He cherished the peace and reassurance of predictability. He’d been killing time with it in the marriage and the new house. It was almost two years since he’d met Donna, both of them captive one afternoon in an airless stint in the holding pen of the DMV. She’d made that ugly time evaporate.

He’d had more ugly time to kill.

John still had a long run of hours, days, months, to go before he would feel free to do what he really wanted to, so he’d been inspired by Donna, her spark striking one of his own, to try his hand at being irresistible. She hadn’t resisted, but that wasn’t solid proof that he’d actually succeeded. She was beautiful and busy, quick to laugh and slow to cry. He didn’t want to be needed, but he admired the little tugs of jealousy and insecurity that pushed him to keep wooing her, and also Carly. The whole diversion was in the game to win them.

But he was addicted to fresh starts. He loved being comfortable, but the urge to break things always held the promise of what to replace it with. His will was a hammer.

John had been enrolled in fourteen schools before he graduated, and he’d been a different sort of kid in each one. He’d made a new Jonathan at every chance, on purpose, for fun and profit. A hammer was a building tool, too.

But it always took him ages to get used to a setup, to dig a self-shaped hole into the pattern of days. He was dug in good this time. Jonathan was John Cooper more than he’d ever been anything else.

•  •  •

The morning after, John knew he had felt worse before, but he’d never been as tired. Donna ticked a glance his way as he walked into the kitchen, but that was all that was on offer—an acknowledgment in place of a greeting. He stopped at the end of the counter, feeling like an intruder with every step into the sunlit room full of everyone else who lived there.

Carly was shoving her quilted lunch bag into her backpack. Her mother fidgeted next to her on the seating side of the kitchen island. Carly, the fact of her and the hope for her safety and happiness, was the only thing that ever rattled Donna. Her only real soft spot.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” asked Donna.

Carly smiled at her mother. “Ye-e-e-e-e-s. Do you believe me yet?” Carly zipped closed her bag. “Hey,” she said to John.

“Hey.”

Carly moved to the other side of the island. “Do you think it’s okay if I go to school?”