “Did you know that Owen is going to get a puppy?”

“No, I did not know that.” I don’t tell him that I also don’t know who Owen is.

“Owen is going to get a puppy.”

“That’s nice.”

“Can we get a puppy too?”